406: Chapter 406 Crimson Eyes, Domain

Inside the dark room.

Dozens of white candles were burning, casting light and shadows that swayed on the walls like living creatures twisting.

Wisps of gray mist seeped in from unknown places.

Like tiny snakes with life, they silently coiled around the candlelight, yet dared not get too close.

That halo seemed to be the only sanctuary in this darkness.

In the center of the candle ring, Jia Sangyi sat cross-legged with his eyes tightly closed.

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The red crescent mark on his forehead was currently blooming with an eerie glow, flickering uncertainly.

Fine beads of sweat seeped from his temples, sliding down his dark, thin cheeks, but he was completely unaware.

This yoga Great Master was clearly at an extremely critical moment.

His breathing was so long and deep that it almost stopped.

The surrounding air emitted a low hum, resembling countless cicada wings vibrating at high speed.

In the CD player placed on the floor aside, the white noise before the storm was still playing.

The howling of the violent wind sweeping through the valley seemed to construct a barrier isolating the inside and outside around Jia Sangyi's body.

But now, a chilling wind blew inexplicably in the room.

This wind arose out of thin air, lingering without leaving, mixed in the white noise, appearing out of place.

It did not look like a product of nature, but rather like the erosion of Mental Energy, a whisper from another dimension.

The candlelight began to shake violently, and the light and shadows twisted into grotesque shapes on the wall.

The wall directly facing Jia Sangyi, its solid cement surface suddenly seemed to have elasticity, abruptly bulging inward into a clear outline.

That outline was clearly a curled-up human figure, seemingly trying its best to struggle out from the wall.

Jia Sangyi frowned tightly, his lips moving slightly as he spat out an ancient and obscure syllable.

The wall immediately emitted a muffled sound, and the bulging human figure retreated extremely reluctantly.

But Jia Sangyi did not let out a sigh of relief.

One after another, protrusions were appearing continuously.

Except for the walls, the ceiling, the floor, and even the windows covered by curtains all seemed to come alive.

Painfully twisted human faces emerged and sank within them, accompanied by faint wailing sounds.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Muffled impact sounds came from all directions, as if countless things were imprisoned behind the walls, deep in the darkness.

They were frantically trying to break into this room illuminated by candlelight.

The reinforced concrete structure at this moment became like a fragile film, which might be torn apart at any time.

Hoo— Hoo—

The chilling wind became even more severe, and the candlelight drifted unsteadily.

More gray mist thus seeped in, converging and rolling on the floor, almost forming a sea of mist within reach.

The cold sweat on Jia Sangyi's forehead became increasingly dense.

His thoughts moved slightly, and a mental connection pierced through heavy obstacles, locking onto a point of light in the darkness.

Then he issued an instruction:

"Old Feng, you can make a move."

After a brief silence, a low response came from the other end of the connection.

"Good."

Having received the reply, Jia Sangyi no longer paid attention to the external anomalies.

He concentrated completely, thoroughly immersing himself in another dimension.

That was a boundless ocean of darkness, where the tide of consciousness rose and fell, stirring up waves.

Dozens of white spots of light representing human survivors were terror-strickenly gathering in several areas, shivering.

And around them, more and denser scarlet spots of light wandered everywhere; those were monsters distorted and alienated by the Inner World.

In the center of the entire dark ocean floated an exceptionally bright point of light.

No!

That was not a point of light; it should be called a cluster of light.

A huge cluster of light emitting an ominous red glow.

Puff, puff.

It pulsated regularly, like a beating heart.

When Jia Sangyi's consciousness focused over, the true face of the light cluster was revealed.

That was an incomparably huge red eyeball.

The pupil was a bottomless pitch-black vortex, resembling a black hole devouring all things in the world.

Countless thick bloodshots covered the entire sphere like ugly root systems.

And radially, they extended toward the endless dark Void Realm.

It seemed to be alive, slightly turning its pupil to meet Jia Sangyi's gaze.

Just staring like this for a second.

Countless crazy ravings rushed into Jia Sangyi's mind like a breached flood.

Attempting to strip his Soul from his consciousness and occupy his body.

Change it to anyone with slightly weaker Mental Energy, and I'm afraid just this glance would completely sink their consciousness, reducing them to those mindless monsters outside.

But Jia Sangyi only had a violent ripple in his sea of consciousness, and then forcibly stabilized his mind.

Not only did he not retreat, but instead holding an even crazier thought, he took the initiative to meet it.

At this moment, Minister Luo Lie should be leading a team to pursue that mysterious expert who sneaked into the building and stole data.

And this was precisely the best time for him to seize the moment to realize his own ambition.

