Finally, Aurora turned to Kranos.
A soft glow blood in her eyes as she gazed at him.
"Thank you, Kranos, for bringing back in ti."
Her voice did not echo aloud but instead rang directly within his mind.
Kranos’s heart trembled violently.
What?
What did she an by thanking him?
Kranos stared at her with a probing gaze, his mind already racing.
Aurora simply smiled at Kranos.
Of course. She rembered everything that had happened.
"So... how do you plan to kill her?"
"What are you talking about?" Kranos responded internally, his thoughts guarded and cautious.
Since they were communicating telepathically, Kathryn and Kevin remained unaware. Their expressions were neutral, unsuspecting. The silent exchange between Kranos and Aurora was invisible to them, and because it was mind-to-mind, the speed of their communication surpassed spoken words.
As soon as Kranos asked the question, Aurora simply shook her head.
It was the sa tactic Kranos had used before.
When she had told him he was a ti cultivator, he had denied it and questioned her, pretending to be ignorant.
"There’s no need to pretend. I recall everything. I’m special—different, in fact, from the typical cultivators of the Black Rain Pavilion."
"Because of that, when you went back in ti, due to the nature of my Null Physique, I was able to return to nothingness and co back to this tiline with my mories intact, unlike everyone else here."
"You don’t have to worry though. I haven’t told Master about this feature of the Null Physique."
What in the world?
Kranos was stunned.
He understood her words clearly, but his mind struggled to process them.
His eyes widened, and the slight shift in his expression caused Kathryn and Kevin to sense that sothing was off.
"You know her?" Kathryn asked, studying Kranos’s facial expression.
Kranos quickly regained his composure and shook his head.
"I just rembered sothing important. That’s why I was montarily distracted."
Kathryn stared at him, unconvinced. Though she did not press further, she remained wary. There was sothing strange about Kranos. Sothing she could not na, but it pulsed at the edge of her thoughts like a dull warning.
Still, she decided not to dwell on it for now.
Turning to Aurora, she asked, "What are you doing here?"
Aurora had been cultivating, preparing to hunt and capture Kranos—the elusive ti cultivator—according to the orders of the Ethereal Beauty.
But then, unexpectedly, mories surged into her mind.
They were not just mories, but vivid flashes from a future that no longer existed.
Her confrontation with Kranos, the betrayals, her own death...
She had been stunned at first. Her own death had been swift and cruel in that other tiline. But she felt a powerful intuition telling her that Kranos had sothing to do with it. Without hesitation, she left the Black Rain Pavilion and made her way toward him.
Because she had already traveled here once before, she no longer needed to ask Master for directions. Her mory served her well.
That was how she had arrived here now.
Aurora returned from her thoughts and looked at Kathryn. "I ca to visit a friend..."
As she spoke, her gaze drifted toward Kranos.
Kranos froze, his mind calculating.
Kathryn and Kevin were equally stunned.
But undoubtedly, Kathryn was the most shocked of the three.
In her previous life, she could not recall Kranos having any kind of friendship with soone from the Black Rain Pavilion.
Granted, she had not known all of Kranos’s acquaintances, but they had been re passersby in each other’s lives.
Even so, Kranos was only sixteen years old. For him to be friends with soone like Aurora, soone deeply tied to the Black Rain Pavilion, he would have had to travel the world more extensively than he had.
Kranos had done no such thing.
A seed of suspicion began to bloom in Kathryn’s heart, quiet but persistent.
She said nothing, however. She simply nodded and watched the scene unfold with careful attention.
"Err, friends, I guess." Kranos said with forced ease. The fact that Aurora claid she had not told her master anything showed that she was extending an olive branch of goodwill.
Kranos did not fully trust her, but if she could be useful as a pawn in eliminating Kathryn, he had to maintain a façade of friendship.
Of course, Kathryn knew of the Black Rain Pavilion. Likely, she rembered them from her previous life. If so, she must also know why they could defy the laws of ti and how to resist such interference.
Kranos was playing a dangerous ga, manipulating pieces on a grand chessboard.
Desmond. Kathryn. Aurora.
All of them were tools, ans to an end.
