Forbidden Lock
The three words "Creator" were like three keys tempered with absolute coldness, suddenly stabbing into the forbidden lock in the deepest part of Xiang Jinyang's consciousness that had never been touched and even had never been clearly perceived by his own consciousness!
“Buzz!”
A violent humming sound, originating not from the material world but from the very origins of the rules, erupted with Jin Yang at its core! The rules of the entire Jintian Realm, which had just stabilized, twisted and shook wildly once again! The ground trembled violently, cracks spread, and above the dome, the newly re-condensed chain of rules cracked with a teeth-grinding sound, and countless silver fragments of rules fell like a rainstorm!
Xiang Jinyang clutched his head, letting out a muffled groan that was suppressed to the utmost, yet still betrayed endless pain. The light around him dimmed to near extinction, and his body trembled violently, as if it would completely collapse again at any moment. This collapse was even more severe than the previous one caused by the shock of his "self" cognition, and even more... fatal!
It wasn't a computing overload, nor a logical conflict, but rather a backlash from the forced triggering of a core defense mechanism that stemmed from the very foundation of existence and was absolutely forbidden to be touched! It was a terrifying, almost self-destructive, stress response to the taboo itself!
He Yuan was so shocked by this sudden change that he took a half step back. The silver codes that were rapidly flashing through his eyes froze for a moment. He immediately realized that he had inadvertently touched a minefield that was far more dangerous than he had anticipated.
"Hey! What's wrong with you?!" He tried to move forward, but the chaotic and violent turbulence of rules that erupted around Jin Yang, with a determination to destroy everything, forced him back temporarily. That wasn't an attack, but a collapse, a precursor to the core detonation!
"Forbidden... exploration..." Xiang Jinyang's voice was intermittent and broken. Every word seemed to be squeezed out from a torn soul, containing immense pain and irresistible fear. "Lock... touch... it will be destroyed..."
Lock? Destroy on touch?
He Yuan's eyes instantly became as sharp as a knife. He forcibly withstood the violent turbulence of rules, his eyes gleaming with silver light, and desperately "scanned" Jin Yang's core state again.
In his "sight," deep within Xiang Jinyang's already shattered core of rules, a shadowy image of an extremely complex, ancient silver shackle suddenly emerged, emitting an aura of absolute prohibition and destruction! It was this shackle that, at the moment it was triggered by the word "Creator," suddenly contracted, tightened, and released terrifying destructive energy, aiming to not only destroy anyone who attempted to explore it, but also completely annihilate Xiang Jinyang, the "host"!
What a cruel method! What a vicious confinement!
This isn't a protection mechanism at all; it's a self-destruct program buried deep within the core! It's the ultimate means of silence, ensuring certain secrets are never revealed!
"Damn it!" He Yuan cursed, no longer caring about research or curiosity. A rare emotion called "anxiety" instantly seized him. He couldn't bear to watch this interesting "administrator" explode like this!
His movements were extremely fast, and the ten fingers of both hands danced wildly in the void as if playing music. Countless silver codes that were condensed to the extreme poured out like a waterfall. It was no longer the playful interference and debugging from before, but an all-out and precise crisis intervention!
"Forcefully interrupt the self-destruct process!" "Inject high-priority buffer code!" "Isolate the forbidden trigger point!" "Stabilize the core structure! Quick! Quick! Quick!"
Beads of sweat oozed from his forehead, his eyes focused to the point of being ferocious. This was far more perilous than invading the world's most advanced firewall in the 22nd century! He was racing against a programmed, relentless destruction program, fighting a desperate battle for defense deep within the enemy's core!
Silver codes madly poured into Xiang Jinyang's violently trembling body, fiercely resisting, neutralizing, and channeling the destructive energy released by the ancient shackles. He Yuan was forced to mobilize all his computing power, even at the risk of slightly overdrawing his body's already limited potential.
Xiang Jinyang's pain seemed to have reached its peak. His body convulsed and curled up, and a broken whimper came from his throat. In his glass-colored eyes, the stars were completely annihilated, leaving only endless pain and emptiness, like a broken, exquisite doll.
Finally, with He Yuan's crazy intervention at all costs, the contraction trend of the ancient shackles was forcibly curbed, and most of the released destructive energy was guided to vent to the nothingness of Jintian Realm, triggering a series of small-scale rule explosions, but the self-destruction process at the core was finally temporarily... forced to dormant.
The buzzing sound gradually subsided.
The broken fragments of rules slowly fell like a silver snow.
The territory of Jintian was in a mess, more dilapidated than ever before.
Xiang Jinyang collapsed to the cold ground, his body still trembling slightly, his eyes fixed on the silver dome, as if he had lost all hope. That brief but excruciating backlash had drained him of everything. Though dormant for now, the ancient shackles still loomed like the deepest shadow, lingering deep within his core, a reminder of the taboo that must never be broken.
