The Last 299 Days of Humanity

Chapter 106 Talking about metaphysics and illusions
Sometimes you have to know when to quit while you're ahead, and besides, Yu Qing knew he wasn't necessarily smarter than the big-headed man. He'd only won one round through a clever trick; it was time to leave with Furong and the others.

The loser is usually not satisfied, so the big-headed man blushed and asked for another round, or best of three or best of five.

These people are useless at everything, but they're incredibly serious about this.

Yu Qing just wanted to get away as quickly as possible so he wouldn't fall for that trick. He smiled and said, "I'm tired today. If I'm interested, we can talk another day when I have time."

The big-headed man stood in front of them, showing no intention of moving aside.

Yu Qing said, "What, swordsmiths nowadays tend to force everything, don't they?"

The big-headed man had no choice but to step aside, pointing to a plate of fruit beside him, and said with ill intent, "Please make yourself at home, sir. Take a step and come to the peaches."

Yu Qing sensed a hidden meaning in his words. The "do as you please" he said sounded like "you're shit," so he was insulting him: You're shit, you ran away after playing one game of chess.

Yu Qing suppressed his anger and said with a smile, "It's kind of you to go to such trouble. I'll come and visit in a couple of days."

The other party seemed to realize that he was being mocked, meaning: "You son of a bitch, you're discouraged? I'll wait two days before I pick you out."

After Yu Qing finished speaking, he quickly left.

Sometimes, clever people can be incredibly annoying when they're mischievous; you can't survive in this place without being shrewd and resourceful. Therefore, Yu Qing decided not to stay overnight at Jian Gong and wanted to head straight to the next city.

But in a place where clever people like swordsmiths lived, how could they let a passerby like Yu Qing take advantage and leave? Just as he was about to leave the city, several big men came over with smiles and insisted on inviting him to their "humble abode" as a guest, to be treated to a lavish meal.

Yu Qing knew perfectly well that they were all hypocrites, probably just looking for a way to humiliate him and save face. Therefore, he absolutely couldn't fall for their tricks.

But if he refused outright, he would seem like an ungrateful barbarian. If he made up an excuse to refuse, he would have to come up with a bunch of lies.

Sometimes a soft knife is harder to deal with than a hard one. They kept showering him with compliments, calling him "charming and elegant," "highly talented," and "learned," urging him to "condescend" and "be generous with his guidance."

They bombarded him with words, not even giving Yu Qing a chance to reply, causing him to forget the excuse he had finally come up with.

After a while, Yu Qing realized that they were deliberately stalling for time. The notice when he entered the city had already stated that the Swordsmith's Workshop would close after 4 p.m. to prepare for the public debate that would begin at 5 p.m.

The swordsmiths believed that their philosophy and worldview were the greatest and most correct in the world, so they gathered in nine large venues every day from 5 pm to 8 pm to debate.

Of course, you can participate in the debate online from home, but unless there are special reasons, sword workers usually attend the meeting in person, which they consider a matter of course.

Since humanity was no longer troubled by material life, it began to make extreme improvements to its organs and functions. After a short period of calm, it began to repeatedly seek verification of things in ideology.

The meaning of life was a subject of debate among swordsmiths for forty-seven years. The debate resulted in the formation of five distinct schools of swordsmithing, each residing in one of the five districts: East, West, South, North, and Central.

Explaining these schools of thought in a few words is as difficult as answering how many fish are in the ocean. This is because the five major schools contain countless branches and subgroups. The five major schools share only one consensus: the existence of human consciousness is the ultimate meaning of life.

Therefore, it's not hard to understand why swordsmiths all have large heads. They need to fill their heads with more things to prove their value in life.

These big shots today are from the West District. They are very dissatisfied that Yu Qing, with such a small mind, managed to stump their own people. But the contradiction is that they also hope that Yu Qing is better than them and can embarrass those stubborn guys from the East District.

Therefore, they deliberately harassed Yu Qing, preventing him from leaving the city and forcing him to participate in the East District debate that evening. Their plan was shrewd: if he lost, he would be the one who lost face, and they would also get revenge for him; conversely, if he won, he would also help them humiliate those self-righteous guys in the East and West Districts.

