Chapter 557: An Elder's Sacrifice |
Du Yanze's awareness stirred as if he was someone being shaken awake from a deep sleep.
"Divine Master? What's happening?" he asked.
I transmitted everything that occurred since he'd fallen asleep, including the experiments with the corruption source and the understanding I'd gained about the Realm Stabilizing Tree and how the blue sun energy was infecting it. I also showed him the solution that would require me to return later on, since there was an approaching threat that made staying here impossible.
"I can fix this," I told him. "I can't do it right now, but when I return with the proper tools it will work, so the time loop will keep everything stable until then, you just need to hold on."
"How long?" Du Yanze asked me, his voice sounding exhausted but with some hope mixed in.
"I don't know," I admitted. "Time flows differently between our worlds, so for me it might be weeks or months. But for you..." I trailed off, not wanting to specify how many loops that might represent for him.
"I understand," Du Yanze said, and there was an acceptance in his tone mixed together with determination. "I'll be patient. Knowing there's a real solution and that this isn't permanent is more than I had before you arrived here."
"I'm sorry I can't do more for you right now," I told him.
"Don't apologize for it, Divine Master. You've given me hope and that's worth more than you know."
"I need to separate myself from your body right this second," I told Du Yanze. "The Enforcer targets dream cultivators, so if I stay connected to you when it attacks, you might be hurt."
"Do whatever you need to do," Du Yanze replied.
I initiated the separation process, and the connection between us stretched out and thinned, with my spiritual form emerging out from his physical form as if it was smoke. It was a strange sensation to experience, almost like being born backward, although I was already used to it by now.
Du Yanze let out a gasp when I separated. His body stumbled slightly as he adjusted to being on his own again after hours under my control. He looked across the room with wide eyes, seeing Lu Chenyang's flickering form and the empty space where the Nightmare Enforcer was currently hunting us.
"I can't see it," Du Yanze said, his voice sounding confused. "The thing that you're fighting right now. I can't see it."
"It's invisible to the inhabitants of this realm," I explained. "Only dream walkers can perceive it, so you need to get out of this room. Now. Before you accidentally get caught in the crossfire."
Du Yanze ran for the door. He was a smart kid; he didn't try to argue with me or help with something he couldn't see or affect. He trusted my judgment and got himself to safety.
The Enforcer's attention shifted. It had been focused on the elder cultivator before, but now it sensed my separation from the vessel. It seemed to view me as the bigger target now, and since I was no longer protected by Du Yanze's body, it saw how vulnerable I was and lunged towards me.
I cut the final connections tying me to this realm, which were those spiritual threads that anchored my consciousness here. Once they were severed, I'd snap back to my physical body in the Dream World, where I would be safe from the Enforcer's reach. The process would only take a second, but it required a huge amount of concentration, meaning I couldn't defend myself while I was busy doing it.
Lu Chenyang saw what I was trying to do, and he positioned himself between me and the approaching darkness. His spiritual form was damaged now with huge pieces of it missing and his overall structure looking unstable, although he stood there in front of me anyway.
"Go," Lu Chenyang said. "I'll hold the thing off."
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"You don't have to..."
"Just go!" he shouted at me. "Find me at the Slumbering Scholars Sect when you return to the Dream World, we're not done learning from each other yet."
The Enforcer’s strike landed.
Lu Chenyang's spiritual manifestation took the full raw force of the attack.
That darkness consumed his form, and his body tore itself apart from multiple directions at once. Huge pieces of his consciousness were ripped away and they dissolved into nothing.
It bought me the time I needed. The last connection severed. Reality lurched sideways as my anchor point disappeared, and I felt myself being pulled from the Realm of the Chosen.
Lu Chenyang's face twisted in pain as his manifestation kept breaking apart, and despite the agony, he spoke to me one more time.
"Slumbering Scholars Sect," he said again as his voice faded. "Don't forget it."
"I won't," I promised him, unsure if he could hear me.
