Chapter 134: The Time of Harvest Has Arrived, the Era Belongs to Bai Fu!
Bai Fu did not rush to kill the Minister of the Truth Society. She still had a few tasks to settle, and she was curious whether she could siphon more gold coins from him.
She crossed her arms, watching coldly as the weakened Minister of the Truth Society grew weaker.
“How do you feel now?”
The Minister of the Truth Society remained expressionless. “Why haven’t you killed me yet? Are you waiting to mock me as a loser in the guise of a victor?”
Bai Fu smiled. “I’m not that boring. To be honest, even though there have been multiple assassination bounties posted on the dark web and many people sent after me, I don’t hate you that much. Without you, I couldn’t have grown so quickly. You and the leader of the Wildfire Gang were both guides on my path on Origin Star.”
Those words stunned the Minister of the Truth Society. He had never expected Bai Fu to speak like that.
It was unexpected, and utterly baffling.
A guide?
What kind of appraisal was that?
It sounded like a stepping stone, but not nearly as hostile as that.
He closed his eyes, his tense expression easing slightly. “Since you want to talk, I’ll indulge you. I’ve always wondered something: how did you find the Marsk Mutant Laboratory? If its location hadn’t been exposed, perhaps my Mutant Project could’ve gone much further.”
“Really want to know?” Bai Fu asked in return.
The Minister of the Truth Society said nothing, but his eyes revealed everything.
Bai Fu explained, “I met someone—a person like you, a man who should have become the protagonist of this era. He was trying to trace the missing obsidian shards from Psionic Research Institute No. 2. By analyzing news and intelligence from the Old Republic, he deduced that somewhere in the Marsk region, or inside a genetic bioreactor, the shards might be stored. He was a genius, right? We would have worked well together, but unfortunately, he wanted to kill me, so I had no choice but to eliminate him first.”
The Minister of the Truth Society’s pupils constricted sharply.
“Protagonist of the era? Him and me? From my perspective, you are more fitting for that.”
“I wasn’t at first, but after getting rid of you, I almost am.” Bai Fu spoke another baffling sentence, then shifted tone in the next moment, “When you heard ‘Psionic Research Institute’ and ‘obsidian,’ didn’t you feel anything?”
The Minister’s face flickered. “What do you mean?”
Bai Fu said, “I investigated your past and found some useful intel. It was a newspaper from over a hundred years ago, featuring an interview you gave when you were a hero.”
He fell silent.
At this point, denial was useless.
“In the interview, when asked why you became a hero without expecting anything in return, you answered that your parents died in childhood and you were very poor. A kind-hearted person secretly supported you. Thanks to that person, you had food and could attend school. You were always very grateful, so after graduation you wanted to find him and thank him in person.”
“You searched for him for a long time—several times you nearly found him but never met. You felt he was avoiding you. Years later, you finally recognized him on TV. He was a gangster thug. He was afraid you’d be disappointed when you met him, so he hid, but eventually appeared in a very unflattering way.”
“He had a past similar to yours, but no one helped him back then, so he ended up joining the gang. After meeting you, he remembered himself. He didn’t want you to walk his path, so he secretly supported you.”
“When you learned this, you resolved to become someone like him—someone who helps others. Because someone had once held an umbrella over you, you wanted to hold an umbrella for someone else. I’m curious: you, who carried that ideal as a hero, what happened at Psionic Research Institute No. 1 that turned you into the person you are now: capable of revenge, even kidnapping the innocent Yulia?”
Bai Fu crouched in front of the Minister of the Truth Society.
Her answer was critical. It didn’t just pertain to story exploration on Origin Star; it very likely involved a new hidden quest.
The Minister stared at Bai Fu. “How did you find these? I even changed my face on purpose.”
Bai Fu said, “I have abilities you cannot understand.”
The Minister sighed. “Special abilities? You are indeed special. Listening to you recount my past, I felt as if you were telling the story of someone unrelated to me. Earlier at the base I wondered: am I really me? Maybe I am that person you mentioned. Maybe I’m just a copy of him. Since you want me to talk, I’ll tell you ‘his’ story.”
It was actually a simple story.
An alien ship crashed in the Bai Ta Republic. Nations recovered a gravely wounded extraterrestrial visitor, a strange black stone, and incomprehensible data.
Then, nations and the dying alien made a pact to establish the Psionic Diffusion Commission, dedicating themselves to studying the ship’s contents.
The Commission created multiple institutes. Institute No. 1, responsible for mutant technology research, started by recruiting many prisoners from jail. When suitable test subjects became scarce among prisoners, they turned to civilians, secretly abducting many matching candidates.
During that time, the Minister of the Truth Society accepted a commission from a group to find their missing family members.
The wheels of history began turning at that moment.
“So you investigated Institute No. 1 to rescue those people. But you didn’t expect the institute to be so deeply entrenched. In the end you became one of their experimental subjects?”
The Minister nodded laboriously and continued recounting.
At the lab he endured countless tortures and several brainwashing sessions, but he endured. He never forgot why he came to the lab.
He found the people who had hired him to rescue their families and conveyed their loved ones’ expectations. Then he made an agreement with them:
“We must survive and leave this hell together!”
He waited for a year, watching friends who had pledged with him die before his eyes.
He felt anger and pain, but could do nothing outside, so he buried all emotions deep within to avoid suspicion.
After one year, opportunity came.
One day a member nation of the Psionic Diffusion Commission betrayed them, sending assassins to kill the dying extraterrestrial. Fierce conflict erupted between nations. The institute became depleted as researchers were withdrawn.
