Ying Zheng covered his eyes with his hand as the light assaulted his senses. There was a moment of disconnect, a feeling of dissociation with his own body and the world. When Zheng regained his sight, he saw what could only be described as a paradise.

Far as the eye could see, glistened pastures stretched without end, verdant forests lined the distance, numerous trees dotted the land, each bearing ripe fruit, a river that carried crystal clear stream from the center, a pleasant and constant temperature. And at the center of this all was a massive tree whose branches covered the entire land.

Zheng turned back to see nothing but grassy plains. The gate he had entered had disappeared as well as any hint of walls. It was as if he hadn't entered the celestial pillar but had been transported into another world, instead. 

"Welcome to the Terrestrial Paradise. I believe the most common name for it is called the Garden of Eden, yes?"

Zheng spun back with erratic heartbeats as he heard the foreign voice so near him. The language was something he had never heard before, yet he could fully understand the words. Zheng warily observed the speaker.

The speaker was a humanoid of higher height than himself. He wore a pair of snappy leather shoes, black striped trousers, a pure white dress shirt, a black waistcoat with a black bowtie, white gloves, a shiny cane in hand, and a lustrous tophat. But the most striking feature was no doubt the speaker's head. The head was that of a serpent with scales of pure black.

"Now, now, no need to be nervous. I am not your enemy." The serpent-headed man said with a mannerism that reminded Zheng of an English gentleman.

"But you aren't an ally either, are you?" 

The figure paused before the edge of its mouth curled almost in a smiling fashion.

"You're not wrong. I am simply a neutral spectator in all of this. For now, my purpose here is to guide you. Do not fear; I will answer all your questions and tell no lies." The last sentence was almost mesmerizing in an eerie way.

"Guide, then you know what is going? Why I awoke here?" Zheng asked, distrust never far from thought. 

"Of course!" The serpent-headed man opened his arms in a grand flourishing motion. 

"Then, why? Why have I appeared here? Where are we?" Zheng questioned, a hint of agitation coloring his voice.

"Tsk, tsk, I'd thought you were one of the brighter ones. Earlier I said that we were in the Garden of Eden, did I not?" The serpent-headed man held his head as if in disappointment.

Zheng couldn't maintain his passive expression anymore. "You know what I mean. What exactly is the Garden of Eden? I remember walking through a gate, and yet I'm here. You still haven't told me why I'm here."

"Patience is a virtue, mortal. This is why humans are so... sigh." The serpent-headed man shook his head before refocusing. "This is paradise, a world onto itself. The denizens of Eden will never know pain or suffering."

Then the serpent-headed man held his chin as if in contemplation. 

"As to the reason that you are here. I will have to begin from the beginning. You should know of the End of Times, the apocalypse spoken about in the Book of Revelations. How about the Yuga Cycle or Ragnarok?" 

Zheng nodded; he had heard all of those. All of them spoke of how the world would undergo a cataclysmic event, and apocalypse would come before the world would renew itself in some fashion. 

"That makes it easier. I love how easy it is to talk to smart people, but smart people are also so slick and full of trickeries." The serpent-headed man muttered the last part to himself. "What you are experiencing is the end of a cycle. It is not the first time nor the last time that it will happen."

"You must have noticed how humanity has been pushed to the brink, right? As for why humanity suddenly appeared, it is because the last human has been reincarnated. At the same time, it is a signal of the End of Times. All of humanity, those who had once lived in the past and those that been born in the current era, have gathered at the same time. There is no next life. Humanity will perish. There is nothing to be done to stop that. "

Zheng found himself eerily calm at those words as if he had already expected them. He even surprised himself with how collected and uncaring he was.

"But that is only if you remained outside of Shamayin. Outside of Shamayin, those too weak, too feeble will perish and have their souls erased. You could consider the land outside Shamayin Purgatory. Only those strong of will be able to enter Eden. But I'm sure you already knew that last part." The serpent-headed man smirked as he looked towards Zheng.

"Elaborate on the reincarnation part," Zheng said.

"My, my, so demanding. If I weren't restricted, I would have already swallowed you whole." The serpent-headed man chuckled in amusement. "Reincarnation is reincarnation. Every human that had once lived has been reborn in the current era with their second life. Whether it was an ordinary peasant to the tyrant rulers or the savage heroes, they all walk the earth once more. And now that they have arrived, the memories of their past life should start awakening once more." The serpent-headed man gave a meaningful smile towards Zheng.

"But back to my main point. Shamayin: the Celestial Pillar that connects the mortal to the divine. It has many names, as I'm sure you know. The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, Yggdrasil from the Norse myths, Ashwattha from Hindu myths, even Jianmu Tree from Chinese myths, all of them are names you humans have given to Shamayin! And this is the ground floor, the first world of Shamayin, the Terrestrial Paradise: Eden." Once more, the serpent-headed man flourished his arms wide as if to emphasize his words.

"Denizens of Eden will never experience pain or suffering. All of the fruits and vegetables in Eden are available for consumption. The animals will offer themselves to you in any way or form. As long as you don't consume the fruit of the tree at the center, denizens will experience eternal peace!" The serpent-headed man fell silent as he allowed Zheng to digest his words.

Zheng pondered and repeated the sentences spoken by the serpent-headed man inside his head. "That only applies to residents of Eden. I'm not a resident of Eden, am I?"

The serpent-hended man didn't say anything, but his widening smile answered Tianyi.

