I'm Trapped in the Block

Chapter 434: Chapter 431: A Bitter Choice

”Many beings have visited, and I’ve had them participate in the simulations as well. But there has never been a better outcome...”

”Your choices were the closest to my own. They were the same things I once did.”

The god continued to stare at the puddle and sighed.

Mo Ling listened, a bit dazed. ’The god has already done everything in the simulation once before.’

In other words, everything he had seen in the simulation was real.

”The Joyful One... it really exists?”

Mo Ling recalled a familiar being.

”It exists.”

”Then what about the Slothful One?” Mo Ling pressed.

”Dead,” the god said, as if stating something mundane.

It pointed to a sandpit not far away and said plainly, ”It has now become a desert, with only scattered ruins and relics left behind. But there is still plenty of life...”

Then, the god pointed to another small puddle in the distance. ”That was once the body of the Joyful One, but it has already left. I don’t know where it has gone now.”

Mo Ling followed the god’s finger and looked at the sandpit and the puddle.

He had a persistent feeling of déjà vu, but that was no longer important.

”Before its death, the Slothful One split into many companions. The one who came here with you should be one of the fragments it left behind.”

”The Little Elf? It’s actually a fragment left by the Slothful One?”

Mo Ling thought for a moment and slowly began to understand everything.

’Perhaps all those wish-granting races scattered throughout the abyss were left behind by the Slothful One.’

”The one who came with me, where is it now?”

Mo Ling suddenly remembered that the Little Elf had also touched the bubble membrane. The god must know where it went.

The god pointed at the puddle. ”It’s in there too. However, its consciousness is recovering more slowly than yours. It’s only now preparing to start the simulation.”

”Do you want to see its choices?” the god suddenly asked.

”Of course.” Mo Ling was very worried about the Little Elf, so he quickly accepted the god’s invitation.

”Then let’s begin.”

The god’s voice suddenly grew distant, as if coming from the edge of the sky. When Mo Ling came to his senses, his perspective had already sunk to a position above the puddle.

”You have awakened and become aware of your own existence. The simulation will now begin.”

The god spoke to the puddle, its vast voice spreading across the entire sea.

”The game of a god now begins.”

”Because of your awakening, the world has been shaken...”

Just as Mo Ling had experienced at the beginning, the Little Elf was now facing its first choice: ”Do you agree to stop the disaster?”

”I agree.” The Little Elf’s voice slowly drifted over. Of course, it wouldn’t allow the subjects on its body to be harmed.

The first choice was made just like that. The Little Elf naturally chose to save its subjects, which didn’t surprise Mo Ling.

And so, the god manifested, and golden light spilled forth...

The seawater gradually calmed, and civilization entered a stage of vigorous development. The entire sea was flourishing as the simulation proceeded along its predetermined path.

The Little Elf diligently fulfilled the wishes of these increasingly powerful civilizations.

But once the desire for survival was satisfied, all sorts of greedy desires followed. The voices of prayer grew murkier, and the chaotic noise made the Little Elf, who was responsible for the entire sea, utterly miserable.

Just then, the second choice arrived.

”Will you create companions to share your work?”

The golden light had always possessed the ability to split. Creating companions to share the workload was a perfectly natural thing to do.

The Little Elf had done the same thing back in Oasis City, using its split-off companions to collect wishes.

However, to Mo Ling’s surprise, the Little Elf, now acting as a god, immediately rejected this choice.

”I will not create them,” the Little Elf said firmly. ”This sea is so vast. If I were to create enough companions to help me handle the wishes, it would require a great deal of energy. But with too much energy, I would lose control over them.”

The Little Elf decisively rejected the choice the god had given it.

Only then did Mo Ling recall that the Little Elf already had experience with this from its time in Oasis City. Due to insufficient energy, most of its doppelgangers had been abnormal, and it had taken the Little Elf considerable effort to retract them all.

And so, the Little Elf chose to bear the burden of all these chaotic wishes alone.

But it didn’t just sit back and wait for the worst. Instead, it immediately established a wish-filtering mechanism, directly blocking out greedy desires from the golden light. The cacophony of wishes instantly became much quieter.

”Quick filter: Fakes rejected.”

”Time filter: Only one valid prayer can be made within a certain period.”

”Location filter: Prayers not made in designated locations are rejected.”

”Non-compliant prayers are rejected. Unclear prayers are rejected. Self-achievable prayers are rejected. World-destroying prayers are rejected. Impossible prayers are rejected. Prayers from those who have cursed the god are rejected...”

After this round of filtering, only a fraction of the chaotic prayers remained.

”That’s much better,” the Little Elf said happily.

This maneuver left Mo Ling completely stunned.

He then realized that the Little Elf had spent so long in Oasis City that it must have dealt with all sorts of bizarre wishes before. To save Oasis City, it must have researched methods for filtering wishes.

He never expected that knowledge would come in handy here.

After being tempered by the human world, the Little Elf had no patience for complications. The information was too chaotic, so it just switched on the filters.

Soon, the civilizations in the sea also realized that having their prayers answered was becoming more and more difficult.

’Is the god angry?’

They began to speculate on the god’s intentions and finally came to a conclusion:

”The god is furious with our unrestrained wishing. If this continues, the god will abandon us and let us fend for ourselves.”

And so, they panicked. They hastily built Temples, appointed specialized clergy, and established all sorts of doctrines and scriptures, beginning to standardize everything related to their god.

Standardized idols, uniform prayer formats, unified rituals...

The result was that the prayers the Little Elf received became increasingly standardized. Because their reverence for the god had reached a new level, there were no longer any prayers filled with greed.

The advantage of standardization was easier filtering. The Little Elf adjusted its filtering system again, setting priorities for different types of prayers.

In the end, the prayers the Little Elf accepted were mostly those that were highly standardized and had a wide-ranging impact.

”O, divine one, it has not rained in the Northern Plains for a long time. The river valleys are dry, and vast swathes of crops are suffering from drought. The people are full of grievances. We beg the divine one to send rain...”

The Little Elf would prioritize fulfilling wishes like this, then methodically handle other, lower-priority wishes.

As the stage of civilization advanced, it would also gradually limit the scope of wishes.

Although it was still busy, it wasn’t on the verge of collapse.

The wish crisis was, surprisingly, resolved with ease by the Little Elf.