Chapter 377 Materialism, the End of the Dharma

Xizhou.

A man and a monkey sat opposite each other.

The old Lin Liu sat in a wheelchair. Although his hands and feet were not flexible due to his current physical defects, he still picked up the wine glass easily and sipped it carefully, because the invisible divine hand could help him do everything.

With a sip of wine and a bite of food, he was very satisfied...

He was enjoying his meal, but the monkey opposite him looked sad and asked again:

"My benefactor, are you really not going to go to the prehistoric world?"

Lin Liu saw through its thoughts, put down his wine glass and said with a smile:

"not going."

"But...if you don't go to the prehistoric world, what will happen to the customs clearance?"

Monkey scratching his ears:
"You are the only anchor point. Without you, the world would be destroyed. This is bad for all living beings in the world, and it is also bad for the person outside the domain..."

Lin Liu shook his head:

"In essence, I have no reason to save the Great Desolation. After all, I am just a person in the saint's dream. The Great Desolation has no meaning to me."

"Besides, I have tried my best to save the world, and I have devoted countless efforts in three reincarnations... I have done my best for this world that has nothing to do with me. I am giving up now because I really can't save it."

"If that's the case, then why should I bother with a task that is absolutely impossible to complete?"

Having said that, Lin Liu picked up the wine glass and took another sip, then said cheerfully:
"It was never my business to begin with, but now I no longer have to worry about it..."

His words clearly indicated that he had given up on the mission, but there was not a trace of the decadence of a loser in his mind and body. Instead, there was only the relief of having unloaded an unnecessary burden.

The monkey hesitated, but finally had to admit:
The benefactor really has no reason to feel depressed about this kind of thing, because he is the protagonist of the world, the world exists because of him, he saved the prehistoric world out of affection, and not saving the prehistoric world is his duty, no one can use this kind of thing to morally blackmail him...

"But even if you don't care about the survival of Honghuang, you can't not care about your own life and death, right?"

The monkey said pessimistically:
"When the world is completely materialized, immortality will no longer be allowed. You will die of old age, and the world you have managed to save will perish because it has no anchor point..."

"Not really."

Lin Liu calmly explained the basic rules of the game to it, and the monkey was stunned...

"…So as long as I die completely, this world can have an ending and be preserved."

After hearing the explanation, the monkey was confused for a long time, and then he seemed to understand:
"Is that so..."

Lin Liu smiled and touched its head with his invisible big hand:

“That’s why I insisted on going down this dead end… It’s like a minimum standard guarantee. Even if I can’t achieve a truly perfect ending, as long as I achieve a relatively acceptable ending, even if I die afterwards, I can still preserve this dream world that I have created.”

"So don't worry, my death will only be a good thing for the world..."

Sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, Lin Liu argued for the benefits of his death.

And the purpose of these words, of course, was to comfort the monkey so that it would not be sad about his death.

But as the monkey listened, he inexplicably grasped a key point that Lin Liu had never imagined:

"My benefactor, this is not right. You are the only anchor point, and this fact will never change. But why is it that after you reach the end, even if you, the anchor point, die, it will not affect the survival of the world?"

"This...what's the principle? The world needs an anchor, right?"

Ok?
The monkey's doubts immediately stunned Lin Liu:

Yes, why?

This question, which he had never thought about before, suddenly stumped him. His intuition told him that there seemed to be some key information hidden in it...

……

Monkey, you caught the blind spot!
While Lin Liu was confused, Zhao Si, who had been paying attention to the development of the plot, was also a little confused:
"…If the anchor is essential and is the only reason for the existence of the game world, then how do those worlds continue to exist even when the protagonist anchor dies?"

In other words, what is the principle behind the so-called “reaching an ending”?
Zhao Si had never thought about this problem before, because the system said "the ending was achieved", so the ending was achieved. This process seemed to require no reason or explanation, and it was completely a matter of course.

But as the plot of each chapter is revealed step by step, the concept of "anchor point" gradually becomes clear:
Because Jin Bing was the anchor point, he eventually created an immortal primitive world of eternal prosperity.

Because bird number three is the anchor point, he eventually makes Honghuang immortal.

Because Xue Xuan was the anchor point, he finally anchored the "eternal wilderness" created by the saints, so that it no longer fell into the "quantum superposition state".

Take them as an example. It is precisely because they are the protagonist anchor points that the world they live in can exist. The role of the anchor point is to anchor the world.

Therefore, when they die in a non-ending state, the world that loses the protagonist's anchor will perish...

From this, it can be clearly seen that the core of these three chapters lies in the setting of "anchor point".

But the problem is that up to now, the system has actually saved many worlds without protagonist anchors!
"Jin Bing I and II, Jiao Ming I, II and III, Xue Xuan I and II, Lin Liu I and II... These worlds have no protagonists, but they are still able to exist stably."

What is the principle that allows these "end worlds" to continue to exist without an anchor point?
It can't be that it depends on the settings...

"The anchor point theory proves that the existence of the world must have an anchor point. If those worlds without protagonists can continue to exist, then there is only one possibility..."

Zhao Si was thoughtful:
"That is, in addition to the protagonist, there are other anchor points in the ending world..."

This important discovery made Zhao Si grasp it tightly:

"System, what is the anchor point of the ending world?"

The system didn't answer for a long time...

It was not until Zhao Si became increasingly suspicious that it replied:
[What kind of world do players think would have no protagonist? ]

Zhao Si was stunned:
"you ask me?"

