98: Chapter 98 The Sin of Twins

The Mechanical Civilization dimension had completely fallen into a deathly silent ruin.

The aftershocks from the recent emotion detonation still rippled slowly through the void. The once overwhelming tide of metallic sand, capable of swallowing stars, had now lost the guidance of the Mainframe's will. It turned into billions of cold, golden dust particles, drifting, settling, and annihilating aimlessly within the distorted space-time. The grey-purple dimensional turbulence, like the gasping of a wounded beast, constantly washed over the hull of the star. The entire ship vibrated slightly as the engine systems worked at maximum power to repair the wounds left by the fierce battle.

The lights in the main control cabin were dimmed to a soft mode, yet they still couldn't dispel the heavy oppression in the air.

Lin Fan leaned against the edge of the main console, his body trembling uncontrollably.

His face was pale to the point of being nearly transparent, and his forehead was covered in fine cold sweat. Strands of pale gold cosmic energy leaked uncontrollably from his fingertips, only to dissipate weakly in mid-air. The price of detonating his last shred of emotion to forcibly counter the Mechanical Mainframe was far more tragic than the facade he had put on in front of AKai and Franklin—deep within his consciousness, it felt as if an unhealable crack had been torn open. One half consisted of the human emotions that had just broken through the dimensional blockade and were flooding back frantically; longing, guilt, heartache, and anger intertwined into a noose, tightening around his heart. The other half was the cosmic power that had expanded wildly after being severely stimulated, eroding his flesh and soul in an overbearing manner, attempting to completely assimilate him into the joyless and sorrowless cosmic rules themselves.

The two forces collided, tore, and engaged in a tug-of-war within his body.

It wasn't a pain of the flesh, but the agonizing torture of the soul being torn apart alive.

“Lin Fan! Don't push yourself!”

AKai rushed forward immediately, his semi-mechanically modified right arm steadily supporting Lin Fan's swaying body, his alloy knuckles turning slightly white from tension. He looked down at Lin Fan's nearly transparent arm, and his pupils suddenly constricted—the skin there was becoming illusory bit by bit, like melting light and shadow. This was the precursor to cosmicization spiraling completely out of control.

Ever since Lin Fan embarked on the journey across the universe to find Kate, the cosmicization erosion had never stopped, but it had never been as perilous as it was now.

Franklin's virtual body quickly floated in front of Lin Fan, his translucent hands sweeping rapidly through the air. Strings of data streams poured down like waterfalls, instantly filling the optical screens of the entire main control cabin. The next second, the entire screen was completely covered by a piercing red alert, and the shrill alarm made the already tense atmosphere even more suffocating.

“Cosmicization erosion rate is at 47% and is still skyrocketing at 0.3% per second!” Franklin's voice had never been so grave. “Just now, you forcibly detonated your residual emotions, which directly triggered a stress response from the cosmic rules within you. If this continues, within ten minutes, your self-awareness will be completely swallowed, and you will become a cosmic puppet that only knows how to follow rules without any emotion!”

Lin Fan gritted his teeth, a suppressed groan escaping his throat.

He could clearly perceive the changes in his body.

His sense of touch was weakening, his emotions were becoming lighter, and even his longing for Kate was being slowly stripped away by a cold force. He desperately tried to grasp those fragments of Kate in his mind—the strawberry energy bar she handed him when they first met in the virtual data pod, her soft breathing when she fell asleep on his shoulder, the warmth of her hand smiling and ruffling his hair on the eve of the final battle, and that whispered 'Goodbye' before she turned into a sky full of light particles...

For every extra second he held on, the pain in his soul increased by a notch.

“I'm fine.”

Lin Fan forcefully pushed away AKai's support, bracing his weak legs to barely stand upright. He ignored the intense pain in his body, his gaze fixed intently on the floating metallic dust outside the viewport, his voice raspy yet exceptionally firm: “Franklin, when you were analyzing the sand grains just now, besides Kate's voice, you must have read something else, right? As the 'cleaner' for the light orb prototype, the Mechanical Mainframe must have the true cosmic truth hidden in its core database.”

Franklin fell silent.

His virtual face rarely lost its usual ease and sharp tongue, leaving only an utmost, heavy solemnity.

He knew that some things could no longer be hidden.

