Two crystals hovered in the center of the dark void-sea.
Their forms were irregular, emitting a steady, faint glow, like cold eyes that had opened of their own accord in the darkness.
—Memory Core Crystals.
The first was branded with the present anomaly—shattered stained glass, the bloody 41, the untouchable green in the rain, and the act of rebellion that was "rushing out".
The second slumbered with ghosts of the past—the Wandering Disciple of the Celestial Mechanism Pavilion, the "Twelve Celestial Mechanism Arts," and the icy blade that had once cleaved boundless darkness.
Mo Bai's consciousness reached out and touched them.
Boom—!
Two torrents collided, tore, and fused. One was the desperate "now," the other the slumbering "past." Within the depths of his consciousness, they annihilated and were reborn, stirring something deeper, something sealed… awake.
His eyes snapped open.
A cold, fluid light flashed in his pupils, then settled into a deeper black. He "saw"—with perception expanded by the core crystals.
The Twelve Celestial Mechanism Arts - Second Form: Reflective Insight.
His injuries, his energy flow—every detail was laid bare. Fractured left rib. Internal bleeding in the right lung. Surface burns covering thirty-seven percent of his body. His energy sea was turbulent, cracked, yet the core vortex… was reversely devouring and fusing the two newborn forces.
The assessment completed in an instant.
He raised his hands, palms facing upward:
The Twelve Celestial Mechanism Arts - Third Form: Meridian Reversal.
Hum—!
His energy sea erupted! The newborn, violent force born from the core crystals surged from his dantian like a broken dam, scouring his limbs and bones! Congealed blood was flushed away, necrotic tissue was pulverized, expelled as black, foul vapor from every pore! Immediately after, his pores reversed, hungrily devouring the remnant spiritual energy lingering in the air. Charred skin sloughed off, new flesh and skin visibly knitting together, healing.
Three breaths later,
A light as sharp as electricity gleamed in Mo Bai's eyes. His gaze, now a blade, stabbed once more toward the window.
Above the square, the blood pupil and the tear it had ripped in the sky were gone, leaving only a rapidly dimming, contracting rim of dark red. Higher up, the colossal "41" remained, silent. Beneath it, the crimson "1" flickered weakly, even dimmer than before, as if it might extinguish at any moment.
The sky-light died. Absolute darkness fell.
Then—
Shhhk.
The firmament was torn open.
There was no process. It was as if an invisible blade had sliced through canvas.
From the depths of the rift, a viscous, writhing black-red light oozed out, coalescing, morphing—finally forming a mouth.
Its immensity defied description. It had no face, no body. Just this gaping maw, opening and closing, occupied nearly half of the "sky."
A dull, grinding, reverberating noise—inhuman—rumbled from the great mouth, vibrating the air and the ground in unison:
"Purge… Zero-point Reset!"
The voice held only cold confirmation, devoid of all emotion.
Mo Bai's heart clenched. His eyes frosted over in an instant.
Whatever this was, it was an enemy. He moved.
The Twelve Celestial Mechanism Arts - Fourth Form: Shifting Shadow Evasion!
The cloud patterns on his white boots blazed! His figure vanished from the spot, transforming into white lightning that tore through the darkness, shooting once more toward that seemingly unreachable rose window—now, the only exit connecting him to the "coordinate"!
His speed broke the sound barrier, leaving a vicious vacuum shockwave in his wake.
Yet, the instant his fingertips were about to touch the window frame—
The window "faded."
It didn't recede. It was an incomprehensible "distancing." It detached from the concept of "distance," freezing into a stationary, remote "painting" embedded in the dark void. The square outside, the plane trees, the hexagonal pavilion, even the "41" in the sky—all became background within the painting.
Mo Bai jerked to a halt. He was left in the cleared seam between "paintings."
HUM!!!
The absolute darkness beneath his feet "came alive," beginning to rotate.
