1002: Chapter 102: Two Angels (2-in-1 ga Chapter, Seeking Monthly Votes) 1002: Chapter 102: Two Angels (2-in-1 ga Chapter, Seeking Monthly Votes) As He Ao advanced, his field of view seed to clear slightly, allowing him to see a bit further down the corridor.
He turned to look behind him, and the door that had just been opened had now beco a hazy glow.
Fine jade patterns flowed on the golden brass cane, emitting a sowhat chilly breath.
He Ao held the cane tightly, withdrew his gaze, and slowly proceeded along the corridor.
The walls around him shimred with delicate light, and inaudible, twisted ravings echoed in his mind.
The surrounding corridor grew more sinister, and after an indefinite period, He Ao stopped and looked ahead.
The corridor before him remained deeply dark, with no end in sight.
He Ao turned his head back to look behind him, where the glow that signified the entrance seed to have moved away sowhat, yet also seed to remain in place.
A slight chill emanated from the cane, and He Ao stilled his heart, refocusing his attention on what lay ahead.
In that gloomy and cold darkness, it seed as if so special force was pulsating, appearing both near and far.
He Ao raised his cane, attempting to ‘touch’ that twisted force.
It was as though he had touched it and yet had not, and at that mont, a thought prompted him to look towards the wall on his left.
There hung a portrait with a golden fra.
Yet when He Ao had first entered, the wall had borne nothing.
The image depicted a dignified elderly man in a gray suit holding a golden cane, who was currently looking up ahead, seemingly gazing at sothing.
This man in the portrait was ‘Linen,’ or rather, He Ao himself.
As He Ao looked at the portrait, a distorted and violent corruption surged into his mind.
Imdiately thereafter, the golden portrait abruptly transford into a twisted mass of ink, reconstituting into a new image.
The scene within the painting quickly shifted to a luxuriously lit study with a mirrored figure levitating cross-legged in the study.
But the image lasted less than a second before it violently shattered.
Then, in a flash, He Ao found himself in a bright and luxurious study.
His eyes scanned over the books on the shelf, but all he saw were warped characters resembling tadpoles.
The distorted and cold aura spread instantaneously from beneath his feet, encircling his body and quickly dimming the room.
In that instant, the scene before He Ao’s eyes broke apart explosively, transforming into a new painting.
Within this painting, a towering altar made of discarded tal and stained with blood stood firm in the center, surrounded by heaps of corpses, like straw ready to ignite.
A crowd of people, their faces etched with madness, were cheering around the altar, holding guns patched up all over.
Above the altar, a man in a black robe was holding aloft another man, dressed extravagantly, who seed to be the master of ceremonies.
At this point, the man in the black robe seed to perceive sothing and turned his head to look at He Ao.
His gaze pierced through the painting, and in the next mont, the scenery around He Ao reconfigured.
Deafening cheers exploded in his ears.
Looking forward, he realized he was standing atop the towering altar, with mountains of corpses beneath his feet and a crowd of frenzied people shouting around him.
A man dressed in opulence but acting erratically was delivering a loud speech before him.
Then He Ao watched as ‘himself’ pulled out a small knife, took a step forward, and stabbed the speaker in the heart from behind, blood suffusing his vision as twisted ravings detonated in the quiet sky.
This violent scene did not silence the cheering crowd; on the contrary, their cheers erupted even more wildly.
He Ao watched ‘himself’ lift the knife-pierced man high, allowing the blood to flow over his face and body, as he observed the increasingly frenzied crowd.
While witnessing all this, He Ao subrged his consciousness into this body, attempting to take control.
He then realized that between his consciousness and body, there was a ‘mbrane’ ford by a strong consciousness, separating him from the body and preventing him from taking control.
And outside the body, he saw ‘his’ own hand lifting the corpse, as ‘he’ fished a black eyeball from his pocket, then clutched the eyeball, gazing up at the starry sky and uttering a hoarse, insane howl,
“You are the end of all, the terminus of everything.
I beseech you, rge with in eternal and undying power, I have seen.”
The world dimd at that instant, the clear sky was instantaneously shrouded in nightfall, and the air around turned so thick it seed to block out light, the howling and cheering crowd finally registering sothing amiss, their voices growing hoarse.
He Ao tried to touch this mbrane, and in that instant, the twisted and insane ravings also exploded in his mind.
At the sa ti, He Ao also ‘saw’ what ‘he’ was about to do next; ‘he’ stuffed the black eyeball directly into his mouth and then burst forth with a thunderous howl,
“All things and creatures will ultimately extinguish, eternal stars plumt into the Abyss!”