“Yes,” Franklin nodded slowly, pressing lightly in the air. “I retrieved a segment of divine memory sealed with dimension-level encryption. This was the core directive implanted into the Mechanical Mainframe since its inception, and its sole reason for existence—to guard this secret, which is enough to overturn the perception of the entire multiverse.”

As the words fell...

The void in the center of the main control cabin suddenly lit up, and a massive three-dimensional holographic projection fully unfolded.

There were no brilliant star systems, no prosperous civilizations, only an absolute darkness older and deeper than the time before the universe was born. In the very center of this darkness, a ball of soft, warm, nearly transparent light floated quietly, pulsating slowly like the original heartbeat of the entire universe.

It was an existence that could not be described in words.

Ancient, vast, sacred, and pure.

“This is...” AKai stared intently at the projection, his breath suddenly hitching.

“The light orb prototype.” Franklin's voice was low, as if reciting a creation epic. “At the dawn of the multiverse, the sole Original Consciousness, the source of all dimensions, all civilizations, and all rules. It woke from nothingness, personally lit the first star, and nurtured the first spark of life.”

The projection began to flow, a scroll of time spanning billions of years slowly unfolding before the three of them.

stars were born and died, civilizations rose and fell, and eras changed.

The warm light orb prototype quietly guarded this newborn universe, watching countless lives bloom and wither, watching countless civilizations rise and fall. But as time passed, that soft orb of light gradually grew dim and weak, like a burnt-out candle, its life force draining at an alarming rate.

Deep in the void, an invisible, intangible, colorless, and odorless yet all-consuming terrifying force was slowly spreading like a tide.

It didn't attack, didn't roar, and didn't destroy, yet it carried the ultimate despair of the universe—entropy silence.

All energy would eventually return to an average, all light would return to darkness, all motion would return to stillness, even time would be completely frozen, and even consciousness would be completely melted. The entire universe would march toward eternal death in endless cold.

The light orb prototype was trembling.

It didn't want to die.

It especially didn't want to watch the universe it had personally guarded return completely to nothingness.

Thus, in endless despair, it made a choice that could rewrite the destiny of the universe.

In the holographic projection, that warm light slowly split from the center.

One became two.

One half remained in its original form—bright, soft, compassionate, and protective—the embodiment of all warmth and life in the universe.

The other half turned completely into a boundless shadow—cold, violent, greedy, and consuming—carrying an aura of world-ending destruction, like a giant beast crawling out of the abyss.

The moment the shadow was born, the entire universe trembled for it.

“That is the Sower.” Franklin's voice fell like a thunderclap within the main control cabin.

Lin Fan and AKai both froze in place.

All the doubts, all the foreshadowing, all the incomprehensible strangeness and conflicts encountered along the way were suddenly connected at this moment, revealing the truth.

Why was the Sower everywhere, yet shared the same foundational aura as the Light Sphere Race?

Why did the Sower destroy civilizations on one hand, while 'creating' dimensions on the other?

Why did the Mechanical Civilization view organic life as a virus, yet followed the orders of an invisible will?

There was only one answer—

The light orb prototype and the Sower were originally two halves of the same whole.

The light orb prototype is the Guardian of the universe, the body, and the heart.

The Sower is the harvester of the universe, the fangs, and the hand.

To combat entropy silence, the light orb prototype actively split off the Sower, letting it traverse thousands of dimensions to consume discarded stars, low-level civilizations, and useless consciousness, converting everything into the purest cosmic energy to feed back into the main body, forcibly extending the lifespan of the universe.

Symbiosis, dependence, neither could exist without the other.

This was their most fundamental relationship.

“The original plan was perfect,” Franklin continued to recount this buried history. “The Sower would only harvest dying civilizations, while the light orb prototype guarded new life. With the two in balance, the universe could linger on under the threat of entropy silence. But...”

His tone suddenly shifted, and the projected images instantly became dark and violent.

It went out of control.

Consumption brought power, and power bred greed.

Through endless consumption, the Sower developed its own independent will. It was no longer satisfied with harvesting dying civilizations and began to actively destroy, manipulate, and 'farm' civilizations, treating the entire multiverse as its food warehouse. It expanded frantically, tearing through dimensions at will; wherever it went, life was devastated, and civilizations were utterly destroyed.

The light orb prototype panicked.

