However, just as the audience was staring nervously at the screen, desperate for the truth, the scene suddenly shifted.
It returned to Amphoreus.
Many of the Chrysos Heirs were still gathered around the Vortex of Genesis.
Since Phainon had entered the trial, time had already exceeded the expected limit.
The audience couldn't see what was happening on March 7th's side, which made them anxious.
But the moment the Vortex of Genesis appeared on screen, everyone immediately thought of Phainon.
Quite a few people felt their hearts tighten.
Was the trial going smoothly? Had Phainon already become a demigod?
Just as everyone was growing more and more uneasy, the camera moved to the Chrysos Heirs surrounding the vortex.
Every single one of them looked grave.
"This trial is taking far too long." Mydei said in a heavy tone.
Under normal circumstances, a trial should not last this long.
Yet they had been waiting here for ages. And there was still no movement at all.
"What do you think of this, Trinnon?" Aglaea turned to the little red-hair beside her, Trianne, and asked.
Trianne closed her eyes, using divine power to sense the fluctuations coming from within.
After a moment, she finally spoke in a low voice: "It's not possible to tell for sure what goes on within the Vortex. All I can hear are fragments of speech and distant battle cries..."
The trial was still continuing, and the fighting remained fierce.
Hearing this, everyone's hearts finally eased a little, but the next instant, Trianne's expression suddenly changed drastically.
"Snowy's voice... I can't hear him anymore..."
"There's a sun-like existence in the trial... It's burning him up...!"
Everyone present turned pale. Outside the screen, the audience completely froze.
...
: No way! March 7th just got frozen, and now Phainon is about to be burned alive too?!
: I'm done for…
: One ice sis and one fire bro, is that it?!
: Ice and fire hell at the same time!
: I'm going to collapse. Is something really going to happen?
: This doesn't look good at all! Someone save them!
...
The comments flooded past. Aglaea, however, seemed to have anticipated this.
Before Phainon entered the trial, she had already prepared a backup plan. If anything went wrong, Castorice and Mydei would enter the trial together and pull Phainon out.
Only now, there were two more people who had to go in.
Stelle and Dan Heng. As Nameless, there was no way they could just stand by and watch.
No one present objected to this. Under Aglaea's gaze, they quickly finished preparing to enter the trial.
Dan Heng stood before the Vortex of Genesis, feeling that violent and chaotic pressure surge toward him, a wave of nausea rose from deep within his chest.
It was a physical reaction caused by the oppressive aura of strife.
But Stelle standing next to him, felt nothing.
At that moment, Aglaea and Trianne's chanting echoed beside their ears. The sound forcibly suppressed their thoughts, leaving them dazed.
When Stelle opened her eyes again, she was already standing on the streets of Okhema.
But in front of her, everything had completely changed. Okhema's once-azure sky was now covered by blood-red clouds.
Black smoke spread through the air, mixed with streaks of blood, forming a thick fog that blocked everyone's vision.
And along the streets and alleys, bodies lay everywhere, torn apart in grotesque ways.
The survivors, some were wailing on the ground, some were huddled around the corpses of their loved ones, standing there in a daze.
More importantly, judging from what could be seen, the dead here were not just adults. Young and old alike...
How was this still Okhema?! This was more hellish than hell itself!
Stelle was utterly stunned.
"What..." The bloody scene before her made her question if this was still Okhema.
Just then, Mydei's voice sounded behind her.
"What's the matter? Surprised?"
He walked up beside her, glanced around indifferently, and explained: "Where there's Strife, there's carnage... It shouldn't come as a surprise to see such a sight in Nikador's trial."
Stelle glanced at Mydei. The appearance of a companion finally steadied her a little.
"Why is it just you? Where's Dan Heng?"
Mydei shook his head, "I don't see him around here... We should go first. Let's pray he stays safe."
With that, the two of them set off together, heading deeper into the core of the trial.
They planned to find their companions first.
Along the way, they witnessed horrific scenes within the trial.
They saw a woman dressed in coarse linen lying on her back in front of her own doorway, her chest pierced through by a sword, her hollow eyes staring at the blood-red sky.
