Prodigy’s Playground

Chapter 183 3911

Suicide—

So it really was suicide.

The moment the young waitress had mentioned that there was a way to choose one’s own death, Jiang Ran had already arrived at that conclusion.

What he couldn’t understand was this.

Puppe had built such an idealized virtual world. The people lived in peace and prosperity, technology advanced at astonishing speed, and everything operated perfectly according to his plan.

Under those circumstances, what possible reason could have driven him to suicide?

“Has the possibility of murder been ruled out?” Jiang Ran asked.

“Yes.”

The girl nodded. “That was ruled out immediately. In the digital world, everything leaves a trace, so crime is extremely rare. Because the moment someone commits a crime, they’ll be caught 100%. If the circumstances are serious enough, they’ll naturally be sentenced to death as well.”

“But Mr. Puppe’s death was very clearly his own choice. Not only were his fingerprints the only ones on the gun at the scene, but he also left decisive evidence on his desk—[a suicide note].”The girl sighed and wiped the corner of her eye. “Actually, Puppe had been suffering from depression for years. It’s one of the very few illnesses in the digital world that can’t be directly cured.”

“Because something like mental illness isn’t physical damage. Aside from counseling, there’s no real treatment.”

“Mr. Puppe fought depression for many years, but in the end he still lost to the illness and used a handgun to end his life. That great hero left us just like that… perhaps he really had simply worked himself too hard.”

Depression. Suicide. A final note.

Jiang Ran narrowed his eyes.

No matter how he looked at it, this was strange. There had to be something hidden beneath the surface.

“Can I see the contents of that suicide note somewhere?”

“It’s beneath the statue in Memorial Plaza.”

The girl pointed northwest. “Every city has a Memorial Plaza dedicated to Mr. Puppe. There’s definitely a mourning event there today—you can go join it.”

“The contents of the note are strange, though. It almost reads like delirious nonsense. But considering Mr. Puppe’s depressive state at the time, I suppose it’s understandable.”

“Especially the four digits written on it. Scholars have been studying them to this day and still don’t understand what they mean.” After clearing her throat lightly, the girl said in a soft voice, “[3911].”

Jiang Ran’s eyes widened.

3911?

39 minutes 11 seconds!

That was the duration of every rollback loop in this virtual world!

This was obviously not a coincidence!

“Xiaoting!”

Inside the juice shop, the female owner in an apron leaned out and waved. “Come help for a second~”

“Ah! Okay!”

The girl turned and called back.

Then she wiped her eyes and gave Jiang Ran a slight smile. “Sorry, I need to go back in. By the way—would you like another refill of juice?”

“No, no.”

Jiang Ran shook his head. “I’m seriously full already.”

The waitress turned and walked back into the shop to speak with the owner.

Jiang Ran, meanwhile, carried his juice over to the roadside and began thinking.

As expected.

The rollback loop every 39 minutes and 11 seconds wasn’t a problem with him.

The problem lay with the virtual world itself!

If Puppe had left that number in his suicide note, then perhaps it meant that, as the creator of this world, he had already discovered this issue three years ago!

“No—”

Jiang Ran shook his head. “Probably not just three years ago.”

Because the waitress had just said Puppe had suffered from depression for years. That meant he had realized the problem even earlier—

In any case.

He needed to see the note for himself first.

Glug glug glug glug.

Jiang Ran tilted his head back and drained the orange juice in one go. This time he was truly full—his stomach even felt a little bloated.

Then he mounted one of the shared flying motorcycles parked by the street and headed northwest in the direction the girl had pointed.

It wasn’t too far away. It only took a little over ten minutes to arrive.

It was a vast plaza. Aside from extensive greenery and stone-paved platforms, there was almost nothing there.

At the very center of the stone platform stood a towering statue dozens of meters high.

At the same time, a massive crowd had gathered there in silent mourning.

There was no need to think about it. That had to be Puppe’s Memorial Plaza.

Out of habit, Jiang Ran raised his hand to check the time, only to remember that in this rollback loop, he had never gone to the shopping district to pick up the free watch.

“No idea what time it is now. Better hurry.”

He twisted the throttle and sped toward the plaza, but just as he was about to enter the airspace above it, a [No-Fly Zone] warning suddenly popped up on the motorcycle’s screen.

Autopilot immediately took control and guided the bike into a slow descent, parking it neatly at the edge of the plaza.

Apparently, flying above the memorial plaza was prohibited. No wonder it had looked so empty from afar, with all vehicles taking detours around it.

That was understandable.

In this virtual digital world, Puppe was the highest spiritual leader, a savior everyone revered almost as a god.

No matter how one looked at it, flying over the head of the savior’s statue would indeed be disrespectful.

Time was tight.

Jiang Ran broke into a run toward the center of the memorial plaza.

The road was packed with mourners walking with their heads lowered.

Everyone’s grief felt like overflowing river water, making every step along the path feel unbearably heavy.

Quite a few grieving passersby even shot Jiang Ran angry looks.

That made him instinctively slow down, lowering his own head as well and pretending to join the mourning.

At last, after squeezing through the dense crowd, he successfully arrived before the dark bronze statue.

He looked up.

A dignified middle-aged man stood there with his head held high, gazing into the distance, his eyes resolute and filled with strength.

The statue’s facial features matched the photograph Jiang Ran had seen in the library.

It was Puppe.

Only, the statue depicted him somewhat older. This was likely what he had looked like near the end of his life.

Since the entire world had accepted that Puppe died by suicide, that meant the suicide note must have carried tremendous weight—

It represented the final regret and final thoughts of Puppe’s life.

