When the 73rd cycle ended, Lin Yi heard a crisp sound as his cervical spine snapped.
That was the instant the Night Owl strangled his neck with the Time Chains; excruciating pain shot through his body like an electric current, and a scarlet spot of light exploded on his retina.
He stared at the owl's twisted smile and suddenly remembered that in the first loop, this extradimensional creature would disguise itself as a well-dressed bank clerk—now it was being honest, half of its face peeling off to reveal the writhing silver veins beneath.
"Died again?" Night Owl's fingertips traced his Adam's apple, and the time fragments on the chains reflected different cycles of death: burned to ashes, cut in half by a spatial blade, and pierced through the heart by his own time blade.
Lin Yi was staring at him from every fragment, the flame in his pupils never extinguished. "You see, no matter how much you struggle, the result is always the same—"
\"Bang!\"
The sound of shattering glass suddenly rang out.
Lin Yi suddenly opened his eyes.
The neon sign of the bubble tea shop flashed overhead, and the stray cat's movement as it darted out from behind the mailbox froze in mid-air. Even the owl's upturned lips froze into a solidified arc.
He could hear his own heart pounding, clearer than ever before the start of any cycle—because this time, his right hand was pressed against a half-shattered windowpane, his palm still covered in fresh shards of glass, the stinging sensation so real it made him tremble.
"0.3 seconds." Chu Yao's voice came through his earpiece, carrying electrical static but exceptionally clear, "Night Owl's calculation matrix needs to synchronize the time coordinates of all matter before resetting; this is the logical gap in its maintenance of order."
Lin Yi's breathing suddenly stopped.
Before the last loop ended, when Chu Yao was forcibly disconnected, this information was hidden in the teardrop formed by the data stream.
He seized that glimmer of light and sealed it into a hidden compartment of the spacetime star map—now, the information within that compartment is surging through his mind in rhythm with his heartbeat.
"Look at the fountain pool," Chu Yao continued. "His core data chain extends from the clock tower to here, and each reset compresses abnormal data into negative space."
But the capacity of negative space...
"Not enough to accommodate too many variables," Lin Yi replied, his fingertips gently stroking the emblem of faith on his left wrist.
It was formed by him using the authority unique to his mythical profession, and it was inscribed with the ancient runes that read "Master of Time and Space," which were now emitting a warm golden glow—he had been waiting for this prompt for a long time.
The owl's silhouette began to blur, a sign that fragments of time were beginning to flow again.
Lin Yi took a deep breath and suddenly shouted at the top of his lungs, "Same as always, I'll count to three!"
His shout was like a pebble thrown into a lake, startling the frozen stray cat so much that it bristled and darted away.
The owl's pupils suddenly contracted, clearly not expecting new lines to appear in the loop.
Before he could react, Lin Yi had already grabbed the metal trash can at his feet and smashed it at Night Owl's knee—this was not an attack, but a precisely calculated trajectory: the edge of the can grazed the silver veins on Night Owl's waist and created spiderweb-like cracks on the time barrier protecting him.
\"one!\"
The roar of the owl mingled with the shrill scream of the turbulent flow of time: "Are you insane?!" He threw a punch, the wind of which carried a string of fragments of time, each capable of tearing through space.
Lin Yi neither dodged nor flinched, letting the fist strike his chest solidly—the sound of bones shattering was louder than ever before, and he could even see his ribs piercing his lungs, blood spraying onto Night Owl's face.
\"two!\"
Chu Yao's voice suddenly sharpened: "Expand the gap to 0.5 seconds! Quickly!"
Lin Yi placed his left hand on his chest, and the light of the faith emblem surged.
He could feel the spacetime star map burning in his sea of consciousness, and seventy percent of the power that should have been locked was leaking out wildly through the emblem—that was the time seal he condensed with the original power of his mythical profession, which contained the memories of the 72nd cycle: Chu Yao's tears before she was erased, the silver roots in the shadow under the Night Owl's feet, and the blood words he himself wrote in the crack of the clock tower wall during the 37th cycle.
\"three--\"
Night Owl's fist pierced his back, pinning him to the glass facade of the bubble tea shop.
Lin Yi's vision began to blur, but he saw the talisman transform into a golden light and disappear into the shadow beneath the Night Owl's feet.