It wanted to take back the Sower's power, only to find it could no longer do so—the symbiotic bond of the twins had become an inescapable shackle. The Guardian and the Destroyer had moved completely into opposition.

One thought to create the world, one thought to destroy it.

One light to plant, one shadow to harvest.

The Sin of Twins.

This was the cosmic original sin that the light orb prototype and the Sower had carried on their backs since the moment of their split, a sin that could never be washed away.

The entire main control cabin fell into a deathly silence.

AKai leaned against the console, his whole body cold, unable to say a word. He had always thought they were fighting against external invaders, an evil alien race, but in the end, the so-called enemy and the so-called god were two sides of the same coin. All their battles and sacrifices were just a speck of dust in this cosmic-level self-salvation.

Lin Fan stood there, his mind a complete blank.

Countless images flashed frantically through his mind.

Kate's smile, Kate's silence, the look in Kate's eyes when she hesitated to speak, Kate's lack of hesitation in pushing him away during the final battle, and that sentence she whispered so softly it couldn't be heard before she turned into light particles...

A terrifying thought, to the extreme, crawled onto his heart like a venomous snake.

“Kate.”

Lin Fan's voice suddenly rang out—trembling, raspy, and filled with a fear bordering on collapse—breaking the dead silence of the main control cabin.

“In this memory, why are there traces of Kate? Why did her voice come from the mechanical sand? What exactly is her relationship with the light orb prototype and the Sower?!”

He rushed in front of Franklin, his hands deathly gripping the other's virtual arms, his eyes bloodshot like a cornered beast.

He didn't dare to think about it.

He was afraid that the answer would completely crush him.

Franklin closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and when he opened them again, he pulled up a piece of information from the deepest layer of the projection's seal.

The holographic projection changed once more.

The scene returned to the moment the light orb prototype and the Sower were in complete, out-of-control opposition.

Two forces of the same source yet contradictory nature collided frantically in the universe. Dimensions shattered, space-time collapsed, and countless civilizations turned to ash in the divine conflict. If not stopped, the universe would be completely torn apart by these twin sinners before entropy silence even arrived.

The light orb prototype fell into ultimate despair.

Its only way was to reintegrate.

To use light to consume darkness, to use protection to suppress destruction, and to bring the Sin of Twins back into one whole to stabilize the foundation of the universe.

But it couldn't do it alone.

Splitting was easy; merging was hard.

The powers of light and darkness were too violent; a forced fusion would only cause the entire universe to explode instantly.

It needed a vessel.

An extremely stable, extremely pure perfect carrier that could both bear the warmth of light and accommodate the violence of darkness, bind with the emotions of life, and be compatible with cosmic rules.

In the projection, lines of cosmic-level rule text slowly emerged:

Vessel Condition One: A digitized soul, free from the shackles of a physical body, pure and flawless;

Vessel Condition Two: Possessing ultimate human emotions, capable of balancing the extremes of light and shadow;

Vessel Condition Three: Deeply resonant with the cosmicized will, capable of anchoring the twin powers.

Three conditions, harsh to the extreme.

In the entire multiverse, among billions of civilizations and countless lives, only one person fit perfectly.

The next second...

In the center of the projection, a clear face appeared.

Kate.

Kate, whose eyes curved when she smiled, with shallow dimples at the corners of her mouth, as gentle as the warm spring sun.

“—!!!”

Lin Fan's entire body jolted violently, as if struck hard in the chest by an invisible sledgehammer. He staggered back three steps, his back hitting the console heavily with a dull thud. His face instantly turned paper-white, without a trace of blood, his eyes staring fixedly at the face in the projection, his mind completely blank.

It was her.

From the very beginning, it was her.

It wasn't an accident, it wasn't being swept up, it wasn't a coincidence.

Kate was the only perfect vessel carefully selected by the light orb prototype across countless dimensions from billions of digitized souls.

Her digitized soul was naturally special, a perfect combination of the virtual world and reality rules; her emotions were naturally pure—gentle, kind, brave, and firm—the best balance point for light and shadow; her natural resonance with Lin Fan's cosmicized power was the only key to anchoring the Sin of Twins.

The Earth's digitization experiment, the arrival of the Light Sphere Race, the birth of the virtual world, even her meeting with Lin Fan...

Everything was a meticulously arranged scheme.