Her child, a boy of about five or six, was kneeling beside her, his small hands futilely pushing at his mother's already stiff shoulders.
From his mouth came choking sobs: "Mom… get up… Mom..."
He couldn't understand the concept of death.
He only instinctively wanted his mother to stop being like this, to stop becoming something that terrified him.
At a street corner, a pair of parents were tightly hugging their child, lying in a pool of blood, already lifeless.
A white-haired old man, perhaps the grandfather, was trembling as he stretched out his age-spotted hands, trying to close the eyelids of his son and daughter-in-law.
Tears streamed down his face.
A white-haired person sending off offspring's and their descendants, perhaps this was the most despairing moment of all.
Scene after scene.
The audience outside the screen felt their scalps go numb. Some people couldn't bear to keep watching and simply closed their eyes.
As the two of them went deeper, such scenes appeared again and again.
A man who had lost both legs desperately rummaged through a pile of corpses, searching for something.
Several surviving children huddled together in a corner, shivering.
Extreme terror. Extreme destruction. Every scene was unbearable to look at, yet all shared one cruel common point.
Beside every scene, there was always a survivor.
A child who couldn't wake his mother. A grandfather powerless to change fate. A husband who had lost his wife and children.
This was the destruction of both protectors and the protected.
And these survivors, what they displayed was an even deeper, more unbearable despair.
The dead were not distinguished by age or gender. The descent of destruction seemed to have no logic, and no specific purpose of taking anything.
It was like a natural disaster that descended purely for the sake of "destruction" itself.
""The greatest fear in the depths of a warrior's heart," huh? ...So, this is what he fears the most?"
Mydei stared at these scenes, his hands clenched tightly.
In Nikador's trial, the trial-taker must conquer the fears in their heart.
And everything before them was, without a doubt, the manifestation of Phainon's deepest fear.
Stelle also realized it. It should be Phainon's own past.
...
: Holy shit… in Phainon's heart, that originally straight-lined restricted zone was already full of corpses.
: Don't tell me Aedes Elysiae really got destroyed like this.
: The survivors' perspectives and feelings… why does it feel like they're all Phainon's own?
: After all, Aedes Elysiae seems to have only Phainon left as a lone survivor.
: There's always at least one survivor, right… so Phainon is probably it.
: So does he live in this kind of pain every single day?
: He personally witnessed his hometown turn into this, and then became the only survivor… holy shit, I don't even dare think about it anymore.
: This trial is way too cruel. No wonder Phainon got burned to a crisp. If it were me, I'd have gone insane on the spot.
: You can also tell from this that Aedes Elysiae's destruction must be related to Strife… otherwise it wouldn't show such horrific imagery.
; This isn't just a simple annihilation anymore.
: Tsk… I'm starting to feel bad for Phainon.
: I can't take it anymore. That sunny, cheerful, refreshing guy from the last episode… he's carrying something this heavy inside?
...
The scenes presented in the trial were all abstract.
But even so, one could still glimpse Phainon's psyche through them. Mydei grew even more silent.
That man's heavy past left him not knowing what to say.
So he could only keep his mouth shut. The two of them continued deeper inside.
What appeared next were remnants of some old battlefield.
The war between Okhema and Castrum Kremnos.
Soldiers from both sides fought desperately.
Only… the ones being slaughtered were the soldiers of Castrum Kremnos.
And every Castrum Kremnos soldier, before dying, would stare at Mydei with bloodshot eyes full of hatred.
"Mydeimos… my king…"
"Why... why did you leave us to the mercy of these foreigners?"
Each word was a tear-soaked accusation spat out by the people of Castrum Kremnos.
Thick blood and deafening noise surrounded Mydei's senses.
"This is utterly ridiculous…" Mydei took a deep breath.
After a new arrival appeared, the scenes in the trial became even more complex.
That earlier scene was obviously one of his own fears being manifested.
Stelle frowned, recalling in her mind the screams and accusations of the Castrum Kremnos soldiers.
But then she remembered Mydei's explanation earlier.
So that meant… the scene just now was also the embodiment of the thing Mydei feared most?