The silver roots in the shadows suddenly trembled violently, like a group of snakes that had been scalded. A crack appeared at the tip of one of the roots, just big enough for the golden light to penetrate.
"What...did you do?" Night Owl's voice betrayed panic for the first time.
He released his grip, and Lin Yi's body slid softly to the ground, the blood meandering into a strange pattern on the ground—a simplified version of a time-space star map, each bloodstain corresponding to a point in time.
The reset has begun.
The streetlights came back on, the words on the billboard rewound to the initial image, and the stray cat darted out from behind the mailbox again.
The owl's figure became translucent, and fragments of time began to swirl around him again.
But this time, Lin Yi did not wake up in excruciating pain like he had 73 times before—his consciousness sank into darkness, but he clearly heard Chu Yao's voice booming in his ears: "The talisman has been preserved!"
It has broken through the clearing mechanism and is now in the negative space of the 74th cycle!
When the sunlight shone through the clouds on the 74th cycle, Lin Yi was squatting at the entrance of the milk tea shop.
He touched his chest—there were no wounds, not even a trace of blood.
But he knew that something was different: the spire of the clock tower was slightly distorted in his view, like glass disturbed by hot air currents; an old lady passing by dropped a candy from her pocket, which paused in the air for 0.1 seconds before landing with a "plop".
"Abnormal data fluctuations detected." Chu Yao's projection suddenly appeared in front of him. This time, her figure was no longer transparent, and even the ends of her hair were covered with virtual morning dew. "The talisman has been activated in the negative space and is reconstructing the tampered timeline in reverse."
Night Owl......\"
"He discovered it." Lin Yi looked up.
The bells of the clock tower suddenly tore through the air.
The hour hand, which was originally rotating at a constant speed, began to reverse, and the minute hand jumped wildly at three times the speed.
The owl's figure plummeted from the top of the clock tower. This time, he was no longer translucent; silver veins covered his entire face, and a ghostly blue flame burned in his eye sockets: "You dare..." His voice was like a rusty gear, "You dare plant nails in my cage!"
The city began to distort.
The milk tea shop's signboard, "Happy Water Bar," has turned into crooked, bloody letters. The stray cat's shadow stretches into a ferocious beast shape, and even the bluestone slabs on the ground crack, seeping out a black, viscous liquid.
Lin Yi stood up, dusted off his trousers, and the smile on his lips was exactly the same as during the 73rd cycle—but this time, golden flames danced in his pupils.
"The 74th cycle?" he said. "No, Night Owl." He raised his hand, a translucent talisman lying in his palm, its ancient runes humming. "This is... the beginning of breaking the deadlock." The city began to crumble amidst Night Owl's roar.
The once smooth asphalt road surface was now like crumpled tin foil, with dark, sticky liquid seeping from the raised folds; the newsstand on the street corner suddenly swelled into a ten-story-high monster, its metal frame emitting a teeth-grinding groan; further away, a little girl in a red dress went from running and jumping to walking backward, her silver hair turning back to black and shiny in the wind, and when her figure disappeared at the alley entrance, she had become a baby wrapped in swaddling clothes—this was the most direct manifestation of time distortion, and the night owl was using a twisted rule to turn the entire city into a living torture device to strangle Lin Yi.
"He's overdrawing the core energy of the mother nest." Chu Yao's projection suddenly froze, then recovered after 0.3 seconds, the morning dew on her hair condensing into ice crystals. "The negative space has been expanded by 37% by the rune; he must use brute force to reconstruct it to maintain the stability of the cage."
Lin Yi's fingertips touched his brow, and the warm golden light of the emblem of faith climbed up his eyes along his veins.
He could clearly sense that the vibration frequency of the talisman in the negative space was in sync with his own heartbeat—it was a nail planted in the 74th cycle, now gnawing at the walls of the time prison like a drill.
"Coordinates locked." Chu Yao's voice suddenly sharpened. "In the underground air-raid shelters of the old city, on the damaged section B12 of Metro Line 3—the beeping frequency of the talisman points there!"
Lin Yi did not hesitate.