The corners of Jia Sangyi's mouth raised slightly, revealing a trace of mockery.

That arrogant and conceited fellow thought he was here to help catch the internal mole; how truly stupid.

The so-called "internal mole" had always been his person.

Minister Luo Lie had no idea that the true purpose of his trip this time was simply for this red eyeball in front of him.

Which was the oddity obtained by the Dongdu Branch of the Noah Organization six months ago, the "crimson eye".

Jia Sangyi had stayed at the Peak of Grade A ability users for too long, long enough for the sharpness of any Genius to be worn away completely.

For a full fifteen years, he had not Advanced an inch, as if fate had drawn an insurmountable upper limit for him.

That threshold leading to Grade S seemed to be separated by only a thin layer of window paper, but in reality, it was like an uncrossable chasm.

This sense of powerlessness and unwillingness gnawed at his heart day and night, almost crushing his pride completely.

Even though the Board of Directors attached special importance to his special abilities, making an exception to absorb him as an observer and granting him the qualification to attend decision-making meetings.

But Jia Sangyi was still unsatisfied with always being inferior to others and unable to squeeze into the true top layer of this world.

And if he wanted to reverse his fate and cross this chasm, the key lay in mastering the "Domain" ability.

The so-called Domain was to condense and temper one's own mental will to the extreme, making it interfere with reality, materialize in the material world, and form an independent Law space with oneself as the core.

Only by possessing a Domain could one truly transcend Mortals and step into the threshold of top experts.

In order to achieve a Breakthrough, he tried countless methods, and finally cast his gaze onto an ancient and dangerous legend—Stealing Heavenly Secrets.

"Heavenly Secrets" referred to the mysteries of world Laws and the operation of heaven and earth.

Wanting to steal it, there were no more than two paths.

The first was to visit those extremely dangerous and desperate places between heaven and earth where Spiritual Qi gathered and Laws were manifested, such as the gang winds of a myriad-zhang abyss, or above the magma of a millennium volcano.

Cultivating bitterly in such places, touching heaven and earth with one's own spirit, sensing all things, and sharpening the will.

Perhaps one could comprehend a trace of Law from it and turn it to one's own use.

This path could be called orthodox, yet it was illusory and time-consuming.

For most people, it was out of reach.

And the other path was more direct, and even more eerie and dangerous.

That was to find a newly born "Inner World".

The Inner World, in essence, was a miniature world whose Laws were still in embryonic form and extremely unstable.

Here, "Heavenly Secrets" were no longer as boundless as in nature, but were compressed within an extremely small range.

Therefore, the target was clearer and easier to capture.

As long as one could use its chaotic and pure Laws as a "whetstone" at the birth of the Inner World, constantly sharpening one's own mental will, there was a great possibility of comprehending the mystery of constructing a Domain from it.

Even, one could be bolder.

If one could partially fuse one's spirit with this newborn world, it would be equivalent to directly usurping part of the authority of this world.

However, such newborn Inner Worlds were hard to come by; most evolved naturally, easily taking tens of thousands of years.

Wanting to find a treasure land suitable for one's Cultivation was no different from searching for a needle in a haystack.

But there were always exceptions to everything.

Six months ago, an expedition team of the Noah Organization encountered an avalanche in the Himalayas, but mistakenly entered a frozen Forbidden Ground because of this.

Under the millennial glacier, they excavated the remains of a huge prehistoric creature's eyeball, named it the "crimson eye", and transported it back to the laboratory of the Dongdu Branch using special methods.

According to the top-secret intelligence sent by the internal mole, this eyeball possessed incredible and terrifying power, capable of creating illusions and corrupting surrounding matter.

In the initial research stage, even across the highest level of protective measures, several researchers still had their whole bodies ulcerating and blistering after approaching it, going crazy and mutating.

What was even more, someone disappeared out of thin air under strict monitoring, as if completely erased from this world.

This was the ability to distort reality and create different-dimensional spaces!

After obtaining the intelligence, Jia Sangyi immediately realized.

This eyeball with an extraordinary background was perhaps the perfect medium for him to steal Heavenly Secrets.

Because it was an embryonic form of an Inner World being nurtured, a ladder used to forge his way to the Peak of the strong.

Thus, a meticulous plan came into being.

What he wanted was not just to obtain it, but even more, an upright and justified opportunity that no one could criticize.

It so happened that Minister Luo Lie was ordered to come to Dongdu to deal with a mysterious expert who was an enemy of the organization.

He then went along with the scheme, making indirect inquiries through the internal mole, guiding Minister Luo Lie's train of thought toward the direction that "the organization has an internal mole".