He was… afraid of the accusations of his fellow countrymen from Castrum Kremnos?
The audience was suddenly shaken. They firmly remembered that scene.
It was very clear.
Through this trial, they seemed to be able to uncover more of the stories behind the Chrysos Heirs.
As they went deeper. More and more scenes similar to the one that showed Phainon's fearappeared in huge numbers.
Only this time, they were all about Mydei.
They encountered Chartonus.
This master craftsman was already on his last breath, yet he still stared at Mydei with eyes full of hatred.
He mocked him, asking whether he had come to take his life as well, the so-called king chosen by fate.
And when Mydei suppressed his emotions and asked where Phainon was,
Chartonus's response became even more resentful.
"All of this, you know very well. Leave our city, cursed son of Gorgo!"
"Humiliate me, you shall not. Leave. Get out of Okhema!"
"Get out! Symbol of your sovereignty, take it! Signet of Kremnos, bask in blood-soaked glory, your kind alone!"
And amid the noise that kept echoing around Mydei's ears, a ring appeared before his eyes.
The moment Mydei saw the ring, he could no longer maintain his cold expression.
His pupils shrank.
That was… his mother's ring!
And at the very instant he saw the ring, Mydei's emotions fluctuated violently.
Chartonus burst into mad laughter.
"Hah! Finally gone mad, despicable vermin have. With your mad king, perish together, in that maelstrom of battle!"
The madness Chartonus displayed in his frenzy made the audience feel terrified.
What the hell is this trial even about?!
...
: Mydei's fear isn't simple either…
: It's all Castrum Kremnos people turning their backs on him, and they all look completely deranged.
: Oh my god, this is way too twisted.
: How are they even supposed to pass this trial? By defeating their inner demons or something?
: Mydei's got quite a story too.
: The moment he saw that ring, his expression completely changed.
: I think I remember someone saying earlier that the last king of Castrum Kremnos was killed by Mydei himself?
: There's probably a tragic past behind this too, just like Phainon…
: This is too miserable…
...
Just as the barrage was scrolling by.
A long, narrow shadow pierces through the phantom of the frenzied Chartonus....
The two turned around to look.
It was actually Dan Heng! He had found his way to them
"Dan Heng?!"
Stelle happily took a step forward, but then abruptly stopped.
The gray haired girl showed a sharp, clever look.
" Are you... the real Dan Heng?"
Stelle looked at Dan Heng warily.
Dan Heng questioned back, "I could ask you the same-"
He shared the same thought.
He immediately asked, "Sane enough to communicate, it seems. Hey, gray-haired warrior. Tell me-"
"-What was the last thing you said to me before I parted the waters at the Scalegorge Waterscape?"
After the words fell. Mydei glanced at the two of them and said uncertainly, "Parted the waters...?"
The clever look in Stelle's eyes gradually turned blank.
"..."
"..."
An awkward silence suddenly filled the air.
"How would I even remember that?!" Stelle frantically searched her memory.
But that blank expression made Dan Heng nod.
"Hmm, that sounds like something the real you would say."
Dan Heng let out a breath of relief.
Although Mydei didn't understand what kind of riddle the two were playing, he didn't really care.
Instead, he asked Dan Heng with concern, "So, you are Dan Heng. What did you go through before meeting us?"
Dan Heng understood what he meant and only nodded lightly.
"Just some memories from my past. Nothing worth mentioning."
...
: Pfft… I can't hold it in anymore. It was all so serious, but the moment I saw Stelle's expression, I lost it.
: Dan Heng's 'doesn't look like acting' line killed me.
: Little Dan Heng really has all kinds of deadpan humor.
: I'm dying of laughter.
: Damn, laughing in this kind of environment is really bad karma.
: Sure enough, Dan Heng also saw his own past.
: Still chasing, still chasing!
: At least MiHoYo still has some conscience. They didn't go as far as they did when showing Phainon and Mydei's fears.
: MiHoYo is actually kind of nice, huh.
...
The audience kept discussing.
And the three who had now gathered together chose to go deeper.
Because Phainon, the protagonist of this trial, was still nowhere to be seen.
How was he doing now, and what kind of enemy was he facing?