The first thing Finn felt when he regained consciousness was silence.
No wind, no mechanical hum, none of the ever-present stench of rot that clung to every settlement.
He slowly pried his eyes open and found himself lying atop a solitary mountain peak.
Blinding white filled his vision.
Aside from a scorching sun, there was only an endless sea of clouds—churning like frozen waves, swallowing the world in a boundless expanse of white.
The entire mountain jutted sharply out of the cloud sea. There was no land in sight, no distant horizon—only this stark outcrop suspended between heaven and earth. The peak was small, its surface rugged and uneven, yet a flat, level area lay at its center.
Finn tried to sit up, but his muscles refused to respond.
Not far away, a gnarled old pine clung to a crack in the stone, its trunk twisted and tough, as though it had endured countless ages. Beside it stood a stone altar, simple to the point of crudity.
Gritting his teeth, Finn crawled toward the altar through waves of pain. And there, at its center, he saw them—seven swords embedded in stone.
Each sword was different in shape. Some were slender, some heavy; some straight, others slightly curved. Yet all were the same ashen gray, rough and unpolished, as if crudely carved from the mountain itself.
Finn stared in a daze.
This was not Earth.
He still remembered being engulfed by the rainbow beam—the fire in the warehouse, the screams, the jumble of fading voices echoing in his mind. It all felt like a dream. And yet he now lay on a cold stone mountain beneath a foreign sky.
Just then, a voice sounded beside him, emerging from nowhere.
"You're finally awake?"
Finn's body tensed. He jerked upright instinctively, only to collapse back onto the ground, his strength drained.
"Stop struggling. You're in no condition to move. Lie still, or you'll exhaust yourself to death."
The voice carried a lazy tone, laced with undisguised disdain.
Finn's throat was dry and raw.
"Wh… who's there?"
After a brief pause, the voice cleared its throat.
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am the keeper of this inheritance space, and the gate guardian of the Seven Swords—Sword Stone."
"Where are you?"
It seemed to attempt a majestic tone, only to give up halfway.
"Ahem. To put it simply—I'm the one with seven swords sticking out of me."
Finn's gaze shot toward the stone altar, his thoughts in complete disarray.
It was as if Sword Stone had been silent for centuries and had finally found someone to speak to. Once it began, it kept talking in a leisurely stream.
"Haven't seen a living soul in hundreds of years. This lonely peak's been unbearably dull—no one even to complain to."
With great effort, Finn propped himself up and looked again at the seven stone swords.
"Where… where is this place?"
Sword Stone fell silent for a moment, its tone turning unexpectedly serious.
"This is the inheritance space of the Seven Swords. Being brought here means you have already passed the preliminary selection."
It paused, then added thoughtfully,
"Besides, your physique… hm. You've already inherited the Chaos Body. No wonder the formation didn't tear you apart."
Finn understood nothing. Each unfamiliar term struck against everything he knew about the world.
But Sword Stone offered no further explanation.
"In short, if you stand on this mountain, it means you are qualified to inherit the Seven Swords."
A faint wind rose from beneath the sea of clouds, rustling the pine needles with a soft whisper.
Finn parted his lips, about to ask more.
But Sword Stone suddenly lost patience.
"Save your questions for later. The only thing that matters right now is that you don't die."
As soon as the words fell, darkness began to creep back into Finn's vision.
As his consciousness slipped away once more, the last thing he saw was the seven plain stone swords standing silently in the altar—
as if they had been waiting for him all along.