Self-Will

Before the words could fully leave his mouth, he paused.

The Waiter had once casually mentioned "looking down on the God of Gamblers." In the end, the Battle-Damaged Guy had blurted out the exact same words. Then there were the rumors quietly circulating through the Entertainment City, the faint dissatisfaction, the disdain, the contempt for the God of Gamblers...

All those seemingly scattered, accidental, and insignificant fragments suddenly snapped together into a complete answer.

The Waiter still wore that perfectly measured smile—warm yet detached.

Ren Yi's gaze fell on him, his voice dropping slightly. "So, was it because of your influence that he came here?"

Ren Yi felt that this matter was starting to exceed his original understanding.

It wasn't that he was surprised the Entertainment City would pull strings, but rather—the Battle-Damaged Guy had come from outside the Instance.

How could the Entertainment City reach its hand beyond the Instance's borders?

"Did you use Contamination?" He frowned, voicing his core confusion.

"No, even the Contamination on us shouldn't be able to forcibly resist the world's will, right? Can Contamination even remain stable and effective after leaving this Instance?"

This was the part he found most incomprehensible.

Contamination was something that was never fully under the control of an Anomaly, let alone something that could be precisely manipulated at will.

Just like with the Battle-Damaged Guy earlier—even a power as dominant as 【Time Stop】 couldn't stop the Contamination from spreading and eroding on its own.

But all of that had happened inside the Instance.

Outside the Instance, under the coverage of the world's will of each Participant's home world, even Contamination should eventually be mitigated, suppressed, or slowly repaired.

Otherwise, if wounds existed that could never heal and never stopped bleeding, most Participants wouldn't even need to struggle in the Instances; they would have died in their own worlds long after returning.

Furthermore, Contamination was far more terrifying than an ordinary wound.

"Of course not," the Waiter denied calmly. "Contamination—at least mild Contamination—can be cured."

"For some worlds, simply going back and resting well is enough for it to heal on its own."

"In more severe cases, after the appropriate treatment and suppression, it will eventually fade away without a trace, like a nightmare one had one night."

"Outside of an Instance, Contamination that has lost the support of its source is not something that cannot be resisted."

The Waiter paused slightly.

"But when did I ever say I used Contamination?"

Ren Yi was stunned.

"I merely..." The Waiter's voice was light, yet it possessed a chillingly penetrative quality. "Occasionally said a few appropriate words at the appropriate times."

"I do not use force, I do not use Contamination, I do not tamper with rules, and I certainly do not directly and forcibly twist anyone's will."

"I simply scattered a bit of opinion, a bit of emotion, a bit of 'contempt' into the air like dust."

"Some people hear it, some people remember it, and some people eventually leave the Entertainment City and carry those words to the outside world, to other Instances, and into the ears of countless drifting Participants."

"The world's will can clear Contamination, erase anomalies, correct paradoxes, and smooth over all traces that shouldn't exist..."

"But it cannot control a sentence. It cannot control an opinion. It cannot control the emotions that quietly germinate in the depths of a person's heart."

"That does not belong to the anomalous, it does not belong to the ghosts, and it does not belong to rule contamination."

"That is merely... what some people assume to be their own 'self-will.'"

"So that's why he said the exact same thing you did..." Ren Yi whispered to himself, his heart filled with an unspeakable shock.

The Waiter admitted it frankly, his tone as calm as if he were discussing a trivial matter.

"I just didn't expect that the one eventually lured here would be a Participant with a top-tier talent like 【Time Stop】."

"But looking at it from another perspective—without 【Time Stop】, he probably wouldn't have dared to charge in here alone to challenge the God of Gamblers, who is protected by 【Luck】."

So that was it.

The Battle-Damaged Guy's arrival at the Entertainment City was never a coincidence.

It was a premeditated scheme laid out by the Entertainment City.

As a permanent Instance that existed stably over the long term, the Entertainment City didn't have a rigid quota for killing everyone who entered.

