Where It All Began

Across the vast valley. Escorted by more than a hundred heavily armed soldiers, the Alliance diplomatic mission, several hundred strong, marched deep into the valley. "...Origin City is just ahead! The capital of the Great Rift Valley and our destination on this trip!" The man who spoke wore gray power armor. Its design bore some resemblance to the Dragoon power armor in the NPC shop, but on closer inspection, it was entirely different. His name was Ma Kai, captain of a patrol squad in this area. Upon hearing that the Alliance mission was bringing along Legion prisoners, he had immediately volunteered to serve as their escort and guide. Having fought a war with the Legion only last year, the vast majority of people in the Great Rift Valley had no love for them. At least, that was certainly true of these soldiers. And the enemy of an enemy was naturally a friend! Sensing the hostile glares directed at them, Antoinette had tension written all over his eyes, his face pale as though coated in white paint since moments ago. In contrast, Piman, the chiliarch from Camp 530 who had been captured alongside him, wore a calm, composed expression. He hardly looked like a captive at all; rather, he seemed like someone out on an excursion accompanied by a swarm of bodyguards. "...Relax, my friend. We've reached the Great Rift Valley. There's nothing to be afraid of." Antoinette glanced at him and whispered tensely, "What do you mean?" Piman gave a soft cough and answered in an undertone, "Exactly what I said. The most dangerous stretch of the road is behind us." The ones who wanted them dead most were undoubtedly the Bugra Free State. After all, if they made it to the Great Rift Valley, those traveling merchants would never be able to carry on their trade with the Legion again. Meanwhile, the Alliance certainly didn't want them dead, and the Great Rift Valley would at most lock them up for interrogation—at which point they could just answer whatever they were asked. In fact, on the trek here, they had been ambushed at least five or six times. It was just that the Alliance soldiers were truly ferocious. Fresh off a battle at Camp 530, they had marched cross-country for nearly a thousand kilometers cut off from their supply lines, yet their combat prowess hadn't suffered in the slightest. "Quiet!" Seeing the two captives whispering, a soldier nearby glared at them and turned to his comrade. "Separate these two." "Yes, sir!" The rookie soldier carrying a rifle nodded and stepped forward. Before he could reach them, however, Piman had already tactfully slowed his pace and drifted away from Antoinette's side. At the front of the column. Walking beside Ma Kai was the Alliance ambassador, a man named Wu Huaide. This fellow had previously served as Shu Yu's secretary at the Alliance embassy in Boulder City. After Shu Yu was transferred to Ideal City, Wu Huaide had overseen the embassy's affairs for a time before being recalled to the Alliance to serve in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. This mission to the Great Rift Valley was his very first time representing the Alliance abroad as an ambassador, and his manner and speech were still tinged with a stiff, self-conscious reserve. According to the Administrator, however, that was by no means a bad thing. The Great Rift Valley's strength was very likely on par with Enterprise and the Legion, and unlike them, it sat right within River Valley Province. When meeting a powerful neighbor on one's doorstep for the first time, a cautious diplomatic approach was preferable. "Before coming here, I thought the Great Rift Valley was just a canyon, but it turns out my imagination was too conservative," Wu Huaide remarked with a sigh of wonder. Ma Kai chuckled. "Haha, you're not wrong either. It is a valley—just one stretching for hundreds of kilometers, so it looks a bit bigger." *Just a bit bigger?* The players tagging along couldn't help snarking inwardly. It had taken them two full days just to walk here from the northern part of River Valley Province, and then another half-day to march from the valley's rim to where they were now. Not having fast travel really sucked ass! "Speaking of which, does the name 'Origin City' hold any special meaning?" Hearing the ambassador's question, Ma Kai smiled and replied, "Nothing particularly fancy. It's just because this is where it all began." "Where it all began?" Wu Huaide didn't quite understand. Just as he was about to press for details, they reached their destination. Ahead of them loomed a colossal gate. Or rather than a gate, it looked more like a massive dam embedded right in the center of the valley. The dense column of several hundred people stood before that gigantic gate like ants beneath an ancient tree. Construction Site Youth and Brick looked up, peered around, and scratched the back of his head with a bewildered look. "Doesn't the Great Rift Valley have the Sacred Shield? How come I don't see it?" Indebted Big Eye shot him a sideways glance. "Do you carry an umbrella on a sunny day?" Construction Site Youth and Brick paused. "What... do you mean?" "He means that thing is only deployed during wartime and kept off normally... At least, that's my guess too." Chiming in, Corps Commander Edge Slacker looked toward the front, where the towering gate was slowly grinding open. And when that colossal door swung halfway open, every player present wore a look of astonished—even