[The Guiding Spirit Lantern has been successfully forged.]
[HooH of [The Equilibrium] did indeed personally intervene. In order to fulfill its mission of equilibrium, it reached out to you, preparing to manipulate the scales in its hand—]
[But Ron's plan was executed perfectly. Bronya did not betray your trust and choice, successfully advancing on the Path of [Destruction]. Carrying the Lantern of [Salvation], she widened the "newborn" branch of the Path of [Destruction]...]
[Nanook of [Destruction] successfully awakened from the control of Terminus, the Finality. Treading on lava and flame, he arrived and smashed his fist into HooH of [The Equilibrium], cutting off any possibility of it manipulating its scales and influencing the forging of the Guiding Spirit Lantern...]
[HooH of [The Equilibrium] tried its utmost to influence the forging of the Guiding Spirit Lantern, and the heavy, dark fog even enveloped the entire Jarilo-VI system—but Herta and Ron held on to that tiny flicker of lamplight, forcefully maintaining their own will. Meanwhile, Nanook of [Destruction] clung tightly to HooH of [The Equilibrium], preventing it from freeing its hands to truly focus on dealing with Ron's existence.]
[Therefore, even though the power of Nanook of [Destruction] was far weaker than that of HooH of [The Equilibrium], and even though this youngest of Aeons in the cosmos was no match for this old-timer, HooH of [The Equilibrium], simply stalling him for two days had already caused his momentum to wane significantly. Nevertheless, he still succeeded in resolving the threat of HooH of [The Equilibrium].]
[He successfully dragged out the time, stalling until the moment the Guiding Spirit Lantern was forged...]
[HooH of [The Equilibrium] was incomparably anxious, but it had no way to change the outcome—its final move was also neutralized by Nanook of [Destruction]. The fruits of their labor had already been cast.]
[The Guiding Spirit Lantern was forged... and then it shone its light.]
---o---
Reading the text on the light screen, a hint of relief gradually appeared on Fu Xuan's face.
It's done... It's finally done.
The goal they had wanted to achieve was just this. As long as they could complete this Guiding Spirit Lantern, the gains from this simulation would be more than enough.
It was hard to imagine just how many hardships and obstacles they had faced in this simulation... The threats of two Aeons were defused through various means, even costing the lives of two people as martyrs, all to finally complete this one Guiding Spirit Lantern...
It was clearly just the first phase, "Sharpening the Blade," yet the difficulty was already unimaginably high.
But looking at it now, it seemed there was still some room to maneuver in this simulation.
The Guiding Spirit Lantern was forged, and as of now, no Aeons other than HooH of [The Equilibrium] had stepped forward to interfere with their actions... Didn't that prove that they could try to pierce the veil of fate and see what was truly at the top of the Tree of Existence?
This was a golden opportunity. Too high a price had already been paid in this simulation. To finish by making this almost suicidal choice and then obtaining the information before being directly terminated by Terminus, the Finality, was a choice that yielded far more benefits than originally anticipated...
Ron must have foreseen this situation. All they needed to do was watch this simulation proceed to its final conclusion.
With this simple thought in mind, Fu Xuan did little else but calmly watch the screen before her. She watched as the text on the screen faded and a new scene appeared—
The brilliant golden lamplight transformed into a torrent of light, moving nimbly from bottom to top. Like a hot knife through butter, it cleanly and smoothly sliced open reality. Reality was cut with incredible ease, revealing the world beneath: the ethereal Sea of Quanta and the fantastical Tree of Existence...
A pillar of light that pierced heaven and earth rose up violently, running through the world. Fu Xuan rubbed her eyes, unable to clearly see what the Veil of Fate, on the inner side of the world and atop the Tree of Existence, truly looked like. However, she could follow the pillar of light with her gaze, climbing upwards, and could vaguely see a small section that had lost its gray-white tint—a Veil of Fate woven purely from black and white threads.