A "point" appeared from nowhere, then expanded at a law-defying speed, instantly becoming a boundless, dark-red vortex that engulfed all perception! At its center was that very same hideous maw, emanating a force that sought to devour everything!
The fabric of space-time wailed and collapsed. Distant and near scenes were shredded and mixed, losing all form and meaning.
He was locked in the void by an invisible force, utterly immobile. Then, a sensation more terrifying than physical剥离 descended—Existential Stripping. Countless layers of semi-transparent "folds" gently, fatally wrapped around him, entwining the memories, perceptions, and self-awareness that constituted the being "Mo Bai."
The starlight of the observation platform, the coolness of the dark jade, the sharp ring of a blade cutting wind, that startling glimpse of green in the rain, the faint glow of the cherry blossom brooch… Everything that defined him began to blur, distort, fade. Like ink wash paintings soaked in water, large swathes of devouring pixelation and static emerged.
Then, strand by strand, thread by thread, they were calmly, efficiently "extracted," "dismantled."
No past, no present, no future.
No "Mo Bai."
Only an "anomaly" about to be disassembled into nothingness, reduced to null.
The last flicker of consciousness, like a candle flame in the wind, wavered, about to be extinguished in eternal darkness.
At that very moment, the instant before that spark was utterly annihilated—
A point of green light kindled, in a place deeper than the void of剥离, more fundamental than the absolute dark.
Faint, yet pure; serene, yet tenacious. Like an ancient seed buried beneath endless glaciers, stubbornly preserving a trace of life in a stillness where even time was frozen.
It moved.
Not movement, but "emergence." In an incomprehensible way, it passed through the层层 folds of "Existential Stripping," circumvented the吸力 boundary of the destructive vortex, and drifted unhurriedly to float directly before Mo Bai's brow, pausing slightly.
As if in contemplation.
Then, it gently seeped in.
A placid, cool, yet infinitely higher, more ancient, freer power, carrying the essence of some supreme law, flowed in with that point, gently but firmly brushing over the last, nearly scattered spark of his consciousness.
The two memory core crystals on the verge of shattering were instantly stabilized, wrapped, and fortified by a resilient, inexorable force.
A third Memory Core Crystal was thus born, here, in this absolute dead land!
It glowed with a warm, restrained, vibrantly green light. At its core, a cherry blossom-shaped halo slowly rotated and pulsed, forming a fateful link with that fleeting memory of a green dress and the glint of a brooch.
Immediately, this green force did not stop. It flowed down the reconnected channels of his consciousness, through his ravaged yet beginning to spark with faint vitality body, and finally—without the slightest hindrance—converged toward his powerless, yet still tightly clenched right hand.
On his palm, that faint, leaf-vein-like emerald mark suddenly blazed with brilliant light!
The green essence, Mo Bai's very flesh, blood, soul, and spirit, and those three interwoven memory core crystals—old and new—resonated in a profound, ineffable way. Light flowed like water. The outline of a longsword materialized from the void, growing from faint to solid, from虚幻 to real—
Verdant Gleam.
The sword shadow quivered, transforming into a warm, flowing light, and sank into his right hand. On his palm, the leaf-vein mark transformed into a deep green sword sigil and silently vanished.
The green essence completed its gift. That point of salvation, cool as it seeped into his brow, dissipated like morning dew, leaving only three ideas, branded with the scent of ancient greenery, in the deepest recess of his consciousness:
[Survive.]
Almost simultaneously—
"Zzzzt… Zero-point Reset complete."
The cold voice of the great mouth, along with the collapsing spectacle of space-time, rapidly receded, faded, and vanished.
Before his consciousness sank into the chaos of darkness and nascent life, Mo Bai's scattered "gaze" was无形ly lifted, sweeping over the ruins, "looking" once more at the firmament.
That enormous, dark red, curse-like—
"41".
Beneath it, that crimson, solitary—
"1".
Flickered, weakly, one last time.
Its light was utterly extinguished.
The number returned to zero.