Chapter Eighty-Five: The Heavenly God Descends

"You... you... what did you say?" Feiyin's response left Fo Xiao stunned. "You're not joking, are you?"

"I'm not. I mean it," Feiyin said. Though her expression was relaxed, she didn't seem to be joking at all.

"Didn't we just finish selling..." Fo Xiao looked completely bewildered.

"Is there any law that prohibits players from selling equipment? We're selling boxing gloves, not selling bugs. Level 2 boxing gloves—we aren't stealing them from anyone, so why shouldn't we sell them? Besides, don't you all use secondary accounts to sell them? Who would know it was us?"

"But... this... that..." Fo Xiao’s brain seemed to have ground to a halt.

As we spoke, we had already exited the city, and the crowd began to thin out. Feiyin looked around, and seeing no one else, she explained:

"...At first, I thought if we could keep the secret of this bug to ourselves, that would be best. But after thinking it over, I realized this kind of thing is impossible to hide. Even if only the three of us know, and the others in the guild don't, there's no guarantee someone else won't discover it and make it public. Once everyone is walking around with a pair of boxing gloves, this bug will be worthless. Keeping the secret to ourselves would be pointless."

"So, I had to find a way to maximize the profits from this bug. Selling for money is the most realistic approach, but we are weak on our own. We absolutely cannot compete with those large guilds. We have to seize the market while others are just finding out, create maximum profit, and simultaneously leak the news to other guilds so they can help us block individual players from accessing this bug, giving us a window to offload our stock."

"We calculated that there are fewer than twenty spots where these boxing gloves drop, and the production capacity is fixed. If we only told one guild, they would quickly reach a point where everyone had a pair, so they wouldn't be able to hold the monopoly for long. Even if they wanted to monopolize it, they are too weak to do it alone. If others came to raid them, they wouldn't be able to defend it. By telling five guilds at once, their speeds will check each other, leaving us more time to clear our inventory."

"Now that we've reached this point, the market is mature, competition has intensified, and it has reached a state of saturation. It's entirely a buyer's market; profits have been shaved thin, and you can't get a good price anymore. Only those with the deepest resources can survive. At this stage, whoever tries to jump in now can just wait to be squeezed out by those monopoly enterprises—no, I mean monopoly guilds." Saying this, Feiyin patted my shoulder. "Don't you agree, Jeff?"

"Hmm? What are you talking about?" Between "production capacity" and "monopoly," I was feeling quite dazed.

Feiyin’s expression darkened instantly, and I sensed a dangerous aura closing in. I immediately perked up, raised my arms, and shouted:

"Whatever decision our Guild Leader proposes, we will resolutely defend! Whatever instructions our Guild Leader gives, we will follow them unswervingly!"

The Guild Leader’s expression cleared up instantly, and she said insincerely, "Haha, little comrade, let's not engage in personality cults..."

"But, but..." Fo Xiao still couldn't wrap his head around it. "...then you didn't have to be in such a rush to report it to the GM either..."

Hearing Fo Xiao, Feiyin looked at him with exasperation. "How can you be so dim? The matter is already known to everyone. Even if you don't say it and I don't say it, someone else will sooner or later. Even if no one ever said it, such an obvious thing would eventually be discovered by the GMs anyway. Since it's bound to be exposed, we might as well report it first. You know, reporting a bug comes with a reward—how could we let others get to it first?" She paused. "...That’s the first reason."

"And the second?" I asked, picking up where she left off.

"I loathe all forms of monopolistic organizations!" Feiyin said through gritted teeth.

"That's just because you couldn't monopolize it yourself..." Fo Xiao's expression was peculiar.

Although I didn't know what they meant by "monopoly," my keen instincts as a Level 49 Battle Warrior told me that Fo Xiao was speaking the truth.

What exactly were GMs and bugs? I had never quite figured that out. I had vaguely heard my Sky-Walker friends mention that GMs seemed to be something everyone wanted to catch, while bugs seemed to be a group of nobles enjoying absolute governing power.

...Wait, let me correct that; I think I got it backward. Bugs are pests, and GMs are the nobles.

