The roar of time echoed in Lin Yi's ears.
As he gazed at the purple flame floating on the crest of the wave, and saw a face exactly like his own reflected in his pupils, the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end—it wasn't a blurry double image, but a perfect replica, down to the curve of his brow bone and the fine lines at the corners of his eyes.
"You think you're the only variable?"
The sound emanated from the depths of the fire, like the buzzing sound of two identical jade discs colliding.
The clone raised its hand, the spacetime turbulence swirling around its fingertips mirroring the golden light of the source core in Lin Yi's palm. "From the very first universe's collapse, every 'Lin Yi' who has attempted to touch the spark of destiny has been nothing more than a puppet on my chessboard."
Lin Yi's breathing suddenly stopped.
He could clearly sense the surging power deep within the other's soul—the authority belonging to the [Master of Time and Space], yet mixed with a cold hardness that made his stomach churn.
Fragments of memory suddenly flooded his mind: the warmth of the blood droplets that Long Wu sprayed on his armor when he fell, the slight tremor of Chu Yao's fingertips touching the back of his hand before the projection dissipated, and Xuan Mingzi's last breathy words, "Let us see a brighter sky"... These warm fragments coalesced into an anchor in his heart, pulling his spirit back from the brink of collapse under the other party's aura.
"So you've come to tell me that all my choices were pre-designed?" Lin Yi's voice was soft, yet as sharp as tempered iron. "Then explain why Long Wu would take a knife for me?"
Why would Chu Yao rather be erased from the system than not send me a message?
A cold smile tugged at the corner of the clone's mouth.
The moment he raised his hand, the river of time suddenly froze into amber, and all the waves were frozen in their splashing motion.
Lin Yi felt a tightening around his neck as an invisible temporal lock wrapped around his throat—it was the [Time-Space Cage] he was most familiar with, but now it was emitting a ghostly blue light from the enemy's hands.
"Because they're stupid." The clone's voice carried a condescending pity, "Just like you're still clinging to these ant-like 'bonds.'"
The time-space lock suddenly tightened.
Lin Yi's temples throbbed, and he saw stars before his eyes.
He could clearly hear the roar coming from the real world—in the coastal city thousands of miles away, the interdimensional portal under construction suddenly twisted into a Möbius strip; in the Awakener Trial Grounds in the Northwest Desert, the suspended magic circle exploded without warning; even the projection he left at the headquarters of the Real Alliance showed a spiderweb-like crack on the office glass.
"This is the price you pay for your so-called 'faith'." The clone's fingertip pressed against Lin Yi's brow. "When your foolishness affects more innocent people, when those you cherish die because of you—"
\"shut up!\"
A loud shout tore through the frozen space and time.
Lin Yi's pupils turned completely gold, and the source core crystal burned into a small sun in his palm.
He grabbed the time-space lock that was wrapped around his neck and actually broke the chain made of laws.
What spewed out from the fracture was not energy, but tiny fragments of stardust, each one emitting a resentful shriek in the air.
"Their deaths will make me stronger." Lin Yi wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, golden light spreading throughout his body along his veins. "And your existence..." He suddenly clenched his fist and slammed it into the clone's chest, "is merely proof that there will always be those who refuse to bow to so-called 'destiny.'"
Two figures intersected in the river of time.
Each collision caused a double tremor in both reality and the game interface: the electronic screens in Times Square, New York, simultaneously displayed "ERRoR", a large amount of chaotic mist suddenly surged out of the interdimensional rift in Tokyo, and even the novice village where the job change assessment was underway experienced spacetime turbulence, directly teleporting the three players to the far side of the moon.
Just as the collision of their energies was about to tear apart the river of time, a sonic wave mixed with a dragon's roar came from behind.
Out of the corner of Lin Yi's eye, he caught a glimpse of a bloody shadow—Long Wu's armor was shattered into pieces, and the wound on his chest was so deep that bone was visible, yet he still held on to his last breath, throwing the World-Destroying Dragon Spear in his hand at the Night Owl's remnant consciousness, which was about to sneak attack Lin Yi's back.
"Boss! Three seconds!"
Long Wu's roar was accompanied by blood and foam.
Golden dragon patterns appeared on his right arm, a forbidden mark planted when he awakened his true dragon bloodline.
As the dragon pattern burned through his skin inch by inch, his entire body began to swell—not an ordinary burst of energy, but a sacrificial berserk state where even his soul was burning.
