Lin Yuan was dead.
As for whether two grim reapers would come to pick him up after death, he had no idea. He hadn't seen anything like that.
But he figured he probably had seen the River Styx.
Staring at the enormous river before him, as if it stretched endlessly into the distance, with countless tributaries branching off from it, Lin Yuan crouched down and looked at his reflection in the brilliantly colored current.
Then, after a moment, he slapped his forehead.
No, that wasn't right. If this were really the River Styx, it ought to connect to the underworld somehow. There should at least be some spider lilies around too.
So where exactly was this place?
Lin Yuan raised his head and looked into the infinitely distant horizon. After a while, he lowered it again and studied his own somewhat translucent body.
He still remembered the truck that had killed him.
A giant truck that had somehow flown up to the twelfth floor and sent him blasting off the toilet—he probably would never forget that for the rest of his life.
Though, well, that life was already over.
Come to think of it, he really wanted to sit on a toilet a little longer.
He had no idea why he was still capable of thinking after dying, but right now Lin Yuan had a much more pressing question.
Seriously. Logically speaking, after a normal person dies, shouldn't some mysterious goddess drag them off to another world for reincarnation?
And if not that, then at least let him be reborn with his memories and hear a nice crisp ding as some system awakened. Pure memory-based reincarnation was way too advanced for him—he hadn't memorized any lottery numbers.
At the very least, couldn't someone just give him a cheat ability right now?
[The Dimensional Chat Group of the Dead has been loaded for you.]
All of a sudden, with a ding, Lin Yuan's wandering thoughts snapped back into focus. He stared blankly at the azure screen in front of him.
Huh?
There really was one?
[Detected that most group members are in a state of critical consciousness collapse and soul dissipation… stabilizing souls now.]
The next moment, Lin Yuan felt his awareness gradually clear, as though he were suddenly waking from a long dream…
He instinctively jerked upright, cold sweat breaking out across his forehead as fragments of memory flashed before his eyes one after another.
Are you sure that was "stabilizing my soul" and not trying to murder me?
Why the hell did you make me experience my whole life flashing before my eyes?
But in the next instant, as the memories from before his death grew clearer and clearer, his mind also began working properly again. Only then did Lin Yuan realize that just now, his thoughts really had been scattering apart, fading toward oblivion.
Ah.
So I almost died.
He scratched his head, thought for a bit, then looked down at the chat interface in front of him.
So there really is a cheat.
Then according to the script, shouldn't this be the part where I say…
"Chat group, add points for me?"
[Welcome, group member Lord of the Pure White Throne, to the chat.]
[Group Member: Lord of the Pure White Throne (Lin Yuan)]
[Cause of Death: Hit by a truck while sitting on the toilet]
[Current Status: Soul body (damaged, extremely unstable, fragile)]
[Remaining Lifespan: 72h59min]
[Abilities: None]
[Points: 0]
Looking at the "remaining lifespan" line, Lin Yuan nearly lost it on the spot.
Here he'd been thinking he had almost died, and that this golden finger was actually pretty amazing—solving his lifespan problem the moment it appeared…
And it turned out it had only postponed his death a little farther down the road?
So I'm still going to die?
Forget it. At least it had dragged his expiration date from "the next second" to "three days later." And judging from the way this chat group was set up, there should still be a chance for him to survive, right?
Truthfully, Lin Yuan didn't want to die.
Wanting to die would be the weird thing, wouldn't it?
At the very least, Lin Yuan felt that all those Soulslike games he'd played as an old veteran had taught him something useful.
At minimum, they had given him the mentality of: Heh. I'm definitely going to survive.
Whatever. First, he should see who his groupmates were…
Lin Yuan had read plenty of chat-group novels. So the next part of the script should be that all his fellow group members were absurd big shots from outrageously overpowered worlds, and they'd carry a dying nobody like him straight to the top of life, right?
Then he'd snag one ability here, fleece one artifact there, and eventually become the strongest being across the multiverse…
Yeah. He knew this script.
So Lin Yuan scrolled downward.
[Welcome, Lord of the Pure White Throne, to the chat.]
[Welcome, "AAA Urban Female Ghost," to the chat.]
[Welcome, "Founder of the Golden Spirit," to the chat.]
[Welcome, "The Great Yan Creator of Writing," to the chat.]
[Welcome, "Let Night City Burn," to the chat.]
[Let Night City Burn: Hm…? Didn't I die?]
[Let Night City Burn: Why does my body look… this insubstantial?]
Wait.
Hold on.
Looking at that message, Lin Yuan felt cold sweat—despite not actually having any—run down his back.
Only now did he finally remember what this chat group was called.
The Dimensional Chat Group of the Dead.
So this lousy chat group was literally full of dead people?!
Immediately, Lin Yuan went back and looked through the member list again, confirming two things.
First: they really were all dead. And there was a very high chance that, just like him, they had only just died before being yanked back up by this chat group and put to work.
Second: his groupmates' situations were probably no better than his own. You could tell just from the names.
"Let Night City Burn"—combined with what he had said—that had to be David from Edgerunners, right?
"The Great Yan Creator of Writing"… was that Jie, that newly introduced fragment from Arknights?
"Founder of the Golden Spirit"—that was definitely Jonathan Joestar, the last true gentleman of the Joestar line.
And "AAA Urban Female Ghost"… damn, don't tell me that was Carmen from Project Moon.
If these people had been alive, Lin Yuan would have said: This is free. I've got this.
After all, each of their worlds had all sorts of amazing stuff—perfect environments for a chat group to develop in.
But the problem now was that everyone was dead.
What the hell were a bunch of dead people supposed to do?
He couldn't seriously expect them to possess corpses and come back that way, could he?
Dead people didn't even get to participate in the plot!
For a moment, Lin Yuan's already corpse-gray face somehow looked even more helpless.
But after a brief silence, he still opened the group chat.
There was no helping it. No matter how much of a scam it looked like, he had to check whether there was any way out.
He only had three days of life left. No matter what, he had to survive…
Even in his current, shattered-soul state.
He still wanted to win his resurrection bracket.
[Founder of the Golden Spirit: Hm? Where is this? Why am I still able to…]
[The Great Yan Creator of Writing: …]
[AAA Urban Female Ghost: Is this some new Singularity of the City? But I clearly died after severing my wrist… To affect the consciousness of the dead… wouldn't that already violate a taboo?]
[Lord of the Pure White Throne: Um, hello everyone?]
Before he could finish typing, Lin Yuan stopped.
Then he saw the announcement issued by the group itself.
[Group Announcement: To all the dead, welcome to the Dimensional Chat Group of the Dead. Within this chat group, souls from the endless dimensions may, after death, be captured and stabilized, thereby becoming members of this group.]
[This chat group offers multiple ways to obtain points, including missions, check-ins, trades, and revisions. Members who obtain points will have the chance to extend their lifespan, exchange for rewards, and ultimately gain the opportunity to be resurrected.]
Lin Yuan silently deleted what he had typed.
Well, in that case, there was no need for him to explain things.
And at the same time, the group chat exploded with messages once more.
-------
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