"Good morning, Lord Deity."
Yae Sakura, dressed in a sakura-pink long dress and holding a small watering can, had been watering a flower. She turned upon hearing the footsteps behind her, saw that it was Xin Yu, and greeted him with a gentle smile.
"Mm, good morning, Sakura. When we lived together before, I kept telling you not to call me Lord Deity. To think that after all these years, you're still so used to calling me that."
"For Sakura, the Lord Deity will always be the Lord Deity. Not just because your power is like a god's, but more importantly, because you saved my sister's life and mine. That alone makes you my eternal deity. Besides, I am a miko who serves a god; I cannot become arrogant just because of the deity's favor."
Xin Yu scratched his head. It seemed there was really no way around it. They had lived together for 200 years before, and he still hadn't managed to change the habit.
"By the way, Lord Deity, where are all my sisters now?"
"Mm, Mei should still have school, but she'll be over in the afternoon when classes end. Kiana hasn't regained her memories of me yet, so she's probably busy earning a living right now. As for Mobius, she's tens of thousands of years in the past. I haven't completely rewritten her history and life yet. I'll have to go back to the past tens of thousands of years from now and change all of it. But there's no rush. I still need some time to lay the groundwork. When I've finished all the preparations, I will bring true happiness and beauty to this world."
Yae Sakura nodded. She knew that her Lord Deity was a very kind-hearted person, a deity who wanted everyone in the world to live happy and beautiful lives.
"Are there only these three?"
"Ugh, Sakura, we really need to align our ways of thinking. My mindset comes from a modern timeline, where most people believe that a monogamous relationship is the most reasonable, unlike in ancient times where polygamy was considered normal."
Xin Yu had originally thought Sakura might get angry about this matter. After all, no matter how one looked at it, it involved sharing the person she loved. He hadn't expected Sakura to be so seemingly unconcerned, accepting it with such frankness. She didn't show a hint of anger, which in turn made Xin Yu feel even more helpless.
Seeing Xin Yu's helpless expression, the corners of Yae Sakura's lips curled up slightly. It was quite nice to see the Lord Deity like this.
"Then I'll leave the shop in your care. While I'm gone, try not to leave the store. All the daily necessities, food, and water you'll need are in the room in the back. Take good care of yourself and Rin. I have to be away for a while."
After saying this, Xin Yu hurriedly departed. As he left, Yae Sakura bowed slightly toward his back.
"I wish you good fortune in your endeavors."
Xin Yu paused in his tracks. He turned to look at Yae Sakura, who was watching him with a gentle smile. He nodded, said nothing more, and opened the door to the flower shop, stepping into a mist that had appeared from nowhere, obscuring all scenery outside.
Siberia. Upon this eternally frozen land stood a steel tower built by human hands. They named it the Tower of Babel. It was unknown whether they intended to reach the domain of the gods as mortals, like in the myth, or if they believed this tower was destined to collapse.
A man with glasses, scattered hair, and slovenly clothes stood before a washbasin, staring at his own reflection in the mirror.
How much longer must this continue? This hell that could swallow anyone's humanity whole—when would it finally collapse like in the stories of myth?
Using children who were barely in their teens, some not even ten years old, for extremely cruel human experiments... They claim it is for the future progress of humanity, but if humanity's future is so fragile that it must be sustained in this manner, then does humanity truly need to exist?
I personally witnessed a child being slowly transformed by Honkai solution, her piercing screams gradually turning into savage roars. I saw my colleagues watch the experiment with cold indifference, some even wearing cruel smiles on their faces.
I saw a ten-year-old child sent to the operating table. After being injected with massive amounts of experimental drugs and Honkai liquid, the child was dissected while still in agony and screaming, all for the sake of obtaining the most accurate experimental data.
Gods! Please open your eyes and look here! If there truly are gods, why do you turn a blind eye to such tragedies?!
Honkai! I have never so strongly wished for you to descend upon this place, to bring the heavenly fire of retribution upon us sinners, to let us be incinerated in our own sins!
I am a sinner, too! Because of my cowardice and powerlessness, I can only sit by and watch these tragedies unfold, unable to do a thing.
I am a cold observer. I am a bystander accomplice.
I have never despised myself so intensely, but the instinct for survival and the existence of my family prevent me from easily giving up my life to do something reckless.
I can feel my humanity decaying in this place. I feel my will being twisted and warped. I'm about to become a monster.
I don't want to become a monster! I want to be human!
I want to be an adult with normal compassion, who can pity others, sympathize with others, and take responsibility.
The man looked numbly at his reflection in the mirror. Haggard. He had never been so haggard.
When had he, a genius, ever looked so wretched?
They told him that newcomers were always like this, with too much compassion, too much sympathy. They had all been through it, and they all got used to it eventually.
Because the children here die for the future of humanity. Their deaths have value. Their deaths are for the survival of more people.
They told him, again and again, that everything happening here was right, was normal.
Those things in human skin wanted to assimilate him, to make him one of them.
God, when will you open your eyes?
The man, who did not believe in any gods, did not know when he had learned to pray to them. Perhaps it was from the very first day he stepped into this place. He prayed, even though he didn't know which god he was praying to.
"I heard you. I saw you. And so, I have come."
A gentle voice rang out beside his ear. The man spun around violently and saw a man who didn't look particularly special, but whose aura was incredibly kind and gentle, standing behind him, looking at him.
"My apologies. I'm late."
From that moment on, in every fragment of the timeline, the thing known as the Tower of Babel began to collapse and fall.