Chapter 2413: Change and Inheritance
"Why should the game be completely eliminated?" The fat player clearly had never considered this question. "What's good about the game disappearing? I owe my current good life to evolution. A lot of people turned their lives around because of evolution. If the game disappears, aren't we screwed?"
Xu Huo didn't say anything more. The fat player muttered to himself for a while, then felt it wasn't safe enough to stay by his side, so he ducked into the auditorium.
Over the next two days, Xu Huo still didn't leave with the Painting Woman. The Old Holy Sword Society was thrown into disarray by his presence, to the point where Lan Huaixie had to take the risk of meeting him again to probe what he intended to do.
Xu Huo repeated himself: he wanted to know the Old Holy Sword Society's purpose, or rather, their guiding principle. With so many members scattered across different wormhole points, they couldn't be acting blindly. There had to be a belief sustaining their actions.
Lan Huaixie met with him privately. After failing to reach an agreement, he didn't go directly to the white-haired elder. Instead, he left and switched to a secret communication channel to make contact.
"He might be someone we can recruit," Lan Huaixie briefly mentioned the incident at the Fish Feast Castle. "At the time, I didn't investigate what was stored in that space, but I later looked into the name 'Food Guest.' He's not a real Super Player. Although he's not famous in the game, according to Fish Feast's archives, this person attacked Fish Feast ten years ago and again five years ago. Each time, he plundered a large number of items and even instance venues. Fish Feast found him extremely troublesome."
"Ten years ago, Fish Feast used over twenty players of the same level to surround him. They even cut off Fish Feast's connection to the game and sealed it off along with the instruments, but they still couldn't stop him from escaping. Five years ago, Fish Feast deployed more than three times that number, chasing the Food Guest across two wormhole points, but he still got away. To this day, Fish Feast hasn't figured out who this Food Guest really is."
"Logically, an A-level player this strong could rival a Super Player. Operating near a C-level wormhole point, he couldn't be completely unknown, but Fish Feast found nothing."
"Someone like that left something at Fish Feast, and someone came specifically to retrieve it. This person's strength is considerable, and they're hostile toward the game and those who represent it. If we could recruit them, it would be a huge help to us."
Lan Huaixie finished sharing his insights. In fact, his original purpose in inviting Xu Huo here was exactly this. He just hadn't expected Xu Huo to have ties to the Old Holy Sword Society, which had now backfired.
"I'll consider your suggestion." The white-haired elder listened seriously before replying. "Like-minded friends often come together by chance along the journey. Those who are pulled in by accident lack the foundation to walk the path together. In the future, you need to be more cautious when seeking companions."
Lan Huaixie fell silent, clearly disagreeing with the elder's view.
The white-haired elder continued speaking to him calmly. "We came together because we share a common goal and regard that goal as the top priority in life. For its sake, everything else is secondary in our eyes. We only have one path."
"These three people you brought—they have many paths."
Since the Holy Sword Society split, many later members—like Uncle Guan, Ruan Qiyan, and Zhou Yuanzhu—joined because they had been persecuted by the game. Lan Huaixie and District 001 were the same. They had suffered deeply from the pain brought by the game's forces, so they were desperate to change the game's rules and willing to sacrifice their lives and energy for it. Their clear purpose was like the sun, overshadowing any stars. No matter what they encountered, it was hard to make them abandon this goal.
People like the fat player and Xu Huo, in their view, were actually beneficiaries of the game. Of course, they might also face life-and-death crises and hardships, but such experiences made it impossible for them to turn back. Burning their bridges wasn't necessary for them. If they could, they only needed to improve their strength to live very well in the current game world. There was no need to court trouble.
Even if they joined out of momentary loyalty or an idea, they might still give up when the going got tough. Although the Holy Sword Society didn't require its members to stick to one path to the end, a comrade leaving midway didn't just dampen morale—it could also bring danger to others.
Lan Huaixie's expression softened considerably. "I'll be more cautious. But these two people really are worth winning over."
"I'll consider it," the white-haired elder repeated.
After the communication ended, the white-haired elder had Gao Feng call Xu Huo over and told him to follow him to a place, insisting that only he could come.
"Where to? Why can't I go?" the Painting Woman protested.
"It's not far," the white-haired elder pointed behind the auditorium. "We'll be back soon."
The Painting Woman naturally wouldn't listen to him, but when she saw Xu Huo also telling her to stay, she reluctantly agreed, adding that if they weren't back in half an hour, she would come looking for them.
Xu Huo agreed.
The two walked along a narrow alley toward the back. Along the way, residents greeted the white-haired elder, and some vendors even handed him a handful of vegetables or a fruit.
The white-haired elder accepted them all, and Xu Huo helped carry some.
Their destination was an old school. The white-haired elder handed the items to the school's teachers to supplement the students' meals, then led Xu Huo to an empty lot behind the school.
"This used to be a large square. It was bombed later. You can still see some bricks and stones now, but most of it is dirt. The school kids come here to play, so the ground has been packed solid."
"Kids are really something. They just come here to play in their spare time, and slowly, they're helping this land recover."
"What we want to do might not be finished in one generation, so we can't be impatient. Adults have adults' work, and children have children's work."
Xu Huo stood on a broken brick. "You want to change the game world by changing the order?"
"Not just ordinary rule changes," the white-haired elder said. "If that were the case, it would be no different from most people thinking that improving strength can make the game world peaceful."
"People will still use a cracked bottle. Even when others say it might cut their hands, the user can talk about turning it a certain way or being careful to show its value, thereby protecting the bottle."
"But if you smash that bottle completely, smash it until it's hard to repair, then those who protect the bottle will agree to make a new one."
"That's the principle of 'no destruction, no construction.' The same goes for bottles, and the same goes for people's mindsets."
"Letting a more reasonable person control the game won't change its essence. Only by killing those who maintain the game and letting a new group of people establish the rules can the game world truly change."
"The Old Holy Sword Society... and the New Holy Sword Society—you want to be the ones to establish the new rules." Xu Huo's lips twitched slightly, a hint of disappointment in his expression.
"History moves forward. Civilization moves forward. No one can go back. Even if they sometimes take a detour, they'll eventually end up on the original path." The white-haired elder looked him straight in the eye. "Do you think that destroying the Dimensional Rift game will prevent the same thing from happening in the future?"
"After the invention of thermal weapons, they caused countless casualties, but no one thinks all thermal weapons and the methods to make them should be destroyed. After all, weapons are neither good nor bad—it's the people who use them that are good or bad."
"The game is the same. In the right hands, it can benefit humanity."