ICAWZ Chapter 229

Since Gayan enjoyed the freedom won through their desperate battle to slay the Zerg King, he ought to pay a price for it.

A traitor can never truly find refuge, no matter where they run.

As one of their own, Gayan did not stand by Xue Po and the others in their life-and-death struggle; as a subject, he also failed to protect the Zerg King to the end.

Whether toward his kin or the fallen Zerg King, he was a traitor devoid of loyalty—like a Kasyapa serpent coiled in a cold, damp cave, forever flicking its tongue in the dark.

Hermes didn’t mind that Gayan watched with cold detachment, nor that he was unwilling to lift a finger in resistance—but what he did mind was that, at the most critical moment, Gayan delivered the fatal blow to Lin Kong.

[If the Zerg Race is fortunate enough to survive and thrive, then perhaps, millions of years from now, you might find a king worthy of your loyalty.]

It was a blessing that hardly counted as one.

After speaking, Hermes didn’t spare a single glance at Gayan’s pale face. With a sweep of his wings, he turned and carried Lin Kong back toward the temple. At last, the churning sky began to calm; the dark clouds slowly dispersed, revealing a sliver of clear blue.

“Why does the death of the Divine Attendant mean the extinction of the Zerg Race?”

This was the first question Lin Kong asked upon returning to the temple. He carefully examined the strange symbols carved into the crumbling walls, but no matter how long he stared, he couldn’t make sense of them—only that they resembled childish doodles.

[Because all things must come in pairs in order to reproduce—except for the Zerg King.]

Hermes touched the carvings on the wall with his long, pale fingers, explaining softly, word by word:

[Like the sun and the moon, the sky and the earth, birds and beasts… and good and evil.]

[They require balance.]

And Gayan was the embodiment of evil.

Lin Kong half-understood, half-doubted. “So it’s like the balance of yin and yang? We have that concept too where I’m from. But what does that have to do with reproduction? You guys don’t even have genders, right? Killing Gayan shouldn’t affect your ability to reproduce—so why would the heavens strike you down for it?”

Hermes stared at the strange, vein-like patterns on the temple wall, his brows slightly furrowed. His deep voice echoed in Lin Kong’s mind, now carrying an oddly distant, ancient tone: [There is… another possibility.]

Lin Kong twitched his ears. “What?”

[His fate is closely tied to ours.]

[If Gayan were to die, our destiny would be thrown into chaos. That is why the heavens do not permit me to take his life.]

Lin Kong reflexively blurted out, “That can’t be right.”

But as soon as the words left his mouth, he suddenly remembered—he had crossed over from Earth. His expression turned strange. “How do you know that?”

Hermes traced the winding patterns on the wall, his eyes deep in thought. [This is a prophecy left behind by the gods. If you are unable to kill him, it means your fate is bound to his.]

Lin Kong glanced at the strange symbols. “Where does it say that?”

Hermes shook his head. [You can’t read it.]

This was divine script—only psychic power could comprehend it.

To this day, Lin Kong still didn’t know what kind of time or space he had ended up in—maybe it was the future, maybe the past, or perhaps a parallel world with no connection to Earth at all. But he had clearly never known Gayan before, so how could that person possibly interfere with his fate?

Lin Kong couldn’t quite make sense of it. After a moment, he said: “The northern region is so desolate—it’s punishment enough for Gayan. Since you’ve already spared him, don’t overthink it. There are only a handful of Divine Attendants. If they all die… that wouldn’t be good either.”

Lin Kong tried putting himself in Hermes’ shoes and thought—if Gayan were to die, Hermes would probably feel at least a little sorrow. After all, they had grown up together. That kind of bond had to mean something.

But if Hermes knew what Lin Kong was thinking, he would definitely think he was being foolish. Sentiment? Maybe—but only toward Xue Po. He and Gayan had been scheming against each other since childhood, always one step away from tearing each other apart. What bond could there possibly be?

That night, when Lin Kong lay down to sleep, he was still fiddling with his phone—but this time, he wasn’t playing games. He was just staring off into space.

As a modern person, Lin Kong felt he should contribute something to this primitive society. Farming, building, or even teaching reading and writing—though he might not do it well, he could still help the Zerg Race progress a little. Spending every day just playing games felt like too much of a waste, a slow slide into waiting for death.

These two high-tech phones were like a lingering attachment to the modern world, something he couldn’t bear to throw away—but in truth, they were practically useless here.

Lin Kong stared at the phones for a moment, then finally rolled out of his beast-skin mattress. He rummaged around the corner of the temple ruins for a while and found a wooden box meant for offerings. With great care, he placed the phones inside, treating them like precious relics.

