Chapter 1: The Next Version of the World
2022, summer. Dimension Transformation Building in Linxiang City.
The girl stood on the railing of the twenty-ninth-floor rooftop, teetering on the edge.
From a physics standpoint, another fifteen degrees of tilt, and she would fall and embark to the two-dimensional world.
Such occurrences were not unusual.
In this month where the suicide rate had inexplicably soared, people fell from high places from time to time.
The citizens, due to the plethora of similar cases, had become desensitized to such events.
However, unlike those determined to die, the girl's phone was clamped to her ear. In the moment she was about to die, the call connected automatically.
"Hello, this is the Suicide Crisis Intervention Hotline, I am Zhou Baiyu."
As soon as the man on the phone opened his mouth, his gentle voice seemed infused with a kind of Magic Power. A strong desire to live suddenly surged within the girl, and the vacant look in her eyes instantly brightened.
Before long, she began to sob uncontrollably, as if she had once again felt the beauty of the world.
Two minutes and twenty-five seconds, the call ended.
Zhou Baiyu, far away on the other side of the city, furrowed his eyebrows slightly.
On his desk lay a black notebook, recording the many reasons why people couldn't go on living.
There were those who suffered from unfinished pre-sold properties, victims who ended up owing huge debts to the bank. There were those who had raised children for years, only to find none were their own. And there were those whose loved ones were killed on the street and still couldn't get justice.
Essentially, Zhou Baiyu's job was to receive negative information and provide positive emotional guidance.
He was very good at this job, even exceptionally so. Regarding emotional guidance, he had an incomprehensible gift.
While some people pleaded and reasoned with the suicidal to no avail,
Zhou Baiyu needed only a few words on the phone, and the person would abandon the thought of death, showcasing an efficiency akin to a special ability.
Seeing Zhou Baiyu hang up the phone, a female colleague at the adjacent desk said:
"Brother Zhou, you saved another one, huh? You're even more effective than a psychologist. Have you really never considered becoming an emotional anchor? You'd certainly go viral."
Zhou Baiyu smiled and shook his head.
He found it strange; during that last call, the girl seemed to snap awake abruptly, and she even hung up the phone voluntarily, which was very different from the usual calls.
But right now, his time was pressing, and he had other important matters to deal with.
"Xiaoping, I have an urgent matter to attend to; that should be the last call. I need to leave right away. If someone asks later, please help me say I've taken leave."
He paused, then added a strange remark:
"By the way, I've always been very grateful for your company; you must take good care of yourself in the future, and don't put yourself through hardship."
"Eh? Okay, no problem, you've worked hard, Brother Zhou, go on then."
The female colleague was initially taken aback but quickly agreed. Watching Zhou Baiyu hurry off, she felt increasingly peculiar about his behavior.
"Strange... what's with Brother Zhou today? He spoke so oddly."
Zhou Baiyu was more than dedicated to his job; he loved it and had never taken leave.
Normally he would work overtime until the very end, not leaving until the building was about to close.
Thus, the female colleague was curious about why Zhou Baiyu would take leave at this time.
Especially in the last month, when the global suicide rate had mysteriously spiked, it was the busiest time.
...
In the restroom of the floor, Zhou Baiyu scooped up cold water and washed his face.
Looking at his drenched face in the mirror, his eyes were filled with exhaustion.
After a while, he took out his phone, opened the memo app, and looked at the document he'd written not long before.
"Dad, Mom, when you see this memo, I should already be dead. I'm so sorry, I ended my own life in this way..."
It turned out to be a last will.
The ace operator of the Suicide Crisis Intervention Hotline, who had prevented countless suicides, had surprisingly prepared a "suicide" will in advance.
It sounded ironic.
Zhou Baiyu could not laugh. Of course, he didn't want to give up on life.
But the countdown that emerged in his eyes reminded him ceaselessly; his death was imminent.
[Countdown, 9:39:04.]
This countdown that had appeared not long before was like a mark etched in Zhou Baiyu's vision, inescapable and unstoppable.
It quietly flowed, reminding Zhou Baiyu that in just over nine hours, his life would undergo a dramatic change.
...
...
The story has to start with an "advertisement"—
"The version is about to be updated; if you can see this update prompt, please contact us."
About a month ago, as Zhou Baiyu passed a construction site, he saw a strange billboard.
A version update, obviously for some software or game. But the advertisement was very irregular, abrupt.
Contact us, "us" who? What is the contact method?
Even stranger things happened next.
