[T/N: We've reached chapter 600 šš]
No wonder J treated Notch like an untouchable white moonlight in his heart. Notch truly was gentle and considerate. Even though he claimed he would not shield J, in reality he was looking after him at every turn.
Handling J's punishment personally would obviously have been far less troublesome than assigning the task to J himself.
The fact that he deliberately arranged for J to handle it clearly came from concern for him.
He understood J's personality well. If he did not give J something concrete to do, J would absolutely drown in guilt and never escape it.
So by putting him in charge of this matter, on one hand, Notch was giving J something to focus on so he would not have time to spiral into endless thoughts.
On the other hand, if J personally carried out D's punishment, then after witnessing all of D's crimes with his own eyes, he would gradually sever himself emotionally from D and slowly stop instinctively forcing D's sins onto himself.
Previously, he had blamed himself excessively because he felt that he and D were deeply bound together.
Of course, Notch also understood that J's past tolerance and tacit approval were themselves sins.
But his understanding of J ran deep into the bone. He knew clearly that for someone as loyal and sentimental as J, immortality was not a blessing at all, but an exceptionally cruel torment.
Whether viewed from the perspective of a Creator God or from the standpoint of a friend, Notch knew that J had already paid a price for his sins far beyond what he should have suffered.
As the Creator God, he could not lessen the pain and suffering J endured.
But as a friend, he could at least give him some warmth and care.
What Notch was doing now was offering him the concern of a friend. And that was all he could do.
At that moment, upon hearing Notch's words, J agreed almost without thinking.
"Alright. I'll be a good director, and I'll also be the prison guard who keeps a close eye on him."
As he spoke, J walked up to Notch and firmly patted him on the shoulder.
"Don't worry. I've already cut ties with him completely. I won't believe another word he says ever again. I'll keep watch over him properly. I absolutely won't let the past repeat itself."
Since Notch had entrusted this matter to J, he naturally trusted him completely to handle it. Still, he smiled and teased him, "I'll remember that. If you soften up and believe him again, I'll grab you and pluck every single hair out of that beard of yours!"
That immediately made J burst into laughter. Stroking his beard, he grinned and said, "Hahaha, you're still thinking about my beard?"
"Fine! When the time comes, I'll give it to you for free."
As he said that, his gaze drifted toward the top of Notch's head, his eyes filled with meaningful amusement.
"Looks like you could really use it right now."
Seeing that J had finally relaxed completely, Notch joked around with him for a while longer before suddenly seeming to remember something.
"You were probably tricked into entering the Nameless Land, right? Which means you and D never actually had a proper final confrontation face to face."
"Even though you'll be responsible for him from now on, you still won't appear before him using your real identity."
"Do you want to meet him once and settle things properly?"
J had always been someone who valued emotions and loyalty deeply. That was exactly why Notch suddenly asked him this question.
Although he already knew that J had emotionally severed himself from D, the two of them clearly had never truly laid everything out and talked it through.
Notch did not particularly care about D's side of things. The person he cared about was J. In his view, J probably still had things he wanted to say clearly to D.
Unexpectedly, the moment his words fell, J immediately shook his head without hesitation.
"No need anymore."
"When two people have fundamentally different values, they're like skew lines in space. No matter how far they extend, they'll never intersect."
"One side can talk all they want, but to the other side it's like a deaf person listening to opera, completely lost and unable to understand a thing."
"And even if he does understand, it'll just go in one ear and out the other. He'll never truly agree with it."
At this point, J paused and slowly turned his gaze toward Notch before continuing, "You and I once treated him with complete sincerity, without holding anything back."
"Even if we met him again, all we'd really do is repeat all the ways we once genuinely cared for him."
J sighed helplessly and continued, "And he would still be the same as before, turning a blind eye to our kindness, even deliberately twisting our intentions."
"Like back then, when he once hinted to me that some of the inspiration for Minecraft came from him and me... what he really meant was that he believed the creator credits should also include our names."
"That was during the time when you hired the two of us with a high salary to help make Minecraft... looking back now, that was probably what he genuinely believed in his heart."
"The ridiculous thing is that back then, I thought he was just joking..."
As he spoke, J could not help letting out a bitter laugh. Even after so much time had passed, bringing this matter up again still felt absurd to him.
"All the things we did for him, all the care we gave him, he never valued any of it. If anything, deep down he probably accused us of not doing enough."
At this point, J showed a faintly dismissive smile and shrugged, as though none of it mattered anymore.
"So even if we met again, it would only turn into another meaningless argument."
As he spoke, J's voice gradually grew lower, carrying traces of exhaustion.
"We were never people from the same world to begin with. For all this time, we've been forcing ourselves to stay together, and both sides ended up exhausted and sick of it."
He shook his head, as though trying to cast off those unpleasant memories.
"I really don't want even our final ending to become another endless cycle of arguing and debating."
"You owed me things, and I owed you things. None of it can really be sorted out clearly, and it doesn't matter anymore."
"I think ending things quietly like this is pretty good."
"The things he doesn't understand, no matter how much we explain, he still won't understand. Since that's the case, let him think it through himself. After all, what he'll have the most of from now on is time."
"Maybe one day, he'll suddenly understand our good intentions. But by then, it'll have nothing to do with us anymore."
After hearing J's words, a relieved smile immediately spread across Notch's face.
J really was still the same J as before. The way he thought still matched Notch perfectly. Everything J had just said was exactly what Notch himself had been thinking.
Back when Notch and Rookie had just come out of the game pod, Rookie had once asked him whether he planned to show off a little of the Creator God's authority in front of D.
At the time, Notch had told Rookie that he would never see D again. Rookie had been curious then, but because they had to save Old Wu, he never got the chance to ask why.
Notch's reason for refusing to see D was exactly the same as J's.
Just like when the Dreadlord once asked Xu Yuan whether Xu Yuan would regret it if he betrayed him, and Xu Yuan replied, "Why should I be the one regretting it?"
Neither Notch nor J had done anything wrong. They had simply done what they believed they should do. So there was no need for regret, and no need to confront D.
Because true farewells had always been silent.