223: A corporate slave awakens to the truth by killing his wife, breaking all previous records!

Hum—!

The moment Lu Sheng's right foot stepped into the Formation, thousands of starlight, like a bursting river, instantly swallowed him whole.

After the light before his eyes exploded, blinding fluorescent lights, the supervisor's ear-piercing roars, and the ceaseless sound of typing in the office flooded his senses like a tide.

Everything was terrifyingly real.

"Lu Sheng! This report must be handed in before you leave today! If you don't finish it, you'll stay all night! Do you hear me!" A greasy middle-aged man with a receding hairline was pointing at his nose, spraying spit as he shouted.

Lu Sheng frowned instinctively, a long-forgotten sense of disgust welling up in his heart.

He looked down and saw that he was wearing a cheap suit, the cuffs even worn and frayed. His hands were pale and weak. He could not feel a single trace of spirit source within his body, and that Dragon God Bloodline capable of tearing apart the heavens had disappeared without a trace.

He tried to call out to the System in his heart.

【...】

Dead silence.

A sense of weakness from being stripped of all power and a bone-deep confusion instantly enveloped him.

"I... am back?" Lu Sheng muttered to himself, a flash of trance in his eyes.

Time in the illusion passed at an eerie speed.

One day, one month, one year.

He was like a true corporate slave, working, working overtime, squeezing onto the subway, and eating boxed meals that cost a dozen yuan, all according to routine.

Life was dull, numb, and devoid of any hope.

Until one day, a gentle and considerate woman appeared in his life.

She would prepare steaming hot meals for him, massage his shoulders when he was tired, and offer him the warmest embrace when he was dejected.

Everything was as beautiful as a dream.

However, deep within Lu Sheng's heart, that instinct for slaughter honed by mountains of corpses and seas of blood, that extreme craving for power, was like a dormant Vicious Beast, never extinguished by comfort.

He would wake up suddenly in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat, his ears filled with the roars of Floating Corpses and the earth-shaking cries of a Dragon.

He picked up a fruit knife from the table to peel an apple; the cold touch made him feel as if he were gripping the ten-thousand-jin dragon devouring spear.

This dull life was like an ill-fitting prison uniform, making him feel suffocated.

Finally, the temptation of the illusion began to escalate.

"Honey, I..." That woman, his wife, snuggled into his arms with a face full of happiness and handed him a medical report. "I'm pregnant."

Her eyes filled with tears, her voice choked with sobs. She gripped Lu Sheng's hand tightly and begged, "We are about to have a complete home... Please, can you forget those nightmares? Let's just live a stable life like this forever, okay?"

Family, responsibility.

This was the strongest cage the illusion tried to build for him, using the softest of emotions.

As long as he nodded, as long as he sank into this tangible happiness, his will would be completely locked within this void.

Lu Sheng lowered his head, looking at his wife's face filled with happy anticipation, and at her slightly bulging belly.

His eyes, however, became colder than ten-thousand-year black ice at this moment.

He thought of Zhou Hai, thought of Zhao Ze, and thought of that coward Li Han who died protecting Su Li.

He thought of the expectant eyes of the three hundred thousand survivors on Gongga Mountain.

He thought of that Phoenix, arrogant beyond compare, yet willing to fight side by side with him.

Those companions who struggled to survive in the Apocalypse and entrusted their lives to him, that heavy responsibility, were ten thousand times more real than this fake tenderness.

Lu Sheng slowly pulled that fruit knife out of the fruit tray.

"Honey, you..." The smile on the "wife's" face froze.

There was not a shred of emotion in Lu Sheng's voice, as if he were stating a fact.

"My woman would only stand by my side gripping a weapon, not become a stumbling block for me with tears and Family!"

"You're crazy!!" Terror instantly filled the wife's face. She screamed as she backed away. "I am your wife! I am carrying your child!"

"Fake." Lu Sheng sneered, his figure as fast as a ghost.

Even when he was an ordinary person, he was a well-known fighter in the company.

Now, even without spirit source, that combat instinct honed by countless life-and-death battles was still carved into his bones.

Under the wife's disbelieving gaze, that ordinary fruit knife pierced her heart with deadly precision at a tricky angle.

"Puchi."

"Fake, it will always be fake."

Lu Sheng pulled out the knife with a blank expression, letting the warm "blood" splash onto his face.

He watched the wife's body coldly, and under her terrified and desperate gaze, she turned into wisps of black smoke and dissipated into the air.

Along with the dissipation of the wife.

Crack! Crack!

The entire office, the whole city, and even this fake Earth, began to shatter inch by inch like a mirror struck by a heavy hammer!

Endless darkness swallowed everything.

When Lu Sheng opened his eyes again, he was still standing in that ancient and magnificent Bronze Divine Hall, standing in the center of the swirling starlight Formation.

Everything around him remained unchanged.

But his aura was more refined and purer than before, like a piece of peerless steel that had burned away all Impurities and been tempered a thousand times.

His Dao was even firmer.

Inside the Bronze Divine Hall, there was dead silence.

The phantom of the Gatekeeper slowly emerged, his nebular eyes, which seemed to contain the entire Universe, staring fixedly at the upright figure in the center of the Formation.

For a long time, on his eternally unchanging face, he revealed undisguised approval and shock for the first time.

"A heart like rock, decisive in slaughter."

"Unmoved by external things, unencumbered by emotions."

The Gatekeeper muttered to himself, his voice carrying a hint of excitement that even he had not noticed.

"You are a born leader, a traveler holding the blade."

From the time Lu Sheng stepped into the Formation to the time he broke out, how much time had passed in total?

Less than ten minutes!

This broke the record of all challengers since the existence of the Sanqing Hall!

Just then, on the other side of the Formation, space distorted, and a crimson figure staggered out.

It was Luo Tianfei.

At this moment, she had long lost her previous composure and arrogance.

Her gorgeous crimson battle armor had become somewhat disheveled, her beautiful face was pale, her forehead was covered in fine beads of sweat, and her golden Phoenix eyes still held a lingering trace of fear and struggle.

Clearly, she had experienced a grueling battle in her own Heart Demon trial.

When she saw Lu Sheng's calm and collected appearance, as if he had just gone out for a stroll, she was completely stunned.

"You... how could you be so fast?!" Luo Tianfei's voice carried a trace of disbelief.

Her trial was to return to her Family, facing those relatives and clansmen who died because of her, facing countless accusations and resentment.

She had almost been lost forever in that endless guilt.

Lu Sheng glanced at her and said indifferently, "It was just a Heart Demon; one slash is all it takes."