247: Echoes of Darkness

Li Dong stepped out of the Void Realm, feeling as if he had jumped from a warm swimming pool into an ice cellar.

No, it wasn't cold; it was a kind of emptiness.

The thinness of the Law made the entire world feel light and airy, as if it would shatter with a single poke. The air here smelled like old books left for a millennium, carrying a scent of decaying dust. Vitality? Nonexistent; even the wind was too lazy to blow.

"Hmm? The energy metrics of this world... are failing." Li Dong stood still in the Void Realm and looked around.

The few "BUGs" he had dealt with before were either excessive energy causing riots or Law disorder leading to aberrations—all cases of "overnutrition." Here, however, it was the exact opposite: severe "malnutrition."

The Void Eye quietly opened between his brows, and the entire world instantly became transparent in his eyes.

The Origin core of the world pulsed weakly, like a shriveled heart. Fine black Laws, thinner than spider silk, were rooted deep within it like malignant roots, slowly and steadily draining the last bit of vitality.

This method was completely different from the overbearing, world-devouring style of the "True Lord." The True Lord would simply eat the entire table, whereas this thing was more like a parasite; it patiently waited for the host to wither completely before feasting on the final remains.

"Did the excised tumor leave behind the root of the disease? Or, in other words... did the cancer cells metastasize?"

Li Dong frowned. He could clearly feel a weak but extremely stubborn malice lurking in the deepest part of those black Laws. This malice was neither ostentatious nor violent; it was like moss in a gutter, growing quietly yet capable of corroding an entire stone.

This was no simple System BUG.

His Divine Thought swept over the land, and he quickly found the survivors of this world. They were huddled in the ruins of a massive, long-weathered city, all gaunt and pale with numb eyes, like prisoners waiting for death.

However, they had not completely lost hope. Instead, with a nearly eerie devotion, they sat around an altar built of withered bones, chanting in low voices.

"Great Mother of Wither, you are eternal peace..."

"Please accept our humble Souls, grant us immortal silence..."

"Decay is rebirth, the end is eternity..."

Listening to these prayers, Li Dong almost laughed out loud. To describe death in such a fresh and refined way—this "Mother of Wither" was far more skilled at brainwashing than that "True Lord," who only knew how to make empty promises about power and immortality.

What was even more interesting was that with every line the survivors chanted, a sliver of their remaining vitality would dissipate, flow into the earth, and eventually be absorbed by those black Laws of Wither. Upon receiving these "offerings," the Laws of Wither would become slightly more solidified, making their draining of the world's core even more efficient.

A perfect closed loop, a vicious cycle of accelerated suicide.

"Needs treatment," Li Dong muttered to himself.

He raised his hand, and a wisp of harmonious and pure "Attunement" power swirled at his fingertips, like a drop of nectar ready to be dripped into this withered pond.

However, just as his power was about to touch the world's Law network, the Laws of Wither hidden in the deepest part trembled violently, and a strong repulsive force exploded instantly. It was as if a sleeping patient were resisting a doctor's needle.

"Hey, quite stubborn."

Just as Li Dong prepared to increase the intensity and forcibly "administer the medicine," several gray figures slid silently out of the shadows of the ruins, blocking his path.

They wore tattered gray robes, their figures gaunt, with no expression on their faces, like desiccated corpses. They were "Gravekeepers," the maintainers of this world's decaying order.

The leading Gravekeeper looked up, and two faint green flames flickered in its hollow eye sockets. It did not speak, simply extending a withered, branch-like finger and pointing it at Li Dong from afar.

A dense power of Wither transformed into an invisible ripple, invading toward Li Dong. This was not a physical attack, nor an energy blast, but an "assimilation" on the level of the Law. It sought to drag all the vitality, vigor, and order from Li Dong into the same decay and silence as itself.

"Want me to rot along with you?" Li Dong raised an eyebrow.

He didn't even move, letting the ripple strike his body.

However, that power of Wither, sufficient to lead a world to wither away, vanished silently the moment it touched his body, as if it had struck an invisible wall, not even stirring a ripple.

The Gravekeepers seemed stunned for a moment, as if their programs did not contain the option "attack ineffective."

"Finished performing? My turn."

Li Dong flashed forward, instantly appearing before a Gravekeeper. With fingers held like a blade, the Law Scalpel glimmered, slicing open the Gravekeeper's chest without a hint of flare.

There was no blood, no internal organs.

At the center of the Gravekeeper's withered husk, a fragment of a Soul, tightly wrapped and imprisoned by countless black Law threads, was emitting a faint but pure light.

Li Dong knew that light all too well.

In an instant, the image of his close friend "Cang Qiong," twisted into a guardian before the Gate of Despair a century ago, overlapped with this husk before him.

The same imprisonment, the same exploitation, the same... helplessness.

The relaxed expression on Li Dong's face slowly faded, replaced by cold calm. He reached out and gently brushed over the Soul fragment. The black Law threads wrapped around it, as if meeting their nemesis, snapped inch by inch and turned into nothingness.

The liberated Soul fragment turned into a speck of light, bowed slightly to him, and then dissipated into the world, finally achieving true peace.

The remaining Gravekeepers seemed to sense their companion's "release," and the two faint green flames in their hollow eye sockets flickered violently, as if struggling and pleading.

Li Dong said no more, his figure moving like lightning, the Law Scalpel tracing graceful arcs at his fingertips. With every flash, a Gravekeeper was purified, and an imprisoned Soul was liberated.

After finishing all this, he hovered in mid-air, his gaze piercing through layers of earth, looking straight at the "Mother of Wither" lurking at the world's core.

"Using others' pain as your own nourishment, and packaging it so pompously."

"It seems the death of the 'True Lord' has emboldened some rats that cannot see the light to crawl out of their holes."

He could feel that scrutinizing gaze from an unknown dimension, which had been following him, was now observing his every move with great interest. It was as if it were watching how he would handle this "anomaly," which was completely different from the "Genesis Storm," and far more insidious and twisted.

Li Dong paid no mind to that "Observer"; right now, he only wanted to scrape this so-called "Mother of Wither" out of the world's core, inch by inch.