An invisible yet vast force responded to his invocation, turning the thick air surrounding him completely black, concealing everything within sight.
And those people, who were screaming until their throats were hoarse, were devoured by the darkness in that instant.
A twisted and cold breath seeped through the pitch-black air into He Ao’s ‘body,’ trying to drag his soul into the depths of the Abyss.
At this mont, however, He Ao’s gaze was fixed on the sky.
Upon the endlessly dark heavens above, at so unknown ti, had appeared a splendor of stars as dazzling as jewels; the boundless stars ford a massive reflection, seemingly watching the scene below.
Under the watchful gaze of those celestial bodies, the frigid atmosphere that swirled madly around him hesitated for a mont.
ntal Shock!
The gathering Soul Power, braving the storm-like corruption, slamd directly into the ‘mbrane.’ Then, like a sharp blade, it pierced through the film, shredding it to pieces.
The colossal Soul Power took direct control of this ‘body.’
Facing the rushing darkness, He Ao raised the ‘knife’ in his hand and plunged it into his own chest.
The sharp and piercing pain spread instantly to his nerves, but his motions did not cease.
The keen blade slit the ‘chest’ open, then continued forward, pulverizing the heart that throbbed in the center of the ‘torso.’
The creeping darkness around him and the stars of the Firmant all fell silent at this mont.
A pair of black eyes opened from within the darkness, looking towards He Ao, struggling to move forward, trying with their last ounce of strength to drag He Ao into the Abyss, but they shattered uncontrollably with a thunderous collapse.
The whole world crumbled before He Ao’s eyes like a castle built of sand.
Indeed, he was the ‘core’ of this space; as long as he ‘committed suicide,’ the space would collapse.
And with the crumbling of the space, a strong sensation of falling surged through his mind.
Then, he felt under his feet a softness, as though stepping on a carpet.
The ‘world’ around him once again blood with light and scenery.
He Ao looked up and around.
This ti, he seed to be in a bedroom with simple decor.
A pristine white bed in the middle of the bedroom, a straightforward bookshelf by the bedside, and a desk composed all the decoration of the bedroom.
He Ao looked up at the ceiling—or rather, where the ceiling should have been.
Instead of being enclosed, there hung dazzling stars.
Then he lowered his gaze to the floor beneath him.
The soft ‘ground’ that he trod upon was not a floor at all, but a deep, pitch-black Abyss with no apparent bottom.
Countless twisted lines andered within this Abyss, and pairs of faintly visible eyes flickered, as if watching the figure standing above the Abyss.
He Ao did not pay heed to the movents within the Abyss but instead withdrew his gaze and once again swept his eyes over the bedroom, then walked to the nearest bookshelf.
This shelf held only one book, which looked similar to those in the ‘study’ he had just fallen into, with its cover text turned into warped, indecipherable tadpole-like figures.
He Ao picked up the book and opened it.
Inside, there was no content, just a bunch of chaotic lines that seed to have been sketched by a madman.
And as He Ao gazed at these lines, the distorted and furious contamination also rushed into his mind in an instant.
He calmly looked at the content within the book and began to turn the pages, bit by bit.
The insidious contamination that surged into his mind seed to stir ripples, and fragnts of ‘knowledge’ began to surface in He Ao’s mind.
As He Ao continued to turn the pages, this knowledge gradually beca more complete in his mind.
This knowledge did not exist in the form of text or images, but rather as a higher-order ‘understanding.’
It was more like a cryptic code, a fundantal Truth Knowledge that hadn’t undergone any translation.
And the ‘key’ to decrypting this ‘Truth Knowledge’ seed to be the Mysticism Knowledge wielded by the Reader.
He Ao could distinctly feel that wherever he possessed relevant Mysticism Knowledge, he could comprehend the ‘Truth Knowledge’ better, but where he did not possess it, it was harder to grasp.
Of course, it was harder to comprehend, not impossible.
Theoretically, without any foundational knowledge, one should not understand the content within, just as a preschool child who has not attended school cannot derive and understand complex calculus equations.
However, He Ao had another ‘cheat’—the Eye of Truth gained by his true self.
Although after entering the Copy World, the influence conveyed by the Eye of Truth had beco minuscule; most of the ti, it only helped enhance his sensitivity to higher Transcendent Power.
But the decryption of ‘Truth Knowledge’ was different, as it was the Eye of Truth’s area of expertise.
Even a slight ‘influence’ significantly amplified He Ao’s comprehension of the relevant content.
After spending so ti, a mix of guesswork and the assistance from the Eye of Truth, He Ao finally fully understood the ‘knowledge’ in the book.
The content within was simple; it described a ritual.
