Chapter 1382 1382: 1382 One of the Forgotten Races

Ever since BS Rita started painting the world fragments as puzzle pieces, players constantly gathered around her whenever she appeared on the ship.

But most of the time, nobody could tell which world she was currently working on just by looking at the races sitting nearby.

Partly because too many people came to watch.

But more importantly, because most worlds and most races had never survived until the end.

Ever since Rita began designing the massive puzzle draft, the little robot that used to follow Nivalis everywhere and attend classes with her had stopped leaving BS Rita's shoulder entirely.

Meanwhile, Deceitful Bloom loved holding the enormous blueprint covered in puzzle outlines and densely packed world names, studying it over and over.

Rita suddenly paused mid-stroke.

Then she frowned in annoyance.

"I missed a world."

Deceitful Bloom replied immediately,

"You didn't. I checked it several times already. Nothing's missing."

Rita turned toward B80 and smiled.

"The Scrap Zone is missing."

B80's tiny dot eyes widened larger and larger as it murmured blankly,

"The Scrap Zone."

That was the endpoint of The Mechanoids.

And the place where she had first taken B80 away.

"Exactly."

Rita looked at it softly.

"Why shouldn't your world be included? Of course it should."

"We visited the Scrap Zone in every timeline looking for you..."

She looked regretfully at the three worlds she had already finished painting.

Then she took the blueprint from Deceitful Bloom's hands and said,

"There's still time to adjust it."

"I was already regretting that there were only 9,999 puzzle pieces anyway. I even had to enlarge some sections slightly."

"But now... ten thousand is perfect."

Then her gaze froze on the blueprint.

Her heartbeat skipped.

And she could clearly feel the breathing of the Deceitful Bloom beside her slowing ever so slightly as well.

B80 raised both fists high into the air excitedly.

"The Scrap Zone! The Scrap Zone!"

Rita had long grown accustomed to B80's emotions.

She knew those reactions came from calculations telling it that happiness was the correct response.

But they were so realistic that she often forgot B80 was not truly alive.

She repeated softly,

"Yeah. The Scrap Zone."

A faint smile and a quiet sigh colored Deceitful Bloom's voice.

"I almost forgot."

"It never even occurred to me that The Mechanoids are actually one of the countless races too."

At that moment, every voice on the deck vanished.

The wind disappeared.

So did the distant sounds of conversation.

Time had been stopped.

Only Rita and Deceitful Bloom remained unaffected.

But neither of them spoke.

Both were still lost in their own spiraling thoughts.

After a long while, Deceitful Bloom finally spoke first.

"I should've realized sooner..."

"You noticed something strange, didn't you?"

"You suspect B80?"

Rita answered quietly,

"I suspect all of The Mechanoids."

Pruning timelines that lacked enough Brilliance felt too subjective.

Like judging whether a story was good or bad.

Living beings with emotions could never evaluate things that cleanly.

Yet every time the bell rang, entire timelines were cut away with perfect precision.

Like deleting faulty programs.

Or erasing redundant code according to some hidden algorithm.

That kind of mechanical behavior...

That almost computational logic...

It was difficult not to connect it to something.

And more importantly...

Who else could monitor players constantly at close range?

Naturally, the other beings inside the game.

NPCs.

Anyone who participated in Divine Game saw them constantly.

They always seemed to have existed there already.

As though they were simply part of the world itself.

Like furniture in a house.

Or paintings hanging on walls.

They craved living beings and Soul Fire with obsessive hunger.

And when they looked at players, it resembled lower lifeforms gazing at beings from a higher dimension.

Only today, when she suddenly wanted to create a world piece for B80, did she feel as though she had awakened from a nightmare.

A thought flashed through her mind:

Why couldn't it be The Mechanoids?

Players like them acted as participants inside the game.

Then who exactly were The Mechanoids, the ones acting as NPCs?

Still, Rita did not deny Deceitful Bloom's guess.

Because she truly did suspect B80 too.

Back when Y128 came to BS, it had struggled for a long time trying to locate her because it was unable to connect to the BS network without permission.

But when Rita traveled through timelines with B80, B80 could freely connect to every network in every world regardless of what form those networks took.

Rita slowly explained all her suspicions before finally asking,

"A long time ago, when I first met B80, it said The Mechanoids were created by gods."

"I'm not questioning whether that statement was true."

"I want to know the history as you understand it."

Deceitful Bloom's fingers brushed slowly across the lower right corner of the painting, passing over one familiar world after another.

Her expression grew increasingly grave.

"As far back as I can remember, everyone already said The Mechanoids were created by some god."

"Even Divine Game itself said so."

"But who exactly created them?"

"There was never a clear answer."

"The factory that produces them is located not far from Foolishness's Toy Palace."

"As long as enough resources and materials are supplied, new Mechanoids appear automatically."

She let out a bitter laugh.

"The great strike was ridiculous, wasn't it?"

"But precisely because we never truly regarded them as important, we tolerated them from such a superior position."

"After all, if we wanted to, we could crush them at any time."

"That's why the Scrap Zone exists."

The more she spoke, the more obvious her frustration and realization became.

Once the answer appeared, every clue suddenly seemed painfully obvious in hindsight.

"They were always special."

"They appeared weak, but they never completely went extinct in any era."

"At the end of every era, we gods would sleep for an extremely long time."

"We only awakened again when the first world entered Divine Game."

"And every time a new era began..."

"All the Mechanoids abandoned in the Scrap Zone during the previous era disappeared."

"As though they had been automatically cleaned up."

Rita lifted B80 from her shoulder and held it before her eyes, studying it carefully.

"Yeah..."

"Who would ever suspect the NPCs?"

"But then why did L12187777 awaken a divine talent because of me?"

"Are there many Mechanoids like that?"

"Occasionally one appears each era."

Deceitful Bloom paused before continuing.

"One awakened because of me once too."

"...But when I woke up in the next era, I couldn't find it anymore."

Rita asked heavily,

"Was it assassinated by... you know who?"

"...No."

Deceitful Bloom calmly changed the subject.

"The little robot was still there when we buried her."

Then she asked,

"So are you still adding the Scrap Zone into the painting?"

"Yes."

Rita nodded.

"Now I definitely have to."

"If they're truly one of the countless races, then the painting would be incomplete without The Mechanoids."

Deceitful Bloom agreed.

But something else concerned her more.

"It formed a contract with you, didn't it?"

"Should I help stage something with you sometime?"

"We could break the contract without openly turning against each other."

"No need."

Rita gently placed B80 back onto her shoulder.

"If contracts are connections and restraints, then those connections work both ways."

"We'll leave it as it is for now."

Then she suddenly noticed Deceitful Bloom staring at her.

The Vineborne had been watching her silently for quite some time now.

Rita could not help asking,

"Why are you staring at me like that?"

Deceitful Bloom asked quietly,

"Why aren't you upset?"

"Why aren't you angry?"

"It lied to you."

Rita: "???"

The Vineborne's tone sounded calm and composed.

But somehow, Rita could still hear the faint trace of accusation hidden underneath.