When Su Lun and Mr. Jing realized they could use the "ice fishing" thod to lure and kill the monsters sealed within, they were no longer in a hurry to uncover the secrets of that mysterious sealed space.
The main purpose of the Dawn Group's trip to the God Burial Ground was originally aid at obtaining the [Cosmic Essence]. Since this thod allowed them to hunt high-quality, rule-threaded monsters relatively safely, there naturally was no urgency to explore the deeper and perilous reaches of the God Burial Ground, which even Sir Isaac had deed extrely dangerous.
To prevent accidents during the hunting process, the mbers of the Dawn Group set up an alchemical formation on the spot.
Once the alchemical formation was in place, the hunting plan began.
Su Lun first created a small spatial rift in the seal, and the scent of living beings quickly attracted the monsters from the world below the seal. Before long, another monster took the bait, a hellish aberration called the [Sabbrus Fleshworm]. It had a body like an earthworm but was equipped with dense, saw-like sharp teeth and could spit toxic acid. Its combat power was upwards of tier nine.
Luckily, the monsters in this space were all so bizarrely shaped that no matter how ugly or disgusting, the people from Dawn had beco accustod to their appearance.
The sa tactic was employed again: the ten-thousand-strong Magician Corps pulled the monster out and then went all out with concentrated fire to kill it, followed by Su Lun extracting the threads of rules.
After several attempts, Su Lun was sure this strategy was sound.
Powerful beings always have their territories, regardless of where they are, so even opening a spatial rift wouldn't attract too many powerful monsters at once.
Killing them one by one certainly still carried risks, but they were manageable risks for the current Dawn Group.
If the monsters ca in swarms, they were usually re riffraff, not too troubleso to handle, and their numbers were manageable.
So it went, one after another.
The "ice fishing" was proving to be very effective.
...
Hunting top-tier monsters exhausted the professionals, and the mbers of the Dawn Group needed ti to rest and recuperate.
The use of the [Urobolos Space-Ti Ring] by Su Lun to create controllable spatial rifts also made it possible to balance work with rest.
They would open up a spatial rift when at full strength, lure a monster out, and hunt it down.
When it was ti to recuperate, they would close the spatial rift.
Even during their leisurely rest periods, the mbers of the Dawn Group did not idle away their ti and began to explore the island's activated silver ore deposits.
They were unaware until they began exploring.
They discovered that not only on the island but also on the seabed of the nearby blood sea, they could find raw ores of extrely high purity scattered everywhere.
They were just like the stones on the surface, omnipresent.
These were godly materials of incalculable value, highly sought after for golems, cursed objects, and chanical armors.
So the Dawn Group established a temporary camp on this desolate island.
They began mining while continuing to hunt monsters.
As the days passed, various alchemy arrays, alchemical towers imitating magical towers, and oversized chanical equipnt were set up, boosting the efficiency of monster hunting even higher.
In the blink of an eye, half a month had passed.
The Dawn Group had hunted countless monsters, and Su Lun had refined a total of over a hundred finished [Cosmic Essences].
Compared to the countless adventurers from the two great empires, who, on average, would find one within two to three hundred years of exploring various ruins, their yield could truly be considered miraculous.
The hundred plus Cosmic Essences not only completely satisfied the current needs of the high-ranked fighters of the Dawn Group but also addressed an urgent requirent for the entire alchemical plane.
For many years to co, this batch of Cosmic Essences would ensure that eighth-tier professionals from the alchemical plane wouldn't be halted at the threshold of tier nine due to a lack of materials.
Moreover, the types of rule threads found in the God Burial Ground were incredibly diverse, nearly eting the needs of any professional sequence, including the [Cosmic Fourth Essence·Death] that Su Lun needed, which he also successfully refined.
On the other hand, countless activated silver ores were mined, and the slting facilities in the small void realm had a continuous supply of materials.
Su Lun no longer had to worry about the scarcity of activated silver when creating golems.
But this was the God Burial Ground after all, a place with dangers no one could predict, and terrifying monsters erged endlessly.
Even if the Dawn Group's might was at the pinnacle of the alchemical plane, they still encountered creatures that were impossible to deal with.