Jiang Ran had to read it.

Especially those digits: 3911.

What exactly did they mean?

Head lowered in feigned mourning, Jiang Ran slowly stepped forward and looked at the pedestal of the bronze statue.

Sure enough, Puppe’s suicide note was engraved there.

The final words this great savior had left to the world.

It was short, only three lines—

[I am a sinner of human civilization.]

[I won the game, but destroyed the entire world.]

[3911—so this is, in the end, the terminus of everything.]

Jiang Ran stared at the three engraved lines over and over, sinking into thought.

These bleak, despairing final words stood in sharp contrast to the high-spirited confidence Puppe had shown in his 2030 address to the world.

Back then, he had strategized with absolute control, waving the banner of a beautiful future and proclaiming a perfect answer sheet for 30,000 years, determined to push humanity toward an evolutionary leap in lifeform and onward to truth and the cosmos.

But now—

In these mere three lines, there was nothing but remorse for his own crimes and despair for humanity’s future.

The first sentence—

Puppe called himself a sinner of human civilization.

Was he referring to the global catastrophe of 2028 that he had caused?

Jiang Ran believed that was absolutely not the case.

—

Because in Puppe’s plan, humanity was always meant to abandon its fragile flesh and enter a virtual world of limitless resources and accelerated progress, gambling on a civilization-wide ascension 30,000 years in the future.

Could it be that his plan had failed?

Had he realized the failure years ago?

Then the second sentence—

Puppe said he had won the game, yet destroyed the entire world.

This seemed like an extension of the first sentence, less new information than a deeper expression of regret for his own actions.

Won the [game].

Jiang Ran caught onto that word.

He suddenly remembered the notebook of settings he had written in middle school.

Inside it, there had been a game involving eleven geniuses, called Prodigy’s Playground.

Although there was still no hard proof that such a game truly existed in reality—

those codenames that so clearly matched Playground roles,

the phone that could contact Lilith and grant any wish,

the gold coins Killer Fang Yang had said represented each person’s identity,

and the unbelievable open and covert struggles among those people—

it really did seem as though this game called Prodigy’s Playground truly existed.

If that was the case—

then Puppe’s ability to trigger a planet-spanning super-catastrophe in 2028, and convert all humanity into digital life without any resistance—

[Could it be that possessing such godlike power and authority was also tied to his eventual victory in this game?]

So this near-divine authority—

was it the final reward for the winner of the game?

If so,

then in that other future prison where the Magician was executed, who had won in the end?

Priest Wu Yuanzheng?

Or another member?

Jiang Ran couldn’t be completely sure.

But it definitely hadn’t been Magician Qin Feng.

He too had been a loser.

“Could it be that these people joined such a brutal game, fighting to the death, all for the sake of obtaining power and authority comparable to a god?”

He recalled the final second of Worldline Zero.

Qin Feng had taken out that old button phone, his hesitant eyes turning toward him.

“Forgive me.”

He remembered too how, ever since acting in that microfilm, Qin Feng had repeatedly shown curiosity about the notebook of settings Jiang Ran had written in middle school, asking about its details again and again.

He remembered Qin Feng’s father’s irreversible death, the Ferris wheel pattern burned into the tunnel wall, the stolen notebook from the basement, Qin Feng hiding his identity and fleeing everywhere—

It seemed clear now.

[Qin Feng had known about the existence of Prodigy’s Playground from the very beginning. Whether in Worldline Zero or Worldline One, he must have come into contact with related information!]

Then it was no longer hard to understand why Qin Feng, someone who valued friendship so deeply, had deceived him at the final moment and sent that time-traveling text ten years into the past.

Perhaps at first, he really had wanted to save his father.

But now, Qin Feng’s purpose was obvious:

to win this game,

to obtain power and authority like Puppe’s—enough to destroy the Earth itself.

With stakes this enormous, what was his true goal?

To use it to revive his father?

Or—

to revive Cheng Mengxue?

“Can the final reward for winning this game really bring the dead back to life?”

Jiang Ran murmured to himself.

He couldn’t calculate it.

Which was more difficult—

causing a catastrophe capable of destroying the Earth,

or reviving a person who had already died?

Did such supernatural power truly exist in this world?

At that moment, Professor Zhang Yang’s words echoed once more in his ears:

“Everything in this world is scientific. No matter what happens, it must conform to the most fundamental laws of the universe.”

“No matter how absurd or fantastical something may seem, if you investigate its basic principles deeply enough, it will definitely be scientific.”

At that moment, Jiang Ran felt lost.

What, exactly, counted as scientific?

Was the edifice of science truly unbreakable?

After thinking it through carefully,

he still believed—or perhaps hoped—that Professor Zhang Yang was right.

Up until now, he had indeed experienced many utterly unbelievable events.

For example, the vegetative Tian Xiaoli opening her eyes.

For example, the 2028 super-catastrophe.

For example, this virtual world before him, far beyond humanity’s technological level.

But—

[There has never been a single case in which a dead person was successfully revived.]

The Cheng Mengxue portrayed by Li Yini had merely been the performance of advanced scientific technology.

The “resurrected” Xin Yan had likewise been the result of a worldline transition caused by the Positron Cannon—not a truly dead body rising back to its feet.

As long as this single principle remained unbroken,

Jiang Ran would continue to believe that the universe was still scientific.

Finally,

he turned his gaze to Puppe’s third line of final words—

“3911—so this is, in the end, the terminus of everything.”