Yu Qing was unaware of these circumstances beforehand and was only focused on escaping their harassment. Now that he knew he couldn't leave the city, he could only point absentmindedly in the opposite direction and say, "I'm so sorry, I have a few friends I arranged to meet up there..."

Seeing that their goal had been achieved, the group of burly men quickly shut up. One of them even said, "Since you have made an appointment, sir, we wish you a pleasant time. We are also going to a place not far away, so why don't we travel together for a bit and chat a bit?"

At this point, Yu Qing and his group had no choice but to head east. After the big-headed men left, they walked a little further, leaving them far behind.

By this time, they had arrived in the heart of the eastern district of Jian Gong, and everyone was beginning to head towards the debate venue. Yu Qing asked one of the leaders for directions to the hotel.

The man glanced at Yu Qing and was overjoyed. He had finally caught a fool! He proudly told Yu Qing, "Stopping people to ask for information is something from centuries ago in our sword-making world. Here, if you want to know anything, you ask Ruyi Star."

Yu Qing asked somewhat awkwardly, "Ruyi Star? We're just passing through, we don't know about it..."

"That's true. Such advanced technology isn't available everywhere. Ruyi Star is an intelligent satellite we've placed in the sky. As long as we wave our hand to summon it and ask it any questions, it will answer them all. However, you'll need to have a small chip implanted in your ear."

After rambling on for a while, Yu Qing still didn't say what he wanted to know. Seeing the displeasure on his face, the man said, "At this time, all the hotels and such are closed; everyone's gone to the debate venue. There's food and drink there, you can even lie down and rest—everything's free, isn't that better?"

Yu Qing said, "We... just want to rest, we don't want to..."

"No problem. Actually, eight or nine out of ten people who go there are just there to watch the show. Some people are even lying there snoring loudly, and nobody cares! Besides, it's open 24 hours a day."

So Yu Qing made a decision he would later deeply regret: he decided to join in the fun.

He regretted it as soon as he stepped into the debate room because he was too easily recognizable; his physical features were too different from those of the big-headed man.

The person who brought him there didn't lie to him, and no one really paid attention to the others coming and going.

But his appearance immediately drew everyone's attention. When the swordsmiths saw him, they all burst into laughter. Perhaps in their eyes, Yu Qing was a pitiful wretch with strong limbs but a pitifully small mind.

Moreover, they maliciously pushed him to the front. Since he was already there, Yu Qing had no choice but to bite the bullet and follow their lead. He clasped his hands together and said, "Excuse me, I'm just passing through and happened to be enjoying your eloquent speeches." This was polite enough that the others didn't bother him any further. However, Yao Dan and the others were turned away at the door because they didn't meet the basic requirements to participate in the activity.

Before the formal debate, the big-headed men huddled together, whispering and talking animatedly. Yu Qing leaned back in his chair and dozed off. He wasn't faking it; he was genuinely tired.

The people around him were arguing incessantly, and Yu Qing couldn't actually fall asleep either. He heard them arguing fiercely about what the largest number in the world was.

One person thought that "9" was the largest number in the world because after 9, you have to start from the smallest number again. The ratio of 10 is 9+1, which left Yu Qing completely confused.

That person even quoted classical texts, saying that people have understood this fact since ancient times, which is why the most sublime place is called "Nine Heavens," the highest power is the supreme ruler, the heaviest thing is the nine tripods weighing a thousand jun, the greatest suffering is nine deaths and one life, and the darkest place is the underworld...

但另一个人却认为“3”是世界上最大的数，因为3以后的数都是从3和比3小的数演化而来的，比如4就是3+1，5是3+2，6是2个3，7是3+3+1，至于9不过是3+3+3而已。

He further cited classical texts, saying that the ancients understood this principle. "The Tao gives birth to One, One gives birth to Two, Two gives birth to Three, Three gives birth to all things. Since all things originate from Three, what could be greater than the Three Greats?"

Yu Qing couldn't help but chuckle upon hearing this. Those men, despite their low opinion of him, all wanted to win him over to their side and ridicule the other man.

"Are you laughing at the absurdity of the claim that 3 is the largest number in the world?"

"Sir, you must think that the claim that 9 is the largest number in the world is nonsense."

