Chapter 70
He drew a long breath—a breath that felt like swallowing memories of a time when he still believed that victory could be achieved without slaughter.
That peace could be built without betrayal.
That friendship could last forever even as the world tried relentlessly to destroy it.
Then he exhaled slowly, letting the air leave his lungs like a river releasing its waters into the sea.
Carrying away the burden he had borne alone all this time.
Without ever telling anyone.
Not even Ling Xu, who had died eleven times to stand by his side.
"You know, Ling Xu," he finally said, his voice no longer lazy, no longer flat, no longer sounding like someone reading the obituary of an unknown neighbor, but heavy and deep, like a rumble restrained behind a mountain ready to erupt at any moment.
His half-lidded eyes now opened wide, staring at the cracked ceiling of the underground chamber where the flickering shadows of oil lamps danced like restless ghosts that could never find peace.
"I never thought that they—The Singer and The Silent One—would become enemies."
Braaak!!
And so they moved.
Not in haste like those chased by death.
Nor leisurely like those strolling through a park.
But with measured, steady steps.
Like two newly sharpened blades ready to cut down anything in their path.
Huan Zheng walked ahead, occasionally glancing back just to make sure Ling Xu was still beside him.
That the girl with the white bandages wrapped around her head was not lost among the thinning crowd of humans as they entered a place no one ever visited except those who had lost everything.
Those who had nothing left to fear.
Those who had died eleven times and risen eleven times so that death no longer held power over them.
City after city they passed.
Grand cities with marble pillars and roads paved with gold.
Slums with crumbling huts and foul-smelling drains.
Ghost towns abandoned because all their inhabitants had perished in an unidentified plague.
Fortress cities with walls a hundred meters high and soldiers stationed at every corner, eyes alert and hands always ready to draw their swords.
And in every city they visited, Huan Zheng asked questions.
Not with a loud or threatening voice.
But with a subtle vibration emanating from the foundation of his Humanity.
A vibration that could not be ignored by anyone.
That forced those who heard it to answer honestly.
Truthfully.
Without lies or concealment.
Because before a cultivator of Humanity whose foundation had returned after so long, lies were nothing but dust scattered by the wind.
Meaningless.
Useless.
Unable to save anyone from the bitter reality they had to face.
"Stop, Ling Xu," Huan Zheng suddenly said, after weeks of crossing cities that grew darker, gloomier, and increasingly hostile to those who still had hearts capable of feeling fear.
His voice was soft but clear amid the howling wind carrying the scent of sulfur and something burning.
His lazy eyes—which throughout the journey had always been half-closed like a drowsy cat—were now wide open.
Staring toward the horizon where the sky was blood-red like an unhealed wound.
Where clouds drifted slowly like corpses walking in their sleep.
Where in the distance lay a region whose form resembled neither city nor village nor fortress nor palace.
But rather… hell.
A man-made hell.
Yet despite being an imitation, this hell seemed capable of devouring dozens of other hells from any mythology.
As if someone—or something—had gathered every horror ever imagined by humanity.
Every torment ever written in sacred texts.
Every fire that had ever burned sinners in bedtime stories.
And fused them into one complete, perfect whole.
Perfect in its brutality.
Like a masterpiece crafted by a puppeteer who had spent thousands of years perfecting the art of making living beings suffer.
And so the two of them walked into the gates of that artificial hell.
Not with hesitant steps like those about to fall into an abyss.
But with measured, steady steps.
Like two newly sharpened blades ready to cut down anything in their path.
Huan Zheng walked at Ling Xu's right side.
His hand—usually hanging lazily at his side or busy scratching an itch that did not exist—now firmly grasped Ling Xu's right hand.
Their fingers intertwined like the roots of two trees that had grown together after years of struggling in narrow soil.
Like two rivers meeting at the delta and deciding never to part again.
Like two souls that had shared death and rebirth eleven times so that nothing could separate them anymore.
Not distance.
Not time.
Not even death itself.
Ling Xu allowed herself to be guided.
Her bandaged eyes could not see.
But her third eye on her forehead—still tightly closed like a flower bud sleeping through winter—felt every vibration.
Every pulse.
Every shift in the air that grew hotter, drier, filled with the scent of sulfur and burning flesh and something unidentifiable that had never been recorded in any history.
And within her heart, between the pulses of her Humanity realm beating in a strangely calm rhythm, she murmured.
Not to Huan Zheng.
Not to the Cancer plague.
Not to anyone outside herself.
But to her mother.
To the woman who never lived to see her child grow into an executioner.
To the one reason she was still standing here even as the world had tried a thousand times to bring her down.
"We are close, Mother. I can feel it. The puppeteer is here. Somewhere within this artificial hell. Among black flames licking walls of bone and flesh. Among screams that never ceased because no one was listening. Among corpses scattered across the scorching stone floor. It waits for us. It knows we will come. It has prepared a welcome. But it does not know that we have died eleven times. That we do not fear fire or bone or screams or death. That we will not stop until we find it. Until we face it. Until we make it pay for everything it has done."
Huan Zheng, walking beside her, feeling every tremor from her tightly held hand, said nothing.
He simply kept walking.
His lazy eyes now wide open, scanning every corner, every shadow, every slight movement among the black flames growing larger as they drew closer to the center of the artificial hell.
Closer to the center of all horrors ever imagined by humanity.
Closer to the center of all suffering ever written in sacred texts.
Closer to the center of all fires that had burned sinners in bedtime stories.
Closer to the point that would determine whether they would return as victors or not return at all.
But suddenly, without warning, without any change in his lazy expression, without a sigh or a yawn or even the motion of scratching an itch, Huan Zheng stopped.
His foot, which a moment ago had been stepping in steady rhythm, froze mid-air.
Suspended between two stone tiles made of smooth, glossy bone like black marble.
And around him, the world that a moment ago had been filled with the crackling of flames and agonized screams and the howling wind carrying the scent of sulfur suddenly fell silent.
To be continued…