Chapter 45: The Merman

Ge Xiu opened his eyes suddenly.

The cold and narrow steel space greeted his sight, and his eyes were hurt by the 24-hour constant biological light source, tears filled his eyes in an instant.

He turned his head and wanted to raise his hand to block the light, but the pull coming from his arm suddenly awakened him and made him finally realize where he was.

Ge Xiu blinked and glanced at the blue and purple shackles that hung on his wrists.

——That’s right, he still was in that special prison.

But… why did he suddenly wake up?

After the end of the first punishment world, he was directly sent to the next world.

Ge Xiu tilted his head thoughtfully, suddenly raised his voice, and shouted: “Hey! Is there anyone? When will I go to the third punishment world!”

The cell was quiet.

No one answered.

Ge Xiu was sure that his voice had been conveyed accurately, but it was clear that those in the courtroom were not ready to answer those questions.

He narrowed his eyes slightly and leaned relaxedly against the steel wall behind him.

The icy cold temperature passed through the thin prison uniform, penetrated into his body, making his brain more awake.

——It seems that the chaos that he had caused in the last world had a lot of impact on this group of people.

Sure enough, was becoming a god a bit too much?

In fact, at the moment when he became a newborn god and gained a believer, Ge Xiu had a clear and mysterious feeling, as if his own existence was accepted by the laws of the whole world, but before he could fully appreciate this feeling the judges quickly suspended the last punishment world.

What were they worried about?

Ge Xiu’s eyelids drooped slightly, and his nearly night-black eyes were hidden under the beautifully curved eyelashes, glowing with a metallic faint blue.

In addition, he also confirmed one thing.

The world of punishment was indeed a virtual world composed entirely of data. Although those people could decide what world he would enter and what would be his identity in the punishment world, from the moment the world was completed, the whole world was already independent of the creator, had its own operating rules and couldn’t be disturbed from the outside world.

That was why he could become the captain of the Leviathan in the first world and the God of Darkness in the second world.

And those people were powerless when they found out that his fate was gradually getting out of track.

Their actions were subjected to the established rules of the virtual world and they couldn’t intervene in the internal operation of the worlds. They could only stop loss in time by reducing his lifespan or directly removing him from the punishment world.

However, another question appeared.

When the world began to operate, the judges could no longer influence the progress in the worlds, so they will undoubtedly set a tragic fate and harsh external environment that would be hardly survivable at the beginning of the creation of the virtual world.

In the first world, it was the harsh environment of the Garbage Star, the hypocritical Alliance with sweetened words and merciless actions*, and the world-wide war that was about to start, as well as the fierce and cruel dark side the continent in the second world, the demons, humans and gods trying his best to hunt him, the seal that had to be opened with his own vitality and made him suffer.

But…each world was not without a turning point.

——Although it was very small and extremely difficult to grasp, it existed.

However, the purpose of the trial was to punish him, based on this fact, it was impossible to actively create a comeback opportunity for him.

And…

Lulai Sivir.

Elinor.

In the two worlds, the attitude of these two people towards him was pure goodwill, one was willing to repay his trust, the other was…willing to offer loyalty and faith to him. Moreover, what puzzled Ge Xiu the most was that they were all willing to do their best to improve his life, whether it was rare treasures or delicacies, as long as he opened his mouth there was nothing they wouldn’t give, without any reservations.

This was totally illogical…

Why would the judges allow such a character to be created in the punishment world?

Ge Xiu frowned in confusion, and felt a faint pain in the depths of his mind, which disturbed his originally logically clear thinking into a ball, making it almost impossible to gather his attention again.

The picture at the end of the last world flashed in my mind.

Everything was falling apart and disintegrating.

However, Elinor was the only real entity in that virtual bubble.

What was going on?

Ge Xiu tried to mobilize his mind again, but the more he thought, the more intense pain in the depths of his mind became. In the end, it had almost reached the point where Ge Xiu couldn’t bear it, and countless colourful patches of colour collided in his mind, the buzzing white noise mixed with the distant and chaotic noise made his mind blank in an instant.