But that didn't mean it had no way to utilize those who were about to leave and head back to the outside world.

It only needed to let them inadvertently see how the God of Gamblers and those around him acted with such arrogance in the city.

It only needed to subtly hint that the Entertainment City itself was not pleased to see such a dominant monopoly.

It only needed to intentionally or unintentionally tell the story of the God of Gamblers to every new customer, pointing out how he had gradually fallen and how he complacently occupied a spotlight that didn't belong to him.

You don't need to do it yourself.

You only need to set up a target.

Naturally, someone will be ignited by a sentence, driven by an emotion, and attracted by a quietly spreading opinion. They will charge forward without hesitation to be the one who flips the chessboard.

Ren Yi remained silent for a moment before suddenly looking up, curiosity in his eyes. "Is this sentence of yours also true?"

The Waiter before him was essentially an Anomaly, or a part of one.

Wang Zhixin's Lie Detection ability was completely useless against him.

Every word he spoke was a mix of truth and lies, making it difficult to distinguish between them.

"So, keeping the God of Gamblers in check isn't actually your primary job?"

"The reason you do this is simply because you hate those who stay on the floor forever, always winning, and making the whole place feel stagnant, right?"

"Hmm... not entirely."

The Waiter gave a soft laugh, a hint of inexpressible depth appearing in his eyes.

"You've only touched upon the shallowest layer."

"The people in the Entertainment City are always in flux."

"They come from thousands of different worlds. They are like sand being sifted—living and dying, coming and going, never staying."

"Time is a very interesting thing."

"Worlds are constantly colliding, constantly being destroyed, constantly being organized by the Alliance, cleared by order, and redefined by rules."

"The vast majority of travelers, after experiencing a few rounds of ups and downs and a few brushes with death, will eventually vanish completely from this city without a trace."

"But there are always some people I must personally handle."

"Why can't they just stay?" Ren Yi immediately pressed. "As long as they don't break the rules, is it not okay for them to stay in the Instance forever?"

"No," the Waiter replied without the slightest hesitation.

"Because there are always some people who, like stubborn stones, stay behind and take root."

"Over long periods of time, they constantly accumulate experience, constantly grope for patterns, and constantly peer into the truth behind this Instance and even all worlds."

"...They even summarize things that should not be summarized."

"These people, I must personally clear out."

The Waiter finally turned his head slowly, casting his gaze toward the noisy, boiling, and brilliantly lit depths of the casino. His voice was light, yet it carried an unquestionable, bone-chilling sense of rule.

"Do not underestimate humans, and especially do not underestimate the word 'experience.'"

"The worlds permitted to step into this place have all been filtered through layers of selection by the Alliance."

"Power systems, rule logic, civilization trajectories, underlying laws... all have been strictly segmented and tightly isolated."

"Once you let those who have lived too long, seen too much, and understood too deeply collide, communicate, and verify each other's discoveries in this city..."

"They will ignite sparks that should not exist."

"That would threaten the stratification of worlds, threaten the order of the Alliance, and threaten... the stable operation of all underlying rules."

"This Entertainment City looks like a place of revelry, a den for the desperate, a casino where lives are wagered."

"But its essence is actually the Alliance's... silent, implicit control over countless worlds."

Ren Yi remained speechless for a long time.

It truly was a unique job.

He realized once again just how massive, cold, and spine-chilling the operating logic hidden beneath this golden, magnificent Entertainment City was.

It wasn't a playground, not a casino, and not a sanctuary.

It was a cage.

A massive prison for filtering, observing, controlling, and clearing all cross-world travelers.

Right at that moment, another thunderous crash echoed from the side.

Dr. Lin slammed a fist hard into Dr. Zhao's face, his entire body shaking with rage as his chest heaved violently.

Dr. Zhao was rolling around on the floor holding his head, dodging while still laughing mockingly. His voice was incredibly piercing as it echoed through the entire floor.

"He didn't leave! He didn't leave at all! You lost! A bet's a bet!"