Chapter 364: God of Hope (2)

[You’re not following him?]

Seregia asked, looking at the god of hope who’d abandoned his holy land and fled.

I won’t follow him. I didn’t even know where I was going, so how could I go after him? I took a lot of information out of the god of evil. If I got to know the realm of the God of Hope, I could destroy it one by one rather than going after him blindly.

“I would drag on the fight by playing tag for no reason. If I destroy his regions one by one, the God of Hope will have nowhere else to run.”

[Good, an example of fine judgment.]

“What?”

Seregia did not answer back. I had a strange sense of deja vu. I thought it was just my feeling.

The Holy Land of the God of Hope made its name clear. Two Zit Pops, and only remains of the once beautiful landscape was left. It was amazing that it had not been completely turned to ashes.

The ones subjugated to my attacks weren’t usually durable. Among the remains of the building, relatively healthy ones were picked and put into space.

[What are you doing?]

“I’m going to take some materials. Later, I’ll ask Yong-yong to make me a temple with this.”

[You’re so frugal.]

What’s with that?

I did this hoping that the God of Hope’s mood will become worse. I was cleaning up the debris and looking for some usable materials, when a red wall came out. The remains of the white temple were spotted with bright red bricks. The red walls were intact as if they had not been affected by the Zit Pop explosion.

Curiosity drove me to inspect the wall. It was not that difficult to pierce. The wall had endured the explosion, but it was easy to penetrate the wall when power was condensed at a single point.

I made a big hole, and entered. It was a space full of strange machinery that had never been seen. And there was one thing that was wriggling among the machinery.

It was a human.

“Hey, do you want to get hit and dragged out, or will you come out on your own?”

“If you don’t hit me, I’ll come out!”

A very rational reply came back.

“Yes, I won’t hit you.”

“Okay!”

A human being who was hiding among the gadgets appeared. It was a human figure, but he was not ordinary. He’s an apostle, that’s why he’s here. I could be convinced.

“Heh… you’re not going to hit me, are you?”

Of course, I’ll hit you. I hit the apostle’s knee in a swift move .On that broken leg, bones popped out from inside the knee that was broken. The apostle of the God of Hope fell down and did not realise what had happened.

After looking at his knee a moment later, he squeezed out a scream as if he felt pain. The high-pitched scream, as if squeezing a nearly dried mop.

I grabbed the ankle of the apostle’s broken leg and tore off the shaking limb. The leg bones sticking out from the knee looked sharp and usable.

I spoke in a low tone, with the leg bone against the apostle’s neck,”I’ll decide whether to hit you or not depending on my mood. Do you understand?”

The apostle nodded his head convulsively and replied yes.

“Now, shall we get to what these gadgets are, first?” I questioned him.

But the apostle was groaning in pain. The pain was too severe for him to explain, it seemed.

“If you don’t start your explanation quickly, there will be more pain.”

* * *

The apostle eventually began to explain only after one more wrist disappeared. I wish I had done it earlier.

“This is the…”

The apostle unwittingly pointed to the gadget with his right hand. To be precise, he pointed with what remained of his arm. His wrist was torn off and lying on the floor.

“It’s a device that watches all over the Holy Land, It is used for managing it.”

It looked similar to a CCTV on Earth.

I had one question.

“The God of Hope doesn’t need a device like this.”

“God has entrusted us with taking care of it.”

Well; That would be the case if there were several temples.

I left Lee Yeon-hee as an apostle on the 60th floor right now. Come to think of it, I wonder if Lee Yeon-hee was doing well.

The apostle continued to explain while I was thinking about something else.

“This way, we can watch the rooms of the upper compartment.”

A huge screen showed people living above the hourglass. Each room that people lived in was about the size of a container. It wasn’t a small room.

“The people who live there are supposed to never leave that room for the rest of their lives.”

It was too small to be their whole world for life. I felt sorry for the people who were trapped there because I had been stuck on the 60th floor for a long time.

“Everyone’s stuck alone.”

“Yes, it is.”

“Then how do they give birth to babies?”

The apostle replied that if people apply to become a couple by mutual agreement, sperm and eggs were extracted and artificially conceived while the two were sleeping. It was an excessively inhumane method of breeding.

“Ahhhhh!”

I tore off the apostle’s right forearm.

“…B-but I’m just telling you the truth..!”

That fact made me feel bad. Still, it was good that people could communicate with each other.

People in the room were usually looking into electronic devices similar to computers.Sometimes, some people read books, but most of them seemed to spend time communicating with each other through electronic devices.

“…anyhow, a child born that way will be cared for in the Holy Land until the age of 10 and then assigned a room at the top of the upper compartment.”

And then, they start living in captivity. Wait, there were kids in the Holy Land? I expanded my senses and looked around.

The place where the children were located was the deepest part of the Holy Land. Fortunately, everyone there looked fine. It appeared to be a sort of shelter.

The guards I first encountered must have detected my intrusion and collected them there. I praised them in his heart. I’d already killed all the guards.

“What was that situation when that room crashed to the bottom?”

I asked what I was most curious about. The apostle hesitated for a moment. He was afraid I’d hit him again for being offended.

“If you don’t tell me, you’ll get more hurt.”

