Shepherding Humanity

“With this, I won’t have to worry about money for a while.”

Although he lacked money, he was content with only earning this much. He knew that even if he increased the monthly subscription fee by 10, 100, or even 1000 times, there’d still be people willing to pay, but he did not want to do that.

He only wanted enough money for his daily expenses, as well as equipment to maintain and expand the large sandbox. A laid-back farmer like him had no real need for more money than that.

As for this newly opened “Meditation Room Sandbox”, which will develop into a Magic Community, Xu Zhi planned to save money by leaving it alone and let them take care of themselves.

They’ll slowly train up his Artificial God’s 17.000+ rubik’s cubes.

Once these 500 characters become sentient “Level Four Mages” capable of training on their own, he’ll swap them out for a new set of 500 rubik’s cubes.

“This training sandbox is just a bot to level up my ‘Artificial God’, which is the trump card that’ll guarantee my safety in the real world; it will be one of my strongest underlings in the future… But my main priority is still the large sandbox, and my second priority is its affiliated evolutionary sandbox. I’ll wait for them to evolve promising species, then place them in my fantasy world.”

Xu Zhi had a clearly defined plan. Exploiting these players was just a means to an end, and he felt nothing about throwing them away once he was done with them. His main goal was still the development of the Magic World’s civilization.

“Another half-day has gone by, let’s see how the Magic World is faring.” Xu Zhi sipped on his tea and started to consult with the Hive Mind.

***

The Kingdom of Babylon, year 937.

Medusa was on the verge of passing away due to old age, but by studying the Blood of Immortality, she had an epiphany and once again broke through her mortal limits.

At this time, she was over 780 years old, and had long surpassed the 600 years limit of ordinary Epic Mages.

Rumors spread throughout the world that very soon, Empress Medusa would follow the Emperor Alchemy’s footsteps and break through her limits to live a second lifetime. She’d surpass the Epic Level and step into the realm of Demigods.

“Once she reaches the Demigod Level and ignites her divine spark, she’ll become a Eight-Level Mythic Witch!”

“With this unprecedented event, a living goddess will be born on earth! A goddess who does not belong to the Land of the Gods in Heaven! She’ll be an ascended mortal!”

The Three Great Kingdoms all knew that Ermin did not have enough experience yet, and they’d have to rely on Medusa; the ancient witch was the only one who could step past that threshold.

Fate was full of twists and turns. While the Emperor of Alchemy never had the opportunity to become a God, it looked like Medusa had a very good chance of succeeding. Sure enough, the true winner was the person who lived the longest.

If Empress Medusa were to become a goddess and rule the world, people would only be oppressed like in the Dark Ages. What’s more, with her personality, she might directly ascend to Heaven and join the Land of the Gods in pursuit of strength, leaving behind her earthly kingdom.

But if the Evil God were to recover, then the world would be destroyed.

With only these two choices before them, Medusa had become the hope of all Mages.

***

In a certain crowded street, the headphone-wearing Longji was making his way through an endless stream of people, past fruit stalls, bones of giant beasts for sale, shops selling simple alchemical ingredients, peddlers hawking their wares, and women in witch robes.

Occasionally, an Alchemical Airship could be seen flying past in the sky.

The Art of Alchemy had reached its peak in this era.

While it was still quite risky for men to become Wizards, women could become Level One Witches whenever they wanted, as long as they had the necessary materials and potions to complement the Blood of the Evil Eye. There wasn’t anything strange about the streets being filled with Level One Mages.

But the world had been thrown into chaos.

An anxious atmosphere filled the entire street, and even a good part of the town.

Though he was wearing headphones, Longji could still hear groups of people discussing the latest strange events in the street: missing people, demonic creatures, talking notebooks, putrid walking corpses, wriggling pieces of bizarre crimson flesh…

Life’s common sense had broken down and disturbing scenes could be found everywhere, causing Mages to slowly lose their faith in the Truth.

“What a strong wind.”

As Longji walked through the streets with leisurely steps, the mages around him hurried away in a panic while holding on to their cloaks. A black veil seemed to be spreading across the entire world, ushering in a fantasy zombie apocalypse.

The air was so tense that people had difficulty breathing. Like the moment before a Tsunami crashed into shore, bringing horrifying destruction and splintering the earth.

Because of the Evil Gods, the entire Magic World was now standing on a terrifying precipice. Will this moment go down in history as the birth of the Age of Gods, or the Ending of the World?

“It’s getting dark! We must hurry home!”

Up in the sky, the once-per-fifty years transition from day to night had begun.

In the traditional folklore of the Magic World, the first night of the fifty-year cycle is called the Night of the Celestial Witch "Azaz", a night of impurity, darkness, fear, and misfortune, when one must hide at home and pray.

The transition from day to night took a relatively long period of time, and would only be completed a few months after the Night of the Celestial Witch “Azaz”.

As soon as the sky darkened, the crowd on the street quickly dissipated, and many people began to close their stalls.

In an instant, all that was left was a deserted street. Several hyperactive children who still wanted to play were scolded by their mother and dragged home, hurrying past a blue-black stone bridge into the depths of an ancient European-style building.

“I finally get to see this once-per-50-years spectacle after being here for so long. Everything’s about to change.”

Longji sat on the edge of the stone bridge as he watched the gradual change in the sky. And then, with a slight frown on his face, he turned towards the “Forest of Flames” bar close by and walked in.

It was quite messy inside the bar. Under the dim flickering lights, countless robed mages with magic staves in hand were brashly clinking glasses and gulping down ale. They expressed their concerns and complained incessantly, all but ignoring the bard who was trying to tell a story in a distant corner.

Longji headed towards the mahogany table in a shadowy corner, where a hunched over old woman was waiting for him, staff in hand. Her gaunt and sickly figure was concealed under a black cloak, and she wore the garments of an evil-worshiping necromancer.

The old lady silently marked the dial on the table without raising her head. “Medusa is about to make a breakthrough and become a living goddess. When that happens, we will all be killed without exception.”

Longji sat down and wordlessly looked at her: “You’re not here to kill me this time?”

Hidden under the skin of the decrepit old witch was Yamada—“The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young,” Shub-Niggurath—a terrifying being who could give birth to countless dark children.

Because they were muscles, they could “wear” the skin of a witch in order to evade attention, but Longji hated doing so and chose to be a conspicuous wizard instead. This was why he often got hunted down.

"If it weren't for you, we Evil Gods wouldn’t have such a bad reputation." Long Ji said.

Yamada took the path of evil and slaughtered countless innocents to create his Grand Undead Cemetery.

He was the reason the Evil Gods had an evil and terrifying reputation and were known for massacre. The others did not harm innocent people and only hunted other players in order to collect body parts.

But, there was no denying the fact that he had become absurdly powerful after walking down this bloody path.