Was the person who made Wu Gengji really dead?

As a fan of online literature, I need to answer this question based on my knowledge of online literature. According to what I know, the person who created Wu Gengji did not really die. In the novel, the protagonist Wu Geng was a fictional character whose story took place in a world similar to the future. In this world, people used technology to create all kinds of creatures, including humans. Therefore, the people who created Wu Gengji were not real humans. Their goal was to create a virtual world that could interact with humans. Although these people did not really die, their lives were limited because the virtual world they created needed to keep functioning. In the novel, these people needed to work continuously in the virtual world to ensure that the world could continue to operate. Therefore, they did not have real freedom and needed to rely on technological means to maintain their lives.