As the buzzing sound of space tearing abruptly ceased, Lin Yi's combat boots slammed heavily onto the alloy deck of the Alliance flagship.
He staggered half a step, only to be caught by a strong arm—Long Wu's palm almost crushed his shoulder blade, his sweaty breath blowing into his ear: "Boss, when you fused that key just now, the dragon scales on the back of my neck popped up!"
With a "click," Lao Zhou's mechanical arm gripped the other shoulder, and the red light in his prosthetic eye swept across Lin Yi's palm: "Spatial stability detected at 97%, but this hourglass icon..." He gently poked the newly generated key with his metal finger, "The energy fluctuations are like breathing, and it's connected to the consciousness anchors of all thirty-seven team members."
Chu Yao's projection emerged from the holographic screen on the ceiling, her hair still damp with the mist of reality. Her fingertips tapped rapidly on the virtual panel: "Teleport coordinates locked. All team members must return within three minutes." She suddenly paused, her gaze fixed on Lin Yi's face. "Boss, you don't look well—"
Before he could finish speaking...
A cold wind suddenly rushed into the cabin.
The star map projection that was originally suspended in the center of the bridge distorted violently, and the silvery-white mist condensed into a figure in front of everyone.
Xuanmingzi's Taoist robe was no longer the flowing moon white, but a deep gray soaked in ink. His brows were tightly furrowed like swords, and even the vermilion at the corner of his eye had faded to a pale red.
He stared at the hourglass key in Lin Yi's palm, his voice as cold as ice: "Stop what you're doing."
Dragon Wu's dragon scales surged out from the back of his neck with a "whoosh," and his fists clenched so tightly they cracked: "Who are you, old man? You just teleported back and you're already looking for trouble?"
"Shut up." Xuanmingzi didn't even turn his head, he just raised his hand and pressed down lightly.
Long Wu felt as if an invisible hand was gripping his throat. His face flushed red, and he staggered back two steps, the dragon tattoo on his neck turning a dark red.
Lin Yi stepped forward half a step, blocking Long Wu.
He could feel the hourglass in his palm burning hot, each pulse corresponding to the heartbeats of his teammates—the mechanical hum of Lao Zhou adjusting the equipment, the tapping of Chu Yao's fingertips as she organized the data, the sound of Long Wu punching in the training field, and even the soft rustling of pages as Su Qing turned the pages in the medical pod—all of these flowed into his consciousness through this connection.
"Have you ever seen their eyes?" Lin Yi asked, his voice colder than Xuan Mingzi's. "When they were chased by monsters and fell into mud pits in the newbie village, when their armor was corroded by acid mist in the interdimensional battlefield, when their family members were seriously ill in reality and they could only cry while clutching the blue medicine bottles that had just exploded—" He gripped the key tightly, and tiny starlight floated on the surface of the hourglass. "Now, when they look at me, there is light in their eyes."
Xuanmingzi's pupils contracted to pinpoints.
He raised his hand and touched Lin Yi's brow, a beam of blue light entering it—the core code of the advanced civilization's selection mechanism, surging like a tide within Lin Yi's consciousness: "This faith link system is essentially a system that transforms the collective will of Earth's civilization into an energy source. When your faith is pure enough, the advanced civilization will send down new trials, ten times more brutal than the previous interdimensional invasions."
"So you want us to be like puppets on strings?" Lin Yi grabbed Xuan Mingzi's wrist with his other hand.
He could feel the data flowing beneath the other's skin, like shattered jade in a glacier. "Last time, when the interdimensional army pressed in, who used the Tremor-Tremor Fruit to withstand three annihilation cannons? It was Whitebeard. He said he wanted to save up for a good school district house for his grandson. When Aizen used the Hogyoku to withstand the spatial turbulence, he said he wanted to see if his spiritual pressure cultivation method could be passed down for ten generations." He released his grip, and the starlight on the key suddenly surged, illuminating the entire bridge. "Why should we extinguish the light they risked their lives for?"
Xuan Mingzi took a half step back, the hem of his Daoist robe sweeping across the ground, leaving two deep marks on the alloy plate: "You simply don't understand the rules of advanced civilizations. When the energy of the faith link overflows the critical value—"
“I understand,” Lin Yi interrupted him.
He recalled the fragments of memory left behind by the silver-robed man before he disappeared: among those floating traces of civilization, some civilizations became tools because of absolute obedience, while others were completely erased because of resistance.