Hermes turned to look at him, propping his head on one hand. His silver hair slipped quietly from his shoulder, carrying a hint of cold allure. “What are you doing?”

He had already picked up some human language.

Lin Kong answered seriously, “I’m burying the phones. Once they’re buried, I won’t be thinking about playing with them all the time. Tomorrow, you should bring those Zerg tribe people over. I’ll teach them how to build houses and farm. Staying stuck in place leads nowhere!”

Hermes didn’t believe that building houses or farming would lead to progress. [They’re beasts. They don’t need houses, and they don’t need food like you do.]

Lin Kong thought to himself that the cultural gap between the two of them was simply too wide for effective communication. “Who says they don’t need food? Xue Po eats every day. The reason they’re still beasts is because they haven’t learned these things. Once they do, they won’t be beasts anymore.”

Hermes asked in return: [What will they be?]

Lin Konglooked up at the night sky, thinking for a moment before replying: “Humans.”

He spoke with sincerity. “People like me.”

Hermes raised an eyebrow, unable to hide his disdain: [People like you? So fragile?]

Might as well be beasts, then.

Lin Kong: “….”

You’re really infuriating!

Lin Kong didn’t argue with Hermes; he only looked down on him for being so short-sighted. Just like how Lin Daiyu was devastated when burying the flowers[mfn]a poignant moment from Dream of the Red Chamber (also known as The Story of the Stone), one of China’s Four Great Classical Novels.[/mfn], Lin Kong felt just as sorrowful when burying his phones. He casually picked a handful of unknown wildflowers from the ground and stuffed them into the box, then closed the lid, treating it as a “burial” for his phones.

“Stay in the box and be good. This way, you won’t get eaten by insects. Once the house is built, I’ll dig you up. Otherwise, I’ll keep thinking about playing games and won’t be able to focus on my career…”

“You know, first comes career, then comes family. A man’s career is important…”

Lin Kong mumbled to himself for a while as he held the box, then finally dug a hole and buried all the electronic devices, as if severing the last tie he had to the modern world.

He knew that if this attachment wasn’t broken, he would never be able to settle down in this primitive society.

After burying the box deep in the ground, Lin Kong stomped on it twice, then crawled back into his bedding. Hermes twitched his ear, and soon heard Lin Kong swearing to himself: “From tomorrow on, I won’t touch my phone again. If I do, I’ll be a dog!”

What did dogs ever do wrong?

Hermes didn’t know. What he did know was that it seemed like he had jinxed things. Just after he’d spoken about how fragile humans were, by the middle of the night, Lin Kong suddenly came down with a high fever. His face flushed bright red, his mind delirious, and he rambled on incoherently.

“Lin Kong?! Lin Kong?!”

Hermes frowned and slapped Lin Kong’s face, the anxious and uneasy feeling creeping up again in his chest. He didn’t know how to bring Lin Kong’s fever down, so he could only pick him up and carry him out of the temple, heading toward the stream. However, just a few steps out, an earth-shattering sound suddenly rang out from behind them.

“Boom—!!!!”

The support beams of the temple suddenly cracked with a loud snap, and the roof came crashing down with a deafening roar. Bricks and tiles scattered everywhere, and thick clouds of dust billowed up. The surrounding animals were so frightened that they fled in a hurry, and the entire ground trembled for a moment.

Hermes immediately flew backward, holding Lin Kong in his arms, retreating a considerable distance to avoid the danger zone. He looked at the temple, now reduced to rubble, his pupils slightly narrowing. A rare look of shock flashed across his face, clearly not expecting the temple to collapse at this moment.

Lin Kong was also jolted awake. He struggled to open his eyes and, with a hoarse voice, asked, “What happened?”

Hermes looked at Lin Kong’s pale, cracked lips and paused for a moment. […Nothing.]

With that, he quickly held Lin Kong and headed toward the stream. It was only then that Lin Kong finally noticed the temple had actually collapsed. He struggled to sit up, turned his head to look back, and said in surprise: “The temple collapsed?! My phones are still buried down there?!”

Hermes thought to himself that burying them was just perfect. Knowing Lin Kong, if the temple hadn’t collapsed, he’d probably have been impatient to dig them up the next day. [It’s buried. It’s buried. You said you wouldn’t play with them anyway.]

Lin Kong frowned and coughed a couple of times, visibly weak. He spoke in a feeble voice: “I said I wouldn’t play with them, but my belongings are still inside. My fever medicine is in there too… By the way, where are you taking me?”

[To the water.]

[You’re burning up.]

Hermes’ responses were always so precise and matter-of-fact.