Although he was caught off guard by the question, Zhao Si still thought carefully for a while before shaking his head:
"do not know……"

I'm just a gamer, what can I ask?
[Then let's put it another way: have players ever seen a world without a protagonist? ] Zhao Sile was amused:
"As an old otaku, what world can I see? I have never seen any world except the one in the game..."

and many more!

Zhao Si was suddenly shocked and scratched his head:
"The world I have seen... isn't that the real world? And in the real materialistic world, there is indeed no concept of a protagonist..."

[Yes, there is only reality but no protagonist, because reality is materialistic, and there is no "protagonist" under the idealistic concept in the materialistic world. ]

[Therefore, the real world will not be destroyed because of the death of a certain person, nor will it exist because of the birth of a certain person. ]

[The laws of nature are constant, they do not exist for the sake of Yao, nor do they perish for the sake of Jie! Individual life has nothing to do with the survival of the world, because personal will is not the origin of the world, the origin of the world is the world itself! ]

【This is materialism. 】

……

Zhao Si suddenly realized:
"So you're saying that the reason those ending worlds can continue to exist without the protagonist is because they have become materialistic worlds?"

【…】

[…Do you think that the primitive world with gods flying around everywhere can be a materialistic world? ]

Zhao Si was silent for a moment:
"Probably not..."

[That’s definitely not the case! ]

[Just as Bodhi Patriarch couldn't make the monkey turn the false into the true, this system can't make the idealistic world become materialistic. At best, it can only simulate it and make it look like a materialistic world in some aspects...]

Zhao Si frowned:
"How do you simulate it?"

[In an idealistic game world, the existence of a protagonist is inevitable... Then who do you think the protagonist is, so that the game world looks like the real world, without the existence of a protagonist? ]

As soon as these words came out, Zhao Si seemed to have grasped something again, and his eyes seemed to understand:
"It seems like I'm just guessing... Can you just tell me the answer?"

[Sorry, this system has no comment on this. If you are still confused, just read on...]

Is this... afraid of spoilers?
Zhao Sixin realized something, so he stopped arguing with the system and just continued to watch the changes in Lin Liu's plot carefully.

His intuition told him that Lin Liu's seemingly self-destructive choice might actually be the perfect way to pass the level...

……

【The monkey's words suddenly made you think seriously. 】

[“Why does the world still exist even though the protagonist dies?”]

[This question, which you regarded as "the way it should be" and never thought about carefully, suddenly jumped into your eyes and attracted your attention.]

【But you finally just thought about it and didn't go any further into this question. Firstly, you didn't have enough information so you couldn't figure it out anyway, and secondly, no matter what the answer to this question was, it had nothing to do with you.】

[Because if you only need to know that sacrificing yourself can save the lives of others, then that is enough, and you don’t need to care about the principles involved…]

【…】

[In the days that followed, you continued to quietly watch the efforts of ordinary people. ]

[In the 135th year of New Heaven, the world's first electric light bulb was born and soon put into production, and then entered thousands of households in large quantities.]

[The light of the electric lamp is like the sun piercing through the darkness of the night. It officially announces to the world: From now on, the night belongs to humans too! ]

[In the 140th year of the New Heaven, the wired telegraph was officially put into operation, marking the beginning of a new era for the transmission of information between mortals! ]

【…】

[One hundred and fifty years into the New Heaven, after various new-era inventions were put into production, the electric power industry officially replaced the original steam industry, and the power of a large number of factories changed from steam engines to electric motors, which greatly improved productivity! ]

[In addition to factories, people’s lives have also become extremely convenient due to the large-scale use of electricity. ]

[Electric lights, telegraphs, electric fans, electric blankets...]

[The technical content of these things may not be very high, but for ordinary people, the improvement is not a little bit! ]

[The entire world is entering a new era with the widespread use of electricity, an unprecedented era that is different from all previous eras...]

[What may make you unhappy is that most of these construction achievements are still based on burning charcoal... Although they use electricity, there is no directly available resource for electricity in nature, so they need to use other energy sources to generate electricity.]

[For example, using thermal power to generate electricity, using hydropower to generate electricity, and using wind power to generate electricity... but there is no such thing as using solar power to generate electricity! ]

[Because solar energy is difficult to use to generate electricity, and the utilization rate of solar energy is very low, it is really not cost-effective. ]

[This makes you very depressed, because you finally turned the sun into a material form, and you thought everyone would be able to use it quickly, but you didn't expect that everyone couldn't use it at all...]

[But you are not too angry. After all, this is a technical problem. You can't force them to achieve supermodel achievements.]

[The only solution now is to trust in the wisdom of future generations! ]

[However, you don’t know how long it will take to achieve this, because you can clearly feel that the world is gradually becoming something you don’t recognize, and you dare not speculate...]

[Soil, water, air, plants, animals, the sun, moon, and stars... Although they still look the same as before, with the careful sensing of divine power, you can clearly find that they are definitely not the things you are familiar with! ]

[What the monkey said is right. Materialization means that the difference between the dream world and the primitive world will become greater and greater, until they are completely different... At that time, all traces of the primitive world in this world will be completely erased, so that the two will have nothing to do with each other...]

[And the more this happens, the more you feel: this materialistic world is gradually rejecting all non-material things.]

[Among these excluded things, there are gods and monks. Many of your true gods have come to report this trend to you! ]

[Of course you know this, because you are also among those who are excluded...]

[At the same time, the Dharma Ending Age is also approaching step by step! ]

[The disaster you caused has come...]

……

(End of this chapter)