Akivili held the opposite opinion.
"What's wrong? Is there a problem?"
Lan's gaze was cold.
"It's called choosing quality over quantity. What's there to be ashamed of?"
Akivili stepped forward on their own, trying to steer the conversation back on track.
"Wait."
"Now isn't the time to argue. Let's think about how we should put it…"
Aha said with a cheeky grin, "Just tell the truth."
"Tell him his good eldest son was too busy arguing with me."
Akivili instinctively looked at Lan.
The Aeon called the "good eldest son" seemed not to have heard Aha's teasing.
They stood there expressionlessly, their presence intensely oppressive.
Before this, Akivili had only ever seen them with a cold expression.
Lan meant the mist in the mountains.
But Akivili felt that this Aeon was less like mist and more like a cold, hard glacier that had remained frozen for years.
Who would have thought… Lan would actually show another expression when defending their close friend's reputation?
That made Akivili even more determined to help mend the relationship between Lan and their close friend.
After thinking for a moment, Akivili said,
"Then push it back by half an hour."
Aha shrugged.
"No need. He only cares about the result, not the process."
"Oh, he doesn't care about the result this time."
Akivili went along with them.
"Yeah…"
If their close friend truly wanted to accomplish something, he would definitely overcome every obstacle.
Akivili was quite troubled.
"But he spent several hundred years preparing for this."
"And after only ten minutes, we were…"
Aha raised a hand.
"Correction. Not 'we.' Lan."
Lan crossed their arms and stared expressionlessly at Aha.
Akivili rubbed their forehead as if they had a headache.
"Don't argue."
Lan turned their gaze toward them.
"Change your face back."
Akivili froze for a moment, then immediately changed back to their own face before continuing, "Then push it back by half an hour. As for the Luofu…" Who's going to communicate with them?
They looked at Aha, then at the taciturn Lan their close friend had brought along, and helplessly sighed.
"Forget it. I'll go."
After Akivili left, Lan looked toward the Cloud Knights of the Luofu who were talking with Akivili in the distance and said out of nowhere, "They interfered."
The moment the "Lord Ravager" stepped onto the Luofu…
It completely cut off the possibility of that person cooperating with the Aeon of "Destruction."
Aha shook their head, denying their guess.
"No."
Aha looked ahead with them and let out a snort of laughter.
"This is… fate…"
They were clearly worlds apart, yet they still followed similar paths.
'Fate…'
'How boring.'
Lan ignored them.
Aha grabbed their sleeve.
"Want to know what happened in the parallel world?"
Lan shook Aha's hand off and said coldly, "No."
Aha continued on their own, "You destroyed one-fifth of the Xianzhou's domains with a single arrow..."
Lan remained unmoved, not even sparing them a glance.
Aha sighed.
"Fine, then let's talk about what happened to our close friend before."
"That person's prediction was pretty accurate."
"As expected of Xianzhou magic."
At the mention of Zero, Lan finally spared them a glance.
It seemed Aha had managed to pry quite a lot of information out of Fuli.
Lan asked Aha, "He made people jealous? Was he used by others? Did he and his friends become enemies?"
Aha pinched their chin, looking as if they were thinking. Afterward, they said, "Uh, how should I put it? That happened a long time ago."
"They can't really be called enemies."
"You could say their values didn't align? They weren't on the same path?"
"There's only one thing I didn't lie to you about."
Their smile faded, and they said solemnly, "I really only met our close friend after going to that kind of place."
Lan, "…"
Why was Aha spreading rumors again?
Aha enjoyed watching the Aeon's expression gradually turn angry and continued fanning the flames.
"It's true. If you don't believe me… you can ask Akivili."
They raised their chin.
"Look, they're back."
Akivili was utterly confused.
"I heard my name… What happened? What are you asking?"
Lan gave a cold laugh.
"Nothing."
Akivili was about to ask further when their close friend's voice sounded in their ear.
"What happened? Are you all right?"
The Aeon hurriedly turned on the voice function and instinctively replied,
"Mm. Everything went smoothly."