Yu Qing didn't want to join their debate. But after they repeatedly asked him to take a stand, he decided to compromise and casually said, "I've always thought 1 was the largest number in the world."

Everyone laughed and said, "What a simple way of thinking! Someone actually thinks 1 is the largest number in the world. This is not even a debate; it was over before it even started."

余庆不服气地说：“诸位可想过这个问题，1以后就不需要其他数了？2是1+1，3是1+1+1，9也是1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1+1。只不过人脑再大也容易弄混了，所以给1+1+1起个简易符号叫3…”

Everyone was stunned. To refute his logic, one must first refute one's own. This guy, several times larger than the other, couldn't even win an argument—it was truly embarrassing. Perhaps this guy had been taught everything he was saying.

Some of them waved their hands towards the sky, seemingly summoning their lucky star to search for Yu Qing's background information. However, at this time, Yu Qing was still unknown, so there was naturally no information available. But the news that he came from the West District still spread.

People thought he was sent by that bunch of cowards from the West District to cause trouble. The people who had just been arguing were naturally furious, and one of them directly challenged them, saying, "Sir, do you keep dogs there?"

Yu Qing didn't know why he asked that, and simply said, "I won't raise them."

Why not try raising one?

Yu Qing said, "I don't have that hobby, but I do have a smart dog."

The crowd burst into laughter, and someone shouted, "He knows that owning a dog is not as good as buying a smart dog! Especially a dog from Xicheng District."

It was only then that Yu Qing realized they had treated him like a lackey of the West District and had insulted him without even asking what had happened.

This infuriated Yu Qing, who sarcastically remarked, "You all don't know this, but recently my smart dog has developed a 'susceptibility to air' problem, and its head is swollen bigger than a watermelon. I'm planning to come to Dongcheng District to buy a few dogs to raise."

At this moment, someone shouted, "Throw this unevolved fossil out!"

However, the leader knew they had no advantage whatsoever if it came to a fight, so no one else chimed in. Someone said, "Listen to me, we should debate, not attack. Since this gentleman came from the West District, is he here to participate in our debate?"

Yu Qing said, "Although I came from the West District, I have no connection with them. I'm not here to debate. As I said beforehand, I'm just passing through and watching the show. If you're not happy, I'll leave now."

"Since you have no connection with people from the West District, I suppose you came to our East District because you dislike them?"

Yu Qing answered honestly, "You could say that..."

"So we should be friends, right? People in the West District think life is worthless, just a fleeting moment, so they should just let their horses run wild and live a life of debauchery. What do you think, sir?"

"That's the view of cowards. They're afraid to face all the problems and don't want to try to change the status quo, so they're just making an excuse for their cowardice."

A large-headed man quickly grabbed Yu Qing's hand and said, "How insightful! The term 'coward' is so apt."

However, he suddenly noticed the ring on Yu Qing's hand and waved his hand towards the sky, trying to summon their auspicious star to identify it. Yu Qing hurriedly withdrew his hand.

At this point, the other leaders began to convey the Dongcheng District's ideology to Yu Qing. They wanted Yu Qing to acknowledge that the value of life lies in an individual's ability to control themselves and everything around them.

Yu Qing merely gave them ambiguous responses, not wanting to delve deeper into the discussion. He had long seen through it; their so-called debate, whether right or wrong, wasn't about correcting their own flaws and errors, but rather about getting the other side to acknowledge that they were the correct one.

Yu Qing did not explicitly agree with their views, which displeased them. They felt that Yu Qing was not smart enough and that talking to someone with such low intelligence was like talking to a brick wall. Therefore, their attitudes changed completely, and no one paid any attention to him anymore.

Yu Qing seized the opportunity to slip away. But just as he reached the door, the burly man who had been holding his hand earlier ran over and said humbly, "Sir, please wait a moment. Could we talk in the private room at the back? Please do me the honor."

Yu Qing was baffled. These people were fickle, and Yu Qing had no desire to deal with them, so he said with unusual firmness, "I have to go. Look, there are people waiting for me outside."

"We apologize for our poor treatment of you."

Why was he suddenly being so attentive? Yu Qing felt that if he stayed any longer, these people would drive him crazy sooner or later. He didn't want to waste any more words and decided to leave directly.

(End of this chapter)