At this moment, Earth's trajectory is entwined with thirty-seven vibrant bands of light, like a crackling fire.
“They are not just data; they are people who feel pain, laugh, and shed tears for a bowl of hot porridge.” He pressed the key to his chest, the mythical mark scorching beneath his shirt. “Even if a higher civilization presents new trials, I will lead them to victory.”
Long Wu suddenly rushed over and pulled Lin Yi behind him.
The dragon pattern on his neck had spread to his cheeks, and his pupils had turned into vertical stripes: "If the boss says we'll win, then we'll win. If you want to mess with his link, you'll have to step over my dragon scales first." Old Zhou's mechanical arm popped out a laser blade, drawing a defensive light net around the two of them; Chu Yao's projection disappeared and reappeared, this time appearing behind the main control panel on the bridge, her fingertip hovering above the "lock all ships" button.
Xuanmingzi looked at the wall built by living people and suddenly laughed.
The smile was even more chilling than before: "Very good." He turned and walked towards the core compartment at the stern of the ship. Where his Taoist robe swept, fine ice crystals condensed in the air. "Come to the core compartment in three hours. I'll show you how long this fire can burn."
The moment the hatch closed behind him, Long Wu's dragon scales retracted with a "whoosh," and he slumped to the ground, panting heavily: "Damn... this old bastard is even harder to deal with than that Night Owl from the other dimension. Boss, are we really going to go head-to-head with him?"
Lin Yi didn't speak.
He gazed toward the core module, where a faint mechanical roar could be heard, like some ancient behemoth awakening.
The hourglass in his palm suddenly vibrated violently. He could clearly sense thirty-seven anchor points of consciousness—some worried, some angry, some silently gripping their weapons—all converging into the same thought: Where he is, we are.
"Go prepare." He turned and walked toward the bridge command post, the sound of his boots striking the ground crisp and powerful. "In three hours, let him see that our fire... can burn through the sky of an entire advanced civilization."
Behind the metal door of the core compartment, the hum of equipment starting up could be heard.
A kind of energy fluctuation, beyond current technology, is outlining a complex star map on the bulkhead in blue light visible to the naked eye.
Three hours later, the metal door of the core cabin closed behind Lin Yi, blocking out the muffled sound of Long Wu's last words, "If the boss can't hold on, just shout."
His boot heels rolled over the remaining ice crystals on the ground, and when he looked up, he saw Xuan Mingzi standing in the center of the cabin.
The holographic star map flowed between the two, staining the edges of their Taoist robes a deep blue. The faded vermilion mark flickered at the ends of their eyebrows, much like a candle flame that was about to go out.
"You've activated the system's access control," Lin Yi said, his voice cold and hard, like metal scraping against metal.
He could clearly feel the hourglass in his palm trembling—the connection of consciousness, which was originally as steady as breathing, was now like a blood vessel being constricted by a thin steel wire, with each pulse carrying a dull pain.
The humming sound of Lao Zhou adjusting the machinery disappeared, Chu Yao's keyboard tapping rhythm became blurred, and the sound of Long Wu stomping his feet outside the door seemed even more distant than in reality.
Xuanmingzi did not turn around.
His fingertips hovered in mid-air, and countless silver codes poured out from between his fingers, weaving a net of light into the star map.
Lin Yi recognized those codes; they were the core permission protocols of the "Infinite" system, which had flashed through the silver-robed man's memories when he awakened his mythical profession: "You are severing the energy flow of the faith link."
“It’s not a complete severance,” Xuan Mingzi’s voice was like an undercurrent beneath the ice. “It’s a temporary sealing. When the combined faith values of the thirty-seven consciousness anchors exceed a critical threshold, the advanced civilization’s monitors will lock onto Earth’s coordinates within seventy-two hours.” He finally turned around, his eyes swirling with a galaxy of data streams. “They won’t care about your ‘light,’ they’ll only care about how much energy this fire can provide. At that time—”
"That's enough," Lin Yi interrupted him.
He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck standing on end, and the mythical mark burning on his collarbone—it was the warning from his [Time and Space Dominator] professional instinct.
