Chapter 61: I Am You, You Are Me

Chapter 61: I Am You, You Are Me

In the dim high-rise apartment, Robert shrank beneath the balcony railing, cautiously poking his head out to observe the madmen wandering the street below.

"Why do those crazy people seem to have more energy with each passing day?"

His years of experience as a police officer made him more observant of subtle details.

Robert rubbed his chin in bewilderment. Realizing that this particular detail was of no practical use to him, he retreated on tiptoe back into the living room.

Snap!

A soft sound came from the adjacent bedroom.

Startled, Robert couldn't help whispering a complaint toward the bedroom from which the noise originated: "Mike, what are you searching for? Aren't you done yet?"

"Found it."

Mike's voice was tinged with excitement as he emerged carrying an object with both hands. "I knew a high-end apartment like this would definitely have one of these. My guess was right."

Through the faint, bloody crimson glow shining in from outside, the object was barely discernible.

A civilian drone.

Robert was baffled. "What are you doing with a drone?"

"Live streaming, of course. Since Jiang isn't around here and I don't have the ability to go looking for him, using this drone is a great alternative."

Mike flicked on his cell phone's flashlight, checking the equipment attached to the drone while saying happily, "There's even a broadcasting setup mounted right on top, and the resolution is much better than my phone's. I feel like my luck today is good enough to go buy a lottery ticket."

"You're still thinking about live streaming at a time like this?"

Robert's face was full of astonishment; he realized he could no longer understand the mindset of modern youth.

Mike replied casually, "You know my dream is to be a top-tier reporter!"

"What does being a reporter have to do with live streaming?"

"Of course it does. I'm in charge of the commentary, isn't that basically what a reporter does?"

"Fine."

Robert slapped his forehead, deciding he didn't want to speak anymore.

Mike logged his own account into the broadcasting equipment beneath the drone, then restarted the stream that he had previously cut off.

The chat room, which had been silent for several minutes, rapidly filled with a surge of scrolling comments.

"Hello everyone, I'm your streamer Mike. I know what you want to see. Although I don't dare to go out and look for Jiang, I've found a good helper now, and it will help me find Jiang."

Mike greeted the lens and began operating the remote control.

The drone slowly lifted off.

It glided straight out from the balcony and flew toward the red pillar of light located several kilometers away.

Both the drone and the remote control were equipped with extended-range control devices. Theoretically, the maximum controllable distance could reach up to twenty kilometers, which was more than enough to fly over to that red pillar of light.

Learning that Mike intended to use the drone to search for Jiang Ren, the viewership of the live stream—which had dropped by more than half—began climbing rapidly at a visible rate.

—— "The streamer has finally upgraded from a slingshot to a cannon, worth celebrating!"

—— "Hurry, hurry, hurry, I want to see the big guy!"

—— "I didn't really believe in the existence of Scavengers before, but after seeing them take action in several different live streams, I knew I was wrong. It turns out Jiang really is a Scavenger."

—— "Somehow, those other Scavengers still seem a bit inferior compared to Jiang, for some reason."

—— "It's not just a bit inferior. Jiang only took three years to stand at the absolute peak of the Scavengers. His talent and abilities are explosively powerful; can ordinary Scavengers compare to him?"

—— "Too terrifying to mess with. I thought all Scavengers were this strong, turns out Jiang is just way too overpowered..."

Mike maneuvered the drone, interacting with the chat room from time to time.

Flying in a straight line, they quickly covered the distance of several kilometers.

The drone descended slowly, finally hovering atop a tall building dozens of meters away from the red pillar of light, aiming its camera directly at the beam.

"Jiang isn't outside. Did he go inside?"

Robert had already taken out his phone and was now watching the feed from Mike's live stream.

"Should I control the drone to fly a bit closer? Or see if it can enter that red pillar?"

Mike addressed the chat room, preparing to check the viewers' opinions when he suddenly heard a chorus of overlapping roars echoing from outside.

Bizarre, chaotic, and eerie.

These sounds rolled in like sonic waves, one after another, each more piercing and deafening than the last, feeling as though they might puncture one's eardrums.

Trapped inside the high-rise, both Mike and Robert instinctively covered their ears, yet the faint sounds still leaking into their ears induced a nauseating sense of sickness.

After a full several minutes, the roaring finally ceased.

Robert and Mike peeked out from the balcony and discovered that the madmen wandering the streets had vanished, replaced by monstrous humanoid beasts standing two to three meters—or even five to six meters—tall. Their bizarre and grotesque shapes looked as though a dozen individuals had been fused together into one.

These monsters were far more terrifying than the madmen, and right now, they were frantically tearing down the surrounding buildings.

Witnessing this scene, the two men exchanged a glance and immediately slipped quietly into an interior bedroom, pulling the door shut tightly as if that could grant them a semblance of safety.

In the live stream, which had fallen silent for a few minutes, messages began frantically flooding the screen.

—— "What kind of garbage real-world game is this? Humans are weak as hell, and not only do the monsters never get tired and have no fear of death, but they can actually evolve too?"

—— "So terrifying. I watched with my own eyes as a two-story-tall monster smashed right through a wall."

—— "I thought monsters only appeared on my side, turns out we're all in the same boat."

—— "Help! Can someone please save me, a monster just spotted me!"

—— "My side hasn't been discovered by monsters yet, but one of them is continuously destroying the houses around me. I feel like it's going to reach my building sooner or later."

—— "Hey, buddy asking for help, are you still okay?"

—— "Probably gone. Haven't seen him post anything since that last message."

—— "What kind of world is this? I worked hard for decades, finally paid off my mortgage and car loan, only to be told the apocalypse has arrived! What a bullsh*t life!"

……

"Who are you?"

In a crimson-hued space where bubbling, scalding magma surrounded them on all sides, dark red boulders stood isolated here and there.

Jiang Ren stood atop one of the stones, expressionlessly gazing down at the magma.

Earlier, the moment his left hand touched the red pillar of light, he found that he had lost all control over his body, and his consciousness had been dragged into this peculiar space.

"After spending so much time together, you still don't know who I am?"

On a boulder opposite him, a human-sized, pure white silhouette of light materialized.

Jiang Ren looked at it, his expression unchanging.

"I am you, you are me."

The light figure didn't mind his silence, smiling as it spoke, "The answers you want to find are already inside your mind. Think carefully!"

Before Jiang Ren could speak, he felt a wave of unfamiliar memories flood into his consciousness.

A name surfaced.

Azathoth!

He clearly remembered hearing this name before within the church of the God of Omniscience.

"Left arm, right eye, heart, the blood-moon mutation, the red pillar of light, and the 'dome' isolating the inside from the outside..."

Through the newly acquired memories, Jiang Ren finally understood what all of this was truly about.