In this half-month period, they had two instances of "fishing for sharks."
When they opened a spatial rift, what erged were entities impossible to overco.
One was a flesh mountain monster whose size was inconceivable, and another was a mysterious tentacle monster that could pierce the fabric of space, both mutant creatures derived from the flesh, hair, and blood of divine corpses.
These were terror-inducing creatures that neither Su Lun, Mr. Jing, nor Mr. Hei leading the Dragon-Tongue Magician Corps could do anything about, and even true divine beings might not be able to handle.
These were undeniably unsolvable threats to the plane.
Under normal circumstances, an encounter with such an indestructible creature would spell doom for any group.
Even for the Dawn Group, their only option was to rely on Su Lun's [Urobolos Space-Ti Ring] to teleport away.
Fortunately, they had a secret weapon, which was the ancient weapon they had discovered earlier in the Golg's temple—the [Twilight of the Gods].
This Demonic Energy Cannon that fires dark matter poses a fatal threat to even god-tier beings and is naturally very effective against monsters.
With each shot fired, the rules of reality collapse, and gods fall.
In any other place, such a barrage would be unbearable.
The event of Twilight of the Gods had been secretly manufacturing it in the war workshop of the small void world but never had a firing range, until now when it was finally put to the test.
The effects were very ideal; both tis when Su Lun was about to flee, it successfully repelled the monsters and sealed the space rift.
Days filled with both risks and rewards flew by quickly.
Until this day,
an unexpected situation occurred.
...
"What happened to ?"
"You were injured at the sealing ground…"
"Senior Sister, do you an that sealing ground… I've been in there already? And stayed for three days?"
"..."
In the captain's quarters of the Eternal Night, Su Lun woke up from his bed.
He looked at the bandages all over his body and the various dense monitoring devices with a confused face, having no idea what had happened.
He moved his limbs slightly, and the pain in his muscles and bones was akin to being sliced by a knife, indicating that his injuries were extrely severe.
Yet, Su Lun had no recollection whatsoever of how he got injured.
His head was foggy, and he only felt as if he had been in a very deep dream.
Then he woke from the dream and couldn't rember anything.
For him, now in the Spirit Wander Realm, to "lose mory" was practically impossible, making this situation very unusual.
By the bedside, Mr. Jing watched him co to, relief clearly easing his worried expression, but the pale white healing glow in his hands didn't cease, fatigue evident between his brows.
She didn't speak; Lulota, who was assisting Dr. Banks in monitoring the equipnt, saw that he was able to talk and showed joy on her face, responding, "Yes, Mr. Su Lun, you didn't just go in for three days, but you've also been unconscious for seven days. Everyone was scared to death."
At these words, Su Lun twitched the corners of his eyes, surprised again, "I've been unconscious for seven days?"
Lulota: "Yes, your injuries were very serious, and Dr. Banks could not completely stop the spread of that negative energy. These past days, the leader has been continuously by your side, suppressing your condition."
Su Lun: "What exactly happened?"
Lulota seed to recall sothing unpleasant; her complexion tensed up as she spoke hurriedly about the topic, "Before, Mr. Su Lun, you entered that sealing ground, and then took a long while to co out. Everybody thought you... had an accident. The leader was constantly researching how to break the seal, wanting to rescue you. Then… then you fell out of the space rift covered in blood, as if chased by so monster..."
Hearing this, Su Lun was utterly confused: "???"
He couldn't rember anything at all.
This feeling of fragnted mory made him very uncomfortable.
He glanced again at his injuries; not many beings in this plane could inflict such deadly wounds on him.
Checking his stat panel, he saw dozens of negative conditions, with loads of high-order chaotic energy eroding his body incessantly.
Clearly, only those indescribable monsters inside the sealing space could cause injuries like these.
But why couldn't he rember anything related to this?
Su Lun looked again and saw that besides Potions repairing his body, there was also a gentle mirror-like force preventing those negative energies from invading his body—obviously, it was his Senior Sister's doing.
His life hanging by a thread was thanks to this mirror-like force protecting his brain and heart ridians.
However, even with Mr. Jing at level nine, her thods could hardly stop these high-order law injuries completely.