Silence fell on the other end.
Akivili suddenly realized they had given themselves away.
If the plan had gone smoothly, they should have used the agreed-upon signal from before, tapping the earpiece to give a response.
Instead, they had directly answered the other person's question.
Their close friend seemed to have expected this. There was no surprise in his voice.
"The plan failed."
Akivili hesitated for a moment before saying softly,
"My friend, it's like this..."
Zero interrupted the Aeon, "Given the relationship between you and me, do you still need to explain?"
He asked again, "Where are they?"
Aha put an arm around Akivili's shoulder.
"My friend, do you know what your good eldest son just said?"
Lan quickly stepped forward, about to grab Aha by the back of the collar. Aha dodged, removed the earpiece Akivili was wearing, and quickly put some distance between them before continuing to Zero in the other domain, "They said, 'Stay behind me.'"
"They also said to the Wraithsoul…"
Aha cleared their throat and deliberately lowered their voice, imitating Lan's deeper voice.
"Now, stay at least three meters away from him..."
Aha imitated them so perfectly that even Zero was stunned for quite a while.
He leaned against the railing beside the pond. At his ears were the sounds of colorful koi swishing their tails through the water, as well as waves of wind coming from the other side.
Aha changed to a more philosophical topic.
"My friend, do you believe in fate?"
Zero casually tossed in some bait and said indifferently, "No. I don't like the word 'fate.'"
Aha nodded repeatedly.
"What a coincidence. I don't like it either."
"It's very boring, isn't it?"
Aha liked misunderstandings born from twists of fate, and they liked amusing anecdotes that made people laugh.
What they liked most was seeing humans reveal the good side of human nature in extreme situations.
Whether when they were once human or after becoming an Aeon, they could never suppress their attraction to humans struggling in desperate situations...to the humanity they displayed.
But if all of this was false…
If the existence called "fate" had already made the choices for them…
Then what did their joys and sorrows, their struggles, mean?
What were they?
Duckweed drifting with the current?
Or fallen leaves carried along by the wind?
Aha thought about it and asked the question aloud.
Zero replied with a question, "What's there to fear? Will I die?"
He chuckled softly, "If I'm duckweed, then I'll drift with the current."
"If I'm a fallen leaf, then I'll follow the flow."
Aha said nothing.
After a brief silence, they began to laugh as well.
"I take back what I said earlier."
"As you wish."
In a tone almost like a sigh, they called out their close friend's name.
"Zero."
"You will get what you want."
"Of course." Zero smiled and asked, "Is this a god's blessing?"
Aha deliberately lowered their voice and spoke mysteriously, "No. This is a god's prophecy."
Zero lowered his eyes and took out his Jade Abacus, searching through the Aeon group chat he had long since muted.
[Aha: @Fuli]
Fuli's way of speaking was obscure and difficult to understand, and they never paused between sentences.
For Aha to actually manage to pry information out of this Aeon…
It really wasn't easy.
Zero thought to himself, as expected.
He had guessed correctly.
At the very beginning, the low-dimensional world should have been able to successfully ascend to a higher dimension.
But Eric had given up.
Aha suddenly sped up their speech.
"I prepared a gift for you."
"Okay, goodbye..."
The sound of wind tearing through the air rang out as the communication device was tossed high into the air by Aha.
Unexpectedly, Zero did not hear the sound of the device hitting the ground.
It was as if someone had caught it securely.
Zero tentatively asked, "Lan?"
"…Mm."
Zero took the initiative to make small talk with the Aeon.
"You came back to the Xianzhou. Why didn't you tell me?"
Lan had always been taciturn, and Zero did not expect an answer from the Aeon. He began praising them instead, "You did pretty well this time."
In this domain, he had not heard any sounds from the other domain.
Lan had clearly gone easy on them on purpose.
Compared with the "Hunt" in the parallel world, who had destroyed one-fifth of the Xianzhou's domains with a single arrow, their "Reignbow Arbiter"… was simply too good.
Zero was quite pleased.
"You even remembered to hold back…"
Lan coughed softly.
