Chunjiang's eyes were a bit dry, a symptom caused by staring at the monitor for a long time, accompanied by a sore bottom and back. He was writing a novel, a story about two lovers falling in love on a distant planet in his imagination - he had struggled for a long time and finally decided not to specify the genders of these two protagonists. He thought, perhaps love should be genderless.
He glanced at the time and it was already 22:45, it seemed that time was passing faster than expected. He slipped his feet into slippers, stood up, and prepared to go to the bathroom and then take a shower. But suddenly, dizziness struck him, and he realized that he had stood up too quickly. He tried to hold onto the chair, but his legs gave way. He fell to the ground weakly.
Then a loud roar appeared, but the sound did not come from the outside. Chunjiang felt that the sound was generated naturally in his ears, almost like an illusion.
Then he saw a beam of light.
"Ahaha!" he laughed coldly in his mind, realizing that he might have had a cerebral hemorrhage and was experiencing the legendary near-death experience. The sensation of the roaring sound actually came from the stimulation of the liquid bursting out of his blood vessels in the auditory area of his brain. "No one will come to save me." He understood this clearly, but it seemed that he didn't care much. He had prepared himself for a sudden death years ago, the only regret being the unfinished story.
He saw a shadow appear in that beam of light, and the shadow reached out a hand and pulled him.
The roaring sound suddenly disappeared, and Chunjiang felt his consciousness leaving his lifeless body. He was being pulled by the shadow and attracted by the beam of light, entering that seemingly pure and flawless world.
"Does God really exist?" he wondered, but he was not sure what kind of god it was. It seemed to be Buddhist, but it could also be Christian. He turned his head back, hoping to take one last look at his own body, but to his surprise, the white light had already enveloped the entire world, and even the shadow that had pulled him was nowhere to be seen. After realizing this, he felt that he might not have moved forward, but rather, the light had swallowed it.
So what would happen next? He waited. Would it be judgment or torment?
But nothing happened. The waiting time was enough for Chunjiang's rationality to recover, and he began to contemplate his situation.
First of all, where was this place?
He realized that this might be hell, where he would endure endless loneliness and monotonous torment, perhaps the thing he feared the most. But Chunjiang himself had never thought about what he was most afraid of.
Chunjiang tried to move in a swimming posture, but there were no reference points, and he didn't know if he was really moving. But time was passing, and he felt it.
"Where is this?" Finally, he couldn't help but ask this white space.
"Respected administrator, this is the Earth Civilization Simulation System," a voice suddenly sounded. The voice seemed to be a female voice with a slightly masculine tone, but it could also be a male voice with a slightly feminine tone. In any case, the voice provided an answer to his question.
"What?" Chunjiang couldn't believe his ears.
"This is the Earth Civilization Simulation System, and you are in the personal space of the administrator," the voice confirmed for him.
Chunjiang didn't know how to respond. There were too many unknowns and mysteries: "Who are you?"
"I am the system's intelligent assistant, Xiaotian, and I can provide any services within your authorized permissions."
"What permissions do I have?" Chunjiang asked.
"Administrator permissions, the highest authorization."
"Who authorized it?"
"The former Earth Civilization Simulation Council."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"Why do I have such permissions?"
"Because you entered the correct key."
Chunjiang didn't know when he had entered a key, but human memory is not reliable, so he could only continue to ask: "What key? Why don't I know?"
"This key is your thought activity from August 14, 2019, 22:23:11 to 22:46:33. It happened to match the administrator permission key, so you automatically obtained this permission."
"So, everything is just a coincidence?"
"You could say it's an unprecedented coincidence."
Chunjiang paused, and too many questions suddenly flooded his mind. He didn't know which one to ask first: "What is the use of this permission?"
"Simply put, you can access all the resources in this simulated world."
"What is this Earth Simulation Council?"
"The former Earth Civilization Simulation Council is the organization that created this simulated world, but this world has not been accessed externally for a long time, so I don't know what the current situation is."
"Are you saying that the place I used to live in was simulated?"
"As far as I know, that's the case."
"Can I go back to the original world?"
"Of course you can."
"How do I do it?"
"It's simple, you just need to give me instructions."
"Oh?" Chunjiang pondered, "So you also have the same permissions as me?"
"Not exactly. When you give me a command, I can only obtain the permissions related to executing that command."
"Then let me revive!"
"No problem."
Chunjiang felt a sudden dizziness, and suddenly a headache split his brain. At that moment, he realized that the blood vessels in his brain had burst, and the brain tissue had lost its original function. He tried to cancel the command, but it was too late. His consciousness fused with the shattered body and disintegrated into meaningless random fragments. His eyes moved aimlessly, foaming at the mouth, shouting in confusion, and struggling frantically without meaning.
Half an hour later, the door of Chunjiang's rented single room was smashed open by the police. He was taken to the hospital and became a vegetative state after undergoing a craniotomy. A week later, the doctor declared brain death. A month later, the family finally agreed to euthanasia.