The purpose was only one—to raise Kate to 'maturity' so she could become the vessel for the reintegration of the light orb prototype and the Sower.

The moment she reached full maturity, she would be pulled into the Domain of the Gods, turning into a cage for the twin powers. Forever and ever, she would be trapped in the gap between light and darkness, with no more self, no more consciousness, and no more person named 'Kate.'

Her existence, from the moment of its birth, had its ending predestined.

[part:deepseek-chat]

"She wasn't a casualty..." Franklin's voice choked, revealing a deeply human sorrow for the first time, "She was an offering. The chosen sacrifice to save the entire universe."

"From the very first day we met her, she knew the truth."

"From the moment she stepped onto the battlefield of the virtual world, she knew her destiny."

"All her smiles, all her strength, all her 'it's okay's... they were all an act."

Each word was like a red-hot knife, plunging deep into Lin Fan's heart and twisting.

He finally understood.

He understood why Kate was always lost in thought late at night, why her eyes dimmed whenever he said 'I'll protect you,' why she pushed him away without hesitation at the final moment, why she willingly let her data disintegrate, turning into fragments carried away by the light orb prototype.

She wasn't sacrificed.

She went to her death.

She walked willingly toward that path, the one the universe had doomed her to.

She traded her entire existence for the continuation of the whole universe.

And him?

He was like a fool, chasing after her, thinking that if he just found the data fragments, he could bring her home. Thinking that if he were just strong enough, he could protect her. He hacked through thorns, fought bloody battles, all along believing he was the savior.

In the end, he was just an idiot who only realized the truth when it was laid bare before his eyes.

"She was carrying the burden for us all along..."

Lin Fan suddenly covered his face, his body shaking uncontrollably. A sob, suppressed to its limit, escaped between his fingers—broken, hoarse, utterly despairing.

An unprecedented wave of guilt, heartache, regret, and powerlessness erupted within him, completely consuming him.

He ached for her endurance.

He ached for her strength.

He ached that despite her fear, she still smiled as she walked toward death.

He ached that she couldn't even bear to utter a single 'I don't want to.'

She was just an ordinary girl who liked strawberry energy bars, liked to smile, liked the simple, everyday life.

She hadn't done anything wrong, owed nothing to anyone.

Yet, from the moment of her creation, she was burdened with the sin of the entire universe.

"Why her..."

"Why did it have to be her..."

"She was so good..."

Lin Fan's weeping echoed in the main control cabin. AKai turned his head away, clenching his fists so tight his knuckles turned white, his eyes red with silent tears. Franklin, who always prided himself on rationality, saw his virtual form fluctuate violently, almost disintegrating into data fragments.

They had fought, they had struggled, believing they were opposing evil, darkness, the unknown fear.

But in the end, the cruelest, coldest, most shattering thing was this damned, merciless cosmic destiny.

Just as Lin Fan's emotions completely shattered and his cosmic power was about to break through the last shreds of his restraint...

The entire universe suddenly fell silent.

The hum of the star's engines vanished.

The howl of the dimensional turbulence vanished.

The sound of floating metallic dust vanished.

Time seemed to be gently pressed still by an invisible hand.

Without any warning, without any signal, a soft, gentle sigh, tinged with faint relief and heartache, came from the depths of the endless void, directly resonating in the hearts of Lin Fan, AKai, and Franklin.

It was Kate's voice.

The voice Lin Fan yearned for, etched into his very soul.

Not the simulated voice of the ship's AI, not an echo from the sand, not a fragment of memory.

It was a living, real Kate.

Lin Fan dropped his hands from his face, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the boundless darkness beyond the viewport. His body trembled violently, his lips quivering, but no sound came out.

"Lin Fan..."

The voice from the void sounded again, light and soft, calling his name gently, just as it had countless times before.

"Don't cry."

"It hurts me to see you cry."

Lin Fan finally found his voice, hoarse and broken, screaming desperately into the void: "Kate! It's you, right?! Where are you?! Come out! I'll take you home! We won't be vessels! We don't care about the universe! We don't care about entropy silence! We'll go back to Earth! Back to the virtual world! Back to our home!"

He reached out toward the void, as if by straining just a little harder, he could grasp the figure he longed for day and night.

But the void held only endless darkness.

Only Kate's voice, softly echoing.

