Global Collapse

Xu Xingcheng held onto the door frame with one hand and scooped up Xiao Hei with the other, striking a very fashionable pose as he spoke.

But no one cared about his actions now. The fat man ignored his awkward posture and said, "Great, Mr. Xie, you're here. We just received a game announcement saying that players are no longer allowed to match dungeons themselves. Come and see what's going on."

This person has so many names it's like they're sold wholesale; Evil God, Slaughter, Xu Xingcheng, and so on take turns appearing.

When the fat man gave him a respectful title, he would use three in a row, and "Mr. Evil" was one of them.

As he spoke, the fat man reached out and pulled Xu Xingcheng into the house.

Xu Xingcheng's carefully arranged pose was ruined, so he could only dust off his clothes and sit down on the sofa as if nothing had happened, putting Xiao Hei aside.

Just as the fat man was about to describe the current situation to him, Xu Xingcheng waved his hand and said, "No need, I heard everything just now."

"That's great," the fat man said happily, not wanting to repeat himself. "Could you analyze this situation for us?"

"It's pretty much what your friend surnamed Chu said. The game developers can't control the dungeons anymore; they can only let them do whatever they want." Xu Xingcheng shared Chu Changge's view. "This is a good thing for everyone!"

This enthusiastic speech immediately attracted Hao Laoshi, who looked over expectantly, as if hoping that Xu Xingcheng could say something succinct.

"The dungeon went crazy, and in the madness, the Earth and the game exploded together! Everyone no longer has to worry about the future. What a wonderful future!"

"Isn't there a gentler ending?" The fat man sweated profusely. "Like the last assumption Brother Chu mentioned earlier, where the world returns to normal..."

He really hoped that Xu Xingcheng would agree with this view.

But Xu Xingcheng was realistic: "How could that be?"

"Why is it impossible?" Hao Laoshi asked anxiously. "If the game completely collapses, there will be no such thing as dungeons in the world, and everyone can return to their lives before the global game started."

"But Earth is also involved in this game. Now that the instance is out of control, it means that Earth can no longer control the game. Do you still expect it to help people kick the instance out of their home planet?"

Xu Xingcheng also offered a new conjecture: "If the dungeon really gets out of control, then I suspect that the players entering the dungeon will also change."

"What kind of changes can players undergo? Are they human before entering the dungeon and turn into Ultraman afterward?" the fat man wondered. "Ultraman is good at fighting monsters, but I wonder if it will be effective against ghosts."

"So you're saying that it's not just 'people' participating in the dungeon anymore?" Guigu suddenly spoke up.

"Is there another dog?" The fat man couldn't help but glance at the little black dog on the sofa, whose head was still pointing out the window and barking.

“And there are NPCs,” Xu Xingcheng spread his hands, “In the past, dungeons were controllable, and you could choose a specific group to enter the dungeon, which was humans on Earth. But now the dungeons are out of control, randomly appearing and randomly pulling people in. So this ‘specific group’ may be broken, and people in the game world may also be pulled into the dungeon. At that time, you may have to do dungeon quests with NPCs;
"Of course, the 'NPCs' I'm referring to aren't the original story characters in the instance, but those that have gained intelligence, like the green-haired one in your apartment."

The fat man, a “high-level NPC,” uttered the advanced term Mr. Green used to describe himself.

Will we be competing against those high-level NPCs in the future?

That way, you'll probably run into a lot of old acquaintances.

A series of haggard faces flashed through the fat man's mind. If what Xu Xingcheng said was true, then these faces would become even more haggard in the future.

But the fat man was still puzzled: "If that's the case, wouldn't the dungeons be attacking indiscriminately? That wouldn't be good for either Earth or the game world, and nobody's going to do anything about it?"

The fat man thought for a moment, but after thinking for a long time, he really couldn't think of anyone who could manage this matter. "It's like the sky wants to rain or a mother wants to remarry, how can you control that? Besides, the lower-dimensional worlds were already on the verge of collapse, and now that things are even worse, there's nothing we can do. Earth might have tried to manage it. I think that island floating in the sky is Earth's doing. Isn't it said to be a paradise without dungeons or dangers? Earth anticipated that the dungeons would go out of control, so it created this place to keep the crazy dungeons out of control. As long as people go up there, they'll be safe."

Xu Xingcheng was referring to the upside-down city.

Let's set aside whether the Upside-Down City can withstand the insane dungeon; even if it could, let's assume it can.

"Isn't this just treating the symptoms, not the root cause? Besides, the place is too small and hard to find, so only a few people can get in."
"This is like going to the apocalypse and not wanting to deal with it, building a spaceship, putting a bunch of people on board, and escaping. It's so despicable... Doctor, when are we getting on the spaceship?"

Gu Mian: "..."

Xu Xingcheng said, "If we want to make more discoveries, we really need to go to that island to take a look. Didn't you originally plan to go there to take a look as well?"

"The only train between the Upside-Down City and the surface hasn't started running yet; you'll have to go early Sunday morning to get there." Gu Mian planned to go up and check it out this Sunday.

Xu Xingcheng pondered for a moment: "I heard there's a rule on the island that once you come down, you can't go back. Have you considered staying up there?"

"It can let me stay up there?" Gu Mian felt that he would be grateful if the car didn't die on the way to pick him up. Earth wouldn't want to put a bomb in its safe haven.

Xu Xingcheng nodded earnestly: "That's the truth. But if you're going up, your children should come with you, since there's a risk of them not coming back."

Guigu's friend never returned. He said he would definitely come down when he left, but soon after, he fell silent and disappeared.

To this day, I still don't know what happened to this friend up there.

Everyone present turned their attention to Guigu.

Guigu also thought of his friend: "He is not the kind of person who would break his word. Something must have happened to him up there."

Whether the accident came from the upside-down city itself or was man-made remains unknown.

If it comes from the Upside-Down City, it means that even this "safe haven for humanity" is not safe.

The fat man thought of another person who had been to the Upside-Down City: "Miss Anzhi Tinglan has also been up there. Her experience was quite exciting."

Anzhi Tinglan had fought monster encounters in the underground cave above. According to her description, the Upside-Down City was extremely dangerous; if you threw a brick on the ground, you could hit seven or eight ghosts.

This is completely different from what Guigu's friend described. Guigu's friend said that it was extremely safe up there, everything was normal, and the people were quite kind, although he didn't know where they came from.

But in the end, Anzhi Tinglan, who had encountered danger, came down from above unharmed, while her friend who said the Upside-Down City was safe mysteriously disappeared.

Another strange thing is that Anzhi Tinglan told them that the buildings in the city were all upside down, but Guigu's friend never mentioned this.

My friend went up to investigate, and such a special and strange piece of information should have been shared with others immediately, but he didn't say anything.

Is it possible that each upside-down city is different? The one that Guigu's friend went up to was a normal building, while the one Gu Mian is here is upside down?

Or perhaps the city that Guigu's friend visited was actually upside down, but something blinded him, making him unaware that he was in an inverted city?
Under what circumstances would a person be unaware of the inversion of their surroundings?
And why were Guigu's friends deceived, while Anzhi and Tinglan remained normal? (End of Chapter)