Apocalyptic Era: Starting from picking up a Bishoujo
Chapter 564 - 530 World Fault 2

Chapter 564: 530 World Fault 2

"It wasn’t the Doomsday that caused the errors; rather, it was the errors that forged the Doomsday," Little Bowl said. "Even though this is just my intuition... the essence of Doomsday should be a destructive process formed by the accumulation of countless errors."

It’s merely a conclusion drawn from personal intuition, but precisely because of this, it carries a different kind of persuasive power.

Little Bowl is the Divine Son capable of communicating with all things in nature. In a sense, she can be considered the spokesperson of the world. Her intuitions and inspirations are sometimes revelations from the world itself to her; the conclusions she draws from them can even be seen as the conclusions of the world itself.

That said, due to the lack of obvious material evidence, there are inevitably emotions that prevent total acceptance at first glance.

"The source of the error originates from something else. This source did not appear at the moment Doomsday descended, and it very likely did not appear only in the era that you, Brother Zhuang Cheng, are in," Little Bowl said. "Just like a patient diagnosed with terminal cancer didn’t fall ill on the day of diagnosis, the initial error can be traced back to an extremely distant history. From that time, the seeds of destruction have already been planted.

"As time went by, the world’s illness grew worse. Until a certain point, the disease entered an explosive stage. The anomalies symbolizing errors also exploded in growth, and the chaotic phenomena spread across the world, leading to the destruction of human civilization."

The "Doomsday" didn’t occur in the future but happened in the past—

The Gua Tianshi also once advocated this same theory.

Although not through the same formulation, Little Bowl also reached the same conclusion by using the Right Positioning Heavenly Phenomena, strengthened by the Power of Divine Seal Fragments.

After thinking for a while, I said, "...Your suggestion sounds as if the anomalies are the embodiment of Doomsday itself, but as far as I know, in the final phase of Doomsday, All Things will fall into annihilation, and even the anomalies are no exception."

"This is not contradictory," Little Bowl said. "If the patient dies, the cancer cells also die. Just because anomalies accompany errors doesn’t mean they won’t be eradicated in Doomsday."

I accepted this logic, then pondered.

There is some kind of inexplicable external force causing the operation of the world itself to go awry—what kind of thing could cause such deep structural damage to the world itself?

From what I know, the only thing I can suspect is the divine seal, and the person who used the divine seal to split the world of common sense and the abnormal world apart.

As circumstantial evidence, the period when anomalies began explosive growth and the first case of soul loss appeared was quite close to the time of the Fantian event, which was more than four years ago.

Even though it is generally believed in Luo Mountain that the Fantian event occurred more than three years ago, Fu Feng mentioned to me that the phenomenon of the boundary between the world of common sense and the abnormal world disappearing had already been recognized on a small scale by Impermanence and Great Success ranks more than four years ago.

Similarly, whether it’s worth comparing or not, my awakening of superpower also happened around an equally close point in time...

Overall, the potential errors in the world might be closely related to the wishes made by past users of the divine seal. But this makes it perplexing again; according to Little Bowl, the source of anomalies is the world’s error, and the world may have only gone wrong after the wish event happened. In other words, when the instigator made a wish, the concept of anomalies might not have existed—and based on this, how would the instigator decide to demarcate the world of common sense and the abnormal world?

This is practically a chicken-and-egg logic paradox.

Did my speculation go wrong at some point? Or is this kind of logical paradox also a manifestation of the power of the divine seal, being an existence so transcendent that it defies comprehension?

The world of the Doomsday Era is in a state unknown whether dead or insane. Can the inspirations and revelations given to Little Bowl by the Power of Heaven and Earth, closely related to it, be calmly understood in their original form? Is there a twisted lie among them that doesn’t match reality? Or, in extreme terms—could there be a malicious part within?

After some more discussion, Little Bowl also couldn’t unravel these mysteries. Besides, there are many other significant issues that can’t be put down. Fortunately, we’re not the type to waste time on difficult problems without clues. While carrying many questions, we continued on our journey.

On the way, Little Bowl took out the cartographer’s map, occasionally glancing down at it, seemingly using this tool to help herself find the direction. I also gave her my blessing lantern. According to the wandering spirit’s claim, there should also be blessings at the survivor settlement, which can help those nearby with blessing lanterns to head there. With this item, it might further save Little Bowl’s energy.

Occasionally, when passing through towns, I also try to use my perception to scan whether the surrounding buildings have basements, and if so, what kind of style they have. With the power of the Unfortunate star, I might be able to rely on luck to approach the basement of the fifteenth floor.