"We can't go back, Lin Fan."

"This was my path from the start. The path I chose for myself."

"I don't agree!" Lin Fan roared, tears streaming wildly. "I won't allow it! I can fight the light orb prototype! I can fight the Sower! I can fight the whole universe! I won't let you become a vessel!"

The voice in the void gave a soft laugh, devoid of sadness, filled only with relief, like a spring breeze brushing the heart.

"It's no use."

"This wasn't forced on me by the light orb prototype, nor by destiny."

The next second.

A light, yet mountain-heavy sentence shattered all of Lin Fan's resolve.

"This is my choice."

My choice.

Five simple words, more moving than the deepest confession, more tear-jerking than the most final farewell.

Lin Fan stood frozen, as if nailed to the spot, tears silently streaming down his face.

He finally understood.

Kate wasn't a chosen sacrifice.

She was a Guardian who stepped forward willingly.

She knew the truth, knew her destiny, knew that once she walked this path, she could never return, never laugh again, never eat her favorite strawberry energy bars, never stay by his side again.

Yet she was still willing.

Willing to give everything of herself, for him, for Earth, for those ordinary yet warm days, for the continuation of the entire universe.

She hid all her fear, all her reluctance, all her pain beneath her smile, bearing it all alone in silence.

"Why are you so foolish..." Lin Fan choked out, his voice almost inaudible.

"Because you're Lin Fan."

The voice in the void grew fainter and fainter, like starlight about to fade. "Because I want you to live well. I want you to remember how to smile. I want you to not have to bear all the pressure alone anymore."

"Lin Fan, don't come looking for me."

"The Domain of the Gods is too dangerous. The Sin of the Twins is too heavy. If you come, you'll only get yourself caught up in it too."

"Move forward. Don't look back. Live well."

"For me... see the stars of this universe."

The voice grew fainter.

And lighter.

Until it finally dissipated completely into the void.

Time resumed its flow.

The engines hummed back to life.

The turbulence howled once more.

As if that gentle sigh, that soft confession, had been nothing but an all-too-real illusion.

Lin Fan remained standing in the center of the main control cabin, arm still outstretched, motionless.

Tears slid silently down, hitting the cold floor and shattering into crystalline droplets.

He finally understood.

What he was searching for was never a string of data fragments.

It was the girl who had already given everything to the universe, who didn't even dare to say a proper goodbye.

"Lin Fan."

AKai's voice broke the dead silence, filled with deep guilt and resolve.

He walked forward slowly, holding a palm-sized device in his hands, its surface silver-blue with faint energy patterns of the Mechanical Civilization flowing across it. At its core was embedded a sliver of residual energy from the Mechanical Mainframe. It wasn't exquisitely crafted, but it exuded a reassuring solidity.

This was what he had forged in the brief moment of Lin Fan's collapse. Using the core technology of the Mechanical Civilization, special materials from the metal sand, and the star's top-tier engine energy, he had worked tirelessly, pouring all his effort into creating it.

"What is this?" Lin Fan slowly lowered his hand, his voice raspy and dry.

"An emotion stabilizer." AKai looked up, his eyes showing an unprecedented seriousness and remorse. "I know nothing I say now matters. Before, I was too stubborn, too obsessed. I was fixated on using mechanical tech to revive Kate, dragging you into the Mechanical Civilization's trap without regard for the consequences, almost getting everyone killed."

"I can't save Kate. I can't change destiny. But I can at least protect you."

Franklin explained softly from the side: "This device can forcibly lock your current emotional module, suppress the mad erosion of the cosmic power, and permanently fix the erosion rate at 47%. It won't worsen further, nor will it let you lose yourself. It stabilizes your soul, preventing you from being assimilated by cosmic laws."

Lin Fan looked down at the small device in AKai's hands.

He could feel the warmth emanating from it—a warmth born from AKai's entire journey of remorse and self-blame, a silent vow of protection.

This man, always obsessed with technology, somewhat fanatical, had finally let go of his fixation and chosen to stand by his side.

Lin Fan did not refuse.

He gave a slight nod.

AKai stepped forward and carefully placed the emotion stabilizer over Lin Fan's heart.

A soft blue light instantly spread out, like a gentle current flowing through Lin Fan's veins to every part of his body.

The next second.

