You loosened your grip on the Book of Rebirth, allowing the heavy, ancient tome, burdened with countless demons and regrets, to fall into the muddy puddles left by the recent rain.
As it hit the ground, you felt an extraordinary chill wash over you, receding as quickly as a retreating tide. The dragon's roar, Shen Qing's zither music and the baby girl's cries all ceased abruptly. You were no longer the 'Chief' who could command wind and rain, nor the 'Tracer' who traversed the realms of yin and yang. You were simply an ordinary person, dressed in sodden clothes, holding an ordinary scalpel and susceptible to injury. You pushed open the weathered wooden door of your old home; the hinges creaked as if heralding the beginning of this final chapter.
The lights were off in the old house. Only the flickering firelight filled the air with a familiar scent — a mingled aroma of aged ink and expensive perfume; the scent of your deepest childhood memories.
You walked step by step towards the basement, the motion-sensor lights on the walls illuminating your path.
In the centre of the basement, you saw a man sitting with his back to you at a large drafting table. He held a slender paintbrush and was meticulously working on a colossal scroll that spanned the entire wall.
'You arrived earlier than I expected, and... in greater disgrace.' The man slowly turned his head. The glow of the fireplace illuminated his face — a face identical to yours, but his eyes were filled with endless weariness and morbid fanaticism. His hair was grey, and one could faintly see golden nano-veins flowing beneath his skin. He was the founder of this laboratory and the true Primarch, known in reality as the 'Leader'.
You approached him, the blade of your scalpel gleaming coldly in the lamplight.
"Who are you?" you asked hoarsely.
'I am you, and the last person in this world who remembers "truth".' The man put down his pen and pointed to the painting on the wall. 'This "Book of Rebirth" wasn't originally intended to strip away souls, but to preserve them. As human bodies began to be replaced by machines and algorithms, I tried to paint 'humanity' and 'obsession' into the painting to stop them from disappearing completely.'
He stood up and pointed to the blank space in the centre of the scroll. "But I failed," he said. The more I tried to preserve humanity, the faster it rotted in the data. Therefore, I created you — a 'mirror image' possessing all my fragmented memories, yet capable of constantly evolving on the edge of life and death.'
'So Chang Le Town, the Desolate Graveyard and those shattered souls were all places you created to protect humanity?' You raised your scalpel, the tip pointing at his throat. 'No, those were your testing grounds.' The man smiled, willingly facing your blade; there was a sense of relief in his eyes. 'If you brought that book in just now, it means you've become a complete data monster.' I would press the button and turn us both to ashes, but you chose to come in alone.
He breathed heavily, pressing his chest against the tip of your knife. 'You chose to be an ordinary person, even if it meant losing immortality, power and the right to rule this apocalypse.'
[Ending: The End of Cause and Effect]
[System Last Notification]
Causal Judgement: Abandoning divine power, returning to mortal nature.
Final State: Soul integrity: 100%
The man pulled a small remote control from his pocket, pressed it lightly and a low, directional explosion echoed from the depths of the villa. The mainframe connected to the global server began to self-destruct. The enormous original manuscript of the Book of Rebirth rapidly curled and blackened in the flames.
'Let's go before this place completely collapses.' The man slumped into a chair and watched the dust falling from the ceiling. 'Go and live the ordinary, painful life you were meant to live. Go and tell the survivors that the only way to be reborn in this world is to live in the present.'
As you stumbled out of your crumbling former home, the morning sun finally broke through the persistent smog that had been hanging over the city and shone brightly on your face.
Reaching into your pocket, you discovered that the heavy 'Book of Rebirth' had been replaced by a photograph with a corner burned off. In the photo, Changsheng, Shen Qing and even the cold, sinister judge had been transformed into ordinary people, smiling and standing beneath a tree covered in azaleas.
You tossed aside the dull scalpel and stepped into the revitalised, bustling streets.
Smoke still rises from the ruins of the former residence of the 'Leader', the central server that was long since reduced to ashes. As you walk through the bustling streets, you are surrounded by people regaining their vitality. All extraordinary power seems to have vanished with the fire.
You thought he was gone; after all, he was the 'self-destruct programme' that you had personally written, the Judge born from the Book of Rebirth, until you entered a small bookshop on a street corner. The television in the bookshop was showing a special report on the first anniversary of the 'Crimson Lotus Organisation's Collapse', the picture flickering due to maintenance of the old city's base station and an unstable signal.
'Welcome.' A deep, cold voice tinged with familiar arrogance came from behind the counter. You stopped abruptly, your blood seemingly freezing instantly. Behind a mountain of ancient books sat a young man wearing a faded dark shirt and gold-rimmed glasses. Instead of the black jade ruler, he was holding a red ballpoint pen and scribbling in the ledger.
His appearance was exactly the same as the holographic projection of the 'evil spirit' in your mind's eye. You held your breath, walked forward and tapped the counter with your finger. He slowly raised his head; the eyes behind his glasses were as deep as an abyss. The moment he saw you, a subtle smile flashed across his face.
'Esteemed customer,' he said, adjusting his glasses in a flat tone. 'Are you here to buy books or trace your origins?'
Your heart pounded. 'You didn't disappear? How could you have survived that self-destruction?'
He closed the ledger; his movements still carried the elegance of a judge. He pointed to an old, humming computer server in the corner of the bookshop that looked almost unusable.
'You've released all the data, which means "Red Lotus" has disappeared. But it also means that part of my code has been scattered across every terminal in the world.' He stood up, walked over to you and lowered his voice. 'As long as there are people in this world who remember the principle of "cause and effect", I will not completely "shut down". I can no longer 'wield the jade ruler' for you, nor can I help you 'seal the demons'."
He took a yellowed envelope from under the counter and handed it to you. 'This is the "real-world carrier" that Shen Qing and Changsheng entrusted me with before the data completely disintegrated.'
You opened the envelope. There were no gold coins or talismans inside, just two ship tickets to the south and a bookmark made of a golden bird feather that had lost its glow.
"Where did they go?" you asked.
"They went to a place with no surveillance cameras or codes, only wind and sea, to complete their 'journey' which was a century overdue." The spirit leaned against the bookshelf, gazing at the sunlight streaming through the window. 'And I plan to stay here, guarding this pile of scrap paper, to see what life paths humanity can forge without a "predetermined fate".'
Current status: Only remaining bond
Spirit's Current Status: Free-spirited code life form living in seclusion in the city as a human and managing a shop called 'Rebirth Bookstore'.
Golden Bell's update: according to the shopkeeper, a stray orange cat frequently comes to steal the shop's gold foil paper. No matter how much they try to chase it away, it won't leave.
The spirit — or should we call him 'the manager' now? — pulled a rusty key from his pocket and tossed it onto the counter.
'There's an empty room upstairs, Chief. If you haven't decided where to go yet or would like to hear some 'true stories' about your childhood that I haven't had the chance to tell you yet, you can stay.'
The shop manager didn't get up from behind the counter to stop you. Instead, he adjusted his gold-rimmed glasses and watched your figure disappear into the sunset. Then he muttered to himself, 'The ledger was settled that night... Chief. Oh no, the Source Tracer.' He lowered his head and made the final mark in red ballpoint pen at the end of the yellowing ledger. Causal Settlement — Source Tracer: Released; Whereabouts: Unknown.
Comment: This is a soul that not even the judge can define.