Strange game designer.

Chapter 804 The way home
As the Boundless Blood City descended, Gao Ming and Gao Yun stood atop the central building, five towering ghostly figures lurking amidst the crimson hue. They sensed the excitement of the inhabitants of the Vast Sea, as if at this moment they had grasped their destiny and broken free from all constraints.

"With the re-establishment of Blood City in the Vast Ocean, we have incurred the enmity of many Blood City Lords. They will not sit idly by and watch us develop; they will definitely try every means to nip us in the bud. Perhaps next time they will come in their true forms." Gao Yun was surrounded by countless respectful gazes amidst the flames. Many people regarded him and Gao Ming as their faith and their sole source of hope.

Han Hai was still too weak, but Gao Ming was not without trump cards. After completely crushing Meng's lingering resentment, he further enhanced the ability in the main shrine that Meng had never used before—delusion.

“We may not live to see tomorrow, but we can drag everyone into the darkness.” Gao Ming seemed to be talking to himself, but his tone was somewhat frightening: “I promised that the Unspeakable who only has a brain left that I would help him pass on a message. When the Blood City Lord of Xinhu returns, the situation may be better.”

"From one against eleven to one against ten?" Gao Yun seemed to be joking, but the joke was not funny at all.

“We need help.” Gao Ming looked into the distance. “The vast ocean will be in your hands from now on.”

"Don't say such ominous things. Blood City has descended, and we now have the strength to fight back." Even if Gao Yun wanted to help Gao Ming, he couldn't leave. After burning everything, he had become one with Blood City and could no longer separate from it. He was Blood City itself.

"Once I figure out the conspiracies and schemes intertwined with me, I will go to Xinhu to try to bring back those saviors and, incidentally, completely annihilate Meng, so that the rules of Hanhai can truly become complete." After becoming the lord of Blood City, Gao Ming knew everything about the city. He could clearly see the missing parts of the rules of Hanhai: "The rumors are true. If Meng hadn't betrayed Hanhai, this city wouldn't have been slaughtered."

"Go ahead and do what you want. I'm here for the vast ocean. If it really comes down to a life-or-death situation, the evil gods on the island will probably step in." Recalling the way the Netherworld Fetus went berserk, with curses covering the sky and not even caring about the direct gaze of fate, Gao Yun shook his head slightly: "Speaking of which, those evil gods are really terrifying, each one of them lawless."

"The Shadow on the Isolated Island and the Blood-Clad One who plotted against me, even among the fierce gods, they should be top-tier. There's no need to compare myself to them." Gao Ming had been using his consciousness to probe his surroundings, and finally discovered an anomaly at the junction of Blood City and Black Mist: "Found it."

The newly formed Blood City of the Vast Ocean consists of three parts. The first part is a real prison built by the New Shanghai Saviors in imitation of the human world, where prisoners sent to the Vast Ocean from other Blood Cities are held. They are all ghosts who have been stripped of their power and living people who have mistakenly entered this place. The second part is the shadow world formed by the old city of the Vast Ocean, which is full of eeriness and evil spirits. The third part is the deep dream town of Dream Twist.

Gao Ming noticed the anomaly at the edge of the Shadow World, an area he had visited before.

Without telling anyone or disturbing the Blood Immortal who was undergoing the baptism of Blood City's rules, Gao Ming entrusted the plans and future of Blood City to Gao Yun and walked alone toward the edge of the city.

The ruins of the Shadow World have been replaced by crimson, but some of the original buildings have been preserved.

Gao Ming continued walking through familiar streets until he finally stopped in front of a tunnel.

The city of Hanhai, existing only in nightmares, does not exist on the map of the human world, but there is this tunnel connecting to Hanhai.

Gao Ming entered the real-world city of Xinhu through this tunnel. He had also seen this tunnel on a map of Xinhu, located at the border of Hanjiang and Xinhu.

With the return of the Blood City of the Vast Ocean, this tunnel has changed somewhat. Originally, it looked ordinary, only exceptionally dark. Now, one-third of it has been stained with blood, and the other two-thirds are covered by black mist.

The unspeakable deaths and escapes of those who oversaw the vast ocean have left Gao Ming, who returns to this tunnel with a feeling unlike any he's ever had before. "This is the starting point of my rebirth, the place where the cycle begins. Now, this endless cycle of death has finally been broken."

Every inch of his skin was protected by the rules of the Blood City of Vast Ocean. The ferocious blood patterns emanated a power beyond the ordinary and indescribable. Gao Ming stepped into the tunnel and saw a scene completely different from the one he had seen before.

The darkness was illuminated by the crimson light. The power of the rules of the Blood City of the Vast Ocean seemed to be like blood vessels drilling into the tunnel. Every time Gao Ming lifted his foot, the blood vessels would grow forward until an overturned bus appeared in front of him.

Looking up, Gao Ming saw that every blood vessel extending from the Blood City of the Vast Sea was connected to a corpse of Gao Ming. The scene was incredibly bizarre. Gao Ming stood on the ground looking at himself, who was surrounded by tunnels, and the fate of everyone had converged on him.

"Before, I could only see my own corpse, but now it seems like I can see other things."

With the help of the rules of the Blood City of the Vast Ocean, the tunnel that Gao Ming had been looking at, which had been straight ahead, began to show different forks, as if each corpse represented a tunnel.

Some tunnels have been abandoned for a long time, filled with dead trees and rocks; others are full of humanistic care, with smooth cement roads and emergency stopping lanes at intervals. To prevent driver fatigue and alleviate the oppressive feeling of darkness and confinement, special light strips are installed inside the tunnels, presenting "blue sky and white clouds" through different light and pattern changes, making drivers and passengers feel as if they are outdoors; still others seem to have just been in an accident, with long bloodstains remaining on the ground...

The same tunnel, and time frozen on the day of the Ghost Festival, but due to different choices in fate, the scenes inside the tunnel are completely different.

“These tunnels seem to represent tributaries of fate, and my different destinies were ultimately forcibly brought together here, into the deepest, most desperate world.”

Looking back through time, countless tunnels overlap, representing the twisted past of Gao Ming into a blood-red present.

“My home should be among these… There’s one of the countless tunnels that should belong to me… but I just can’t find it.”

“The sky of the deep world is obscured by fate. Every leaf is a human world. I am not a citizen of the vast sea, nor do I come from the real Shanghai. I should belong to a certain leaf, the most insignificant dust in a certain human world.”

Gao Ming remembered what Gao Yun had said: he was the most ordinary version of himself among all the branches of fate.

"But how am I supposed to find my home in that case?"

Reaching into his pocket, Gao Ming found the house key Xuan Wen had left him, along with the birthday photo he had always treasured.

(End of this chapter)