"Chaos..." Night Owl's remaining consciousness was still piecing together a human form, half a face showing the madness Lin Yi was familiar with, the other half a distorted mess of data. "You all have to..."
\"burst!\"
Long Wu's pupils turned pure gold.
His body exploded in front of the Night Owl's defensive net, not in a gruesome scene of flying flesh and blood, but transformed into a luminous dragon composed of dragon scales, flames, and stars.
The moment the light dragon pierced through the chaotic mist, spiderweb-like cracks appeared on the energy shield that the night owl had just condensed.
Three seconds.
Lin Yi seized the opportunity the instant the dragon pattern exploded.
He grabbed the replica's wrist with one hand and placed his other hand on its chest—a primordial mark that only the [Master of Time and Space] could break.
The golden light of the source core and the purple light of the fire seed intertwined wildly at the point where the two overlapped, like two flames trying to devour each other.
"You lost." Lin Yi's voice was burning with unwavering determination. "Because you'll never understand the power that comes when someone is willing to burn their life for you..." His fingertips pierced the clone's chest, "enough to burn through any predetermined script."
The clone's body began to disintegrate.
But before it completely dissipated, a glimmer of surprise flashed in his eyes: "So... this is the meaning of variables..."
The river of time has begun to flow again.
Lin Yi staggered and supported Long Wu's remaining dragon spear, looking at the unconscious Long Wu—the boy's face was even paler than three days ago, but he still maintained the posture he had used when throwing it, like a statue of a battle spirit forged with his life.
"Boss, Long Wu's vital signs are stable." Chu Yao's voice suddenly rang in his mind, carrying his usual calmness, yet concealing a barely perceptible tension. "But the system's underlying layer detected an abnormal data stream... like some kind of..."
"It looks like code from another dimension?" Lin Yi looked down at his palm—there was still the purple light from when the clone disintegrated, intertwined with the golden light of the source core to form strange patterns.
Chu Yao paused, then said, "We're tracing the source. However..."
"But what?"
"Your genetic sequence is in the data stream."
The waves of time have risen once again.
Lin Yi gazed at the dissipating chaotic mist in the distance, then looked at the unconscious Long Wu, and suddenly smiled.
He bent down and carried Long Wu into the space-time rift. As he turned around, the golden light of the source core flowed into a galaxy in his eyes.
"It seems our story..." he murmured to the gradually calming river of time, "has only just entered its most exciting part."
Chu Yao's voice resonated deep within Lin Yi's mind, causing the source core in his palm to tingle slightly.
He tightened his grip on Long Wu's arm, the boy's body heat seeping through the tattered armor, a burning sensation carrying the smell of blood and rust, like a fine needle pricking his nerves. "Be specific." His Adam's apple bobbed, the golden light in his eyes shrinking to pinpoints.
The holographic projection unfolded in the river of time, and Chu Yao's virtual figure appeared semi-transparently beside him, her fingertips rapidly tracing the data stream that only she could see.
The tangled purple-gold patterns were suddenly disassembled into millions of threads, each thread ending in fragments—the blood droplets that splattered when Long Wu shielded him from the knife, the temperature of Chu Yao's fingertips before the system erased them, the breath sound of Xuan Mingzi before he breathed his last... All the memories that Lin Yi considered most precious were now spread out in the torrent of data like a dissected butterfly.
"Faith Mirror." Chu Yao's eyelashes trembled slightly, a micro-expression that rarely appeared on her as an AI. "Night Owl used the characteristics of the Destiny Spark to extract your obsession with 'bonds' and compressed these memory fragments into a copy with autonomous consciousness."
He knew… her voice suddenly lowered, “that what you find most unbearable is doubting whether everything you're protecting is real.”
Lin Yi's pupils suddenly contracted.
He finally understood why the clone could so accurately strike at his weakness—it wasn't another version of himself at all, but a weapon from which he had personally fed his most cherished emotions to the enemy.
The source core burned painfully in his palm, as if it were burning away the anger of being used.
"So what it said, 'all choices are puppets,' was a trap set by Night Owl?" His knuckles were white from clenching his fists, and Long Wu's spear cast a long, thin shadow on the ground. "He wants to shake my beliefs?"
More accurately—
A crisp, sharp sound of something cutting through the air interrupted Chu Yao's words.
The dark figure appeared at the crest of the river of time, its black robes fluttering without wind, and the scepter in its hand, adorned with star trails, emanating a pale golden light.
His appearance came without any warning, as if he was meant to be there, and even the flow of time seemed to slow down slightly because of his presence.