He raised his hand, and the starlight on the hourglass key suddenly exploded violently, forming a golden barrier between the two, shattering the silver codes into pieces. "The rules you mentioned, I've seen in the silver-robed man's memories. But he didn't say—" He took a step forward, and with each step, spiderweb-like spatial cracks appeared in the ground. "When Whitebeard used the Tremor-Tremor Fruit to withstand the Annihilation Cannon, his grandson received the property deed for a school district house in reality; when Aizen used the Hogyoku to withstand spatial turbulence, his spiritual pressure training method had already been passed on to his tenth generation disciple." His pupils glowed with the purple light of spatial turbulence. "These are variables that don't exist in the rules of advanced civilizations."
Xuanmingzi's fingertips suddenly tightened, and the silver code curled into a ball like a living thing.
He looked behind Lin Yi—the air there was slightly distorted, and he could vaguely see Long Wu's shadow pacing outside the hatch. Old Zhou's mechanical arm was pressed against the door lock, and Chu Yao's projection flickered in the crack of the door before quickly disappearing.
"You've tied their lives to your mythical profession." His voice finally cracked. "What if one day your power is insufficient to sustain this flame?"
"Then I'll use my life to continue." Lin Yi's answer was without the slightest hesitation.
He could hear a faint cracking sound coming from the hourglass—it was the pain of the connection being forcibly blocked, like someone cutting his nerves with a blunt knife.
But even clearer was the soft rustling of pages as Su Qing flipped through the pages in the medical pod, suddenly penetrating the barrier and crashing into his consciousness; the "clicking" of the mechanical arm joints turning as Lao Zhou adjusted the equipment, becoming clear again; and Long Wu's gruff voice outside the door, cursing and saying, "If you dawdle any longer, I'll kick the door down!"
He looked down at his palm; the starlight on the hourglass was recombinating, and thirty-seven points of light, as if attracted by a magnet, crawled in along the crack.
"They trust me to win, so I can't afford to lose."
Xuanmingzi's Taoist robe fluttered even without wind.
He suddenly raised his hand to his chest, where an hourglass mark identical to Lin Yi's appeared, only as black as ink: "You think I don't want to believe it?" His voice lowered, like a sigh crushed by the wind, "Five hundred years ago, I was also a chosen one. Back then on Earth, a girl shielded me from the fangs of a mutated beast with her body. Her last words were the same as the way your teammates look at you now—" He abruptly looked up, the data in his eyes surging like a storm, "and then an advanced civilization descended to test her, turning her soul into an energy source."
Lin Yi's breath hitched.
He suddenly understood why the vermilion at the end of Xuanmingzi's eyebrow had faded to a light red—it wasn't fading, but rather that it had been washed with blood too many times, finally fading into the color of memories.
But he didn't step back. Instead, he pressed the hourglass key to his chest, the mythical mark resonating with the key, creating a temporal turbulence between them: "So you choose to protect yourself with the rules?" His voice was sharp as if carved by a knife, "But we are not like you were five hundred years ago. We have Long Wu's world-destroying dragon mark, Lao Zhou's mechanical prosthetic body, and Chu Yao's holographic computing—" His fingertips traced a spatial rift, taking out a silver medal that Whitebeard had given him before his death, "We also have the confidence they gained with their lives."
Xuanmingzi's fingertips were trembling.
He gazed at the medal, and the storm in his eyes suddenly subsided.
Then, he did something that surprised Lin Yi—he reached out and gently touched the medal.
The cool data stream swept across the metal surface, as if touching some kind of lost temperature.
“Very good.” He suddenly smiled, but this time there was no coldness in his smile, only a kind of desolate relief. “Since you insist on taking this path…” He took two steps back, and a dark spatial rift appeared in his palm. The air currents surging from the rift made his Taoist robe flutter loudly. “Then let me see if your beliefs are truly trustworthy.”
Before he could finish speaking, Lin Yi suddenly felt the air around him become viscous.
He raised his hand and found that his movements were three times slower than usual—the flow of time was being manipulated by some force.
He looked up at Xuan Mingzi, whose figure flickered in and out of sight within the blue light of the spatial rift. A hint of pity played on Xuan Mingzi's lips. "This is just the beginning," he said. "If even my Slowing Domain can't withstand it..."
A loud bang came from outside the hatch as Long Wu kicked it open, the sharp shriek of deformed metal piercing the eardrums.
But Lin Yi's attention was entirely on the man in front of him.
He could feel the mythical imprint burning hot, and the starlight on the hourglass key was condensing into substance—it was time to let Xuanmingzi see just how brightly this fire, ignited by thirty-seven souls, could burn.
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