"What will happen to the people outside of Eden?" 

"Only those who have made it to Shamayin under their own power will be able to enter Eden. However, not all of them will be erased. The cream of the crop, representing the peak of humanity, will be able to enter Shamayin but not Eden."

"There is a world other than Eden inside Shamayin?"

"Of course, this is only the first world."

"How many worlds are there inside Shamayin."

"Unknown, no one has been able to reach the end."

"If all of humanity are all gathered here, then who entered Shamayin before us?"

"The residents of a bygone era."

"Have I heard of them?"

"I am not at liberty to say."

"Then what is the point of me entering Eden?"

"It is a preparation period granted to those with potential. All of those gathered here are the pinnacle of humanity. Doesn't that make you happy, to be able to stand far above the rest of common man?"

"What kind of preparation?" 

"You're no fun. But I tell you everything. But your actions here will impact your future results in Shamayin. In Shamayin, you must continually climb the tower world after world, floor after floor. Only then will you avoid the fate of erasure."

"Are there any other people who have entered here beside me?"

"Of course, you are neither the first nor the last who will be able to enter Eden. I am not exactly at liberty to say who had arrived, but I can tell you that Adam was the first to arrive."

"Then what is the point of climbing Shamayin?"

"It is to reach the Divine Dais! Whether it is authority, wealth, or honor, or even the Truth, all will be granted to the one who reaches the Divine Dais!"

Ying Zheng stayed silent after the serpent-headed man's final words. He took a deep look at the man before him without saying anything.

"Are you the serpent that tempted Adam and Even in the Book of Genesis?"

There was a visible shudder in the serpent-headed form, and his slitted pupils narrowed as his gaze became venomous. Zheng felt his body petrify as if he was a frog before a snake. Even his breath hitched, and his lungs began to scream for air.

"KukukukuahhaahahahaaAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" It was a low chuckle at first, but as time went on, the serpent-headed man released full-blown laughter. At the same time, the invisible hold was released from Zheng's body as he was finally able to breathe again.

But Zheng didn't have the same look in his eyes as he observed the laughing creature in front of him. A drop of sweat slid down his forehead and into his eyes, causing him to blink.

"Do not be so fearful. I momentarily lost my composure because someone identified me. But there is one thing you got wrong." The serpent-headed man said as he raised a single gloved finger in front of himself.  "It was not I who bewitched them, but Adam and Eve who tempted me to aid in them in stealing the forbidden fruit! Of course, I was made to pay a price for my treachery. It is also the reason I am here acting as a guide to those who come into Eden."

When the serpent-headed man finally regained his composure, the gaze at which he looked at Zheng was different. Instead of the previous indifference, it now held an unknown meaning that caused all of Zheng's hair to stiffen.

"Aren't you going to ask me any more questions? This is your only chance, after all."

Zheng inhaled deeply as he regained his calm. His face returned to the previous passive expression it held before.

"Earlier when I first stepped into Shamayin, something popped up in front of me. What did that mean?" 

"Oh? Don't you know? Isn't that the latest craze you humans were into? Shamayin has decided to introduce a game-like system to gauge abilities into numerals and categorize your skills into easy-to-understand terms to help facilitate you humans' integration into your new place in life."

"Make the real world game-like? Are you insane?" Zheng couldn't help but rebut. 

"Really?" The serpent-headed man shrugged his shoulders. "You managed to deduce my identity, but you can't accept that reality will become game-like?"

Of course Zheng knew what he was saying was strange—only grabbing onto that single fact despite all the stranger things occurring around him. But that was only because, in all the things that happened to him recently, he clearly understood what a world with game elements signified.

"Then what about my current appearance? Ignoring my face and skin, having such long hair for a man in the modern era is clearly abnormal."

The serpent-headed man held his head with his free as if in resignation. "Another dumb question. Everyone on earth was brought in the prime state of their lives. For people like you, yourself of the previous life was much magnificent than you of the current era. So when you were brought here, your body was changed. Just when I got interested in someone, they started to become dull and stupid, what a curse." 

Zheng didn't know why, but those words had broken his calmness. There was a nagging feeling that those words had been spoken to him before in mockery and ridicule, but he just couldn't remember when or how. But he knew that he hated being called dull and stupid. It was originally a question he saved for last, but right now, he just wanted to prove the serpent-headed man wrong.

"Then...what would happen if I ate the forbidden fruit while I am here?"

The serpent-headed froze once more before again released a peal of laughter. "Ah, I was wrong. You aren't dull and boring. But that is not a question I can answer. But I really want to let you know. What to do, what to do..."

The serpent-headed man snapped his fingers. "How's this. I will answer this question, but you will no longer be able to ask any more questions. Do you still want to know the answer?"

Now it was Zheng's turn to turn silent. There were still many questions that he wanted to be answered, but he had an instinct that the forbidden fruit would play a pivotal role for him in the future. It only took Zheng a few more seconds to make his decision. The serpent-headed man had already said that there were others who were within Eden. He could just gather the unasked answers from them instead.

"Yes, tell me what would happen if I ate the forbidden fruit."

The serpent-headed man's smile widened into a full-blown grin at Zheng's answer, as if saying, "You did not let me down."

"For a mortal like you to even taste an apple of Eden is to step steal from the gods. That is all I can say." 

Without another word, as mysteriously as he first appeared, the serpent-headed man disappeared from sight. But Zheng didn't have any time to ponder anymore as a transparent window popped up in front of him.