A gentle breeze brushed by, and the silver moonlight shone brightly.
On top of a super high-rise building, Sincere sat on the edge, his legs swinging over the high air as he enjoyed the spoils of his day.
The thing he was chewing on was the most common reward from the Food Trial: a blood finger bread. This bread was shaped exactly like a human finger, and it even felt the same to the touch.
The only way to confirm it was really just food and not a severed finger was the cranberry jam flavor that exploded in your mouth when you bit into it.
Unfortunately, the bread was waxy, and the jam was sour. It was a C-level food, and it didn't taste good.
But none of that mattered because it provided energy, and energy meant it could extend his life.
Yes, in the world today, staying alive was the most important thing.
Ever since the Gods had descended half a year ago, the real world had been turned into an absurd Faith Game.
Everyone on Earth had to choose a Path of Fate and believe in a God, clinging to the blessings of the gods to survive in this broken, unreal reality.
The reason it was called broken was because the world had been divided into countless fragments by the gods.
Everyone, or rather, the Players now called Followers or Believers, had been randomly assigned to one of these fragments to survive.
For Sincere, the place he was assigned was the rooftop of an unknown building.
The rooftop was about two hundred square meters. The space was large, but it was completely exposed with no cover, not even a piece of cloth to wrap around himself.
The hardest part was that there were air walls around the rooftop on all sides. Even though the door to go downstairs was right in front of him, he couldn't walk through the air walls to get to the lower floors.
Unless he triggered the "Trial of Space Extension" and succeeded, only then could he break through the air walls and gain more living space.
And this also tied into what he had said earlier about how "unreal" everything was!
The world had been physically divided, and society had come to a complete halt. The reason players, with no resources to support them, had survived for six months was entirely due to the game granting them anything they wanted.
In this game, all "resources" had to be earned through participating in Wish Trials. From "food, clothing, shelter, and transportation" to "God-given power," as long as you dared to make a wish, the gods would send down a God's Trial Arena and match you with appropriate teammates.
By teaming up with others to clear the trials, everything you wished for would be granted by the Gods and appear right before your eyes.
The more outrageous the wish, the harder the trial.
Not only that, each trial would increase your score, letting you go further down the path of trials.
Of course, if you had social anxiety, you could choose solo trials. But solo trials wouldn't increase any scores, and the rewards were barely useful.
The players who had made it this far had long since gotten used to everything in the game. Many of them had already become experts in it.
Sincere sat on the rooftop, painfully swallowing the food in his mouth, and looked up at the game information displayed in his view.
[Current global number of followers: 8478114678]
In just six months, two-thirds of the global population of 12 billion had already disappeared.
The Faith Game wasn't an absolutely safe game. Dying in the game meant dying in real life.
But if you didn't accept the gods' trials, you wouldn't get the resources necessary to survive.
So the game's objective was clear: only by growing stronger could you live until the end.
"One day left..."
Looking at the glaring red reminder in the center of his view, Sincere sighed.
The Faith Game wouldn't let players live complacently. Every seven days, it would automatically match players with a Special Divine Trial.
This trial was extremely difficult. If players failed to clear it, even if they somehow survived, they would be deprived of the ability to participate in the Wish Trial for the next cycle.
In other words, failure meant there would be no rewards for the next week—only the need to consume stored food.
To be honest, Sincere still had plenty of food on the rooftop. After half a year of effort, he had set up two storage rooms on the roof.
Though the supplies were of poor quality, they at least ensured his survival.
"I hope this time I get a reliable teammate. After being screwed over the week before last, I wasted a lot of food last week. My stockpile is almost down to the warning line..."
As he thought about how to deal with tomorrow's challenge, a voice suddenly called out from afar.
"Hey, buddy, how's the harvest today?"
Sincere looked up and saw that the voice came from a "neighbor" on the rooftop of the building across from him—a young man with long hair, dressed in trendy, colorful clothes, all acquired from trial rewards.
The guy's name was Aaron.
Though the world was separated by air walls, these invisible barriers only restricted players' movements. They didn't block light or sound, and they didn't stop people from throwing things at each other.
Because of this, most neighborhood relationships were unfriendly, as you never knew when your neighbor might pull out an assault rifle and shoot you.
The game didn't prohibit players from killing each other.
There were a few neighbors where Sincere lived, and the young man on the rooftop across from him was one of them.
The two buildings were about thirty meters apart, and they could only communicate by shouting.
He introduced himself as Aaron, a civil engineering senior from Sky State.
He was a little eccentric, but not a bad guy.
Before the gods arrived, he had been struggling to find a job, but after the gods' arrival, he was immediately employed.