“…death. One room falls down every day. The room at the bottom falls. It usually takes 10 to 25 years for the top room to crash.”

“So the people there usually die between twenty and thirty-five.”

“Yes, we call it life expectancy.”

Twenty-five. It was too early to admit one’s death and face it calmly. No, it has nothing to do with age. Who can stand death coming in visible form from day to day?

“Instead, one person a month is blessed with random ascension.”

“Ascension?”

“Yes, the God of Hope allows us to live in the Holy Land. Then we’re free from death. In fact, that’s how I came up to the Holy Land.”

I had seen people praying. Now I knew what they were praying for. They were praying for ascension.

I didn’t want much faith. The problem was not the materials, but the believers. If people remained, the God of Hope would continue to squeeze the believers out of their faith. I’ll steal the believers, not anything else.

[Are you going to take the ordinary people and use them?]

They don’t really need to be used. If I thought about it, it’s for the Tutorial stage. I can take the entire tutorial from the Hundred Gods Temple at any time. And many of the Tutorial stages were undeveloped.

Or there were places where the civilization had already been destroyed. I couldn’t just leave such a place alone, so it wouldn’t be a bad idea to let those people live there.

[Will they want that?]

Well… I didn’t know. Life out of here must be hard for them. Instead, they will be given freedom, but some people would want comfort instead of freedom.

But still.

“I can’t leave them like this.”

It’s not because of my idea that people should be free. This was because their existence gave strength to the God of Hope.

I projected myself into each room. People were surprised and delighted to see me suddenly appearing. I told people I’d let them get out of this narrow room. Naturally, people were glad that I was talking about ascension.

“Oh… God, at last…….”

“Thank you, thank you very much.”

Those people knelt and prayed before my projection in the room. They cried and expressed their gratitude.

There were various people. Some of them showed unusual reactions. Especially a young woman. Of course, most of the people here were young.

“…can you take someone else besides me?”

I asked her.

[Who are you talking about?]

“There’s my son… He’s only 16, but he’s in a room lower than me. Please…”

Luck seemed to apply a little bit to falling down. I couldn’t believe the son was further below his mother. By the way, I was curious about the age of the woman.

“I’m 36.”

She was older than I thought.

Age usually fell between twenty and thirty-five before the died, so she may be one of the oldest by this standard. It seemed fine to let this woman manage people later.

[Your son will also go to the new holy place. Not only your son, but everyone.]

The woman was thrilled.

Rather than saying that everyone would ascend to heaven, she seemed more pleased to be able to meet her son in person. Some people asked something different from women.

“…Can I not go?”

[Why?]

Dumbfounded, I asked roughly, not even thinking about maintaining dignity.

“I… just feel comfortable and good here.”

[If you stay here, you’ll fall and die soon.]

“We still have five more years to go.”

The man said smartly. He was a very lazy fellow.

[No. Destiny can’t be avoided just because you hate it.]

I recited a deceptive line after quite a long time, ignoring the man’s request to leave me alone. I’ll have to send him to a rough place. I thought it would be nice to have him on the 12th floor of Hell Difficulty level.

As I took questions one by one, people began to ask all sorts of things. What was going to happen in the future, where were they being sent, and more such queries.

I answered as much as I could. It was an act of little help to God’s dignity, but I wanted to give people a minimal explanation.

Many of them asked questions like.

“Who… who are you? Who are you?”

“Are you really God? Did you listen to my prayer?”

There was a man in every world who doubted the existence of God. Even the world where God himself existed, was no exception.

I answered them.

“Your God, and your hope.”

All the people were sent into space. Then Seregia asked me a question.

[Is it okay to call yourself hope?]]

It’s alright.

Faith is a curious thing. Hope for them is no longer the god of hope, but me who met them face-to-face and talked to them.

Ambiguity protected God’s authority, but it also confused the direction of faith. There were countless stories of believers who had come to worship the representatives, not the gods, even in the religion of the earth.

People would regard me as the god of hope, not the God of Hope that they had never seen or heard of in their lifetime, but the one who’d appeared in person and liberated them.

It had now been too inefficient to deny the God of Hope and to put forward new faith. The faith of hope was already deeply embedded in people’s minds. It was easier to impersonate the name of the god of hope and direct their faith toward me.

I put everyone in the open space, and moved the children in the shelter to an open space. Then, in the Holy Land of Hope, only me and the apostle were left.

“God, I will do my best. Take me with you.”

Said the guy, bowing down.

I’m sorry, but I didn’t intend to do that.

“You know why I kept you alive?”

“…yeah?”

“The God of Hope is watching me through you.”

“Well, that’s not…No, I don’t think I’m such a great person…”

This guy introduced himself like a head of ordinary managerial jobs, but it couldn’t have been. Apostles were no ordinary believer. Beyond their body, they were like a god’s alter ego.

Everything he heard and saw was seen and heard by the God of Hope.

“Had enough watching me rampage in your holy land?”

I grabbed the head of an apostle who was trying to flee and raised his body. I said, turning his head to make eye contact with me. Towards the God of Hope beyond those eyes.

“Wherever you hide, I will find you.”

As soon as I finished speaking, I burst the apostle’s head.

[Are you sure you’re leaving right away?]

Let’s go.

After all, this holy place had been burned neatly so that even its remains could not be found.