He seized the chance, planning to lead all innocent test subjects out.
But he underestimated the institute’s security. At that time he had no backup like Bai Fu’s run at duels.
“No one could save me. I could only save myself, I told myself that. But—”
He was wrong.
When he was surrounded, it was the very people he wanted to save who sacrificed themselves to pave his escape.
When he finally breathed fresh air outside after a year, he felt bone-searing pain.
He wanted to save them!
But what had he saved?
Faces of ordinary people flashed in his mind—those who thanked him and used their bodies to hold back guards so he could run. He didn’t know how to face those who had commissioned him.
“I didn’t bring anything back. I only brought back hate.”
The Minister of the Truth Society’s breath grew frantic.
That day, after everything, he still mustered the courage to meet with those who had commissioned him. He went to apologize, but no one blamed him. Those who had commissioned him were grateful and chose to follow him. From that moment, they laid the foundation of the Truth Society.
The Truth Society never pursued the truth itself, only justice.
They struggled fiercely, believing they would never again see the light of dawn. Yet one day, the great powers suddenly went to war, and then, the Cataclysm struck. The world erupted in chaos, and upon the wastelands, the Truth Society saw for the first time a chance to reclaim justice.
“I searched all over, and everyone said that Extraterrestrial Visitor was dead. But I could feel he was hidden inside the Gene Primordials. We, the original Mutants, were all modified using his cells.
“I never expected help from the powers who threw us into hell. They were all in on it. And besides my intuition, I had no proof that the Extraterrestrial Visitor survived.
“I built the Truth Society step by step, taking in many who were persecuted by those nations. I attacked the Gene Primordials many times to find concrete proof that the Extraterrestrial Visitor was still alive.
“You must be curious why Li Cheng from the Gene Primordials would defect to the Truth Society, right? He saw my memories and had his faith collapse. I took advantage of that opening.”
Bai Fu nodded. That explained many mysteries, and sure enough, a new game prompt appeared.
【Plot Exploration on Origin Star +1.3%】
On her journey to become the sole protagonist of Origin Star, the Truth Society President had made yet another contribution.
“A touching story. The only issue is that you involved too many innocent people in your quest for revenge.”
Just then, Yulia limped over.
“So now I lie here—this is my punishment for descending into madness, isn't it?”
The Truth Society President closed his eyes. Having spoken so much, his consciousness began to blur.
He was truly exhausted. Even venting everything couldn't ease the emptiness inside. Perhaps only death could fill that void.
Bai Fu looked at the two options that popped up before her eyes. This was the follow-up to the mission 【The Origin of the Truth Society】.
The first option was to kill the Truth Society President directly. The second was to help him fulfill his dying wish—eliminate the Extraterrestrial Visitor.
Of course she chose the second option. It offered better rewards, and she had long wanted to go after the Gene Primordials.
“Rest in peace. I’ll send those Gene Primordials down to join you.”
The Truth Society President’s eyes snapped open. He stared at Bai Fu for a long while, as if trying to etch her face deep into his soul.
“You... seems I was wrong. You're not my nemesis... you're my savior...”
Even though it was late, a savior was still a savior.
The void within him suddenly felt whole. He no longer wrestled with whether he was the original man or just a memory-implanted Artificial Human.
As his consciousness drifted, he couldn’t help but wonder: what if, on that day, when he tried to lead people out of the research institute, Bai Fu had suddenly appeared?
He closed his eyes again, as if returning to the days of his youth.
Truly, even now, he had never again tasted a meal as delicious as that first one he had with the donation money, nor had he seen stars as brilliant as those that night.
In that moment, a genuine smile appeared on his face.
...
The Truth Society President was dead.
He lay on the ground alone. In death, he looked very ordinary, like any nameless figure lost to history.
But he was far from alone. Benardo and the other Psionic users who had always followed him arrived.
They didn’t fight Bai Fu, nor did they blame her.
They wiped the blood from the President’s face. Then, one of them pulled a vial from his clothes and drank it in one gulp. It was a potent poison. He soon died beside the President.
One by one, all the Psionic users, except for Benardo, followed suit.
Thud. Thud.
Each one of these Psionic users—feared by all major factions—fell like wheat in a field.
They died decisively, without preserving a shred of dignity. Their deaths shook all who witnessed the scene.
“They, like me, are descendants of the original commissioners and followers of the President. Everything we achieved was thanks to his support. He bore burdens he never should’ve borne.”
“They chose death because they’d rather die than be captured by the descendants of their old enemies.”
“I must live. I must collect their bodies. I must live long enough to see the collapse of the Gene Primordials with my own eyes. No matter how much humiliation I suffer before that, I must live.”
Benardo closed each comrade’s eyes.
When Coleman and the others arrived, he calmly extended his hands, allowing himself to be handcuffed.
“You won—but not with your own strength.”
Benardo’s words made Coleman’s veins bulge in anger. He punched him twice, but Benardo just laughed.
As laughter echoed, the Truth Society President’s death and the fall of the Truth Society swept across Origin Star like a tornado.
Bai Fu had no interest in others’ cheers.
She didn’t know whether this, as others had said in their terminals, marked the end of an era. She only knew—her era on Origin Star had begun.
She opened her game prompt panel, and a stream of notifications poured out like water.
【You killed the Truth Society President】
【You completed the Regional Main Storyline [Elegy of the Watchers] Branch 2 [Guardian Angel]】
【You completed Faction Mission [Fall of the Truth Society] Objectives 5, 6, 11】
【You completed Story Mission [Truth Unknown]】