Upon hearing this, Lin Kong immediately struggled to sit up, his head pounding painfully. “I’m sick! How can I soak in cold water? Just find somewhere for me to sleep.”

Hermes actually stopped in his tracks after hearing this. [But you’re burning up.]

Lin Kong forced himself to rally, trying to sound more convincing: “Fever’s always like this. Tomorrow, go back to the ruins and dig out my belongings. Two fever pills should be enough.”

Although he wasn’t sure if the medicine was expired, there was no room for being picky in the wilderness.

Hermes, hearing this, had no choice but to comply. He took Lin Kong to the cave where they had been staying, gathered a pile of animal skins to keep him warm, and then sat by his side, motionless, staring at Lin Kong. It was as if he were afraid this fragile human might suddenly stop breathing, just like last time.

In the medicine-deprived wilderness, even a small cold or fever could become a fatal illness.

Lin Kong was delirious from the fever, and when he saw Hermes staring at him from the side, his red eyes glowing eerily in the dark, he couldn’t help but momentarily wonder if Hermes might devour him at any second.

“I’m not going to die. It’s just a fever…”

Lin Kong tried to reassure Hermes: “I’ll be fine after a nap. Don’t rush to eat me…”

Hermes thought to himself that he would never eat Lin Kong again. He couldn’t bring himself to, but upon hearing Lin Kong’s words, he didn’t argue. He simply replied with a quiet “Mm.”

Lin Kong finally closed his eyes and fell into a restless sleep. He had never been seriously ill before, but this time the fever hit him hard. For an entire week, he was in a dazed, half-conscious state. After the high fever came the chills, and he was so weak he couldn’t even get out of bed.

Lin Kong really worried that he might die. Wrapped in thick animal skins to avoid the cold wind, he barely left the cave. In his free time, he would use stones to draw house-building plans on the walls, thinking about how to construct a solid house in this primitive society. Unknowingly, the walls became covered with his deconstruction sketches.

“Building a house requires nails, but we don’t have any. We can use the barbed spines from the back of the spine-beast to substitute. Their barbs are replaced every year, so we can collect them and use them like nails to pin into the wood, which will help secure the house.”

“If we can’t find enough barbs, we can also use mortise and tenon joints to fix the structure. It just takes more time. I’ll use small twigs to demonstrate for you. You just need to follow this method…”

“Also, the length of the wood has specific requirements. You can use this grass rope to measure. I’ve tied a knot every certain distance, and each knot represents one centimeter…”

Lin Kong crouched on the open ground, seriously explaining the method of building a wooden house to the low-level zergs. Due to his recent recovery from illness, his voice was still hoarse. Holding a twig in his hand, he drew on the ground, trying his best to simplify the method so they could understand the principles.

When Lin Kong used to film shows, he had stayed in rural areas and had seen others build simple cattle sheds. He had vaguely remembered how it was done. Adding to that, he used a bunch of simple wooden sticks to make a small model demonstration. By the end, most of the zergs had understood about half of it.

[We understand. We’ll do it as you said.]

The low-level zergs were originally controlled by Dongning, but some had already followed Gayan to the northern region, while others belonged to Xue Po. With Dongning’s death, the zergs he had once protected were left without a home. Lin Kong decided to take them all in and gave the tribe a simple name—

Let’s call it the Eastern Tribe.

It was perfect, considering he came from the distant East.

Hermes had already become the new king of the Zerg Race. Every day, what he did was hunt, hunt, and hunt again. It seemed like nothing had changed compared to before. Looking at the vast number of his subjects, he occasionally felt a sense of confusion—

What should he do?

Or rather, how could he make the tribe stronger?

In contrast, Lin Kong had countless things to do every day—finding planting soil, collecting plant seeds, weaving grass ropes, making clothes—like a busy little bee.

Even now, Hermes still remembered something Lin Kong had once said: “Hermes, do you know what my race is like?”

“At the beginning, humans were no different from those low-level zerg tribes. They couldn’t fly like you, nor were they skilled hunters, but they survived countless hardships and learned to use fire and tools…”

“At first, they lived in wooden houses too. But by the time I was born, they had already built countless giant steel machines, capable of flying higher and farther than you, even reaching the moon…”

“One day… I mean, maybe, just maybe, these Zerg tribes could reach that point too?”

When Hermes heard these words, he couldn’t help but scoff. How could fragile humans like Lin Kong possibly fly as high as him, let alone touch the moon?

He hadn’t even touched the moon himself.

But Lin Kong spoke with such seriousness, as though there was no room for doubt.

The low-level zergs were not stupid. The speed at which they constructed the wooden houses was much faster than expected. They had experienced three failures, accumulating a lot of experience. By the fourth attempt, a beautiful and sturdy wooden house appeared before Lin Kong’s eyes.