He raised his hand to hold his hot forehead and gasped violently.

After a while, this strange feeling finally faded slowly.

Ge Xiu opened his eyes, and his sight that had just recovered clarity swept over the place where he had just pressed his palm, and then stopped suddenly in the next second.

There were chaotic handprints and sweat stains remaining on the steel plate. From it, countless repeated and stacked characters could be barely recognized. It seemed as if he had painted them countless times just now-

“P”

Ge Xiu felt his head hurt again.

At this moment, a familiar voice of the presiding judge sounded from the loudspeaker in the cell: “Don’t worry, you will be able to enter the next punishment world immediately.”

Ge Xiu straightened up, his crossing knees naturally pressed down slightly with his movement, and cleverly concealed the ground smeared with handprints in the blind spot of the camera.

He said empathetically: “It’s okay, I don’t mind waiting a little longer.”

Ge Xiu looked at one of the cameras accurately, as if he knew that the other person was observing himself through the lens, and asked with sincerity and concern: “So, is there anything wrong? If you need my help, just tell me.”

The presiding judge in front of the screen could hardly breathe** and was almost maddened to death.

Obviously you are the culprit!! Why are you pretending to be innocent!!!

If need my help, just ask…

If you could serve your sentence well, don’t play so many tricks***, that would be the biggest help, okay!

The presiding judge gritted his teeth angrily. He inhaled and exhaled heavily, reluctantly suppressed the growing anger in his chest, then turned to look behind him, and said:

“I said it a long time ago, Ge Xiu is a heinous criminal and should be imprisoned in black prison! This kind of experimental punishment in the virtual world is not suitable for criminals like him who have no repentance!”

He only got the value of the remaining Ge Xiu’s evil points not long ago, after the last world finished, although the data this time was much better than last time, it is still too low compared with the world difficulty last time.

Most of the pain points that exceed the threshold were generated during the first exploration period. In the end, even the pain forced by the system could no longer increase the criminal’s pain value…as if he had already adapted to the pain.

It was unbelievable.

In the first world, Ge Xiu only completely reversed his fate, and in the second world, he even directly crashed the virtual world! It took him less than a year!

In the real world only eight hours have passed!

If it continues to develop at this speed, it was possible that in the end, once the whole world was down, it was not impossible that Ge Xiu’s evil value would not decrease at all.

Such punishment was too inefficient!

A mediocre-looking man in the uniform of the Security Bureau stood not far behind him, and replied indifferently: “All experiments are for the official launch of the new punishment and transformation system.”

However, the presiding judge was not as easy as to compromise as before, he said slowly with a cold face:

“I’m not without contacts from the top. I have also done some investigations during this period ─ this new punishment and transformation system did not appear in any written documents or virtual databases. Even in the past five years, there hasn’t been any experimental record, and it hasn’t been used on any prisoners…except Ge Xiu.”

In fact, the presiding judge felt something wrong when the sentence was announced earlier.

Ge Xiu’s trial process was completely non-standard, there was no questioning, no evidence chain, and even the jury was completely confidential.

The whole process was an unknown black box, and only the final result is delivered to his hands.

In addition, he has been in this position for so many years, and he has never heard of any new punishment and transformation system. It only appeared out of thin air after Ge Xiu was arrested. There has never been any record before, and there was no way to know where did it come from?

However, that order…was real.

It was not forgery, as no one dared to forge it.

The man from the Secret Bureau stared at the presiding judge with a blank face: “Those are the decisions from above.”

…and again.

All doubts and doubts will be directly returned in this way.

The presiding judge gritted his teeth, turned back his head stubbornly, and once again stopped his gaze on the surveillance picture on the screen.

In that narrow and cold space, the slender young man sat with his knees bent, his head hanging slightly, his facial features were blurred in the shadows, and only the smooth and elegant lower jaw could be seen.

