Lind blinked his eyes until he could see around him again. He had been in natural settings and in esoteric places, but he was shocked to see he was in all too familiar study.
The massive hearth had flas licking at the dark stone that had a dark wood mantle holding various items he still could not identify. The room was well lived in with a word leather couch in front of a golden wood table. The desk had a dark shine to it and the shelves held scrolls, jade slips, and books.
He looked out the windows to an icy storm obscuring anything beyond. He suspected the storm was intentional.
"So nothing changed? I am still stuck on this path?" Lind spoke aloud with so doubts in his heart but a laugh drew him instantly to a chair that had been empty just a mont ago.
A very familiar face sat there in robes that glittered with starlight. He could not even get a sliver of an idea what grade the items were but he did notice sothing distinct. The black ring on his right hand was missing!
He looked at his own and saw Haro was there. A gentle smile spread on the older version of his face.
"We could argue about what I rember versus what you saw in the last glimpse of the future you had but it would be easier to tell you the simple truth that you can change all this. The Trial of a Divine Inheritance allowed us to et again but it has not officially started." Confusion filled Lind.
He was not starting the Trial? Then why was he back in the study?
"Is this a different–" His older version held up a hand and simply pointed at himself.
"The fact I am visible to you should answer your question. You have advanced enough to withstand . Further, the event you saw is both in the future and yet no longer the sa." A small headache began in his head as the talk of possible tilines made him ponder just ignoring trying to work it out.
"So then why am I here?" The older version smiled as if every thought was apparent to him. Lind suspected he did actually.
"A warning. Just as I can interfere, so can that bastard. I am closer to you so I felt the reverberation in Ti. This is just a friendly chat." Lind felt his headache increase.
Not only was his future self leaving things ambiguous but he admitted his first encounter with the future was even farther ahead than the current one.
"Am I allowed to ask any probing questions?" A smile spread on his older self before he shook his head.
"While fiction ignores the laws of physics, they do get a few things right. Your future is not set. If I give you any–" The older face suddenly paused as if rembering sothing. "I suppose there is one thing I can say. It is nothing profound or of help to your cultivation path. All I can tell you is that you do not need to lose hope in your heart."
Lind wanted to punch him. The strong urge to smack the smirk off his own face. What use were those words?!
Why did higher realm beings delight in being so damn vague?!
As if reading his mind, which likely was true given he could recall perfectly what Lind was thinking mont to mont, his older self smiled.
"You have to go. I can't obstruct the Future Trial without incurring consequences even at my level. Rember, that bastard can interfere. Good luck." Lind vanished but not to go back to the trial.
His fist slamd into his own cheek but it was like striking a diamond as his hand split apart and blood flew in the air. The damned smirk never left his older self.
"Feel better?" The shimr of scales revealed what had happened but Lind frowned at them. They were cracked. He did not do that damage so what had?
Feeling his look, his older self shrugged.
"Maybe you will learn the answer one day or you will avoid it. The future is not set for you yet. Once you beco a Divine Realm cultivator that will change. This kind of thing will be impossible then." A spark of understanding blood in Lind's mind but the room truly vanished and he felt it all go dark.
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The cracking of flas brought him cold comfort. He had forgotten how full of life he used to be. It had been refreshing to see that again.
A knock preceded a door appearing where none had been before. A young woman poked her head in. She had a head full of erald hair and reptilian eyes.
"Will he succeed?" She asked nothing else but he looked at her before he changed the world around him. The office fell away as it beca a ruin of its forr self and the wasteland was exposed by the storm he had dismissed.
Only the door remained.
"I will never know. He is walking a path different from mine and the other version of us. If he truly finds a way forward, all of this will fall into his mory alone." She looked sadly at him before they approached a row of headstones.
They had nas all too familiar to Lind.
His wives, his children, and all he had loved were buried in the wasteland they had once called ho.
"Spirits, if there is any rcy left in you, let him find a new way forward." Lind looked at his injured body and knew he had only a little ti left. He looked up at the swirling sky above and saw no stars.
There were no moons and no sign of any life. The wasteland was all that remained.
"That was the last attempt to fight back for . You damn bastard. I will not simply give in to death." Lind shimred with his scales but he could no longer transform. His soul could not withstand it.
His life was over but the battle was not. The Great One would fall. No matter how many tis either side interfered, there was a limit. The current Lind was deviating far from the history he rembered. It was weird knowing that the past could change yet he still existed.
He knelt one last ti in front of the graves and prepared for his final battle.
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Lind was crying when he appeared in a stream. It was not water, however, but so kind of energy flowing around him. He could not take it in as imnse grief filled him but he did not know why.
It took him but a mont to think before Haro answered him.
[Resonance is likely correct. I do not know why he let his guard down at the very end but I can tell you why he did not have the ring, or at least the most likely reason.] Lind waited as he stabilized his mind.
[The ring is a mark of a True Lord. We are either issued to potential candidates or True Lords are issued after they are chosen. Either way, the rings are a mark of your station to many older beings. We are not ant to be with you forever, only so long as you are a True Lord.] Lind was well aware of that.
When he had been under punishnt for Haro's interference in his tribulations, he had no longer been a True Lord. He had to earn his place back.
[The most likely reason he no longer had the ring was because he was dying. He had to be very close to death that any use of his Authority would result in his instant death.] The answer confused him.
How could his future self be close to death if they had yet another encounter in the future? Did it happen right after he left? It made no sense.
The headache of ti travel paradoxes returned to his head but he had to push it aside as he felt pressure on his body. He finally looked around only to be more confused.
He was definitely in a stream of so kind but there were no banks or scenery around him. It was not empty but trails of more energy going off into the distance from the main flow he was in the middle of.
His movents caused no disturbance but it did flow around him only to resu its original path. The colors were faint and ever shifting but it was not Qi.
In fact he felt no Qi around him at all. Unlike the last trial, where he was inundated right away, the current trial seed to leave it up to him to start it.
{Future Trial has begun. Warning: True Death can happen if you fail}
After that cheery notice, the spirit went silent.
The Foundation Trial forced him to refine his soul by facing his origin and also his cultivation by pushing each realm to the limit. It was also imposed on him. He had no choice but to do it.
The Present Trial was the sa. He was placed in the glade and had to analyze it to even begin to comprehend what was going on before the trial was once again imposed on him.
He did not recall how he had passed entirely but the steps up to it and the feeling of enlightennt was clear to him.
Yet, the current trial seed like a puzzle type. He was not going to be imposed on but had to figure it out for himself.
He sighed as that made the difficulty much higher. Having to overco an obstacle pushed him and but him in danger but it was sothing that could be picked apart and grasped in ti.
Having to find the starting line, on the other hand, would be a tireso process. There did not seem to be a ti limit but he did not assu a lack of being told that ant there was not so kind of limit on the quality of his rewards.
He sat down and began to study the streams of energy around him. He had to figure out what they were and what the point of the trial was from scratch.
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