"Aha left something for you."
Zero casually asked, "Oh? What is it?"
In the corner of his eye, he saw Stelle put down the long-distance remote sensor, seemingly having finished the game.
Without waiting for the answer, Zero hurriedly ended the conversation.
"We'll talk later."
"Ask Akivili for me."
"Ask them… if they want to return to the train? If they want to see the conductor?"
Zero took off the earpiece and casually stuffed it into his pocket.
He returned to the pavilion and asked, "Did you clear it?"
Stelle nodded vigorously.
Putting aside the ending, this was the most satisfying game she had ever played.
Although she had triggered countless talent effects midway through and had been repeatedly betrayed by the empire's higher-ups…
The Emperor did not care.
No matter how much the higher-ups tried to sow discord, the Emperor always stood on her side.
There was an NPC who had deliberately made up a hellish joke to slander her character.
Something about how women weren't children, and children weren't women…
'Wait, why does that sound so familiar?'
Stelle thought about it and suddenly realized that this NPC was actually herself.
She raised her head and happened to meet Victor's gaze.
His eyes were calm and completely undisturbed.
All the details from the past suddenly connected at this moment.
Victor had a very close relationship with Dan Heng.
Therefore, Victor was a Xianzhou native.
And considering Victor's reaction when he saw the statue of the "Father of the Xianzhou"…
Victor had an inseparable relationship with his close friend.
Stelle stared intently at Victor.
Zero was very interested in this game.
At first, he had thought the model for the Crown Prince was Lan.
Now that he thought about it… the Crown Prince seemed more like the "Destruction" Aeon Nanook from the previous cycles.
The creator knew too much.
Zero patiently asked about the plot and ending he had missed, while Stelle explained with gestures.
He asked, "Sounds interesting. How do you download it?"
Stelle looked troubled and explained that the game could not be downloaded and that there were only a limited number of account slots.
She also told him, word for word, about the plagiarism controversy the game had encountered.
Zero fell into thought.
The number of game accounts was extremely limited.
The creator did not make it for profit and had remained silent throughout the plagiarism incident.
This was a game from another cycle.
Combined with the game's story…
The creator hated the Empire and hated him.
So they had maliciously created this game.
Considering how strongly the game pointed toward certain things, they had only shared it with a specific group of people in order to stay alive.
After reaching that conclusion, Zero instantly lost interest.
Something created with malice behind it… could not be trusted at all.
Stelle remembered the game's final ending and sighed inwardly. She could not help asking, "The Crown Prince and the Empire…"
Zero said softly, "The Crown Prince will always be loyal to his Empire."
Just as Lan had always guarded the Xianzhou Alliance.
Even now, they were still protecting the leader they acknowledged.
After everyone finished their journey and the Nameless reassembled once again, Zero said goodbye to them and headed to the starport where the train was docked to meet the Aeons.
The moment he got off the Starskiff, Lan stuffed something into his hand.
A system notification with completely different wording from before, and with more functions, automatically popped up.
[Aha's Gift]
[They generously gave away one-tenth of their divine power.]
[Nothing will happen after touching it. You might as well keep it as an energy source.]
[They offer their blessing to the close friend they have chosen.]
[As you wish, you will obtain everything you want.]
The words that only Zero could see remained suspended in the air.
He stared at the final sentence.
Yes.
He would get everything he wanted.
Was it that the power of the "Imaginary Tree" and the Aeons was not enough to support their ascension to a higher dimension?
It didn't matter.
The system inventory contained countless treasures from low-dimensional worlds, as well as strange objects and Aeon fragments collected during past cycles.
Zandar had preserved all the scientific research data from the previous cycles.
Besides that, they had a group of geniuses who, even taken individually, were enough to overturn the entire universe.
No matter what choice they made, they would succeed.
Zero put Aha's gift into his inventory. When he looked up again, he happened to see the system's assessment of Lan.
That line of text gradually faded away.
There was no trace of it left in the air.
"You were recording?"
Zero looked incredulous, his expression becoming somewhat strange. In the end, his mischievous side won out, and he asked with interest,
"What did you want to hear me say?"