This interstellar most notorious wanted criminal, whether it was his past, present, or future, was all a cloud of chaos.

He seemed to be in the center of the storm, full of deadly mysteries, but he seemed to contain all the answers.

A man’s urging voice came from behind: “When will the third punishment world begin?”

The presiding judge’s brow furrowed tightly, and he continued to ask questions reluctantly: “Your purpose is to punish him, right? But the first world couldn’t do much harm to him at all, although the performance of the second world was a little better than the one before, but it didn’t take long to collapse. How do you plan to create the third world?”

Although only two worlds have been carried out, the presiding judge has a relatively precise understanding of Ge Xiu.

He was not afraid of pain, pressure, hardship… He was tenacious like a weed growing in a crack in a rock.

How could such a person be hurt?

The presiding judge felt it was a little unimaginable, but after experiencing the first two worlds, the other party did not seem to be as frustrated as he had imagined.

The man looked at him: “I advise you, sometimes, knowing too much is not a good thing.”

There is no unnecessary ups and downs in his voice, as if he was just asking about the weather today.

However, the presiding judge still couldn’t help being shocked.

There was no threat more terrible than words from the workers of the Secret Bureau. Even if he was in his current position, he still couldn’t treat this seemingly light remark as a trifling matter.

“However, there is one thing you can know.” A slight smile overflowed on the lips of the plain looking man****:

“This world is specially prepared for him…If it goes well, there should be some unexpected gains.”

Gains?

What does that mean?

The presiding judge stared at the curve of the man’s lips, and suddenly felt cold all over, he quickly looked away, raised his hand, and pressed the button that ready to start anytime on his smart brain.

The moment it was pressed, the cold metal mechanical sound rang in the empty room:

【Virtual world is being generated…】

·

Ge Xiu felt an invisible pressure pressing from all directions, heavier than the air, softly clinging to his limbs.

Was it… water?

Vaguely, Ge Xiu could feel the gentle water swaying slowly, covering his whole body, making it so that he was immersed in the liquid from head to toe.

Ge Xiu thought he would suffocate.

… But what was strange was that his breathing was not obstructed in the slightest.

The water flowed into the mouth with the ups and downs of his chest, and then came from behind his ears ─ this feeling was too weird, making Ge Xiu instantly wake up from the chaos just now, and he opened his eyes suddenly in the water.

It was pitch black all around, and only faint light penetrated through the gaps in the wood, and he could see the dust floating in the small wave of water illuminated in front of him.

And… Although he opened his eyes in the water, his eyes didn’t feel any discomfort or tingling.

This space is very narrow, trapping him like a coffin, and the waves around him were flowing rhythmically, he seemed to be moving.

Ge Xiu stretched out his arms and leaned toward the light source, but what he encountered was only smooth and cold hard glass.

Through the sound of the water flowing in my ears, he could hear the whispers of conversation outside:

“Finally… caught…”

“It must be…sell for a big price…”

“…Grand Duke…”

At this moment, the familiar mechanical sound rang again in his ears, like a bell, it instantly overwhelmed the noisy and low-pitched conversation outside, and brought Ge Xiu’s full attention back: “Welcome to Punishment World III.”

Ge Xiu was taken aback for a moment.

This time… it didn’t say the name of the punishment world.

*口蜜腹剑 lit. honeyed words, a sword in the belly (idiom); describes a person who speaks sweet words but has a sinister heart and wants to frame people everywhere. hypocritical and murderous

**一口气没上来 meaning that he can barely breathe and is about to die, an exaggeration. Generally used when people are badly stimulated.

***幺蛾子 meaning: to create something out of nothing; tricks; wicked ideas.

****其貌不扬 means plain or appearance is not upright (pinyin: qí mào bù yáng) derogatory meaning.

Bamboo has something to say:

You guys guessed it! This time Ge Xiu is a bewitching merman, how interesting~