Noticing my actions over here, Little Bowl enhanced my perception and added a blessing status to me. It’s somewhat similar to the blessings she gave me in the Void Realm before; last time, it allowed me to adapt to the Void Realm environment, and this time, it allowed me to adapt to the Doomsday Era environment.

This time, however, it couldn’t be achieved in an instant, more like accelerating my analysis of chaotic time and space. Even so, the effect was like adding wings to a tiger. Before, solving math problems felt like half-asleep and half-awake, but now I finally felt awake, full of spirit and endless inspiration.

Now, even if I send the "fireflies" far away, the information transmitted back won’t have a lot of noise anymore.

"If the wraith is still alive..." I thought of this.

If the wraith held on for just a bit longer and realized the existence of the fifteenth-floor basement, knowing it’s possible to return to the modern world, maybe it wouldn’t have been so eager to die.

No... ultimately, it’s because the wraith consumed the Three-Life Stone Powder to regain memory that I was able to meet with Little Bowl and get the lead on the fifteenth-floor basement.

Blessed monks are destined never to obtain what they desire.

If the wraith hadn’t become a blessed monk, would it have turned out differently? However, without blessing power, the wraith would have long died at the hands of the cartographer, or possibly perished amid endless past sufferings. Blessing power is both the weapon that aids blessed monks to survive the doomsday and the root of their misfortune. It’s both a blessing and a curse.

I’m glad that Mazao is not a true blessed monk, yet Mazao carries the incredibly heavy curse of the sweeper star power. Similarly, "the more crucial the part, the more lacking in capability"—a similar rule seems to apply in variant forms to the Impermanence beings, myself included.

Why is there such a rule that the more you desire, the less you can obtain?

Is this also a sign of a malfunction in the world’s operational process?

"Brother Zhuang Cheng, how’s the effect of the blessing?" Little Bowl seemed to look forward to my praise.

"Outstanding!" I said in evaluation, "In just one or two hours, I should be able to start using my own power of word spirit. If it were just me alone, I might not achieve this in even one or two months."

Little Bowl was evidently very pleased, and her steps ahead were much lighter.

Then, as if recalling something from the past, she sighed, "If only I could do such things when I was with Sister Mazao..."

Unfortunately, there were no signs of the fifteenth-floor basement appearing on the way. This was also expected, because not only did the fifteenth-floor basement not appear, but after joining Little Bowl, the misfortune of being attacked by abnormal phenomena every few steps also stopped. Probably my sweeper star power was overshadowed by her strong luck.

However, this can also be seen as her strong luck being proportionately depleted by the sweeper star power. If she could delay the Catastrophe Demon’s pursuit relying on this power, then surely in some time, the Catastrophe Demon would arrive.

"Is it really okay to meet with No. 7 now?" I was curious.

"Brother Zhuang Cheng means?" Little Bowl asked.

"Going to the place where the Tai Sui Army is, in the current state of being pursued by the Catastrophe Demon, might lead the Catastrophe Demon there. You should be able to foresee this," I said, "I thought you might worry about collateral damage... or is this what you want to achieve?"

"Quite the opposite, I want to avoid this result." Little Bowl said, "I can temporarily cover the sweeper star power, but can’t truly eliminate it. Forcing suppression will only cause a rebound at some point.

"So, while we said earlier we’d find a way to meet Lady No. 7 of the Tai Sui Army... even if we do nothing, clues to their location will eventually find us, or even the Tai Sui Army itself might bump into us.

"But we can’t let this situation occur.

"Letting the sweeper star power dictate our actions will only lead to a situation where disasters never come singly. I can bet that the Tai Sui Army and the Catastrophe Demon would definitely converge before us simultaneously. Similar things, surely Brother Zhuang Cheng isn’t encountering for the first time?"

I reflected on the past adventurous events I had encountered and nodded.

"As long as we take the initiative, we can grasp a certain degree of control, especially when my strong luck can still barely suppress the sweeper star power," Little Bowl coaxed gently, "We have to complete the exchange of information with Lady No. 7 before the Catastrophe Demon arrives... and if we are lucky enough, we might even witness the scene of Great Demon Xuanwu hunting the Tai Sui Army on the spot..."

"Why is such a situation considered lucky?" I was puzzled.

"The Great Demon Xuanwu and the Catastrophe Demon have a mortal enmity; upon meeting, the Great Demon Xuanwu would certainly attack the Catastrophe Demon first." Little Bowl said, "And I can summon the Catastrophe Demon directly."