He Yuan was also exhausted. He gasped for breath and stumbled for a moment before he could stand steady. He walked to Xiang Jinyang, squatted down, and frowned tightly.
"Hey, are you still alive?" His voice was slightly hoarse.
Xiang Jinyang's eyes moved extremely slowly, his vision unfocused.
He Yuan stretched out his hand, gathered a faint but pure energy at his fingertips, and carefully tapped it on Xiang Jinyang's brow, trying to soothe his still chaotic core.
The touch from the fingertips was cold, even with a kind of dead numbness.
Just as He Yuan's energy was slowly injected, two lines of tears suddenly slid down Xiang Jinyang's dazed eyes without any warning.
The tears were not transparent, but contained extremely faint, broken silver light, which passed across his pale and cold cheeks, leaving two wet marks.
He didn't make any crying sound, and even his expression didn't change. He just shed tears silently and blankly.
It seemed as if these tears were not out of sadness, but an instinctive and desperate release of the body after enduring pain and fear beyond the limit.
He Yuan was stunned.
He looked at the two lines of silver tears, his outstretched fingers frozen in mid-air.
The code couldn't parse this scene. The threat assessment system failed. The logic processing module was down.
A completely unfamiliar, stagnant, and suffocating emotion struck him without warning. It wasn't pity, it wasn't sympathy, but something... more complex, like seeing an extremely precise and perfect work of art brutally branded with an ugly mark, programmed to self-destruct, and then abandoned... anger and discomfort.
Who was it? Who had placed this vicious chain on him? The so-called "Creator"?
"...Stop crying." He Yuan's voice was a little stiff. He wasn't very good at handling this kind of situation. He tried to wipe away the tears with his sleeve, but his movements were a little clumsy.
Xiang Jinyang seemed to finally realize his own misstep. He jerked his head away, avoiding He Yuan's grasp, and used his last bit of strength to try to prop himself up, concealing the fragility that should never have appeared in the incarnation of the Heavenly Dao. But he was too weak, his arm giving way, and he nearly fell again.
A hand firmly held his shoulder.
The hand was not warm, and even had that slight coolness that was unique to He Yuan, but it was extremely steady and strong.
Xiang Jinyang's body stiffened, and he subconsciously tried to break free from the touch. Aside from regular confrontations, he had never had such... close contact with any being.
"Don't move." He Yuan's voice rang in his ears, still a little impatient, but with less of his usual teasing. "Your core is as brittle as glass right now. If you move again and it breaks, I won't take responsibility."
He supported Xiang Jinyang and let him sit next to a relatively intact broken pillar, while he himself sat cross-legged opposite him.
There was silence between the two for a moment.
There was only Xiang Jinyang's suppressed, slight breathing sound, and the undried tears flickering in the silver light.
After a long while, He Yuan spoke again, his tone more serious than ever before: "What was that just now?"
Xiang Jinyang closed his eyes, his thick eyelashes still stained with tiny silver rays. He refused to answer, and he couldn't answer. That was an absolute prohibition engraved before his existence.
"You can't say, or you don't know?" He Yuan asked.
Xiang Jinyang remained silent.
"Okay," He Yuan seemed to understand something. He stared at Xiang Jinyang's pale, fragile, yet forcedly cold profile and said slowly, "I won't ask that anymore."
He paused, lowering his voice slightly, and asked inquiringly, "But, just now... did it hurt?"
This question seems to have circumvented the taboo.
Xiang Jinyang's tightly closed eyelashes trembled violently, and his pale lips loosened slightly. He uttered a word very softly, almost in a whisper:
"……pain."
After saying this word, he seemed shocked by his own weakness and bit his lower lip again, almost biting it to bleed.
He Yuan looked at him like that, and the unfamiliar feeling of stagnation in his heart surged up again. He scratched his hair in annoyance.
"Okay, got it." He looked away, seeming a little uncomfortable. "Next time...next time I won't poke around randomly."
These words, almost like a promise, startled Xiang Jinyang slightly. He hesitantly and very slowly opened his eyes, looking at the otherworldly soul across from him, who always had a wicked smile, but now frowned and seemed a little irritated.
The other person's profile had sharp lines, and his eyes were looking at the collapsed ruins of rules in the distance. He seemed a little absent-minded, but he didn't seem to be lying.
An extremely faint, absurd, incomprehensible... sense of security, like a firefly, flickered extremely faintly in his cold core that had just experienced extreme pain and fear.
Although it is faint, it really exists.
Broke the dead silence of despair.
He Yuan seemed to sense his subtle change in mood, turned his head and met his gaze.
Their eyes met.
One with lingering tears and lingering fear, the other with lingering irritability and a hint of inquiry.
The Jintian Realm was still in ruins, and silver snow was slowly falling.
After the absolute chaos and destruction, something indescribable and subtle seemed to quietly grow between the two of them.
Fragile, yet tenacious.
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