A ritual based on fear, hatred, and chaos, one that connected to the Abyss.
The first half of this ritual could establish a connection point in the real world with the Abyss, allowing Higher Beings from the Abyss to descend.
While the latter half of the ritual is the ‘maintenance’ after the descent.
This ritual could use all lives involved in the ritual as a kind of ‘flesh and blood battery’, supporting the activities of the Higher Being that has left the Abyss, and as an anchor point, to prevent this Being from the Abyss from being dragged back to the Abyss.
Of course, the information contained in this knowledge is not actually as brief as this.
In the content understood by He Ao, this knowledge almost encompassed all the information about the entire ritual, how to operate, how to execute, why to operate in such a way, and the underlying Mysticism Knowledge that supports this information.
Having read this book, He Ao had acquired not only the knowledge of the ritual but also all the fundantal knowledge related to the Mysticism Power involved in the ritual.
There was even so knowledge related to the Abyss.
For example, Higher Abyssal Beings are immortal in the Abyss, but they cannot leave the Abyss; even if they devise ways to leave it, they would still be forcibly dragged back by the Abyss.
Unless they use this special ritual to establish an anchor point and a ‘battery’ that could sustain their activities in the real world.
Unlike Higher Abyssal Beings, ordinary Abyssal beings in theory cannot leave the Abyss either, but they can be briefly ‘sent out’ of the Abyss with the help of Higher Abyssal Beings.
However, even so, the vast majority of Abyssal beings need to ‘parasitize’ to survive in the real world.
Only a few strong and specially constituted Abyssal beings can exist in the real world for a short ti without such dependence, at the cost of their strength.
The Great Tutor of the Prisoners’ Gang, Wills, whom He Ao had encountered before, was likely such a special Abyssal being.
Of course, even for a being like Wills, if he continually remains without ‘parasitizing’, he would still be dragged back to the Abyss after a long ti.
This knowledge also corroborated so of He Ao’s previous speculations.
Of course, apart from the Mysticism Knowledge related to the ritual, this ‘Knowledge of Truth’ also deconstructed the ritual itself in great detail.
For example, when the ritual reaches the Advent phase, it requires a ‘precise anchor point’, which is used for the Descender’s location positioning.
The final descending location will be near this ‘precise anchor point’, which also serves as the construction site of the channel between the Abyss and the real world.
Building this ‘precise anchor point’ requires imnse Abyssal Power.
Generally, Higher Abyssal Beings will send this power ahead of ti and then let their powerful ‘servants’ in the real world or powerful Abyssal beings that were sent ahead construct the anchor point.
Clearly, the Abyssal Being behind Scott wanted Scott to do this, and even after Scott died, he still tried to use Scott’s soul to forcibly construct the anchor point.
He Ao raised his hand and looked at his palm.
At the mont, his hands were empty, the brass staff that he had been gripping tightly was already gone, but if he carefully sensed it, he could still feel the coolness that had spread to his palm.
This ant that the brass staff was actually still in his hands, only invisible to him now.
The jade spear absorbed by the staff in the morning must have been the embodint of the imnse Abyssal Power that had been sent ahead by the Abyssal Being to construct the anchor point.
So when He Ao pulled out the spear, the Abyssal Being beca so angry.
He Ao lowered his hand.
Now, he had killed all the powerful Abyssal beings and individuals with imnse Abyssal Power in Yilan City.
Now, he was the only person in Yilan City with imnse Abyssal Power.
Without a precise anchor point, the ritual could still proceed as normal, but the descending location would be completely random.
But with a precise anchor point, the Descender could only descend near the precise anchor point.
Thinking things through, He Ao closed the book in his hands.
He felt the power of Super mory pulsing in his soul.
After reaching B-level, Super mory had a total of five marks, three of which he used during his confrontation with 009-1 in the Main World.
Theoretically, these three marks should have a three-month cooldown period.
But in practice, He Ao had never waited for this cooldown period to end naturally.
Because the cooldown period of Super mory is actually the ti it takes for the soul to repair itself naturally, which is affected by two factors,
First is He Ao’s mastery over Super mory; the higher the mastery, the faster the repair, and the shorter the cooldown,
Second is external factors.
After each ending of a Copy World, he would receive powerful Soul Power feedback, which would directly enhance the recovery progress of Super mory, shortening most of the cooldown ti.
Together with these two factors, the actual cooldown ti for Super mory is most of the ti only a quarter of the stated period, or even shorter.
And calculating from the ti since the last use, inside and outside the Copy World, it had been about over twenty days, nearly a month, which was relatively long.
From his current perception, the cooldown of the three marks was almost over, with about nine hours left.
