Unfortunately, although I had also established an organization and was called “King,” I had never truly been a leader.

Being able to lead an organization and being able to establish an organization were fundamentally different concepts in themselves.

I had no way to completely simulate Nie Bei’s state of mind, nor did I know what kind of decisions he would make.

If it were me… if I knew an organization or a city was about to collapse, what would I do?

I could only say that I was truly unsuitable to be a leader, because I had a high probability of abandoning that city.

In the end, I could only become a “Shadow.” I operated in the darkness—the brighter the sun, the deeper I would become.

“But even if I really want to stay…” Guyu lifted his head to look at me. “Sister Zhichun… how can I stay?”

“You…” I looked at him with furrowed brows, knowing this was also an urgent problem that needed solving.

I didn’t know the situation of his “Interview Room.” If it was like “Bamboo Shoots After Rain,” where too few people meant being unable to clear it… then Guyu would ultimately be unable to escape.

It took me about five or six hours to travel from one end of the city to the other. If Guyu truly came from another city, then each cycle he would need to spend at least a full day migrating.

“After all, I was born in ‘Jade City’…” Guyu slowly lowered his head. “Every time I die, I return there… When I open my eyes, I see smiling ‘family members’… They’ve all become possessed… They smile, pull at me, and speak to me in soft voices about how wonderful ‘home’ is… but all I want to do is escape.”

Just listening to Guyu’s description made my back turn cold.

Wait… I suddenly thought of a problem…

Among the five cities here, two had already completely fallen, and two more were in the process of falling.

But why was “Dao City” where we were located so strange…?

Every person was still active. There were even many people who couldn’t preserve their “Echo,” returning full of enthusiasm with their lost memories.

Every cycle in “Dao City” had people starting anew. This caused the entire situation of “Dao City” to be completely different from the remaining four cities.

What situation caused this?

I pondered the common points between “Whirlpool City” and “Jade City,” and quickly came to a conclusion… they were too “united.”

Once a city was unified, it would act according to the leader’s directives. Regardless of whether the leader’s decisions were right or wrong, it was fundamentally impossible for anyone to “succeed,” because there wasn’t a single path in the entire “Land of the End” that led outside.

So cities that were “united” were only left with two paths—either the leader was overthrown, or the leader led everyone down the path set by “Heavenly Dragon.”

Thinking this way… could it be that the reason “Dao City” was still healthy to this day was because it was too disunified?

There were many strong people here. Whether it was Chu Tianqiu’s forces or Zhou Liu’s forces, including that powerful “Participant’s” forces from several years ago… countless large and small organizations occupied their own territories, not interfering with each other like water from different wells. The absence of friction was already considered extremely fortunate, much less the possibility of merging with each other to become a monopoly.

Because capable people would always possess capability. Even if they lost their memories, they wouldn’t be willing to submit to others.

So this place would never be unified.

In other words, “strong people” were the lifeline keeping this city “healthy.”

But why were there so many strong people in this city?

Among the remaining four cities, did each city only have one strong person?

Wait…

I actually forgot about myself.

There was another extremely important reason why people in this city didn’t trust each other…

That was the “Extreme Path members”!

As long as “Extreme Path members” who could hide their identities appeared, it would be very difficult to “unify” here!

Now “Extreme Path members” had already infiltrated various forces. Was this a coincidence or a destined direction…?

A cool and cold voice suddenly rang out in my mind:

“Yan Zhichun, I’m giving you a difficult problem to solve. First, I need a method to make the people here full of despair and greatly increase the probability of ‘Echo.’ The more formidable the person, the more desperate I want to make them. Second, I need to prevent everyone from collecting thirty-six hundred ‘Dao.’ If anyone wants to achieve this goal, you must stop them at all costs. Third, I need powerful, trustworthy ‘Echo’ users who can be used by me.”

My heart was beating so fast… wait a moment… I needed to sort out the current situation…

I seemed to have discovered something incredible…

Baiyang, Extreme Path members, a divided city, powerful yet desperate Echo users, protecting this place…

“Protecting this place.”

So that’s it… he had already thought about protecting this place!

All these situations pointed to one possibility…

“This is also his plan…” I murmured to myself. “My god…”

“Hm…?” Jiang Ruoxue looked at me. “Zhichun, what’s wrong with you?”

“The lifeline of this city’s health isn’t ‘strong people’ at all… it’s ‘Baiyang’…” I said. “This is too absurd…”

Goosebumps instantly spread all over my body, and even my fine hairs stood up.

What kind of thinking was this? How could he possibly think of this method?

“Ruoxue… he’s using ‘division’ to guarantee ‘unity’…!” I said somewhat excitedly.

“Ah…?” Both Jiang Ruoxue and Guyu looked at me with astonished expressions.

“The more divided the surface appears, the healthier the city’s core will be… What kind of reverse thinking is this?” I swallowed and said. “His thinking has surpassed us by too many steps!”

“I, I don’t quite understand.” Jiang Ruoxue said.

I grabbed her somewhat excitedly. “Good heavens… Ruoxue, listen to me… Although bringing up ‘Baiyang’ now might still make you angry, everything we’re doing now seems to be within his plan.”

I briefly explained the current situation to Jiang Ruoxue, and her eyes also slowly widened.

“What…?” Guyu was also slightly stunned. “‘Unity’ leads to destruction…?”

“Yes…” I nodded. “Over ninety percent of the ‘Participants’ here want to ‘escape,’ so a normal organization, a normal ‘leader,’ must be able to promise everyone this condition to possibly become a ‘leader.’ But once you become a ‘leader’ because of this, then the organization’s path has gone wrong… Baiyang thought of this point long ago, so he single-handedly made this place divided… and everything we ‘Extreme Path members’ have done is within his expectations…”

After I finished speaking, I slowly lowered my head again. “I thought I was very clever… I thought I had come up with the best method to merge ‘three difficult problems’ into ‘one difficult problem,’ yet I never imagined that Baiyang had already thought of this step… Indeed, for him this truly was only ‘one difficult problem.’ Only when ‘Extreme Path’ appears here does it count as completing this ‘one difficult problem.’ All other methods won’t work.”

“Wait… wait a moment…” Guyu was still a bit dazed after hearing this. “The ‘Baiyang’ you’re talking about—is he a ‘Zodiac’?”