[Your Majesty, this is the palace we built for you. We hope you like it.]

The Eastern Zerg tribe didn’t know exactly how to address Lin Kong, but they knew his status was similar to Hermes, so they referred to him in the same way. They all knelt before the cave entrance, eager to present the “palace” they had personally crafted for him.

When Lin Kong saw the wooden house, he couldn’t help but smile for a moment. He thought to himself, What palace? This is clearly just a small wooden house. But, out here in the wilderness, in a certain sense, it could be considered a palace.

“You built this? It’s so beautiful!”

Lin Kong never hesitated to give compliments. He walked around the wooden house, noticing that fresh flowers were placed around the eaves. He thought to himself, These Zerg tribes already possess human-like aesthetics and emotions. If they don’t perish, maybe they’ll go far in the future.

Hermes stood silently beside him, wearing his black ceremonial robe, a sight that instilled fear in anyone who looked at him. His gaze swept across the slightly “shabby” house, and he frowned before speaking, [I can build one too.]

He added, [A bigger one than this.]

Lin Kong chewed on a blade of grass, thinking to himself, So, even scoundrels like him are the same no matter the species or era. He smiled and said, “Let’s see if you can actually build it first. Houses aren’t something you can just make with a snap of your fingers.”

After speaking, he seemed to remember something. He gestured for Hermes to come closer, with a playful motion of his fingers. “By the way, now that we’ve built the house, how about we give this place a name?”

Lin Kong had found a beautiful large stone yesterday. It felt cool and smooth to the touch, like a giant egg.

When Hermes heard Lin Kong wanted to name this place, he paused for a moment. He walked over to the large greenish stone, crouched down beside it, and surprisingly didn’t reject such a trivial task. [What do you want to name it?]

“Hmm…”

Lin Kong wanted to come up with something classy, but his mind drew a blank. After thinking for a while, he tentatively said two words, “Blue Star?”

Hermes was confused: [What is Blue Star?]

Lin Kong gestured a little, trying to explain: “It’s… a blue planet.”

After saying that, he felt the explanation was too simplistic and wouldn’t sound nice if engraved. He then asked: “What would this phrase be in your ancient language? We can engrave it on this big stone, so we won’t forget it in the future.”

Lin Kong sometimes worried that, over the long years ahead, he might gradually forget his identity, the things he wanted to remind himself of or remember.

For example, that blue planet…

Hermes didn’t respond immediately. After a moment of thought, he slowly lifted his sharp nails. His eyes lowered, and as the wind rustled from right to left, he pressed his claws down firmly and slowly, carving a line into the stone —

[Salaranfa.]

Hermes’ voice was low, as if telling an ancient story. He gently brushed away the debris from the carving, and in the warm summer breeze, he quietly watched Lin Kong, a trace of tenderness in his eyes.

[Let’s call it, Salaranfa…]

At that time, Lin Kong still didn’t know that these four characters would be passed down along with the title of the Zerg God for a very long time, long enough for the Zerg Race to eventually fly to the heavens with the aid of tools, to build countless towering steel beasts, and to fulfill his vision of the future.

After all, back then, they hadn’t yet learned to reproduce. Back then, life was limited. With a lifespan of only a hundred years, they couldn’t see the rise and fall of millions of years into the future.

Their descendants would never know the story of their ancestors. They would only guess based on the fragmented historical records, imagining that the Zerg Race once had a “god” and then create their own version of those vague pasts.

The Zerg tribe in the south was exquisite and beautiful, surely because the Zerg God had favored their ancestors so much that they were blessed with a beauty that stunned all who laid eyes on them.

The Zerg tribe in the north was cunning and treacherous, with dark skin, and it must have been because they were not favored by the Zerg God that they were exiled to the cold northern lands.

The Zerg tribe in the west was born graceful, filled with strategies and wisdom. They were also known as the descendants of the Zerg God.

And then there was the East, that distant tribe, which, in most cases, kept to themselves. They revered the divine, but did not blindly worship it, for their ancestors had once said that, no matter how the tribe might evolve in the future, everything they would achieve would be through their own hands.

The god who had once blessed them had only existed for a brief hundred years, and then, on a night under the blood moon, vanished without a trace. Perhaps it was simply the end of its lifespan, and it had gone to wherever it was meant to go.

Yet, the zergs were unwilling to accept the fall of their god. They preferred to believe that it had traveled to some unknown distant place, continuing to guard this land from afar.

By the way, their Zerg God is called,

Hermes.

But the ancient East says that there was not just one god, because their other god had black hair and black eyes…

 

 

 

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