Secret World: I Became a God Through Lies

Chapter 170 Haiyuan's Rebellion Theater

"On the stage of fate, the audience doesn't watch how well you perform, but when you collapse."

The abyss is silent.

Calvino walked on the cobblestone streets of the sleeping sea city, and the soles of his boots splashed a layer of foamy water covered with coral algae.

The sea building was high and tilted, and the oppressive feeling was like a dome overturning. His figure was repeatedly cut into pieces in the weightless reflection.
The sky above and the seabed have long lost their boundaries, as if stepping into the afterlife dream of an ancient civilization.

Several deep-sea demon fish glided by quietly, their bodies transparent, outlining veins of light flowing in the darkness on both sides of the street.

Those are the traces of veins left by the origin of the Dream Sea, and also a sign that some ancient existence is still watching this place.

Calvino lowered his head and lightly touched a card on the lining of his coat with his fingertips.

The dark blue cover reflected a faint light, the mask pattern was faintly visible, and a chill meandered up along the spine of the life pattern.

"The lost scholar." He whispered.

That was the card Siming gave him before he left the team.

——"This card is not suitable for me, but you...maybe it can be used."

He remembered Sima Ming's cynical eyes at that moment, but at that moment they were calmer than fate, as if he had already seen through this dream.

"Do you know what you are doing?" Baroque interrupted his recollection, swinging his axe impatiently.

An axe chopped off the dark purple coralline algae coiled around the street corner, and a strong fishy and salty smell filled the air.

"This water smells even more disgusting than the Imperial sewers. Captain, how much longer do we have to go? Ian and the others have already finished their fight!"

Calvino raised the corners of his mouth slightly, but his eyes did not leave the gradually brightening scenery ahead.

"Don't worry," he said. "They may be more anxious than us."

Baroque snorted and shook off the slime on the axe blade. "Don't beat around the bush with me. I just want to know if I can chop something solid."

As he finished speaking, a faint blue halo suddenly appeared in front of him. It was not a magic fish, nor was it the natural fire flowing on the seabed, but rather - human voices and lights.

It was a kind of "liveliness" that did not belong to the deep sea.

Calvino stopped immediately and narrowed his eyes.

"This isn't...the light from the Lantern Festival," he whispered.

"This is the abyss." Baroque frowned and spoke in a vigilant voice, "Who else but a ghost could be so noisy?"

The two walked side by side towards the light source.

After passing through a broken archway, they saw -

It was a theater.

A theater that should not exist in reality, nor should it be born in dreams.

It seemed like a temple pieced together from the dreams of the dead and the fragments of deep-sea shipwrecks, with its colonnades supported by twisted spines.

The platform is carved from fossilized coral, and the dome is half collapsed, like a whale bone with its mouth open.

The auditorium spiraled upward, layer upon layer, reaching up to an invisible dome.

Each floor is filled with sea ghosts—they have blurry faces, empty eye sockets, and wear long-rotten dresses.
Like cursed spirits nailed to seats, they stared at the stage in unison, silently, without blinking, as if waiting for a grand sacrifice to take place.

There was no air in the theater, but it was filled with the salty, rotten water pressure and the impenetrable dampness.

The flames were actually jumping in the water. It was a dark blue fire, which made the curtain look mottled, as if a giant memory that was slowly rotting was hidden behind the curtain.

In the center of the stage, a play has begun.

There are no actors, no scenery, only the flames themselves performing.

The dark blue flames turned into a vortex, rolling up the dreams and shadows of the past, as if the memory itself had been pressed the play button.
It was torn apart, twisted, and forcibly interpreted into another unrecognizable story.

Just as they looked around alertly, a cold yet gentle voice suddenly rang out from the sea. It was unclear whether it was whispered or seeping from the cracks of the entire sea city:

"Welcome to the Dream Theater."

"This is the dream of deep sleep."

"I am Sabellius, the director of the Dream Script."

"And the writer of your destiny."

The voice did not come from a certain place, but from the depths of each of their consciousness.
It was like lines written into my mind, forcibly awakened by some irresistible script.