In the following days, Zhou Baiyu saw the advertisement inside the elevator of an office building, and then on a billboard at a bus stop in his residential area.
Public restrooms, basketball courts, swimming pools, taxi advertisement areas...
The increasingly prevalent "version update" alerts covering the entire city made Zhou Baiyu very curious—
What kind of software or game was it that required such a grand fuss for an update?
The eleventh day.
It was not just in Linxiang City, where Zhou Baiyu lived, but also in Hechuan, the capital, Songjiang... Everywhere was the same.
In areas where crowds gathered, one message could always be seen—
"The version is about to be updated."
But by that time, Zhou Baiyu was merely curious and hadn't delved deeper into it.
He was busy with work every day, always researching how to evoke positive emotions towards life in people.
The world's suicide rate was soaring, the divorce rate was soaring, and the birth rate was plummeting.
In the past, news of suicides was rare, but recently, for some unknown reason, there had been a surge of messages related to suicide.
If there was really something that needed updating, Zhou Baiyu only hoped that it would be the world itself.
What he didn't expect was that the unfolding events would indeed be as if the world were about to undergo some strange transformation.
On the nineteenth day, not only domestically but also abroad, similar signs began to appear.
"Version" became a trending topic.
Even though Zhou Baiyu was swamped with work, due to big data, he was forced to see related information.
He could sporadically see similar discussions on various forums:
Netizen Yun Dongliu: "Advertisements for the version have also appeared everywhere overseas now. I heard that even in the grasslands of Black Africa, there are update prompts in the native tribal languages, which is quite far-fetched."
Netizen Zhuge Wanjun: "I saw someone say recently, 'The world is about to welcome a significant update to version 1.0, and humanity is on the brink of extinction.' They spoke as if heralding the end of the world."
Such topics were widely discussed.
Zhuanghu, Douban, Weibo... There was an abundance of content on these platforms.
Everyone was guessing what kind of version was about to be updated.
Naturally, many people, like Zhou Baiyu, hoped for a change in the world.
Zhou Baiyu himself had been invited to a post on Zhuanghu.
That post was quite interesting— "If the World Were Divided into Many Versions."
The answer by author Fisher prompted Zhou Baiyu to even feel... perhaps there really were version iterations of this world:
Version 1.000: New attack range for Pangu's axe, efficiency of opening the heavens increased by twenty-five percent. Fixed bug preventing Pangu from acting.
Version 1.001: Nerfed the divine properties of the Norse gods, added the clay sculpting function for Nüwa. Increased the chances of Zeus's infidelity.
Version 1.002: We added the "making fire" capability for humans. Human intelligence was enhanced. Climate temperateness slightly adjusted.
...
Version 1.018: Considering Ying Zheng was too dominant, we decided to ban him. The DLC item "Elixir of Life" was deleted.
Version 1.036: We used a meteor to fix the bug with the time traveler Wang Mang.
...
The post, detailing the history of various nations in the style of game updates, with an emphasis on the history of one's own country, was eye-catching.
But it also made Zhou Baiyu and many others feel incredibly fearful upon deep thought... If there really were versions, then who was this "we" responsible for fixing bugs?
As the post blew up in popularity, it made people start to imagine:
What would it look like if the world truly underwent an update in the next version?
If that were the case, Zhou Baiyu hoped—
"Open the portal to the two-dimensional world," "Add Gundam and giant cockroach mounts," "Fully implement and promote socialism," "Fix the bug of excessive inequality between the rich and the poor."
Of course, he still thought it was probably just some mega-corporation creating hype.
Or maybe countries were promoting something like a "Metaverse."
Until the twenty-third day when the sand timer symbolizing life suddenly appeared.
In the lower right corner of Zhou Baiyu's vision, a countdown emerged.
This startled Zhou Baiyu.
Because as the countdown decreased, he genuinely felt a chill of death closing in on him.
For this reason, he had seen doctors and psychologists, had undergone a comprehensive physical examination.
But the conclusion was that he was in excellent health, healthy as if he were an immortal.
Once convinced that there was nothing wrong with his body, Zhou Baiyu suddenly had an intuition—
"Could this countdown have something to do with the recent hot topic of 'version update'?"
His intuition was usually accurate, and he quickly began to collect relevant information.
But the "version update" was just too popular, and searching for it meant filtering through a massive amount of information.
Only yesterday did he finally glimpse a corner of the truth, using "countdown" as a keyword after sifting through endless details.
A terrifying and desperate data analysis result laid before him:
"The version is about to be updated, and I will... be forced to commit suicide?"