206: The Afterglow of the Divine Dynasty

The intense pain receded like a tide, leaving behind a bone-deep weakness and coldness.

The mo yuan fragment (Han Li) lay on the cold straw mat, his chest heaving violently, each breath tugging at the scorching pain deep within his Soul.

The forced activation of the [eternal calamity protocol] had almost drained all the energy this body had just accumulated, and even his consciousness had become somewhat scattered and blurred.

Outside the door, Mo Juren's footsteps stopped at the threshold; he seemed to hesitate for a moment, but ultimately did not enter and turned away.

The bowl of cold medicinal soup and the threat that came with it had been temporarily delayed.

Inside the humble room, there was dead silence.

Only in his mind, the tiny mark formed by the remnant of the all-knowing eye was still quietly burning, like a candle in the wind, maintaining that "thread of sensing" that pierced through endless time and space, weak to the extreme.

The cold data of [Recovery Progress: 0.0000007%], like a maggot on a bone, reminded him of the eternal calamity he was enduring.

He could not stay here any longer.

Mo Juren's "teaching" was like boiling a frog in warm water, which would eventually extinguish any possibility of resistance.

He must get that "bottle" as soon as possible; it was the key to breaking the deadlock, the source of Mo Juren's power, and perhaps... the only hope to resist the cleanup program of this "World Engine".

A strong desire to survive (or more accurately, a "desire to exist") suppressed the weakness of his body and the exhaustion of his Soul.

He sat up with difficulty, leaning against the cold earthen wall, and began to circulate the optimized "Evergreen Skill" with all his might, frantically absorbing the thin Spiritual Qi in the air, while carefully recalling every detail about obtaining that mysterious little bottle from the original timeline.

Cliff... midnight... moonlight...

Several days later, taking advantage of a rainy night when Mo Juren was out visiting a friend, he dragged his still-weak body and silently slipped out of Shen Shou Valley, relying on the route in his memory to arduously climb up that remote cliff.

The cold, eerie moonlight pierced through the drizzling rain, casting its light onto the wet and slippery cliff face.

He held his breath and searched carefully.

Finally, in a crevice, a faint, gentle green light that almost blended with the moonlight caught his eye.

His heart began to beat violently, beyond his control.

This was it!

He carefully reached out, his fingertips touching the cold body of the bottle.

The next moment, the little green bottle seemed to have a life of its own, automatically falling into his palm; a strange feeling of being connected by Bloodline and Soul surged into his heart.

Success!

However, before he could carefully examine this mysterious little bottle, a sudden change occurred!

In his mind, that "thread of sensing" maintained by the remnant of the all-knowing eye, connecting endless time and space, suddenly began to vibrate violently without any warning!

It was not because another space-time storm was approaching, but rather as if... the other end had been forcibly "anchored"!

A massive, ancient, and desolate torrent of consciousness, following that thin thread, crossed unimaginable distances and barriers, and fiercely surged toward him!

"Warning! High-intensity consciousness resonance detected! Source point locked: Main timeline anchor point!"

"Forced connection established! Information stream importing!"

Before he could make any reaction, the consciousness of the mo yuan fragment was completely submerged by this torrent!

This time, it was not the painful tearing of space-time, but a series of static images, yet containing endless sorrow and dead silence, that were forcibly stuffed into his mind:

He "saw" a vast, fragmented land.

The sky was eternally dim yellow, with no sun, moon, or stars, only solidified clouds like filthy blood.

Once-towering mountain ranges had broken into huge chunks, floating in the void.

Dried-up riverbeds were like ugly scars covering the land, bottomless.

He "saw" countless broken, colossal remains of metal constructs half-buried beneath the ashes, with a familiar and heartbreaking style—these were the remains of the Sequence Legion of the Lei Yan Divine Dynasty, their scale far exceeding imagination, as if they had experienced an end-of-the-world war that swept across the entire world.

He "saw" a deeper, heart-trembling darkness on the distant horizon.

Was that... the Spirit Realm? No, it looked more like a huge void that had been forcibly dug out, a graveyard of a world, exuding a dead silence that could freeze even time.

Desolation, dead silence, destruction.

Was this... the main timeline? Was this... the ending of the Lei Yan Divine Dynasty after he left?

A million years? Had it really become this weathered?!

In this extreme shock and sorrow, his "gaze" (consciousness perception) was pulled by that powerful resonance force, and it suddenly cast toward the very center of that ruin!

There, a "mountain" stood tall.

A massive black "mountain range" piled up from countless broken giant swords, twisted metal, and solidified energy crystals.

That was... the ultimate remnant of the Sword Grave sequence! It was its most ultimate and tragic form!

And at the very peak of this Sword Grave "mountain range", he "saw" clearly—

A towering, heaven-supporting... stone statue.

The stone statue was made of a dull, light-absorbing black material that seemed to absorb all light; it could vaguely be recognized as a human figure, but its features had long been blurred, etched by the wind and sand of endless years until only a rough outline remained.

It maintained a kneeling posture on one knee, holding a giant, unimaginably large, and also petrified broken sword with both hands, its tip deeply inserted into the ground beneath its feet, while the hilt pointed diagonally toward the dim, dead-silent sky, as if in the final moment of its life, it was still guarding something, or perhaps questioning and resisting some irresistible fate in silence.

The surface of the stone statue was covered with dense, bottomless cracks, as if it would completely disintegrate in the next second, yet it was forcibly held together by an invisible, extremely stubborn will.

[Tomb Keeper]!

It actually... still existed?! And had turned into such a... tragic form?!

How long had it guarded here? A million years? What was it still guarding? Was there anything worth guarding in this dead, silent ruin?!

A strong sense of resonance came from deep within the stone statue; it was a wordless call that spanned a million years, almost instinctive, calling for its creator, calling for... the King.

The consciousness of the mo yuan fragment trembled violently before this apocalyptic painting, and for the first time, such a surging emotion called "sorrow" welled up in its cold core.

His Divine Dynasty, his creations, everything he had once poured his heart and blood into... had actually turned into such a wasteland.

Even the last guardian had long turned into a cold stone statue, with only that unyielding posture silently recounting the past persistence and final despair.

The afterglow of the Divine Dynasty had long since dissipated.

Only the stone statue remained, holding the sword and questioning the heavens.

And he himself was still trapped at this starting point of time, struggling to survive, unable to even maintain his own existence.

The huge gap and sense of powerlessness almost crushed this strand of broken consciousness.

Just at this moment, in his palm, the little green bottle he had just obtained seemed to sense something, warming up slightly, emitting a trace of extremely faint, vibrant green light, gently brushing over his consciousness, bringing a trace of insignificant, yet real... warmth.

This trace of warmth pulled him back from that million-year-old scene of sorrow to reality.

The cliff remained cold, and the rain continued to drizzle.

He gripped the warm little bottle tightly and "looked" again at the petrified Tomb Keeper standing quietly in the apocalyptic ruins in his mind.

His eyes became cold and firm again.

No matter what the road ahead was, no matter what the price was.

He must survive.

He must become stronger.

He must... go back and see.

He turned around quietly and disappeared on the cliff in the rainy night.

Behind him was the newly obtained treasure.

Before him were the predestined thorns.

In his mind, there was a million years of desolation and an eternal... tomb-keeping stone statue.

The journey had only just begun.