Consciousness flickered but for an instant.
Chen Yi's mind was groggy as he felt his soul plummeting.
It was a strange sensation.
First, he walked atop the water's surface, then, as if responding to a call, he immersed himself into the water and traveled from the world he knew to another.
Chen Yi barely opened his eyes, staring around at pitch darkness, seeing nothing.
The water seemed to separate two worlds; the world he left had light, while the world he was entering was one of Chaos and pitch darkness, where all things known to man had not yet been born.
From all directions, endless and viscous darkness surrounded Chen Yi.
Chen Yi's limbs were submerged in the pitch darkness.
Darkness, still boundless and pitch, devoid of even the slightest emotion, an absolute, rational darkness.
Not even the word "Abyss" sufficed to compare with it.
A darkness without any impurity, as if thick black holes were everywhere, deep and profound, somber and sullen, without wind, without stir, nothing but silent and lonely death.
Chen Yi felt time slipping by rapidly within the chaotic darkness.
Everything around was so quiet.
Trapped in this chaotic darkness, Chen Yi's thoughts became increasingly disordered, his life's memories slowly became chaotic.
"What's going on? What's happening?"
The sensation of being trapped in a phantasmagoric dream intensified.
Chen Yi slowly started forgetting the past.
"I... where am I? I should be in Athens at Piraeus Port... Yes, the Piraeus Port in Athens..."
"I should be in... in Athens... Where in Athens?!"
He had just remembered, but in the next instant, it was gone.
Chen Yi's face turned pale in terror as his memory irrevocably slipped away.
In a moment of shock, he even forgot what Athens was.
The endless darkness around seemed to be crushing his thoughts completely.
Chen Yi realized that with the passage of time, he might not have a single memory left...
He crazily recited everything in his memory, his family and friends, dreams and hopes, knowledge and learning... He recited name after name, trying to fend off oblivion.
But it was useless.
No sooner had he recited something than it vanished from his memory.
Chen Yi forgot his family and friends, forgot his dreams and hopes, forgot his knowledge and learning... He could not stop the erosion of memory, just as he could not stop a collapsing building.
In front of the Chaos and pitch darkness, his struggles seemed so powerless.
"Chen Yi... I am Chen Yi."
He muttered, pitifully muttering...
"I am... who am I..."
He clutched his head, fingernails nearly breaking the scalp, but he still couldn't remember who he was.
Who am I?
Chaos and darkness crowded around him, as if to make him forever lost.
"Lord, my God,
Your name I must not forget."
In the depths of the Chaos and darkness.
A voice surged from deep within the darkness, echoing in his ears.
It was like...
The thirsty lamb yearning for the grass, the life within the darkness called out for light.
His pupils constricted...
"That voice... it's calling me... but I... who am I?"
"Lord, my God,
Your name I must not forget."
As if to answer his confusion, the voice sounded again.
He widened his eyes.
The answer was on the verge of revelation.
"So that's it, I am... I am..."
The voice called him...
God.
He calmly accepted the soul's descent.
His body felt cramped in the darkness, difficult to stretch out arms and legs.
The darkness seemed to be a kind of viscous glue, thick and squeezing, annoying.
He tried to spread his arms, attempting to push against the enveloping pitch black.
Suddenly, he realized, his legs and hands, the ground beneath his feet and the darkness overhead, all slowly parted.
He had separated the Chaos and pitch darkness of this world.
Light burst forth from His body, emerging through the dark crevices.
The world revealed itself before His eyes.
In the beginning,
heaven and earth were parted in darkness,
so
God descended upon an age when all things had yet no names.
God gazed upon everything before Him.
He stood atop a high mountain, and the vast land seemed insignificant.
God had lost many memories.
His memories were fragmented.
However, He knew that He came from another world, drawn by a calling voice.
He instinctively searched for the source of the voice.
Then, He saw a withered figure sitting at another corner of the mountain's peak.
That figure had no trace of life, dead for quite some time.
God looked at the figure.
This person had thoroughly died, as if employing some forbidden art not meant for this world; his body, like withered wood, had been drained of all vitality, his soul eradicated, nowhere to be found.
God walked over.
He came in answer to the call, yet the one who had summoned Him was dead.
And in calling Him, that person had sacrificed his soul and life.
Therefore, the reason why that person had summoned Him was also lost.
While thinking this, God lowered His head.
On the ground where the person had been sitting, there was a line of text etched with a sharp blade, deep and with force.
"Lord, I come from the future, the apocalypse is near, please save us from fire and water…"
For some reason, God understood the writing on the ground.
From the future…
Apocalypse…
God realized something.
This world would face an apocalypse in the future, therefore this person returned to the past, to summon Him? To hope that He would save the entire world?
God speculated based on these brief words.
"Perhaps… as time unfolds, I will understand everything."
God murmured softly to Himself, He had a premonition.
Overall, He had descended upon a world where Chaos was first breached.
God forgot that He was once called "Chen Yi."
Fortunately, in this age, all things in the world likewise had no names.
For there had yet to be a creature with the wisdom to name all things.
Though He had forgotten many memories, God still tried to grasp the corners of the past from His fragmented memory.
God so loved His people...
He captured those fragmented memories.
Thus, His eyes swept across the land.
The earth, bereft of grass and beasts, was desolate as it had been before Chaos had been breached, and it continued in desolation.
God shook His head,
"Is there aught on this earth that could be called 'people'?"
He descended the high mountain.
His feet stepped upon the earth.
Looking into the distance, God saw the boundary of the land, where the profound sea lay.
God wanted to walk over there.
"I want to walk over there."
As the thought arose, merely with a gentle step, He arrived at the edge of the land.
Under the sea's surface, ancient marine plants and plankton thrived, having existed since Chaos was first breached.
God looked beneath the sea, where currents meandered, and with a thought, His body slowly sank into the water.
Amidst the sea, God tenderly observed these fragile early forms of life.
Extending His hand, His fingertips radiated a faint glow, and under the guidance of that light, the plants and creatures of the deep sea drifted toward Him.
God lifted those lives slowly from beneath the sea, and moments later, His figure emerged above the water's surface.
He walked over the water, stepping onto the land.
God saw life beneath the water, and so He brought life from the water to the land.
After the passing of long days, those lives would yield the fruit of wisdom.