But that was actually irrelevant. Bugs and GMs, pests and nobles—there wasn't much difference between them. Most of the time, they were the same thing. In my view, the very existence of GMs might be a massive bug—the vast majority of nobles are just parasites!

If I had truly understood what a GM meant beforehand, I would never have entertained such blasphemous and dangerous thoughts.

Feiyin led us to a mountain hollow in the southwest corner of Reed City. It was a barren, desolate place, far from the city, and the monsters weren't very high-level, so few people ever visited this half-baked ghost town. Even in normal times, few people came here to grind, let alone now, when everyone was distracted by the rumors of the boxing gloves. Who would waste their time in this wasteland?

So, when we arrived, it was just as we had hoped—not a single outsider was around.

Feiyin took out her magic book and turned to a page filled with strange magical symbols. I remembered it was called the "System," but I never understood what it was for. I only instinctively felt that the page was imbued with powers that did not belong to this world, preventing me from daring to try it.

Feiyin placed her hand on the magical symbols, wearing a solemn expression. She spoke rapidly in a tone filled with piety and supplication: "Report to GM: System Bug."

I guessed she was casting some kind of special summoning magic, but her incantation was so simple and plain that one couldn't feel any magical resonance. Just as I was doubting whether her magic would work...

A soft, humming sound suddenly resonated through the air, vibrating incessantly near my ears. The sound had a simple rhythm, repeating monotonously, yet it was like a song, magnificent and grand, never becoming tiresome. Hearing it made me feel at peace, my whole body overflowing with a sense of being blessed and cherished.

A holy radiance suddenly shot down from thin air, piercing the already bright sky and drawing a perfect circle at our feet. In the air, the holy light rippled in layers. Though gentle and soft, it remained dense and concentrated, outlining a massive, shimmering pillar of light that reached straight to the heavens, making one look up in awe.

Looking up, I saw a black shadow descending slowly through the air, carried along the trajectory of the holy light. It looked vaguely like a man. Because of the backlight, I couldn't see his face clearly, but I was certain he was not a creature of this mortal realm. He came from that most exalted divine dwelling far beyond the heavens. He might even be a god himself—at least a divine messenger bearing the favor of the gods. Because behind him were the holy marks that did not belong to this world—a pair of huge, white wings.

These wings blotted out a piece of the sky, casting a holy shadow on the ground that covered my lowly body. Honestly, I was deeply shaken, moved to tears. Don't mock me; I bet if you witnessed such a magnificent sight with your own eyes, you wouldn't perform any better than I did. Aside from reverence and happiness, there was no room left in my heart for anything else.

"GMs really are just bird-people..." Fo Xiao glanced at the sky, indifferent.

"His equipment must be worth a fortune!" Feiyin drooled as she calculated, as if she were watching a money bag filled with gold bars descending from the sky.

Well... fine, I admit, there will always be some people whose faith in the divine is not so firm and pious, but I must emphasize—they are, after all, a tiny minority.

But what the hell—why did it seem like everyone I met belonged to that tiny minority?

Regardless of the two heretics beside me, I was currently immersed in a violent emotional upheaval. Who could have imagined that I would one day possess such immense glory, to witness the descent of a divine being at close range, and even bathe in his holy shadow? I wanted to scream with happiness, or perhaps kneel devoutly on the ground to express the excitement in my heart with my entire being. But at this moment, my throat was dry and raspy, my knees were stiff and shaking, and my whole body felt like a rock, so tense that I couldn't move a muscle. I could only express my overwhelming, irrepressible reverence with a pure, forty-five-degree gaze upward.

This was the closest I had ever been to holiness in my life, and I truly wished such a moment would never pass. However, just a moment later, the sudden appearance of a crow ruined everything...

"Caw... caw..." A pitch-black shadow streaked through the air, making an annoying sound as it flew. Not too early, not too late, just as the heavenly god descended to the same altitude, the crow happened to dive right into the holy light and crashed headlong into the arms of the winged god.

"Oh... oh no... what is this... get away... I can't control it... help, help me..." The sudden appearance of the crow seemed to disrupt the rhythm of the god's descent. He began to scramble in the air, seemingly struggling to keep his balance. Because he was floating in mid-air, his hands and feet found nothing to grab onto, and he could only wave them helplessly while his wings flapped stiffly, making him look like—forgive my blasphemy—a toad being fished out of a ditch.