awestruck—disbelief. Row upon row of concrete buildings sat terraced along the slopes on both sides, while crowning the crest was a long glass curtain wall embedded directly into the mountainside. Inside, there was surely another world entirely, though nothing within could be seen from the outside. Spanning the middle of the valley was a crisscrossing network of steel-framed bridges and walkways, with elevators lining both mountain walls connecting the upper and lower levels. Yet none of that was the most shocking part; at the center of the rift plunged a bottomless abyss. Embedded along the precipices on either side of the chasm were more boxy concrete structures, together forming an immense architectural complex. Because sunlight reached the depths only around midday, street lamps along the roadsides burned day and night starting from the mid-slopes of the mountains on both sides. This was a city buried within a mountain basin. And buried beneath its feet were trillions of tons of hydrogen, oxygen, chlorine, and various mineral elements produced through the electrolysis of seawater, all stored in solid state. What baffled Edge Slacker was not its background lore, but its layout. After remaining silent for quite a while, he finally couldn't help snarking, "Aren't they afraid of landslides?" Even if there were no landslides, whenever it rained, this rift was practically a natural riverbed. Not to mention they had built such a massive gate, turning the whole place into an artificial reservoir. Kakarot's expression turned subtly amused. "Maybe... it's black tech." The technological level here certainly appeared far below Ideal City's, but one couldn't judge things purely on surface appearances. Along the way, they had seen at least a hundred sets of power armor and various models of exoskeletons. At least in terms of combat capability, no one dared underestimate them. These people were in no way inferior to the Legion, and naturally not to Enterprise either. A man dressed in a brown robe stood at the entrance of the massive gate, nodding slightly in a show of respect. "Welcome to Origin City. I am Yang Wei, Secretary-General to His Excellency the Chief of the Great Rift Valley, in charge of external affairs." "Alliance Ambassador, Wu Huaide." Stepping forward to shake hands with the brown-robed man, Wu Huaide stated with earnest sincerity, "Our visit this time is primarily regarding matters concerning Sunset Province." Yang Wei nodded in understanding. "I have already reported your business to the Chief. Please proceed to the lounge and wait a moment; he will receive you in person shortly." "Thank you." "You are most welcome. Please follow me." Saying this, Yang Wei turned to Ma Kai, who stood next to Wu Huaide. "I'll take care of our guests. As for the two captives from the Legion, take them where they belong." Ma Kai grinned. "Will do!" The handover of the prisoners was completed quickly. Piman offered no resistance, calmly following behind the guards who approached him. Antoinette did the same. Though frustration was written all over his face, he was a smart man and knew that obeying meekly at this point would save him from suffering. There were still over three hundred players from the Death Corps who had made it here. In name, they were Alliance soldiers, but it was impossible for all of them to meet the leader of the Great Rift Valley together. Neither reason nor courtesy would allow it. Following the Administrator's instructions, Wu Huaide selected a few players with the highest contribution points to accompany the Secretary-General to the lounge. The rest followed Captain Ma Kai to the temporary quarters prepared by the Great Rift Valley for the Alliance to rest. Outside, dusk was gathering, and it was getting close to log-off time. While missing out on the upcoming story cutscenes was a shame, with things like the official website forums around, they wouldn't miss any critical information anyway. Leaving temporary command to Kakarot, Edge Slacker and his companions followed Yang Wei into an elevator, ascending to the topmost level of the Great Rift Valley. The architecture here was completely different from below. The expansive halls and long corridors were cast entirely of alloy, looking remarkably like a high-orbit space station from a sci-fi blockbuster. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows lining one side of the corridor, one could look directly down into the depths of the valley floor. As they crossed the corridor, Construction Site Youth and Brick suddenly spoke up. "I think I've figured it out." "What have you figured out this time?" Indebted Big Eye gave him a side-eye. "The vibe here... feels just like a space colony from a sci-fi movie." The surrounding players were taken aback. "Say what?" "Don't you guys feel it?" Construction Site Youth and Brick scratched his head, sounding slightly embarrassed. "The buildings down in the Great Rift Valley aren't on the same technological level as this place at all, yet their living standards are decent enough. And structurally, I keep getting the feeling that those buildings... are like eggs laid by this space capsule." "Pfft... what kind of analogy is that, hahaha!" Indebted Big Eye burst out laughing, unable to keep a straight face. Edge Slacker, however, wore a pensive expression. "Hmm... that might actually be possible." Washing Machine Hairwash nodded thoughtfully. "I think that makes some sense too." Indebted Big Eye: "...?" Whatever the origins of this facility were, the group finally reached the doorway of the lounge. Inside the spacious room were numerous tables and sofas, surrounded by bookshelves lined with many books that looked quite old. Given this game's usual quirks, high-value intel was hidden either in books or in the mouths of NPCs, waiting for players to uncover it themselves. Unfortunately, everyone standing here was essentially "illiterate." While their listening and speaking skills were passable, their reading and writing were mediocre at best, leaving them to rely on their VMs' offline translation feature to get the general gist. Still... Snapping photos first and uploading them to the official forum once they had a signal was an option too. Pulling a book from the shelf, Edge Slacker flipped through it before turning back to the cover. When he saw the emblem printed on it, he froze for a moment, a strange look crossing his face. "This is... Enterprise's emblem?" "There're Legion and Academy ones too," Indebted Big Eye said, pulling down two books from beside another bookshelf and flipping through them. "...Though I don't see Church of the Torch." Washing Machine Hairwash: "Maybe the Church of the Torch doesn't have the clout? Lore-wise, it was only founded twenty-some years ago." Indebted Big Eye frowned. "But why would there be insignia from the Legion, Enterprise, and the Academy? Setting the Academy aside, both the Legion and Enterprise fought wars against the Great Rift Valley, didn't they?" Construction Site Youth and Brick scratched the back of his head. "According to the lore collection on the official website, the Legion, Enterprise, and the Academy all once belonged to the Post-War Reconstruction Committee, and the headquarters of the Post-War Reconstruction Committee was located in River Valley Province..." Halfway through his sentence, he suddenly trailed off. Origin City... The place where it all began. His Adam's apple bobbed. Construction Site Youth and Brick murmured in an uncertain whisper, "...Could it be right here?" Pairs of eyes turned toward him, making him feel somewhat nervous. "Just a guess, okay... Don't laugh at me if I'm wrong." Yet nobody laughed at him. Not even Indebted Big Eye. Staring at the book in his hands, Edge Slacker knitted his brows and swallowed hard. "That... might actually be true." ... While the players were gathering clues in the lounge, no one noticed that the Alliance ambassador had already been ushered into the adjacent room. Despite tagging along the entire way, they had still missed a critical main storyline cutscene. Sitting on a sofa. Wu Huaide looked stiffly at the drowsy-eyed old man before him, whose temples were streaked with gray. From their earlier pleasantries, he had already learned that this elderly man's name was Ge Yan, the Chief of the Great Rift Valley, holding a position analogous to the Alliance's Administrator. Unlike their Administrator, however—who was tall, imposing, dashing, and brimming with youthful vitality— this old man had cloudy eyes and a face etched with wrinkles, looking as though he suffered from Alzheimer's. Though having such a thought was rather disrespectful, Wu Huaide couldn't help letting it cross his mind, feeling a spontaneous wave of pride welling up inside him. The old man sat very quietly, his gaze resting on the young man opposite him. Yet his eyes did not seem fixed on him, looking through him instead toward someone who wasn't in the room. After a long silence, as if having found the answer he sought, his withered lips finally moved. "...I am already aware of your situation. I have dispatched an investigation team to the Bugra Free State, and I promise to give you an accounting within three days." The Bugra Free State was a vassal of the Great Rift Valley. With the leader of the Great Rift Valley speaking up, the illicit deals between those crooked merchants and the Legion would definitely come to an end. Not expecting things to proceed so smoothly, Wu Huaide's brow relaxed slightly, and a pleased smile appeared on his face. "Thank you." The old man smiled faintly and said, "I hardly deserve that thanks. This matter was originally our oversight to begin with; it is I who should apologize to you for causing so much trouble." Taken aback by how sincere the old man was, Wu Huaide felt a stir in his heart. If he could persuade the Great Rift Valley to commit troops against the Legion, it would undoubtedly bring this war to an end much sooner. Though this was not a task assigned to him by the Administrator, he decided to give it a shot. "Speaking of which... there is actually something I don't quite understand," Wu Huaide said, seizing on the pleasant atmosphere of their conversation to find an opening. The old man looked at him kindly. "What is it?" "The Legion's deployment in Sunset Province is clearly aimed here. Why have you... allowed them to do as they please?" Looking at the old man, Wu Huaide continued earnestly, "Once they complete that supply line, even more soldiers will be shipped to the front line, and you won't be able to avoid fighting another war. Why not join forces with us now and eradicate future troubles once and for all?" After hearing this, the old man remained silent for a moment before speaking. "That the Legion came for us, and that we allowed their actions... both claims are inaccurate." Seeing his indifferent expression, Wu Huaide couldn't help clenching his fists on