Akivili was deeply shocked.
'Lan, how did you become like Guanliang too?'
Guanliang took my close friend's clothes, and you were recording?!
'Compared with the two… Lan seems a little more normal…'
'No, neither of them are normal!'
The corner of Akivili's mouth twitched, and they hurriedly tried to smooth things over.
"Come on, let's go."
Zero refused to let it go.
"There happen to be more than a hundred attendants."
"Why not announce your identity at tonight's banquet?"
Akivili pushed and urged them along, but still could not make Zero give up teasing Lan.
Lan, "…No. I'm leaving first."
After saying that, the Aeon hurriedly left.
Akivili was speechless.
They had worked so hard to mend the relationship between their close friend and Lan, and what happened in the end? They had teased Lan into running away without even having time to eat a meal.
Zero sighed regretfully.
This time, he switched to pushing Akivili along.
As the Aeon and the human approached the train, Akivili suddenly planted their feet firmly in place.
They pressed their lips tightly together, gripped the sides of their pants with both hands, and refused to move another step.
The distance was less than ten meters, yet they spent a full minute dawdling.
Just as they were pushing each other along, the train door automatically opened.
Akivili wiped the sweat from their hands onto their pants, took out their Jade Abacus, and used the screen to look at themselves.
After a long while, they took a deep breath and said, "Let's go."
Akivili took one step forward, then suddenly pulled Zero in front of them.
The Aeon hid behind Zero.
"You go in first."
Zero had no choice but to follow the Aeon's instructions and walk ahead.
After a few steps, they saw Pom-Pom.
Zero raised a smile.
"Conductor, long time no see."
He suddenly took a big step to the left, revealing Akivili behind him.
"Look..."
"I brought them back."
"I told you that you'd reunite."
Pom-Pom clenched both fists and lowered their head.
Because of the difference in height, Zero could only see the top of Pom-Pom's hat and their drooping ears.
Confused, he was about to say something when a small gray figure suddenly leaped up and slammed headfirst into him.
The question he was about to ask was cut off by the sharp pain in his abdomen.
Zero lowered his head, steadying himself against the wall with one hand while pressing his abdomen with the other.
Akivili was dumbfounded.
They saw Zero's chest rising and falling violently, apparently enduring the pain.
After a while, the other person gave Pom-Pom a thumbs-up.
"…As expected of the greatest conductor in the universe."
Cold sweat broke out at Akivili's temples. Their lips opened and closed several times before they finally lowered their head to look at Pom-Pom.
They blinked their eyes and deliberately put on an utterly innocent and harmless expression.
"…Since you already rammed into him, you can't ram into me too."
Pom-Pom sneered and answered with action, leaping high into the air again and ramming headfirst into Akivili.
After ramming the Aeon, Pom-Pom turned around and took off their hat.
They carefully inspected it while patting away nonexistent dust.
Pom-Pom turned it over and over three times. When they were staring at the hat absentmindedly, they heard Eric say from behind, "Akivili, are you all right?"
Judging from his voice, Eric seemed to be carrying out the first step of emergency first aid...patting Akivili on both shoulders while loudly calling their name to check whether the injured person was conscious.
"Akivili, wake up."
Pom-Pom did not turn around and continued facing away from the Aeon and the human.
Eric patted the Aeon's shoulders for a long time. Seeing that Pom-Pom still showed no reaction, he said, "Pom-Pom, come take a look..."
Pom-Pom thought to themself that Akivili… was definitely lying flat on the ground with their eyes tightly shut.
Then, once Pom-Pom got close, they would suddenly open their eyes and use the opportunity to tease them.
Pom-Pom turned around, only to see a tall gray figure crouching down and blocking their view.
Akivili tightly wrapped their arms around them and said softly, "Pom-Pom…"
"I'm sorry…"
"Pom-Pom, I'm sorry…"
Pom-Pom opened their mouth.
The three words "It's okay" were so simple.
Yet they could not say them.
As Akivili spoke, their voice began to tremble.
