I Have a God Simulator

"The Academy has warned you time and time again... and yet you still break the rules of Sand City!"

"Tell me! What is the first lesson of the Forest Academy?"

The tall Tree Person looked down at the three Pine Slipper Rats at his feet.

"We praise Yao God and life!"

The Pine Slipper Rats chanted in unison, "We guard the desert and the sea of clouds!"

"Then look what you’ve done! You forgetful, fluffy-headed fools!"

The Tree Person’s voice was like muffled thunder. In his anger, the leaves on his umbrella-shaped canopy suddenly flared open, making his already sturdy frame look a size larger.

The three Pine Slipper Rats were so scared they curled up on the ground, burying their heads in the grass with only their fluffy tails exposed.

"We’re sorry, Teacher. We couldn’t help it..."

"What *can* you help?! You get no food today!"

The Pine Slipper Rats hung their heads in dismay.

They couldn’t help but mutter under their breath.

"Our kind just loves to plant trees. When we see a desert that barren, of course we want to plant something. It’s such a waste otherwise..."

"Exactly! It’s painful to see so much land go to waste."

"It would be so nice if we could plant some pine trees or Sour Tree Raspberries there, and maybe some roses too."

"All of you, shut up!"

The Tree Person was beside himself with fury.

He raised a branch-like arm, pointing at the Pine Slipper Rats on the ground and roaring, "Do you have any idea what you’re doing? That’s the last desert region in this world! It’s a key conservation area for all of Yunzhong Temple!"

"If I wasn’t certain you had just arrived, you’d all be sent to the Gravel World to mine coal just for destroying a local ecological reserve!"

At the mention of mining coal, the Pine Slipper Rats couldn’t help but tremble.

Plucking up their courage, they said, "We thought that place..."

"I don’t care what you thought! You are to obey!"

The Tree Person cut off their excuses, saying sternly, "This is the last time. Tomorrow, all of you will go to the desert to serve as Desert Guardians for a full month."

"The Forest Academy is under immense pressure because of this. Your actions have brought ridicule upon the entire academy... One more time, and you’re all expelled!"

Hearing this, the Pine Slipper Rats finally relaxed.

Teacher had chewed them out, but in the end, he had also protected them.

The three of them were still a little confused.

In other worlds, deserts would be planted with trees and gradually transformed into oases and habitable lands. But here in Sand City, a vast desert was deliberately preserved, and its destruction was forbidden.

"I keep telling you, spend the time you waste playing around on reading. Read more books..."

The Tree Person was disappointed they weren’t living up to their potential.

He sighed and could only explain, "Fifteen Eras ago, this place was a vast, desolate desert. There were Sand Dunes everywhere. The entire world was nothing but clouds and sand—dry, barren, and almost completely devoid of life."

"This was originally a world on the verge of destruction. All traces from before the Era of Stagnation had vanished, leaving only the Cloud Monks who had become Cloud Illusions. The world’s Rule Power and Order had been crumbling for years. Its complete fragmentation and Annihilation were only a matter of time."

"But Yao God decided to rebuild it. He reforged the rules, repaired the shattered world, allowed rain and soil to be born again, and life began to sprout anew. He saved this ancient and terminally ill world."

One Pine Slipper Rat couldn’t help but ask, "Teacher, Teacher, why did Yao God rebuild this place? Since it was already broken, wouldn’t it have been better to just find a new, good world?"

Its companions next to it chimed in, "Exactly! Lord Yao God is omnipotent. What’s so great about this world?"

"Most Gods do exactly as you say."

The Tree Person’s tone calmed. "If it’s broken, throw it away."

"But what makes Lord Yao God so great, so revered and followed by the Gods, is not just His immense power or His omniscient Wisdom. It’s also His compassion and mercy for the weak, and His tolerance and regard for all Races and civilizations."

"Before the Era’s Stagnation, Yunzhong Temple also gave birth to a brilliant culture. The God Cloud Guest and various forms of life existed, and Gods and men worked together to perfect this world... until, in the end, only Lord Guest Monk remained, guarding this place alone."

"Lord Yao God believes that it is an incredibly difficult thing for any Race to create a civilization."

"A civilization, even if only one person is left, still represents a flame that has not been extinguished. That is why Yao God used Lord Guest Monk as the kindling, striving to restore life here and bring back the glorious sight of its past civilization."

The Tree Person looked down at the clueless students at his feet.

"If that day ever comes—and I’m speaking hypothetically... if you are the only ones left in your world, you must do everything you can to survive. As long as you preserve the embers of the past, there will be a future for Rebirth."

The normally chattering Pine Slipper Rats seemed to understand something now, and they all nodded seriously.

The Tree Person changed to a lighter topic. "Who can tell me who the first mayor of Sand City was? Answer correctly, and you’ll get a pinecone as a reward."