his knees. "Is that not the truth?" The old man looked at him calmly. "It is the part you see, but not the whole of it." Before the young man could speak, the old man continued: "Let us change the subject. How do you believe the wasteland can be brought to an end? By building countless houses? By founding many schools to pass down knowledge? Or by producing vast amounts of weaponry? Or perhaps by letting the residents live the lives of the Prosperity Era?" Wu Huaide opened his mouth, staring blankly at the old man, momentarily at a loss. He couldn't comprehend why the man had suddenly brought this up. Seeing that the young man did not answer, the old man continued in an unhurried cadence: "All of these things are important, in truth. But what comes first and what follows must be guided by a proper plan. "We must purge the slime mold and radioactive contaminants from the surface, and revive the collapsed atmosphere... This is the foundation upon which our civilization may endure, and the overarching agenda of the Post-War Reconstruction Committee. "And to accomplish this work, we require a powerful military, technicians tasked with recovering and preserving the heritage of civilization, and producers to manufacture industrial goods and daily necessities. "Yet people are not machines. Everyone has different thoughts. Even when working toward the very same goal, disagreements will still arise on many matters." "Does this... have anything to do with what we were discussing?" Wu Huaide couldn't resist asking. "Of course it does," the old man nodded. "Whether it is the Legion, the Academy, or Enterprise... they all once belonged to the Post-War Reconstruction Committee. Even if conflicts and differences drove us apart, we have still never forgotten our work. That work functions like a precision machine, still proceeding in an orderly fashion—merely in a different form." Wu Huaide pressed, "Including detonating nuclear bombs? Is that part of the work too?!" The old man coughed softly. "That matter... indeed went too far." Wu Huaide couldn't help pressing further, "Even when the Legion tried to conquer you?" Yet facing that aggressive tone, the old man merely offered a faint smile. "If the entire Legion intended to conquer us, what came would not have been a mere expeditionary force. Besides, those people have already been dealt with by us." Wu Huaide stared at the old man in disbelief. He was entirely different from the young soldiers outside. The old man seemed devoid of hatred, not even holding that war to heart. It was as though... it were merely the side effect of an antibiotic, wholly acceptable for the sake of curing the disease. "I don't understand..." Looking at that bewildered face, the old man replied in an undertone, "It does not matter. It is enough if your Administrator understands. If he came from a vault, he will certainly understand what I mean." A flame of rage flared up in Wu Huaide's chest. Although he knew a diplomat shouldn't harbor such emotion, he was a survivor of River Valley Province, and even more so, a refugee driven from his home by the routed remnants of the expeditionary force. His hatred for the Legion was no less than his hatred for the Bone Chewer tribe, and now that fury burned right here. That nonchalant expression made it seem as though the war had been an inconsequential trifle in the grand scheme of things, an entirely acceptable cost paid for a long-term plan. What did he mean by "proceeding in an orderly fashion"? What did he mean by "merely in a different form"? Everything fell within the plan of the Post-War Reconstruction Committee. Yet in this grand plan, the only thing he didn't hear was any mention of himself. Where was he in it? Where were those survivors who lived neither in the Great Rift Valley nor in Boulder City? If the old man hadn't mentioned the Administrator, it might have been fine, but he just had to bring their Administrator into it... Taking a deep breath, Wu Huaide reined in the wrath in his chest, knowing this was no time to act on emotion. He did not represent himself. He represented the Alliance! Even knowing they were talking past each other, he couldn't help raising his voice in a final effort, trying to awaken this old man who was either asleep or playing dumb. "The Legion doesn't just plan on exterminating mutants; they intend to wipe out everyone who isn't a Wilant! Is that part of your salvation plan as well? When the Wilants rule the world, where will we be? Getting nose bridge implants?" The old man shook his head. "That is the ideology of a faction among the Wilants—like a tumor in muscle tissue. It is a mistake, but I believe it does not represent the whole. If nothing else, their Marshal is not a Wilant himself. As the leader of the Legion, how could he possibly endorse such an insane notion? "Naturally, I do not approve of many of his actions. Ending chaos requires violence, but his indulgence in violence has indeed gone too far." A look of astonishment crossed Wu Huaide's face. Not because of the old man's phrasing itself, but because of the revelation hidden within his words. "The Legion's Marshal... isn't a Wilant?" "He is not." "How do you know that?" A nostalgic expression crossed the old man's face, though that fond reminiscence soon dissolved into a soft sigh. "Of course I know. After all, I watched that child grow up. "And besides... the Wilants came later." Wu Huaide stared at him in utter bewilderment. "...?"