After all, there were no jobs left in the world, and technically speaking, being a professional player could count as employment.
So, he was one of the few "arrival faction" people, who believed that the gods had saved the world—at least saved the world's employment rate.
Sincere shook the can of tentacle slime drink in his hand and smiled, indicating that this was his spoils.
"Damn, snot water? Buddy, I've never respected anyone in my life, but I sure as hell respect you. How the hell can you drink that?" Aaron stared at the drink in Sincere's hand, his face paling.
"Snot water" was the nickname for this drink, since the tentacle slime was green and extremely viscous, resembling the snot produced during a wind-heat cold, hence the name.
But despite that, it was still a great thirst-quencher, and due to its stickiness, it even had some filling effect.
Sincere smiled and said, "How do I drink it? Once it enters your mouth, it's impossible to bite, and it just goes down by itself—glug, glug."
"..." Aaron's face grew even paler, and he dry-heaved a few times, then said helplessly, "Seriously, buddy, I see you're always calm when you come out, your ladder score probably isn't low, so why do you keep torturing yourself with solo runs?"
Of course, it was because solo trials had lower difficulty and less pressure.
This was common knowledge, so Sincere just smiled and didn't answer.
"Hey, by the way, we've been neighbors for so long, but I still don't know which god you follow. Care to share? Who knows, we might get matched up next time, and we could coordinate in advance," Aaron shouted again.
"And you?" Sincere asked in return.
"Me? Didn't I tell you already? I follow the God of ORDER, isn't it obvious? The fire of civilization burns, and order endures!" Aaron said, standing at attention, performing the signature move of a follower of ORDER—right fist lightly tapping the left shoulder.
He did it perfectly and with practiced ease, but Sincere knew he was lying.
This wasn't a conclusion based on reading the other person's micro-expressions and movements—after all, it was hard to see the details from twenty meters away.
This was Sincere's ability.
Or rather, it was the Faith Talent granted by the gods.
Since he started following THAT god, he became unusually sensitive to lies.
As soon as someone lied, he could sense it. Although he couldn't pinpoint exactly which part of their words was the lie, by analyzing the context of the conversation, Sincere could easily guess what was going on.
But even though he knew the guy was lying, he didn't call him out.
After all, neighbors could be useful for some casual chats to kill time. There was no need to make the relationship awkward.
Even if the guy wanted to extend his boundaries and invade Sincere's survival area, any trial would still need Sincere's consent.
As for the trial related to extended space, if the target space didn't belong to anyone, it could be opened freely.
But if the target space was already claimed, the consent of the person who owned it was required to decide whether to enter into a competitive trial or a cooperative one.
No matter what trial it was, Sincere definitely wouldn't agree.
"Hey, man, come on, hiding it isn't any fun. Just say it. It won't affect anything. Are you competing with me or something?" Aaron was probing.
Sincere smirked and started to fight back. "What's your score on the Ladder of Audience? What's your ID? Let me see where you rank."
Aaron froze for a moment, then asked cautiously, "Are you really a follower of ORDER?"
Sincere shook his head, a playful smile forming. "No, I'm a follower of CHAOS."
"..." Aaron was clearly shocked. His pupils dilated and his brow furrowed.
Sincere spoke so calmly, as if he really could check the Ladder of Audience ranking of the Followers of ORDER.
This surprised Aaron. He had thought that Sincere, who often chatted casually with him, was a follower of a more orthodox faith.
But he hadn't expected him to be a follower of CHAOS.
In the Faith Game, there were opposing paths of fate.
Just like Civilization and Chaos, which were two opposing paths of fate.
Some gods of opposing paths of fate even had a Faith Opposition.
For example, the first god of the Civilization Path, ORDER, and the first god of the Chaos Path, CHAOS, were opposites in their beliefs.
Their goals were completely different, and their ideals were worlds apart. As a result, their followers, under the gods' will, harbored mutual hatred.
However, even though their beliefs were opposed, both sides shared the same Ladder of Audience ranking and could see each other's rankings.
The ranking on the Ladder of Audience determined the opportunity to "face the true god and receive divine favor." Therefore, if the higher-ranking players were from opposing beliefs, the weaker side might struggle until the next Ascension.
Aaron changed his expression multiple times. He didn't mention his score and didn't ask any further questions.
Because he wasn't a follower of ORDER.
At that moment, the moonlight fell on his face, but it couldn't brighten the gloom on his expression.
He couldn't quite figure out Sincere's true strength.. "You're not lying to me, are you?"
Sincere smiled. "I never lie to humans."