"Night Owl is merely a pawn pushed to the forefront." The shadowy figure's gaze swept over the Source Core in Lin Yi's palm, then fell upon the dissipating chaotic mist in the distance. "The true source lies deep within the Seed of Destiny." He raised the Scepter of Cause and Effect, its tip pointing towards the suspended purple seed of fire—the instant the scepter touched it, spiderweb-like cracks appeared on the seed's surface, revealing a closed eye deep within, its corner lines identical to Lin Yi's.
"The Eye of Order." The shadowy voice was like an undercurrent beneath the ice, "The ultimate monitor used by advanced civilizations to observe the Civilization Trial Grounds."
The owl can create a mirror image of you because it reads all your data through its eyes.
Lin Yi's breathing suddenly stopped.
He finally remembered the system notification when he first awakened as the [Master of Time and Space]: "Abnormal variables detected"—it turned out that from the beginning, his so-called "unique mythical-level profession" was nothing more than an "observation sample" selected by the Eye of Order.
Those things he thought were "coincidences"—Long Wu's selfless protection, Chu Yao's self-sacrifice, and even the appearance of the clone—were all woven into a meticulously planned experiment under the watchful eyes of these people.
"So, what you meant by 'cooperation' earlier..." He stared into the shadowy figure's eyes, which remained devoid of any emotion, "was it about me breaking this experiment?"
"It's not 'want,' it's 'only you can.'" The shadowy figure handed him the Staff of Cause and Effect, the star trails on the staff suddenly coming to life and wrapping around Lin Yi's wrist. "The Eye of Order needs 'variables' to verify the possibility of civilization, but it didn't expect that your 'variables' would grow something beyond data—" His gaze swept over the unconscious Long Wu, then landed on Chu Yao's projection. "It's 'faith.'"
When you fight to protect these, you cease to be a sample; you become a rule-breaker.
Lin Yi's fingertips gently traced the Scepter of Cause and Effect.
The tactile sensation of the star trails flowed across his skin like a living thing, resonating with the golden light of the source core.
He gazed at the closed Eye of Order in the distance and suddenly smiled—not out of anger or despair, but because something more intense was burning in his eyes.
"So the real battle is never against clones." He released his arms from Long Wu, carefully placing the boy into the spatial rift. As he turned, the golden light of the source core enveloped his entire body. "It's to let these eyes see answers they never calculated."
Chu Yao's projection suddenly flickered. She looked at the Scepter of Cause and Effect in Lin Yi's palm, and a faint light appeared in her eyes: "Detection of a loosening of the Destiny Seed's defense mechanism!"
I need to hack into the system...
"No need." Lin Yi gripped the Staff of Cause and Effect tightly, golden light and star trails condensing into a dazzling ball of light at the tip. "This time, I'll show it to it myself."
His figure transformed into a streak of light, rushing straight toward the spark of destiny.
The residual purple light from the clone collided with him on the way, but melted away instantly like snow meeting the sun—when his beliefs were no longer questioned, those mirror images built from fragments of memory could not withstand the power of the real "variable".
\"boom!\"
The moment the ball of light struck the spark, the entire river of time trembled violently.
A crack was torn open in the purple flames, and the eyelids of the Eye of Order slowly lifted, revealing the surging chaos below—within which countless folded spaces of time and space could be vaguely seen, each containing a "Lin Yi" who was fighting, protecting, and burning in different ways.
As the shadowy figure watched this scene, a faint smile finally appeared on the corner of his mouth.
He turned and walked towards the end of the river of time, his robes fluttering in the wind, but his voice clearly reached Lin Yi's ears: "Remember, you are not breaking the rules of a civilization..."
Before he finished speaking, his figure had already disappeared into the waves.
Lin Yi stood before the cracked spark, the Scepter of Cause and Effect in his palm still burning hot.
He gazed at the overlapping images of himself deep within the crack and suddenly understood the unfinished words of the shadowy figure—what he wanted to prove was that no matter how many times and spaces exist, "faith" is always the most incalculable variable.
The golden light of the source core surged from his heart, flowing along the cracks in the fire seed injected into the scepter of cause and effect.
The waves of time suddenly reversed, overlapping his figure with those "selves" in time and space into a galaxy.
Just before his consciousness was about to be submerged by the torrent, he heard Chu Yao exclaim in alarm: "The crack in the fire seed is expanding!"
Cross-dimensional energy detected...
But he just smiled.
Because he knew that the moment the power of faith was injected, all that was observed, calculated, and defined as "destiny" would truly collapse within this crack.
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