"I know! It was Lord Apostle Slime Mod!"

one Pine Slipper Rat said in a rapid-fire voice.

"Very good."

The Tree Person tossed it a pinecone. The Pine Slipper Rat took it gleefully, peeled out a pine nut, and popped it into its mouth.

"Next question, the reward is also a pinecone. Listen carefully."

"What was the purpose of establishing Sand City?"

Another Pine Slipper Rat immediately said, "Me, me, me! Sand City was built to host the Martial Arts Tournament!"

"Although the Martial Arts Tournament was Sand City’s most important event initially, that answer is incorrect."

The Tree Person wagged a branch-like finger.

The third Pine Slipper Rat’s eyes lit up. "For civilizational expansion! To let the Yao Race Civilization come into contact with the civilizations of other Divine Kingdoms, integrate them into the Yao cultural sphere, and further promote development! It’s called..."

It racked its brain before blurting out, "The External Civilization Cycle! No, wait, the Civilization’s External Circulation!"

"Correct. Here is your reward."

The Tree Person tossed it another pinecone.

"Last chance."

The Tree Person looked at the Pine Slipper Rat that had answered incorrectly. "Before the united Divine Kingdom of the Ghost Realm and the Bamboo Reed Kingdom sent a delegation to Sand City, our city dispatched its own first official envoy as a gesture of establishing relations. Who was that envoy?"

The last Pine Slipper Rat shouted, "Ice Fist! It was Mr. Bingg Quantou, the ’Northern Ice Fist’!"

"Wrong, you idiot!"

Its two friends watched anxiously from the side and couldn’t help but say, "It was Mr. Yu Gu, the ’Lonely Hero’!"

"Ah, right, right, it was Mr. Yu Gu!" the mistaken Pine Slipper Rat quickly corrected itself.

The Tree Person shot it a glare. "Right is right, and wrong is wrong."

"If you don’t seize the opportunity, you must accept failure."

The other two Pine Slipper Rats couldn’t bear to see their friend go hungry, so they each shared some of their pine nuts. The three of them ended up with half-full bellies, so none of them went hungry after all.

The Tree Person suddenly saw a slowly moving Sand Dune appear outside the city.

He immediately said to the students at his feet, "Lord Guest Monk has arrived. Hurry over there. If you get there early, you can ask many questions. It’s a rare opportunity, so make sure you seize it this time."

"Okay, okay!"

This time, the three Pine Slipper Rats scrambled toward the city outskirts. Scholars of other Races were also rushing over. It wasn’t every day one could listen to an experienced Apostle lecture and answer questions.

The Tree Person looked into the distance and saw the tall Guest Monk surrounded by many people. Behind it, just as the legends said, followed eighteen disciples, all of them Calamity Beasts.

The Guest Monk tirelessly explained and answered questions for the crowd. When it came to matters before the Era, no one knew more than it did.

As the oldest living witness of Yunzhong Temple and the Watcher who had never left since the new Era began, the Guest Monk held an extraordinary significance for this world.

The Tree Person remembered waking up for the first time in this desert city. He was a seed personally given life and a mission by Yao God.

When he was still a small Tree Person, his Ice Giant Monster friend had carried him as they sprinted over to listen to the lectures, just like those young ones outside.

That was during the first Era after the world’s reboot. Sand City was terribly empty, the weather so hot it could bake smoke out of the sand, and strong winds blew away many of his leaves.

He had been baked dry by the sun, and his friend’s body was even melting.

But the two young Scholars gritted their teeth and persevered, asking the Guest Monk all sorts of questions. The great fish-shaped Apostle answered each one and even built a cellar out of sand to prevent them from getting too badly burned.

That was all many years ago.

Back then, what the Tree Person and his friend said most often was how hot and dry it was, and how wonderful it would be if it rained more and there was an oasis.

Time flew by. In the blink of an eye, more than half of Yunzhong Temple had become an oasis.

Members of all different Races now lived together in Sand City: Yao Clan People, Burrower Monsters, Sand Worms, Wuzi People, Bamboo People, Lumin, the Funeral Race, Ghosts... Only the deserts in the areas of the two Miracles and the old site of the Cloud Guest Divine Country were preserved, commemorated as a legacy of the pre-Era civilization.

Stone tablets and wooden signs were erected at the desert’s edge, all inscribed with stern warnings.

—NO DESTROYING THE DESERT!

—PLANTING TREES AND SUMMONING RAINFALL HERE IS STRICTLY FORBIDDEN! VIOLATORS WILL BE PUNISHED!

—PROTECTING THE DESERT HERITAGE IS EVERYONE’S RESPONSIBILITY!

The Tree Person stretched its branches.

It looked up at the sky.

’For Lord Yao God, remodeling a world is perhaps a trivial matter.’

’But for the life in this world, and for the long-silent civilization of Yunzhong Temple, this earth-shattering transformation is a Miracle of resurrection.’