He rushed into the twisted street, dodging the sudden rain of glass. As he passed a convenience store that was growing in reverse, the cola cans on the shelf suddenly stopped flowing backward and cracked open with a "crack." The overflowing bubbles condensed into the phantom of a rune in mid-air—a road sign created by Chu Yao using data interference.
The entrance to the underground passage is at the corner. The rusty iron gate is now oozing silver veins, writhing like a living thing, trying to close.
Lin Yi placed his palm on the door, and the light of the faith emblem instantly scorched through those veins, the acrid smell of molten metal stinging his eyes.
He kicked open the warped door, and a damp, musty smell mixed with the burnt smell of electricity hit him. The steps in front of him were collapsing at a visible speed, and every step felt like walking on shifting sand.
"We've arrived." Chu Yao's projection suddenly materialized, reaching out to press down on Lin Yi's shoulder.
Her fingertips glowed blue, pointing directly at the swirling mist of light at the end of the stairs. "The core of time is at the center of this mist. The protective mechanism is the 'causal lock' of the Mother Nest civilization, requiring your faith as the key."
From within the luminous mist came the piercing scream of an owl: "You dare touch it! That's...!"
"Those are fragments of the spark of destiny," Chu Yao finished for him, data flowing through the projected pupils. "The Mother Nest civilization uses it to collect 'you' from parallel worlds; each name represents the end of a timeline—Night Owl uses these death anchors to weave a cage, trapping you in a loop forever."
Lin Yi's breathing suddenly stopped.
The fragment suspended in the light mist finally took shape; it was a palm-sized, deep purple crystal, its surface densely engraved with countless names, each name perfectly matching his voiceprint, bone structure, and even soul fluctuations.
The name on the top floor is still oozing dark red blood beads, remnants of the time when his neck was severed by the chains of time in the 73rd cycle.
"He wanted you to break down through countless deaths, ultimately accepting the fatalistic belief that 'all Lin Yis deserve to die.'" Chu Yao's voice softened, "But he didn't know..."
"What's sealed within the emblem of faith is the 'disagreement' I've accumulated since the very first cycle." Lin Yi's fingertips gently touched the fragment.
The excruciating pain swept over me like a tidal wave.
He saw himself being cut in half at the waist by a spatial blade in a torrential rain in 2035, saw himself being torn to pieces by extradimensional creatures on the altar in the newbie village, and saw himself being swallowed by the temporal turbulence in the 108th cycle while protecting Chu Yao—every memory was filled with vivid pain, the feeling of warm blood splattering on his face, the crisp sound of bones breaking, and even the savage smile of the Night Owl every time he succeeded was so clear that it made him want to vomit.
"Enough!" Lin Yi's roar shattered the illusion.
He could feel the power of faith surging within his consciousness, the spacetime star map burning into a golden vortex, and the names etched on the fragments beginning to peel away, like ashes scattered by a gale. "I am not your pawn!"
Not a puppet on a string in a loop!
The time cage trembled violently.
A scream came from outside the fog of light, this time filled with genuine fear: "Impossible!"
The causal lock can even trap mythical beings...
"Because you've trapped the only mythical-level master of spacetime." Lin Yi's palm pressed against the fragment, his faith erupting like a volcano.
The cracks on the surface of the fragment spread like a spider web, and the originally stable light mist began to leak out a dazzling white light—it was the sunlight of the real world, carrying the warmth of a long-awaited reunion.
"A crack has appeared!" Chu Yao's projection suddenly grabbed Lin Yi's arm. This time, her body temperature was no longer virtual data. "Coordinates successfully located, right here..."
"That's enough," Lin Yi interrupted her.
He stared at the ever-growing crack in the misty light, the golden flames in his pupils almost scorching everything. "The rest, it's time for Night Owl to see who truly is the master of time."
At the top of the time cage, the owl's silver veins are crumbling.
He gazed at the ever-brightening light below and finally remembered the warning in the ancient texts of the Mother Nest civilization: when the power of faith of the imprisoned exceeds the sum of all death anchors, the Time Cage... will become a grave that traps and kills the caster.
At this moment, Lin Yi was stepping on the scattered fragments of names scattered on the ground, walking step by step toward the rift that was enough to tear apart all illusions.
His silhouette stretched long in the white light, like a sword about to be drawn, capable of severing destiny.
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