Chapter 48
"Four crystal seeds," Ling Xu said as he wrote in the small notebook he always carried—a mission log that had grown as thick as an ancient dictionary, filled with hundreds of notes about planets, beasts, Gods, humans, and everything they had encountered along their journey, "plus two from the previous mission, plus one from the mission in the fifth star cluster… that makes seven crystals in total, Zhao Wei. Three more to reach ten."
Huan Zheng, who sat atop a floating asteroid rock in the vacuum of space with his legs lazily crossed and occasionally yawning because interstellar travel somehow made him sleepy, merely nodded without opening his eyes, then replied in a voice that sounded like someone speaking in their sleep.
"Three more, Liu Xin. Three more missions. Three more crystals. And after that—"
He opened his eyes, and within those lazy eyes, Ling Xu saw stars.
Not one, not two, not a thousand, but billions of stars scattered across an endless night sky, as if Huan Zheng's eyes were windows into the boundless universe itself—and through those windows, Ling Xu could see everything that had happened, everything that was happening, and everything that would happen, all within a single blink that felt like a century.
"After that, Liu Xin, we will return to the fifth sky city. We will face the Supreme Gods."
The final mission before reaching ten crystals came not from any authority or renowned sect, but from the universe itself—a distress call etched into the stars, readable only by cultivators with at least seven crystals in their chests, containing just a single sentence written in the light of a supernova that had died billions of years ago.
"Save the center of the universe from the rising darkness."
Without hesitation, without devising strategies, without preparing any equipment beyond the robes clinging to their bodies and the crystals pulsing in their chests, Ling Xu and Huan Zheng shot through space and time, passing star clusters, nebulae, black holes, and supernovas, until they arrived at the center of the universe—a place where light never dies despite darkness constantly trying to extinguish it, where the Supreme Gods reside in palaces made of pure light, where decisions about the life and death of billions of beings across the infinite universe are made every second.
And there, before them, stood a being that could not be called human, God, or beast—but darkness itself, manifested as a colossal shadow with thousands of eyes, each filled with death, threatening to devour the entire center of the universe if nothing stopped it.
"We face it together, Liu Xin," Huan Zheng whispered, his voice no longer lazy nor flat, but deep and heavy, like a rumble trapped behind a mountain ready to erupt at any moment. Ling Xu simply nodded—a firm nod that felt like an oath sworn upon his mother's grave, an oath he would never betray even if the entire universe conspired to stop him.
The battle lasted seven days and seven nights.
It was not a physical battle of punches, kicks, and explosions of Qi, but a battle of souls, a battle of will, a clash between the ten deaths they had endured and a darkness that never dies—and on the seventh night, when the darkness finally shattered into fragments of light scattering in all directions like newborn stars in a dark sky, Ling Xu and Huan Zheng stood upon the saved center of the universe, with ten crystals pulsing in their chests—ten perfect crystals, ten deaths that never truly died, ten lives that never truly lived—and within Ling Xu's chest, among those ten crystals beating in rhythm with Huan Zheng's pulse, he felt something he had never felt before.
Not pride, not satisfaction, not victory—but silence.
A strange, peaceful silence, like the surface of a lake at dawn untouched by wind, human, or beast—a silence born from the realization that he had done everything he could, that he had died ten times and risen ten times, that he had stood at the peak of the cosmos with ten crystals beating in his chest.
In the audience chamber of the universe's central palace made of pure light, after their mission report was received with the highest honor by the Gods seated upon star-thrones, Huan Zheng turned toward Ling Xu with an expression he rarely showed.
Not laziness, not indifference—but a cold curiosity, like a scientist about to propose a new hypothesis before his favorite student.
"Are you curious, Liu Xin?" he asked, his voice soft yet echoing clearly in the silent chamber as the walls of light reflected every sound a thousandfold. "About what awaits us after the 10 Falling Crystals? About the realm that even the Supreme Gods here dare not name without trembling?"
Ling Xu, standing beside him with robes still damp from the battle against eternal darkness, simply nodded—a nod that felt like stepping into a bottomless abyss, a decision that could never be taken back once the word "yes" had left his lips.
Huan Zheng let out a long breath—a breath like wind whispering through dry leaves before a storm arrives, carrying the weight of knowledge possessed by only a handful of beings in the entire infinite universe—then cleared his throat once, twice, like a priest about to begin a sacred ritual in the oldest temple.
"The Supreme Dao, Liu Xin," he said, his once-lazy eyes suddenly deep and heavy, like an ancient well untouched by sunlight.
"That is the name of the realm above the Vast Cosmos. To break through into it, you cannot simply gather crystals, kill enemies, or complete missions. You must meditate—but not ordinary meditation by sitting cross-legged in darkness with your eyes closed. You must stand, Liu Xin. Stand without doing anything. You are forbidden to see—meaning you must shut your eyes tightly, as tightly as possible, until you feel your eyelids are the only barrier between you and madness. You must not even breathe. One breath taken without permission, and you must start over from the beginning—from the first death, from the Trial of Concealment Within Corpses. All ten deaths will be reduced to nothing."
Ling Xu felt his chest tighten.
Not because of the cancer that had transformed into a softly pulsing crystal among his ten crystals since reaching the Cosmic Expanse, but because of the weight of Huan Zheng's words crashing upon his mind like stones falling endlessly from the sky.
To be continued…