While calculating his strength, He Ao put the book back on the shelf.
At that mont, he noticed that a black book had appeared on the shelf when he wasn’t looking.
He picked up the small book, a slightly chilly breath perating into his fingers through the book.
He opened the book, and even more twisted and mad thoughts rushed into his mind imdiately.
The content of this small book was much simpler than the large one before, and most of it was insane gibberish, ineffective content; He Ao could only extract so information resembling ravings.
‘Talent Sequences 121: Bandit…
Talent Sequences 193: King of Thieves…
Talent Sequences 265: Princes’
‘Serve …
Angel…
Immortality…’
His speech wasn’t even coherent anymore, yet he spoke of immortality.
He Ao reached out and put the small black book back in its place.
And it was at that mont that the abyss beneath his feet erupted violently, as twisted, black shadows burst forth from below, howling as they rushed towards him.
He Ao raised his hand, and with a hint of coolness, a golden staff appeared in it.
He swiftly used the staff to shatter the fastest approaching shadows, then looked up at the stars above.
The stars at this mont were like a mirror, reflecting the rough outline of his shape, then this reflected outline slowly raised a hand, pointing in a direction.
He Ao turned his head, discovering a small door in the direction that the reflection pointed.
That door appeared to have always been standing there, but he had failed to notice it all along.
Lifting the staff in his hand, he casually pierced through the surrounding shadows rushing at him, and He Ao instantly appeared in front of the door, grasping the doorknob.
The mont his hand touched the door, a cold breath spread through the doorknob into his body, like nurous arms stretching out from the abyss, wrapping around his body, dragging him.
At the sa ti, the ‘ground of the abyss’ beneath his feet turned from soft to muddy, as if stepping into a swamp, pulling his body slowly downward.
The surrounding shadows surged up and entwined around him.
Just then, a sharp power surged from the doorknob, cutting through the abyssal strength that wrapped his body, helping relieve so of his burden.
In the instant that power erged, He Ao did not hesitate; despite the surrounding drag, he violently pushed open the door, gazing at the hazy light shining from outside, and took a step forward into this brilliance.
The entire world instantly collapsed, and He Ao’s field of view flashed; that deep corridor appeared before him again.
At this mont, he was standing at the entrance of the corridor, leaning on a brass staff.
The events of just a mont ago, as though they had never happened, were rely a dream.
He seed never to have entered this corridor.
The dream, reflection, stars, these powers seed familiar.
He Ao lowered his head, looking at his palm.
A twisted pattern was slowly disappearing from his palm, the mark left by that sharp power.
This was a complicated geotric figure made up of patterns, and squarely in the middle of the pattern was a cross.
It seed to indicate the insignia of a Higher Being.
Rembering this insignia, He Ao raised his head to glance one more ti at the deep corridor that seed connected to the abyss, finally confirming sothing.
During his fight with Scott, when he was nearly dragged into the abyss, it indeed was Speaker Levi who helped him.
That Honorary Speaker of Yilan City, it seed, for so reason, had been pulled into the abyss, and most likely, it was the abyssal existence attempting to descend upon Yilan City that had dragged him down.
He Ao looked back at the dimly lit hall; at that ti, the situation must have been consciously controlled, but the pervasive abyssal strength still dragged the entire apartnt into so sort of crevice between the abyss and reality.
He glanced again at the insignia in his palm, which was almost completely gone.
In the corridor just now, Speaker Levi had never revealed himself from start to finish but had always relied on other thods to transmit information, which indicated that his situation was not good.
He Ao lifted his staff, closed the corridor’s small door, and slowly walked toward the apartnt’s main entrance.
Everything around was so quiet, only the elderly man’s slow footsteps could be heard.
About a minute later, He Ao crossed the entire hall and stood at the doorway.
The automatic sensing switch at the door activated, and the tightly closed double doors opened toward both sides.
It was then that He Ao seed to sense sothing, turning his head to look back.
At the end of his gaze, outside the dimly lit floor-to-ceiling window, as if an invisible, chilled gaze was penetrating the abyss, a twisted and terrifying oppressive sensation watched him quietly.
Pure and invisible ravings of madness echoed in He Ao’s mind.
Yet, He Ao’s expression did not change; he calmly looked in the direction of this gaze, leaning on his staff, a slight smile forming on his lips as he slowly spoke,
“I look forward to our true eting.”
Then he picked up his staff, turned his head back, and walked through the door threshold.
The open double doors behind him closed automatically, the flowing Array light covered the door, once again isolating the dim apartnt.
It was not known how much ti had passed, and only when everything had completely returned to silence did a trembling, cautious, rustling sound arise in this dim space.
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