The old man barely knew who I was since we'd met not long ago, even then he chose to protect me at the cost of losing his own spiritual manifestation. I couldn't afford to let his sacrifice go to waste.
When his projection shattered, fragments of dream qi scattered in all directions before they dissolved into pure nothingness.
The Nightmare Enforcer absorbed whatever was remaining, and it grew larger from consuming his consciousness. It then reached its darkness out for me, but I was already falling backward past reality itself.
The tea house room disappeared, the Realm of the Chosen vanished, and Lu Chenyang's destroyed form faded from my view. The Nightmare Enforcer's oppressive presence receded into a distant memory.
Everything turned pitch-black.
I felt myself tumbling endlessly into the void, passing the space between the inner worlds and dimensions that didn't have names or physical properties. The sensation of having a physical body disappeared, leaving me as pure consciousness and awareness. I was a spark of self that persisted regardless of having any physical form. The darkness was absolute and endless.
And then it wasn't anymore.
***
Du Yanze stood there in the empty tea house room, breathing hard.
The Divine Master and that old man had been struggling against something, that much had been obvious to him. It was obvious from their movements and their techniques, plus the way they'd both looked terrified.
Du Yanze had reached the peak of World-Writ Sovereign cultivation, so his spiritual senses were sharp enough to detect techniques from miles away. He could read how the flow of Xuan Yi moved across entire city districts, however something had been inside this room with him that was close enough to threaten his Divine Master, and he'd perceived nothing.
The sheer ignorance of it bothered him more than any visible threat could ever have done.
Du Yanze looked across the room carefully, trying his hardest to sense any lingering presence. There was nothing there other than the tea house energy and the usual spiritual background radiation of the world. Whatever being the Divine Master had been fighting was either gone now or it remained invisible to him.
He decided that standing in the empty room accomplished nothing, so it was better to return to the library and continue his preparations.
As he walked back past the tea house corridors, Du Yanze let his thoughts wander over to some more pleasant memories. The Divine Master's return had felt incredible to experience. It wasn't due to the power and knowledge he brought with him, instead it was the simple presence of having someone who remembered everything. Someone who truly understood it.
The nap had been nice too, Du Yanze couldn't remember the last time he'd slept peacefully.
Usually, his consciousness remained aware during his physical rest, leaving him unable to disconnect himself from the heavy burden of his memory. But with the Divine Master present and in control, his mind relaxed enough for him to experience genuine sleep.
He'd dreamed a bit, and they weren't the usual nightmares filled with endless repetition or watching his friends die over and over again. They were dreams filled with images and sensations. It was the sort of meaningless mental noise that ordinary people typically experienced every night, and experiencing it had been refreshing for him.
More importantly, there was the promise he made. The Divine Master had found a real solution, since the corruption had a source. The Realm Stabilizing Tree could be healed, so the time loop wouldn't need to continue forever. There was an actual end point to this suffering now.
Du Yanze felt this huge burden lifting off his shoulders, and although it wasn't gone since the heavy weight of isolation pressed down on him, knowing there was a real path forward changed everything.
Du Yanze had always trusted the Divine Master to know the right thing to do.
From their first meeting when he had been at his lowest point and was ready to throw away everything with a suicidal challenge against Lu Wenjun, the Divine Master had appeared and offered him wisdom, guidance, and understanding.
The Divine Master never promised easy solutions or instant gratification, but he always knew what to do. He saw patterns that others missed, and he understood connections that seemed random as he planned multiple steps ahead as everybody else was too busy focusing on their immediate problems.
Du Yanze had faith in his master's abilities. He promised himself silently that he would be patient however many loops it took and however long he had to wait for him, he would maintain the time loop and keep this world alive.
The Divine Master would return eventually, fully equipped with whatever tools were needed to save everyone. Until then, Du Yanze had his own personal cultivation to focus on.
With the Divine Being’s help, he’d achieved the World-Writ Sovereign level, but the cultivation system didn't end there. The next stage up was Heaven's Beloved, where the realm itself would start responding to his needs. That seemed a good goal to work toward while he waited.