And where the torrent of light landed, a tiny spot of light illuminated it. At this moment, the Veil of Fate seemed like an ordinary piece of cloth, and under this brilliant point of light, it was gradually being singed black...
In that instant, the Veil of Fate seemed to have become ordinary cloth, and the Guiding Spirit Lantern had become a simple lens, focusing the heat of a star. It was like high noon on a scorching summer day, using a convex lens to focus a sunbeam onto a piece of cloth, heating it in a very common and plain manner, raising its temperature, charring it...
And then, igniting it.
A tiny, brilliant golden flame ignited upon the Veil of Fate at that radiant point of light, struggling to burn through this heavy, thick veil...
The Guiding Spirit Lantern was truly worthy of being the blade that could pierce the Veil of Fate. It truly possessed the power to break through this veil. With enough time, a scorching light like this could not only burn a small hole through the Veil of Fate but could burn the entire thing away. As long as it didn't repair itself, it was possible to incinerate it completely.
If only... there was enough time.
But now, time seemed to be in short supply.
The moment the light stream from the Guiding Spirit Lantern tore open the boundary of reality and that brilliant torrent struck the Veil of Fate, Fu Xuan vaguely felt a sense of oppression.
This oppressive feeling was different from the one she felt when facing HooH of [The Equilibrium]... Although HooH of [The Equilibrium] exuded a sense of divinity, and its voice, echoing like a call in a desolate valley, did inspire a sliver of fear in one's heart, that was the extent of it.
As an Aeon, HooH of [The Equilibrium] inspired fear, but only to that degree.
Whether it was HooH of [The Equilibrium] or Nanook of [Destruction], the power of an Aeon was enough to inspire awe and fear, to make one understand their own powerlessness against them—but that was all.
When HooH of [The Equilibrium] was entangled by Nanook of [Destruction], Fu Xuan knew very well that it posed no threat to her, and deep down, she felt no great pressure from HooH's [The Equilibrium] existence...
But now, a faint pressure was rising from the bottom of her heart, as if a great mountain was being piled up in her soul from scratch. Jagged boulders and accumulated clay were mixed together, bit by bit constructing a mountain of unimaginable pressure—
Fu Xuan saw what looked like a faint, dim "river" outlined by transparent colors appear on the horizon.
Wisps of black and white lines twisted and rose from it, jumping out one by one, then gradually interweaving, bit by bit forming the shape of a hand...
The image on the screen froze.
Watching the image on the light screen, as that hand became more and more complete, the pressure in Fu Xuan's heart grew stronger and stronger—she knew what this was.
Ron had told them before what all these phenomena represented... The long river of fate had already extended from the future. The master of fate was pulling out the strings of a marionette, shaping them into a hand that controlled everything.
This was the true body of Terminus, the Finality. This was the Aeon Itself, in person.
It was coming... It was about to arrive.
Right now... It would soon be able to complete that hand, reach out towards them, and directly crush that Guiding Spirit Lantern...
There wasn't enough time.
The brilliant stream of light fell upon the Veil of Fate, and though a golden flame had been ignited, the spot of light had ultimately not broken through. A real opening had not been made...
So close... just a little bit more.
Isn't there any way to help Ron right now? The Guiding Spirit Lantern was about to break through the Veil of Fate, just a little bit more, just one final push was needed to succeed. She couldn't just let the fully formed Terminus, the Finality destroy it all in the next moment.
Otherwise... the information that could have been obtained in this simulation would have to wait until the next one, and that was not a good option.
She couldn't let Terminus, the Finality so easily stop the Guiding Spirit Lantern from piercing the Veil of Fate... She had to think of something.
Fu Xuan frowned tightly, racking her brain as she stared at the screen before her. Suddenly, her expression shifted—
A spark of wisdom lit up in her eyes.
A way... It seems there really is a way.
If it's just the final push that's needed... why can't I place my hopes on the Edict of the Reignbow Arbiter?
