Amidst this deathly despair, he kept his eyes open, staring at the blood-red sky.
He cycled through this endlessly—a day, a year, ten thousand years, a hundred thousand years...
He experienced the ultimate pain and torment inflicted upon an entire species, spanning across several epochs, in its entirety.
His soul burned; his will crumbled.
Just as he was about to be completely swallowed by this endless despair, a gentle yet vast power shielded his mind.
The extreme agony did not destroy him.
Instead, like a smelting fire, it burned away all his impurities.
What remained was a will forged in billions of years of despair, harder than diamond.
In the real world, only a single second had passed.
Luo Ji's face instantly turned pale. A drop of cold sweat slid down his temple, falling onto his hand.
He abruptly raised his head.
Everyone in the venue who caught his gaze subconsciously felt a piercing sharpness.
What kind of eyes were those?
The previous sluggishness and bewilderment were gone, replaced by a deathly calmness that seemed to pierce through to the very end of the river of time.
He slowly gripped the microphone in front of him, his knuckles turning white from the force.
The entire venue was dead silent.
Everyone held their breath, waiting for this mysterious fourth Wallfacer to speak his first words.
Luo Ji's lips moved. The voice that came out was hoarse, yet it carried an unquestionable weight.
"I accept."
Luo Ji's voice was not loud, but it clearly pierced through the amplification system.
Every single person present heard it loud and clear.
However, Luo Ji did not step down from the podium or deliver an inauguration speech as expected.
He remained standing there, like a statue under the spotlight.
He surveyed the room, his gaze sweeping over the confused, contemptuous, and curious faces.
Finally, his line of sight seemed to pierce through the walls, looking toward a much further place.
"Fellow citizens," he spoke again, his tone so flat it was chilling.
"You no longer need to agonize over the arrival of the Trisolarans."
The moment these words were spoken, the entire world was shocked.
The frozen air within the venue ignited instantly.
With a buzz, suppressed murmurs surged like a tidal wave.
"What... what did he just say?"
"No need to agonize? Is he crazy?"
The live stream comments completely flooded the screen at this moment.
In the front row, the first Wallfacer, Frederick Tyler, furrowed his brows tightly.
He had spent his entire life studying macro-strategy; Luo Ji's statement was absolute empty talk.
It lacked all logic.
The Venezuelan President, Manuel Rey Diaz, curled his lips into an undisguised sneer.
In his eyes, this was nothing more than a coward losing his mind to escape reality.
In the dark corners, the members of the Earth Trisolaris Organization (ETO) also fell into unprecedented confusion.
"Incomprehensible."
"His thought logic is chaotic. There is no goal, no plan."
"The Lord cannot read any useful information from his calm expression either. His mind is a blank slate."
"Could it be some sort of profound strategic deception that we cannot understand?"
Facing the stormy waves sweeping across the globe, Luo Ji's expression did not change in the slightest.
He merely waited quietly, waiting for the clamor to subside a little.
Then, he continued in that emotionless tone, uttering even more unbelievable words.
"Because, compared to our true enemy."
"The insignificant Trisolaran civilization doesn't even deserve to be called a crisis."
"At most, it is just a knock on the door."
"Reminding us just how despairing the darkness outside the door truly is."
The venue descended into utter chaos.
Chairwoman Say struck the table forcefully, trying to maintain order, but her voice was quickly drowned out by the wave of anger and questioning.
"He's spouting nonsense! Kick him off the stage!"
"This is shaking our morale! It's nihilism!"
In Luo Ji's mind, those memories that did not belong to him—the bloody epic spanning billions of years forcibly instilled by Ian—merged with his own sociological knowledge to form a clear conclusion.
He had personally experienced a civilization falling from the peak of its golden age into a hell of being modified, tortured, and humiliated.
Compared to that despair, the crisis brought by the Trisolarans was indeed insignificant.
He took a deep breath.
He took the core theory he had summarized from his hellish experience.
And for the first time, he announced it to this world still in its "civilizational infancy."
"The universe is a dark forest."
His voice was not loud, but it possessed a strange magic that overpowered all the noise.
The venue quieted down once again.
Everyone looked at him, waiting for his next words.
"Every civilization is an armed hunter."
Luo Ji's eyes were hollow, as if describing a scene he had witnessed with his own eyes.
"Stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path, trying desperately not to let their footsteps make a single sound. Even their breathing must be done with caution."
A terrifying picture slowly unfolded in everyone's minds as he described it.
People could almost smell the scent of rotting leaves in that forest.
"He must be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him."
"If he finds other life."
Luo Ji's tone grew increasingly icy.
"Regardless of whether they are a hunter or not, whether the other party is a formidable opponent or a fragile infant."
"There is only one thing they will do."
"Eliminate the other party."
"In this forest, others are hell; they are an eternal threat."
"Any life that exposes its own existence will swiftly be wiped out."
"This is the true law of the galaxy we reside in. It is the axiom of cosmic sociology."
"And the Trisolarans are merely one insignificant hunter following this law."
As his words fell.
The entire UN Headquarters building, and even the whole world watching through the live broadcast.
Plunged into a deathly silence.
Every single person felt a chill shoot up from their spine to the crown of their head.
Their souls trembled.
Following the brief, deathly silence was an even more violent, hysterical outburst.
"Lunatic! He's an absolute lunatic!"
"This is anti-human, anti-peace extremist ideology! This is fascism!"
A portion of the people felt unprecedented fear, while another portion erupted in intense anger.
They could not, and would not, accept such a dark, despairing picture of the universe.
Facing all of this, Luo Ji's gaze did not waver in the slightest.
He had endured billions of years of torture and witnessed a civilization's most brilliant glory and its most tragic end.
The scene before him was nothing more than a gentle breeze brushing against his face.
His mission was not to make people accept it.
But to inform them of the truth.
Meanwhile, through the omnipresent Sophons.
The Trisolaran world also heard Luo Ji's words.
For the first time, they felt fear toward this weak civilization.
What did this mean?
It meant that Earthlings knew about the sharpest sword hanging over the heads of all civilizations.
They were no longer lambs waiting to be slaughtered; they now had the capital to ensure mutual destruction.
"Alert! Alert!"
"Luo Ji must be eliminated! Immediately! At once!"
Directives were transmitted through the Sophons into the minds of every member of the Earth Rebel Organization.
"Temporarily abandon all Wallbreaker Projects!"
"Supreme Directive: Kill Luo Ji!"
"At all costs!"
"The Lord will provide you with weapon support!"
At this moment, an assassination plot against Luo Ji officially began.