Fortunately, Su Lun himself had regained consciousness.
Using the All-knowing Eye at secondary resolution, he scrutinized the negative states afflicting his body and barely lifted his hand to form a sorcerer's seal. In an instant, a green glow of self-healing enveloped him, targeting those troubleso negative energies.
In the bag of blood by the bed, Dragon Blood had been prepared, and as the Blood Devour spell ford, the blood was consud and his flesh rapidly repaired itself.
As his consciousness returned, those "non-physical" injuries also began to improve.
Once he had finished, his vital signs finally stabilized.
Su Lun, seeing the fatigue on his Senior Sister's face, said, "It's enough, Senior Sister. I am out of danger for the ti being."
Saying this, he added, "Thank you, Senior Sister."
At these words, Mr. Jing finally heaved a sigh of relief.
Without much ado, the white light in her hand subsided, and after another look at Su Lun, she asked, "You don't rember anything?"
"Hmm."
Su Lun nodded, trying hard to recall and then said, "I only rember that we seed to have hunted an octopus-headed humanoid aberration, and then I woke up... to now."
Mr. Jing sighed faintly and spoke indifferently, "That was ten days ago."
...
"At that ti, you said you had an intuition that you needed to go down and take a look, so you decided to go..."
"Black Crow didn't spot any problem, and then you opened the space rift."
"The result was that you were gone for three days. When you ca out, it was like this."
"..."
Having listened to Mr. Jing's words, Su Lun then understood what had happened during this ti.
Ten days ago, after the space rift was opened, no more monsters ca out, so Su Lun judged that the density of the monsters below might have reduced to a sufficiently safe level.
Then he decided to go down alone to explore.
After all, his thods of preserving his life had a high probability of success, and he thought even if there were dangers, he could escape in ti.
However, the outco was that he returned gravely wounded.
It was the type of injury that teetered on the brink of life and death, returning with his last breath.
But, peculiarly, he could not rember at all what had happened after he went down.
After finishing, Mr. Jing looked at Su Lun, whose confusion had not diminished in the slightest, and asked, "Is your brain damaged?"
She knew that compared to the detection of instrunts, asking Su Lun directly was better; his All-knowing Eye was more accurate than any device.
"No."
Su Lun checked and found that, be it on the physical or spiritual level, there was no problem with his brain.
But his gesture implied that it might be so force beyond cognition that caused this mory lapse.
A hundred thoughts ran through his mind without answer, when a sudden inspiration struck him, and he took out a notebook from the miniature void realm.
Su Lun always had the habit of making notes when exploring high-risk forbidden lands on his own.
Because he had experienced sothing similar more than once.
He knew that human senses could be easily deceived—ntal disturbances, visual deceptions, auditory interferences, and mory tampering... all could lead to cognitive bias.
Therefore, even at his current rank, he still maintained this habit.
Mr. Jing, standing beside him, looked at his actions with a touch of curiosity.
However, when Su Lun flipped through the notebook and saw the notes written there, his face changed instantly.
Because the notes contained content he recognized as his own handwriting, but of which he had absolutely no recollection.
The contents of the notebook were as follows:
"After I entered the space, I vaguely realized that my cognition was being eroded by a mysterious force. It was an existence I couldn't understand that seed to influence my five senses. Intuition told I had to record sothing, although I wasn't sure what to write."
"I couldn't grasp that feeling; all I could do was use the pen to jot down the fleeting thoughts that crossed my mind."
"Looking at the lines of text, I feel so unfamiliar. They're my notes, but I have no recollection of when I wrote these words..."
"I often used the All-knowing Eye to understand the existence of this space, but... huh, what exactly did I see?"
"I realized that if I continued to stay in this space, certain aspects of my cognition would be erased from myself, making forget the entire world. I need to leave. If you see this line of text, please leave imdiately."
"..."
Seeing these cryptic notes, Su Lun instantly felt his hairs stand on end.
He had actually written these things?
The notebook lay open like that, and Mr. Jing from the side also caught a glimpse of the content, equally incredulous. For a mont, her face even showed a hint of wariness, suspecting that the Su Lun in front of her might be parasitized by so kind of monster or that there were so unknown circumstances.
