Qi Nian, accompanied by a crowd of ghostly silhouettes, gathered around a tall man.

He stood quietly on the street, opened his hands, and keys appeared in them.

"You succeeded."

Another male voice emerged from the corner of the street.

Xun Weimo slowly walked out.

He looked at this familiar yet strange former companion, momentarily at a loss for words.

The tall man turned to look at him, it was Bai Yanren.

Xun Weimo smiled helplessly, glanced at the ghosts behind Bai Yanren, and asked, "Even now, I still don't know whether you're human or a ghost, or what exactly you're doing."

Bai Yanren slightly opened his mouth and said in a low voice, "It's not important."

He seemed to think he couldn't be so indifferent, so he added, "If you want to know, you can follow me and see for yourself."

Even without Bai Yanren's suggestion, Xun Weimo had already planned to do so.

Over the years, he lived somewhat muddle-headed, Fog Gathering, Fog Realm, Nine Prisons, all turned out to be in vain, or rather, a conspiracy planned from the very start.

And the source of this plan was the man in front of him—

Bai Yanren.

Xun Weimo followed him, and the two walked slowly on the streets of Ye City.

As time passed, occasionally one or two ghostly figures around Bai Yanren burst like breaking bubbles, turning into speckled fragments, bits and pieces sinking into the ground until they vanished.

"What do you think I am?"

Bai Yanren suddenly asked.

"You?"

Xun Weimo was first taken aback, then gave a helpless smile, "That question sounds more like what I should be asking."

"The 'I' I speak of is the concept of [self-awareness]."

Bai Yanren stopped, turned, and faced Xun Weimo, his pupils emitting a slight white glow.

In Xun Weimo's eyes, the world transformed completely, and in an instant, he was brought to a 'new world.'

"Since the inception of life, consciousness is in a chaotic state, without the birth of [self-awareness]."

"What causes the emergence of [self-awareness]? Does it naturally appear after a certain time, or is it artificially created through postnatal education?"

Bai Yanren waved his hand, and the sky and earth, once blank, suddenly filled with crawling insects, flying birds, flowers, plants, and trees...

"Before the birth of [self-awareness], does it mean [I] could be an insect, a bird, a plant, or any form of life."

Bai Yanren seemed to be conversing with him, but also as if talking to himself.

Xun Weimo was immensely shocked by his abnormal means, what exactly was Bai Yanren? A God?

But he quickly calmed himself, shaking his head, "Humans have conducted experiments, and only a few species possess self-awareness, with their self-recognition far inferior to that of humans."

"Therefore, the emergence of self-awareness is not exclusive to the human species, correct?"

That's exactly what Bai Yanren wanted to hear.

Xun Weimo opened his mouth, speechless.

The human standard to determine whether a creature possesses self-awareness usually involves a series of tests, the most renowned being the 'mirror test,' which checks if they can recognize themselves in a mirror.

In these experiments, elephants, dogs, chimpanzees, dolphins, and even pigs, perceived as unintelligent by humans but are quite smart, can pass the mirror test and recognize themselves.

Self-awareness, or self-recognition, is indeed not exclusive to humans.

"Then... the notion of being shaped by postnatal education becomes impossible..." Bai Yanren murmured.

"So, I believe all species have the potential to develop self-awareness, except... they each require different amounts of time."

Bai Yanren waved a hand, and an ant appeared out of thin air in his palm.

"For example, this one."

"If humans require two to three years to achieve self-recognition, then they might need a year, ten years, a hundred years."

"In other words, this species might never reach the day it opens self-recognition in its life cycle, not because they cannot, but because the time it takes exceeds their life cycle."

Bai Yanren's expression grew peculiar, observing the ant in his palm, speaking softly as if not to disturb it, "If there were an ant that broke through the lifespan limit of its species, reaching the moment of self-recognition, what would it feel like?"

Xun Weimo's expression became more complex, utterly puzzled.

He first looked at Bai Yanren, then at the ant in Bai Yanren's hand, questioning, "This question is meaningless. All life forms have a species' lifespan limit. If, as you say, self-recognition occurs beyond this limit, it implies the species was never meant to achieve self-recognition or intelligence."

"Moreover, breaking the lifespan limit itself is impossible. If such a thing occurs, it stops being an ant; its essence has changed. Perhaps... it would be a God among ants?"

"Ants..."

"God..."

Xun Weimo's voice trailed off, realizing something, a long-lost sense of dread quickly spreading from the depths of his heart to his entire being.

Could it be that Bai Yanren is...

Bai Yanren seemed lost in thought.

He waved his hand again, and the ant vanished, leaving the sky and earth in front of Xun Weimo blank once more.

"Once, there existed such a place."

Bai Yanren said softly.

"Life existed in that world too, but its life system was quite peculiar, having birthed only a few species."

With Bai Yanren's words, Xun Weimo's vision underwent a massive transformation!

Patches of gray-white grass rapidly sprawled across the ground, and simultaneously, a striking sapling stood alone on the vast, flat grassland, rapidly growing visibly to the eye. Its gnarled roots dug deep into the earth, and its branches and leaves spread to cover the sky, an unimaginable sight.

"It's called the Mother Tree, rooted in the earth, drawing nutrients in the eyes of the life of this world."

"In truth, its roots are anchored in another world, at the fundamental level of the Human World, and the nutrients it absorbs is an invisible energy to life in the Human World, called Emotion by humans."

"Joy, anger, sorrow, pleasure, greed, hatred, obsession, resentment..."

"The exponential increase in human numbers led to an overflow of emotional energy, manifesting in the other world as... the birth of a new life form."

"They originated from the surplus human emotion the Mother Tree absorbed. They have human-like appearances but are bizarre in myriad ways, perhaps because the overflowing emotion is inherently extreme."

Under Bai Yanren's voice, desaturated, twisted human forms emerged like crawling insects on the massive tree.

Their numbers grew, gradually occupying every part of the Mother Tree, even falling off the tree onto the gray-white grassland.

"Let me ask you."

Bai Yanren suddenly paused his narrative.

He stared intently at Xun Weimo.

"These twisted humanoids lack self-awareness, and their life cycles are extremely short. In human terms, they are born to die within a day."

"But..."

"If one of them lived a full day, gaining self-awareness?"

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