Chapter 311: City of Dolls

“Oh… what a spectacular sight.”

Upon arriving at the deepest part of the “Elevator Platform,” the black-haired girl stepped out slowly and curiously observed the vast underground landscape filled with a modern vibe in front of her.

If one hadn’t seen it with their own eyes, no one would have expected this.

Deep inside the City of Angels, the capital of the Holy Empire, the stronghold of the Church of the Goddess renowned for its faith and theology, there actually hid an underground city that, while not grand in scale, was not any smaller than the entire Holy Court.

And here, perhaps, is the true, deepest secret of the Church under the leadership of the Holy Church.

—The source of faith-based magic.

“We’ve arrived, Miss Vilyric. As you can see, this is the last site left by that person… Hao Miao Yi Meng before he vanished. This was his most outstanding work, a breathtaking scheme that deceived the Holy Kingdom and the entire world for three hundred years, originating from here.”

Losa Cecelia, who stepped out of the elevator platform first, turned back, while Min Chen, who had already healed most of his injuries with the help of the Priestess, slightly looked up at this sight he had probably seen many times before, letting out a deep sigh.

“Hao Miao… did not forget our initial agreement. What started as a casual conversation about bringing back the scenery of our hometown to this world of magic and fantasy, which we merely laughed off, he… ultimately made it a reality.”

Following their gaze, Vilyric looked around to take in everything.

This was a mechanized city.

Countless floating mechanical spheres, seen before on the Holy Spirit Path, flew around in the sky like dense flocks of migrating birds, resembling soldiers following some predetermined trajectory—flying, circling, soaring, and sinking.

Tall but not overly grand modern buildings stood throughout the city, and various types of dolls with different styles but at least seventy percent similar looks hustled back and forth; just the number Vilyric saw at this entrance was already in the hundreds, if not thousands.

If the distribution density within the entire underground city were not much different, the total number of dolls here would probably count to at least ten thousand.

Such an achievement, if done solely by Hao Miao Yi Meng, would even earn some admiration from Vilyric.

Not long after stepping out of the elevator platform, a waiting doll girl approached and bowed to the three of them.

Of course, her main focus was obviously on a certain Priestess who had come to this place for the first time.

“Welcome to 【Dungeon No. 00001】, I am known as 【Guide No. 00039】. Following the instructions of 【Divine Network Final Model 0】, I provide guiding services. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me at any time.”

This doll girl looked much like most others Vilyric had seen before. She wore a simple yet proper modern work uniform, had delicate features, long hair flowing down her shoulders, and prominently displayed the number 【00039】 on her neck—a very professional look.

Her expression was also not like those battle dolls that are unchanged and cold for eternity; her smile was natural and gentle, easily making a good impression at first glance.

This surprised the Priestess.

“Guide… are you the tour guide for this city? But shouldn’t this place not have many visitors usually?”

Guide No. 00039 nodded, still smiling.

“I detected a permitted inquiry. Answer: 【Guide Type】 is one of the functional categories designed by 【Father】 when constructing the 【Dungeon Series】, primarily tasked with guiding non-Dungeon Series outsiders and preventing them from entering dangerous areas and important locations beyond permission.”

“The Dungeon Series has the function of providing external tours. According to the original rules set by 【Father】, at least one-third of the dungeons should have been opened as tourist attractions, but due to later amendments of the rules, all dungeons have entered a semi-closed state. Currently, within 【Dungeon No. 00001】, there is only this guide model operational.”

“…?”

Not immediately responding to the doll girl’s detailed explanation, Vilyric slightly frowned and turned her head toward Losa Cecelia and Min Chen beside her.

“Is this doll the same as those battle dolls we encountered before?”

Fake.

Although that warm, gentle smile brought Vilyric some good feelings at first, after just a few sentences of conversation, she vaguely sensed something was off.

It wouldn’t be fair to call it fake… it’s just that her smile didn’t represent genuine emotional expression, but rather a specific facial contour that mimicked biological behavior after mechanical imitation.

This doll probably didn’t understand what a “smile” represented; it was merely a design that dictated — when welcoming guests, she must display this specific expression.

Thus, this smile was not lively and wouldn’t change with the flow of conversation, giving off a subtle yet hard-to-ignore feeling of awkwardness.

In other words, this doll did not possess true emotions.

Similar to a familiar topic that arose with the rapid development of intelligent machines and technology back on Vilyric’s Blue Star.

—Should robots be considered true beings when they possess enough intelligence to coexist and communicate with humans?

Such debates had arisen long ago and hadn’t reached a clear conclusion even by the time Vilyric crossed over, and in the high-fidelity game 【Fantasy World】, due to the same issue, pets and auxiliary-type game creatures weren’t allowed to possess overly high AI intelligence, even the top-tier SSS-grade pet like Xiao Guang was no exception.

Therefore, upon discovering that the Little Dragon Daughter had turned into a true being with independent thinking and emotions at the very beginning of her crossover, Vilyric was particularly astonished.

How should one respond to a mechanical being possessing human-like intelligence yet lacking emotions?

But Vilyric had seen emotional machines.

That was the Puppeteer Clan from the Mountains of Ten Thousand Demons.

At this point, the origins of the Puppeteer Clan were no longer a mystery; they were evidently helpers created by 【Father】 during his early resurrection experiments for certain purposes, perhaps experimental subjects aimed at validating whether he could create or trace back to a soul.

The results of the experiment were clearly failures. As the clan leader Iwen had said, while the puppets possessed the same thinking abilities and even emotions as normal beings, they fundamentally lacked a soul, still operated as magical machinery coordinated by a central core.

Thus, probably upon realizing this fact, that 【Father】, namely Hao Miao Yi Meng, gave up on the original plan and began attempting other means.

Here — the dolls of the Holy Empire were undoubtedly crafted by his hand, but these dolls, at least all that Vilyric had currently encountered, including the one she fought against Afalyj and the little maid beside the Redeeming Saintess, were different from the Puppeteer Clan.

They were a purer existence, specifically designed as 【tools】 to achieve certain purposes.

   

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