The arrow that had once killed Ron, the Emanator of [The Abundance], the token she had always used to deceive the higher-ups of the Xianzhou [Luofu], the Light-Arrow that had always been purely symbolic, was not just symbolic...
After a Light-Arrow of [The Hunt] from Lan is fired, under normal circumstances, it will shatter upon hitting its target, turning into a pool of light dust. Only fragments will be left behind; it never leaves itself whole.
And this was the only completely intact Light-Arrow Fu Xuan had ever seen... The power surging within it was also the strongest she had ever witnessed among all the Light-Arrows shot by the Master of the Divine Bow.
In a previous simulation, she actually had an option to directly use this Light-Arrow to shoot [Lord Ravager Phantylia]. The result predicted by the simulation was that the entire Xianzhou [Luofu] would be annihilated along with Phantylia, bringing about an equal destruction.
An arrow this powerful, though insignificant before the Veil of Fate, should at least be able to have some effect on it...
As long as it could help, even by a fraction, it would be enough to break through the Veil of Fate... Just a fraction would be enough.
"This time, I'm really playing all my cards..."
Fu Xuan muttered to herself under her breath, clicked on the screen before her, and proceeded according to her own idea...
The image on the screen continued to play—
At the moment when Terminus, the Finality was about to arrive, when the Guiding Spirit Lantern was just a hair's breadth away from piercing the Veil of Fate, but time was clearly running out, just as it was about to be stopped by Terminus, the Finality...
Fu Xuan, who had been on the sidelines the whole time, produced a Light-Arrow that shimmered with a jade-like glow. An extremely sharp and dangerous aura surged from it.
She aimed at that brilliant, golden point of light. The power of the Path of [The Hunt] poured into the Light-Arrow, instantly activating the already unstable and violent power within...
In an instant, the sharp astral wind directly tore Fu Xuan's hands to shreds. She was grievously injured by this, her face turning deathly pale from the pain...
But the moment that bloody mist burst forth, a brilliant Light-Arrow shot out along with the sharp astral wind, like a shooting star.
In just an instant, the Light-Arrow landed squarely on the golden point of light focused by the stream from the Guiding Spirit Lantern, crashing into it with a bang...
The next moment, everything seemed to stand still.
Whether it was the battlefield of Nanook of [Destruction] and HooH of [The Equilibrium], or Terminus, the Finality forming its hand in the long river of fate, ready to stop all this from happening, they all seemed to have been frozen, pausing for a brief moment.
But... the Light-Arrow did not.
The Light-Arrow of Lan of [The Hunt] struck the brilliant point of light. It was only hindered for a moment before it suddenly exploded...
This violently exploding power converged with the brilliant, golden torrent of light. In that one instant, it finally broke through the Veil of Fate, opening a tiny, incomparable hole...
And then, in the vision of the Guiding Spirit Lantern, Ron's remnant consciousness saw this scene—
From the giant humanoid hands formed by black and white threads, countless fine threads were being lifted. These threads were attached to all the branches of the Tree of Existence, controlling the entire Tree like a puppeteer manipulating a marionette.
And Itself was mechanically pulling these shimmering threads, one after another, who knows in what direction it was pulling fate...
Its lower body had completely merged with the Tree of Existence. It was impossible to tell if it was a branch extending from the Tree of Existence, or if it was controlling the Tree of Existence...
And in the void, besides It, were twisted clusters of stars formed by a turbid, dark, malevolent current. On them, because of the irradiation from that brilliant light, they seemed to wriggle slightly, opening what looked like dazed, irregular circles, as if they were Its hollow eyes—
Its gaze fell upon the Guiding Spirit Lantern. This existence, which should have been without consciousness, opened its mouth at this moment. Its words held a tranquility that could make the listener lose all thought...
A dim and faded voice descended from the sky. Ron's consciousness, attached to the Guiding Spirit Lantern and almost completely worn away, heard the last words he could possibly hear—
"You are not the new ending... you have failed..."
"Then don't break the fourth wall, you clever little thing."
"You still... lack a bit of heat."