His panicked struggle not only failed to help him regain his balance but actually accelerated his descent. Finally, when he was about thirty paces from the ground, the venerable god completely lost his balance. With his rear to the heavens and his head toward the earth, he presented us with a textbook trajectory of free-fall motion.

"Ah... thud... ouch!" The god's holy cry cut a sharp line through the air, ending his brief flight with a massive bang. The moment he landed, a crushing divine pressure, mixed with swirling dust, rushed toward us, making me involuntarily hold my breath and close my eyes. At that moment, I truly felt the air groaning and the earth beneath my feet trembling in fear.

Of course, if a giant boulder fell from the sky instead of a god, you would also feel the earth tremble. But I am absolutely certain that these two tremors were completely different.

How were they different? Honestly, I couldn't tell you.

Anyway, they were different!

"Caw... caw..." The crow's malicious cawing came from the sky.

As expected of a god. Despite a small accident, falling from such a height to the ground, he still maintained a posture of awe-inspiring solemnity, his body as straight and upright as a javelin. Straight into the ground before me.

Regrettably, when I hoped to catch a glimpse of his solemn divine face, I encountered a technical difficulty—I’m afraid we would have to pull his head out of the dirt first.

Yes, just as you imagined. Our great god’s head was buried deep into the soil—actually, not just half his head; his shoulders and half his arms were also shoved into the dirt, making it hard for his limbs to find a proper point of leverage. His whole body was straight and stiff, feet together, pointing toward the sky. His wings lay limp on the ground, twitching occasionally. His entire body stood inverted.

In short, if the soil hadn't been so loose, our god before us might have gone straight from heaven into hell.

Even in this state, I could still feel the astonishing aura radiating from him. His current inverted, heroic posture was like a towering monument providing great inspiration, making one unable to feel anything but respect!

A poetic and philosophical name flashed through my mind, perfectly fitting this thought-provoking scene:

The sky leaves no trace, but the bird-man has flown!

The god must have had his own profound meaning for meeting us in such a way, but this did indeed bring me a small dilemma: Should I fall to the ground without hesitation and shout praises from the bottom of my heart to express my sincere piety, or should I grab the god's holy thighs, wrap my arms around his holy waist, and pull his holy head out of that holy hole in the ground?

This was truly a difficult choice, and it seemed that choosing either would be committing a grave act of blasphemy.

I looked to my companions for help.

Feiyin and Fo Xiao were clearly stunned by the god's shocking manner of arrival. Their eyes were bulging as if they were about to pop out of their sockets, and their mouths were wide open at a dangerous angle—it was hard not to worry about their jaws dislocating.

It seemed I wouldn't get any useful advice from these two.

"Hey, is anyone there? Can someone help me?" Fortunately, after some strenuous struggling, our god finally confirmed that he couldn't save his head from the hole by his own power. He waved his hand backward with great difficulty, clearly communicating his first divine decree to us.

A muffled voice came from beneath the earth.

I was immediately struck with awe: a god is a god. Falling headfirst from such a height and still alive—if it were an ordinary person, their head would have been pushed right into their torso, and they would have been sent straight to the afterlife.

At the same time, I felt a sense of relief:

Thank goodness we summoned him in a grassy field instead of on a pile of rocks!

Having received the god's command, the three of us rushed forward. Fo Xiao grabbed his left leg, I grabbed his right leg, and Feiyin grabbed him in the middle—ahem, I mean his belt. The three of us shouted in rhythm, and only then did we manage to pull the god’s head out of the ground.

The god's calves were bare, his leg hair upright and stiff, carrying an awe-inspiring majesty. When I thought that I had the immense fortune to have my hands make intimate contact with a god's sturdy calves, my heart was filled with indescribable happiness and pride.

In an instant, the corners of my eyes moistened...

...

"I am so sorry, I’ve made you laugh. Equipment like wings is just too difficult to use; I can never seem to master the balance..." Standing up completely intact, the god said, looking shy and scratching his scalp—I was so moved, what an approachable deity!

Only then did I lift my humble gaze to see the name above the god's head:

GM007

What a prescient and fitting name...