It was a perilous gamble, but if anyone could succeed in such a sche, it was Kranos.
The others were re children compared to him—he was a reincarnated monster, ancient in experience.
However, Kathryn...
Whenever he thought of her, a strange unease crept into his bones. It was a sense of wrongness he could not define.
What was it?
"I... uh... I’m sorry for destroying the house. I wasn’t sure if anyone was still living here," Aurora said suddenly, her voice soft with contrition.
Kathryn rely waved her hand, brushing off the apology.
"How about I travel with you for a while?" Aurora asked, putting on an innocent expression that didn’t quite reach her eyes.
Kranos was dumbfounded.
Within her gaze, he saw sothing terrifying—sothing cold and calculating. He could tell the girl was already scheming.
"I’m not too sure. You should ask the others..." He kept his tone light, as though they were close friends.
Kathryn thought for a mont.
Aurora was a ti cultivator. If she stayed with them, perhaps she might help locate another. That would serve their purposes well.
"There’s no problem with her coming along," Kathryn said finally.
A sweet smile blossod on Aurora’s face at those words.
She glanced at the wreckage of the house and sighed. It was a minor loss. They could find another place soon enough.
With the situation settled, Kathryn and the others dispersed.
Kranos would have preferred not to be alone with Aurora, but they had things to discuss.
In just a month, the trial would begin. They would soon enter the secret realm.
Besides, he remained curious about how she retained her mories.
It seed there were deeper risks to regression than he had anticipated.
With Kathryn and Kevin gone, Kranos turned to Aurora and smiled.
"It’s nice eting you..."
Aurora returned the smile.
"You are different from all the ti cultivators my master told about."
She looked at Kranos with a peculiar intensity, still reeling from the revelation that he could regress in ti.
Rembering all the techniques he had used, she was filled with awe.
How many ti abilities did Kranos possess?
And how did he bear their weight?
Ordinary ti cultivators specialized in one technique, refining their understanding over the years. But Kranos?
He was sothing else entirely.
This was what it ant to possess an Eternal-grade ti affinity.
"What do you an by that?" Kranos asked, wary.
"Nothing... Don’t worry about it. It’s a good thing," Aurora replied casually.
Kranos studied her for a mont longer but chose not to press.
"Why did you co here?" He did not want to talk about her ability to regress—not yet.
"The sa reason you did," Aurora said. Then, with a whisper of thought, she added using sound transmission, "To kill Kathryn."
His expression did not change.
Since she had co this far, Kranos had already suspected her intentions.
"You rember everything, so you must know how terrifying those eyes are, right?"
Kranos’s voice was calm, but sharp with implication.
If she had a way to counter Kathryn’s Divine Illusion Eyes, it would be a massive advantage.
He had a feeling she would.
"I don’t have anything right now. But it shouldn’t be a problem for Master," Aurora answered lightly.
At that, Kranos fell silent and no longer communicated through voice transmission.
Aurora, too, had nothing more to say.
"Since you’ll be traveling with us, be patient. Kathryn will find us a place to stay soon."
With that, he walked a few steps away and sat cross-legged, pretending to cultivate.
But inwardly, he was not calm.
Aurora was the only person completely unaffected by his ti abilities. Until he found a reliable way to eliminate her, he would remain cautious whenever she was nearby.
Ti passed quickly, and soon Kathryn returned with news of a new house that she and Kevin had found.
Only one month remained before the trial.
Everyone was now focused, imrsed in preparations for the grand event.
A month’s ti would decide everything.
Would Kranos succeed in killing Kathryn or not?
The mood grew solemn.
Two days later, Aurora returned to the Black Rain Pavilion.
She needed to seek ways to counter the Divine Illusion Eyes—and to prepare trump cards in case Kathryn had more surprises.
anwhile, Kranos’s cultivation progressed smoothly.
Not only did his strength grow, but his understanding of his techniques deepened steadily.
He also maintained contact with the Scarlet Moon Organization during this period.
According to them, they were ninety-nine percent certain they could kill the anomaly.
That number shocked Kranos.
But considering the terrifying depth and experience of the Scarlet Moon Organization—an entity that had specialized in assassination for countless years—it made sense.
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