Seeing this, Su Lun was shocked, but then he suddenly felt an odd sense of familiarity.
This scene seed familiar.
He solemnly said, "Senior sister, do you rember when we ca to the God Burial Ground a few years ago? Back then in the cursed space of this ruin, I encountered a ti secret realm and also lost a few days of mory?"
Mr. Jing nodded, "Yes. I rember. At that ti, I told you that you must have seen so kind of super-cognitive existence."
With this said, both of them seed to realize sothing.
Su Lun might have seen so super-cognitive existence in the sealed space below.
...
Su Lun flipped through the notebook he had found back then.
If he hadn't rembered just now, he would have even forgotten the existence of this notebook.
The content on the notebook was similarly babbling, so cryptic content without a clue.
Su Lun glanced at it and couldn't discern anything significant, nor did he recall any more useful information.
But almost from the mont he took out the notebook, he vaguely felt that it was ti to unveil the puzzle.
He continued to flip through the notebook, musing to himself, "If it were , in that situation, I would definitely leave so clues for myself. Why... why is nothing recorded?"
This was what puzzled him.
The handwriting in the notebook was fine, it was his own.
The content was also fine, it was about realizing the danger and reminding himself to leave.
But that was the biggest problem.
Su Lun knew his character well, facing such a bizarre situation, he should have left so clues for himself no matter what.
Instead of just coming out like this.
Was there no ti to leave anything behind...
Or was there another reason?
Mr. Jing, standing beside him, seed to have thought of this possibility and hinted, "Could it be, so sort of cipher?"
Su Lun nodded; he was thinking the sa thing.
But another doubt arose in his mind: why use a cipher in a note written to oneself?
Without waiting to think it through, the two of them were looking at the text in front of them,
Su Lun and Mr. Jing, one having harvested countless mories and being proficient in various cryptographies, the other having copied almost all the information of the current alchemy civilization. In theory, if there was any existing encryption in the notes, both should be able to recognize it.
However, after careful observation, they did not discover anything that matched the various complex encryption thods.
Instead, Mr. Jing thought of a very common possibility.
It was an encryption thod that was practically unsolvable without the correct context.
He suggested, "Could it be... it needs so kind of reference?"
Su Lun had actually thought of that just now.
But many references flashed through his mind, and none translated anything.
"If it's a reference, then it must be sothing I'm frequently in contact with, deeply impressed by, and can easily think of... perhaps it should be related to the God Burial Ground..."
Su Lun's brain entered a state of absolute detachnt, his thoughts drifting, deducing various possibilities.
Although he didn't know why he was doing this, he assud that if he really needed to use so sort of cipher to record sothing in that situation, he would figure out how to do it.
For a ti, various canon texts, newspapers, docunts... almost all were texts he had read and was familiar with recently, appeared in his mind.
And so he looked for nearly a quarter of an hour.
After repeatedly eliminating possibilities, suddenly, a spark lit up in Su Lun's mind: "That's right! The gibberish in the five alchemical manuscripts of Sir Isaac!"
He thought of a possibility.
Since it was related to the God Burial Ground, then those five notebooks left by Sir Isaac were certainly pointing to the secrets hidden here, weren't they?
In the instant that this idea erged, the symbols in Su Lun's mind ca alive before his eyes.
Then they corresponded with the text on the notebook, the punctuation marks, automatically transforming into other content in his mind.
That's it!
He had found the way to break the code!
The new content is as follows:
"Hahaha... I finally unraveled the ultimate secret of the notebook. Sir Isaac's idea is truly unfathomable, he actually used such a thod to record an 'existence' that was impossible to be noted down. No wonder the God Profaner's implant was used in the seals—it makes sense now."
"I've co to realize that so mysterious force in this space is distorting my cognition, preventing from taking the secrets out of here. And Sir Isaac's thod also inspired , I finally know how to record what I've seen."
"I saw the '⍥' symbol..."
"I've witnessed the truth."
"No gods should enter anymore!"
Seeing the lines of decrypted text in front of him, Su Lun's expression imdiately brightened.
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