Calvino's expression suddenly changed, and he instinctively reached for his holster: "Be careful, Baroque! Don't—"

"Impulsive?" Baroque roared, taking a step forward, and the giant axe swept out with anger, chopping down at a ghost spectator who was slowly approaching them!
That blow was as powerful as a tsunami crashing against the shore, unreservedly using all his muscle and fury! But—it was ineffective.

The axe blade pierced the ghost like a knife through the sea. There was no sound of bone breaking,

There was no splash of blood mist, only the audience's body swayed slightly, and even his standing posture did not change.

He slowly raised his blurry and distorted face, raised his hand towards Baroque, and made an extremely contemptuous and insulting gesture—

The fingers seemed like dried-up bones of a dead person, and the joints made a slight crackling sound, as if mocking the ignorant struggles of mortals.

next second.

The “sleepless pocket watch” on Baroque’s wrist suddenly made a crisp “click”.

He suddenly lowered his head - the pointer had moved three times and stopped at three o'clock.

——The lucidity value dropped by thirty points.

"Damn it!" Baroque groaned, feeling dizzy and his consciousness seemed to be surrounded by thick fog. His feet went weak and he almost stumbled and fell.

He suddenly realized that a part of him had just been "swallowed" - not his body, but some deeper "sense of existence".

Calvino grabbed him and whispered, "The show is open."

His voice was low, but it carried a warning that could not be ignored:
"This is not acting."

"It's the script of fate."

At this moment, the air seemed to freeze briefly.

An extremely inappropriate chuckle sounded, as if the director pressed the first curtain lever behind the scenes.

Sabellius' voice rang out again, a mixture of sarcasm and contempt:
"it's useless."

“In my theater, the audience is the real god.”

"If you touch them, your lucidity will be lost."

"Even if you run away, they will still watch you take your final bow."

"You want to live?" He drawled, his laughter tearing holes in every nerve.
"Haha, you can only act according to my script."

The next moment, a layer of misty and inky water vapor suddenly rose in front of the theater stage, like the breath from the bottom of the sea slowly rising.

A light curtain then unfolded in the mist, as if the projection of fate itself emerged on it.

That was not an ordinary play text, but pages of script fragments with beating pulses, rolling and burning in the light curtain. Each page was like the corpse in a play after the skin was peeled off from a human dream, staring at them.

At that moment, they seemed to realize that the so-called "theater" was not for them to perform.

Instead, let them perform for fate.

An ancient plaque emerged from the void, the inscription old and clear:
Play: The Fate of the Rebel

Protagonist: Italo Calvino (The Betrayer)
Supporting role: Baroque (the betrayed)
Setting: Former comrades on the Lost, on the most critical night of decision, the captain personally closed the dream door.

Baroque was left in a nightmare. Trust collapsed, anger ignited, and revenge came like a burning sea breeze.

Goal guidance: Perform an unforgettable betrayal and build the peak of conflict with fragments of trust.

The audience ratings determine whether you can walk out of the theater or become a prop in this play forever.

Around them, the ghostly audience, originally as still as dead, began to wriggle, their necks stiffly turning towards the stage.
Some suppressed excitement seemed to ignite in the empty eye sockets, and the heavy script in his hand was opened, waiting for the next line to sound.

The main lights in the theater suddenly came on.

It was an extremely strange light, as if all the deep sea light of the entire sea city was focused here.

The figures of Calvino and Baroque were projected in the beam of light, so clear that even their skeletal lines seemed exposed to the audience.

The stage is the trial ground for dreams.

The air became thin, as if even breathing had to be coordinated with the rhythm of the script.

Calvino stood at the edge of the stage, slowly loosening his fingers from the gun handle, his eyes as deep as an old harbor.

He turned his head slightly and glanced at Baroque. There was pain, guilt, and an inescapable calmness in that look.

He said softly:
“…The show has begun.”

"To act is to survive; not to act is to sleep."

"But if the plot is already predetermined, then is struggling just another arrangement?"

(End of this chapter)