The two forces wildly clashing within him abruptly calmed.

The soul-rending pain slowly receded.

His consciousness became clear, stable, and firm once more.

The skyrocketing cosmic erosion rate was forcibly pinned at 47%, not budging an inch further.

A warm power enveloped his nearly shattered heart.

"Stabilized." AKai let out a long sigh of relief, his tense shoulders finally relaxing. He turned his head, pretending to look at the control console, his voice slightly trembling. "Don't get the wrong idea. I just don't want you dying halfway, leaving no one to tank the damage for us."

His words were still sharp, but his heart had long since made its decision.

From now on, he would no longer be driven by technology, experiments, or obsession.

He would accompany Lin Fan. Even if the road ahead led to the battlefield of the gods, the Sin of the Twins, the end of the universe, he would walk it to the very end.

Lin Fan gently pressed his hand over the softly glowing stabilizer on his chest, feeling its steadying power. "Thank you, AKai."

That single 'thank you' instantly reddened AKai's eyes.

The star slowly left the ruins of the Mechanical Civilization behind, sailing into a vaster, darker unknown stellar region.

Lin Fan stood before the viewport in the main control cabin, the emotion stabilizer on his chest emitting a gentle blue glow.

The collapse, despair, and confusion were gone from his eyes.

In their place was a calm so profound it was absolute. Beneath that calm lay a tenderness and resolve fierce enough to burn everything.

Kate's words from the void—"This is my choice"—had not broken him. Instead, they had brought him complete clarity.

He would not let go.

He would not turn back.

He would not let her bear the sin of the entire universe alone.

This time, it was his turn to protect her.

This time, it was his turn to bear the burden for her.

This time, he would definitely bring her home.

"Franklin, locate Kate's coordinates." Lin Fan's voice was calm, yet carried undeniable force. "No matter which dimension, which spacetime, which cosmic layer she's in, even if it's the Domain of the Gods where the light orb prototype and the Sower are, we're going."

Franklin nodded, his fingers flying across the light screen. A complete multiverse star map slowly unfolded.

At the center of the map, an extremely faint, almost devoured-by-darkness trace of pale golden light extended toward the deepest, most mysterious part of the universe—the Domain of the Gods. There lay the ultimate battlefield where the light orb prototype and the Sower confronted each other, the core of the Sin of the Twins, the beginning and end of everything.

AKai walked to Lin Fan's side, looking at that light trace leading to the point of no return. "What lies ahead isn't an adventure, isn't a campaign. It's the Domain of the Gods. Once we step in, there's no turning back. Either we succeed, or we die there, not even leaving data fragments behind."

Lin Fan didn't turn his head, his gaze fixed on the depths of the endless darkness. His voice was soft yet firm:

"I never intended to turn back."

At that very moment.

The entire universe suddenly darkened.

Lin Fan, AKai, and Franklin—all three of them—simultaneously narrowed their eyes, looking up toward the deepest part of the cosmos.

In that ultimate darkness where not even light could reach, two immense, ancient, terrifying shadows slowly opened their eyes.

One, radiant with light, warm as the dawn of creation—the light orb prototype.

One, endlessly dark, cold as the end of all things—the Sower.

Light and shadow.

Guardian and destroyer.

The true forms of the Sin of the Twins.

Across billions of dimensions, they gazed calmly at the star, at Lin Fan.

No anger, no attack, no pressure.

Only a stillness that had waited for eons.

And between the two colossal shadows, a slender figure with white hair and a gentle smile flickered in and out of existence.

Like Kate.

Yet not Kate.

A vessel.

A container.

The sole fulcrum balancing the Sin of the Twins.

The next second.

Darkness swallowed everything.

The two shadows, that slender figure—all vanished in an instant.

As if they had never appeared.

Lin Fan slowly withdrew his gaze and pressed the star's jump button.

The ship's engines roared to life.

Pale golden jump light completely enveloped the star, tearing through the darkness as it charged forward, straight toward the Domain of the Gods.

He gently pressed his hand over the emotion stabilizer on his chest.

There, his heart was beating.

There, memories were burning.

There, a silent vow was hidden.

—Wait for me.

—This time, I'm coming to take you home.

The final battle of the universe was about to begin.

And behind the Sin of the Twins, an even deeper, more terrifying secret was slowly awakening in the darkness.