Pom-Pom wanted to raise a hand and pat the Aeon's shoulder, but the other party held them tightly in their arms, leaving them unable to move.
Akivili was immersed in their own emotions.
"I'm really… the worst…"
Eric could not bear to watch anymore and stepped forward to rescue Pom-Pom.
"Okay, Akivili, let go. Pom-Pom can hardly breathe."
Akivili came to their senses. While checking Pom-Pom's condition, they apologized, "Sorry…"
"I really am the worst Nameless…"
Pom-Pom looked steadily at the Aeon and slowly shook their head.
"Akivili, you don't need to apologize."
After a moment, they corrected them, "The worst Nameless is obviously that guy who blew up the train."
Pom-Pom lowered their head and hurriedly wiped the corners of their eyes.
Seeing this, Akivili blinked rapidly and pressed their lips tightly together, seemingly trying to hold back the urge to cry.
Eric tilted his head and said something completely unrelated, "Is it going to rain on the Xianzhou?"
The tears that were about to fall from Akivili's eyes immediately stopped.
Right.
They really had said that when an Aeon cried, the entire Xianzhou would rain.
That was clearly just a joke they had casually made! Back then, their close friend had been in terrible shape, and they had only said it to comfort him! How did he still remember it now?
The corner of Akivili's mouth twitched.
"…That's not fair!"
Pom-Pom could not understand the conversation between the Aeon and the human.
But they knew that Eric… was trying to lighten Akivili's mood.
They really hadn't changed at all.
Pom-Pom looked up.
"Eric, long time no see."
Eric crouched down to meet their eyes and said softly, "Long time no see."
Pom-Pom reached into their pocket and rummaged around for a while before taking out a golden badge engraved with an intricate pattern.
This was a badge unique to the Nameless.
Before Eric left the train, he had taken off this badge.
After Akivili discovered it, they had passed it on to Pom-Pom.
Pom-Pom lowered their head and pinned the badge to the edge of Eric's clothes.
They let go and carefully inspected it. After confirming there was nothing wrong, they put their hands on their hips and ordered, "Don't lose Pom-Pom's badge again, pom."
Akivili also put their hands on their hips.
"Did you hear that? No next time."
Zero reached out and rubbed the badge at the edge of his clothes with his fingertip.
The metal was still bright.
The engraved pattern was still clear.
The lines of the design felt smoother to the touch.
Pom-Pom must have taken it out and polished it often.
Zero softly promised, "Don't worry. I won't lose it again."
Pom-Pom's eyes shifted, and they immediately complained to Akivili.
"Eric went too far. He actually gave the train shares in the company!"
"Oh, that…" Akivili scratched their head. "I know."
Zero breathed a sigh of relief.
Luckily, he had told Akivili beforehand.
If he had angered both Akivili and the conductor at the same time…
No matter how much he talked, it would have been useless.
Zero asked where Dan Heng's room was and said that he was Dan Heng's family and wanted to give Dan Heng something.
After getting the answer, he said goodbye to Pom-Pom and Akivili for the moment, leaving them some time alone.
He heard Akivili ask, "Pom-Pom, did you encounter any… particularly special planets along the way?"
Zero walked out of the observation car and, following his memory, arrived at the room Pom-Pom had mentioned.
Dan Heng's room was right next to the Archives.
Zero sighed inwardly.
Fine. At least he wasn't living directly in the Archives.
He opened the door, went to Dan Heng's desk, took out his checkbook from the system space, casually signed his name, tore off a blank check, and stuffed it into the gap between the books.
Next, he went to the Archives next door to pass the time.
Half an hour later, Akivili knocked on the door of the Archives.
"It's just about mealtime."
"Eric, are you hungry?"
Zero nodded very cooperatively.
Akivili clasped their hands together and looked at Pom-Pom expectantly.
"I really want to taste the conductor's cooking again…"
"Hmph. Then wait for it, pom." Pom-Pom snorted coldly and turned toward the kitchen. After walking a few steps, they turned around and urged them, "Why aren't you following?"
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