Afterward, in the capacity of an old friend, he logically came to "help".

The so-called internal mole capture plan, gathering all suspects and enemies within the building, was merely a blindfold meticulously planned by him.

Jia Sangyi's true purpose was to create a disturbance large enough.

Thus giving the internal mole a chance to destroy the laboratory's suppression of the "crimson eye", causing its power to completely erupt and form the Inner World that now enveloped the building.

Afterward, all blame could be pushed onto that mysterious force.

A tragic battle, an accidental leak in the laboratory—everything could be said to be logical and reasonable.

Even Minister Luo Lie, who led this operation, could not avoid bearing the charge of incompetence.

And he, this supervisor who came to help, could hide behind the scenes and safely steal the fruits of victory.

Bang!

Suddenly, a loud noise interrupted his train of thought.

That wall, which had long been overwhelmed, was after all forcefully smashed open into a pitch-black large hole.

An even more violent chilling wind swept in, instantly blowing out half a circle of candles.

The light in the room suddenly dimmed, and the sea of mist on the floor surged even more violently.

Jia Sangyi's heart tightened abruptly.

However, the scene of monsters swarming in as anticipated did not happen.

From outside that hole, a burst of explosions and miserable roars suddenly came.

Jia Sangyi secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

The backup plan arranged had already been activated.

The internal mole was leading people to create a greater commotion, successfully leading the monsters controlled by the "crimson eye" elsewhere.

Opportunities were fleeting; he had to speed up his actions.

Jia Sangyi ignored the external clamor and concentrated all his spirit.

That invisible net of spirit quickly closed up in the ocean of consciousness, like a giant hand, enveloping toward that incessantly pulsating red eyeball.

As the distance shortened, the terrifying mental shock increased exponentially.

The crazy ravings were no longer a vague background sound, but turned into countless sharp poisonous needles, piercing into his mind.

He saw his mental Secret Realm, cultivated bitterly for many years, dissolving inch by inch under the red light, and even his Physical Body turning into a pool of pus and blood.

He heard the mockery of dead enemies, as well as the most seductive whispers from the depths of his Soul, urging him to give up resistance and merge into one with this great existence.

Every illusion was a terrifying trap; with the slightest misstep, he could be doomed eternally.

Jia Sangyi chanted ancient and profound incantations in his mouth, sweat rolling down his face.

His body began to tremble violently out of control, enduring torture that Mortals could not imagine.

Suddenly, his brows knitted fiercely.

Countless mental threads finally broke through the red light defense, piercing into the halo emitted by the eyeball, as if taking root in flesh and blood.

The threads began to be dyed, rapidly changing from transparent to bright red.

A pure and chaotic power of the world Origin was being forcibly extracted by him, flowing along the blood-vessel-like threads into the mental Secret Realm symbolizing self-awareness.

In the real world, behind Jia Sangyi, a huge phantom of a spider web quietly emerged.

That spider web, taking him as the center, bred and spread from nothingness.

Countless threads flashing with weak light intertwined into complex patterns.

Every thread seemed to be breathing, pulsating synchronously with his heartbeat.

Faster... Almost done...

Jia Sangyi endured the intense pain in his mind like blades stirring, a wave of irrepressible wild joy surging in his heart.

He could feel that he had not only stolen a trace of the Origin Law for constructing a Domain, but even had the opportunity to control this newborn world by virtue of it.

At this thought, he greedily accelerated the absorption of power.

The spider web phantom behind him became clearer and clearer, grander and grander.

In reality, those transparent threads also began to mix with wisps of eerie scarlet.

Amidst the flashing of light, this net fused with the invisible barrier of white noise, almost shrouding the entire room.

A Domain with him as the core seemed to be about to take shape.

...

The 84th-floor office hall.

The thick gray mist, like a weighted fluid, slowly crawled between the gaps of desks and chairs, licking the cold floor.

Here was dead silent.

There were only the eerie movements coming from the depths of the darkness, as well as everyone's deliberately suppressed breathing sounds.

Occasionally, there were water drops seeping down from the ceiling vents, smashing onto the floor, the "drip-drop" sound being infinitely magnified.

Everyone waiting knew that this peace was actually very fragile.

It came entirely from that man leaning against the pillar.

He was like a mountain, suppressing all restless greed and malice deep in the mist.

Not knowing how long had passed.

This tranquility was ultimately broken by a slight exhalation.

Cheng Jiashu, who was sitting on the ground, slowly opened his eyes.

The fatigue previously covered due to excessive consumption had mostly faded, and his gaze regained its luster.

He stood up, dusted the dust off his body, his movements elegant.

"I have rested well."

(End of chapter)