章 19: Leap of Faith
Fang Yuan has been lost in the labyrinth for months. He is exploring the labyrinth for a way out. Either an exit or gateway.
He didn't go very deep into the labyrinth as he could feel a sense of doom. He sticked to the outer areas. He kept away from any place of True darkness. He didn't really want to meet the true rulers of this labyrinth. He usually hunted awakened nightmare creatures with the help his echo, now champion. He also grown stronger himself.
---
When Fang Yuan finally managed to gather 100, he decided to truned his echo into champion.
Fang Yuan found himself in his soul sea, moving against the current. He summoned the echo in front of him.
[Transform echo into Champion? (100/100)]
He agreed as he instantly felt himself losing power. But he didn't focus on that as he saw the sun in his soul sea beganinig to rumble.
Suddenly a shard shoot out from the sun. It landed on his palm while leaving behind a blazing trail. It was a small radiant green marble. He took it closer to his eyes and looked at it with fascinating. The marble was full of vitality and life.
While observing the marble with his Ultra Sense, he got some information form the marble.
It can be called a life jem. If he uses this on an entity, it will become integrally with his core. As long as the core exist, the entity can't truly be destroyed. The entity will regenerate in the soul core in due time, even if the entity is destroyed on atomic level. One soul core can only create one of this life jems.
"So, there is chance that I can have more than one core."
He still felt there is more secrets to the life jem. But he felt the life jem itself was calling for echo. So, he pressed the jem against the echo's chest. The life jem got absorbed into the echo.
[Your echo has been destroyed.]
[You have gained a Champion, Nephilic Sister.]
---
At the same time, somewhere in the cursed expands of the forgotten shore, a blind seer dreamt of a revelation. The blind seer is Cassie. The revelation in her description;
"At first, I saw a… a boundless darkness locked behind seven seals. Something vast was churning in the darkness. I felt like if I directly saw it, I would lose my mind. As I watched, terrified, the seals broke one after another, until only one remained. And then that seal broke, too."
She trembled a little.
"After that… I don't know. It was as though my mind shattered into a thousand shards, each shard reflecting its own image. Most of them were dark and scary. Some I have already forgotten. The other…"
Cassie fell silent, remembering.
"I saw the human castle again. Only this time, it was at night. There was a lonely star burning in the black skies, and under its light, the castle was suddenly consumed by fire, with rivers of blood flowing down its halls.
I saw a corpse in a golden armor sitting on a throne; a woman with a bronze spear drowning in a tide of monsters; an archer trying to pierce the falling sky with his arrows. A demon singing in slaughter."
Finally, she looked up, her face full of horror.
"In the end, I saw a colossal, terrifying crimson spire. At its base, seven severed heads were guarding seven locks. And at the top, a… a dying angel was being consumed by hungry shadows. When I saw the angel bleed, I suddenly felt as though… as though something so precious that it can't be described with words was taken from me."
Her voice became quieter.
"Then, I felt so much sorrow, pain and rage that what little remained of my sanity seemed to disappear. That was when I woke up… I think."
-----
After that, he started actively hunting for nightmare creatures to complete the soul fragment counter. His core is already half saturating.
Soul Fragments: [567/1000].
He hunts the awakened ones and hides form the truly dreadful ones. He has secured all of his basic needs. Now, his only goal is to escape.
After months—perhaps even years, though time in the labyrinth had long since lost its meaning—he had finally found it. The exit.
His heart did not race, and his breath did not quicken, but a deep, cold satisfaction spread through his mind. The crack in the wall was narrow, almost imperceptible, hidden between jagged stones, veiled in shadows. No creature of the labyrinth would have noticed it. Not without instinct. Not without something beyond normal perception guiding them. His Ultra Instinct had led him here, to this final sliver of hope.
The narrow gap was barely large enough for a human to squeeze through, yet the faint air beyond it felt different. It wasn't the thick, damp atmosphere of the labyrinth, nor the stale, suffocating darkness that had clung to him for so long. This was something fresher, something new. An escape.
He approached the crack, his ghostly companion hovering silently behind him, its faint light casting eerie shadows on the cave walls. The ghost had grown stronger alongside him, its presence now a constant, silent guardian. It has become something more than just an echo of a damned soul.
With practiced precision, he slipped through the crack, his body moving fluidly despite the tight space. The rock scraped against his skin, but he felt no pain. His mind had long since adapted to the harshness of the world. He was more than what he had been when he first awoke in the labyrinth—stronger, faster, a predator among the dark creatures.
On the other side, the world was veiled in fog. Thick, rolling clouds of mist clung to the air, wrapping everything in a cloak of obscurity. The ground beneath his feet was soft and damp, the air cooler than it had been inside the labyrinth. His senses flared, every instinct sharpening as he took in the new surroundings.
Before him, shrouded in the dense fog, flowed a wide, slow-moving river. Its surface was dark, almost black, with barely a ripple disturbing its smooth, glass-like appearance. The water looked cold, lifeless, as if it had been flowing silently for centuries, untouched by the outside world. The river's edge was lined with smooth stones and reeds that swayed gently in the breeze, but beyond that, he could see nothing. Only fog. Endless, white, suffocating fog that concealed whatever lay beyond the water's surface.
He felt no relief at finding the river, no joy at the prospect of finally being free from the labyrinth's suffocating grip. The instincts that had guided him here told him this was not yet the end. This river, this new place, was part of this region's mystery. It was another test, another path to follow. His mind remained cold, calculating. The ghost, floating beside him, pulsed again, its energy aligning with his thoughts.
There was only one thing left to do.
Without hesitation, he stepped to the edge of the river. The fog swirled around him, the mist dampening his skin, clinging to his body like cold fingers. His reflection in the dark water was distorted.
His muscles were lean, hardened by constant battle. His eyes, though no longer of use in the darkness, held a cold, unrelenting focus. He had survived everything the labyrinth had thrown at him, and now, his instincts told him this was the next step.
The river called to him, a silent invitation veiled in the mist. He couldn't see where it led, but his Ultra Sense told him it didn't matter. This was the path. The only path.
Sure his Ultra Sense glaring red alerts about the river, but it also told him it is the only way of his escape.
The specter also pulsed once more, a final, quiet confirmation. He dismissed his champion.
And so, without a second thought, he took a leap of faith and jumped into the river.
The cold was immediate, biting into his skin like a thousand needles. The water enveloped him, pulling him under the surface with a smooth, quiet force. He didn't fight it. His body relaxed, moving with the current as it carried him forward into the unknown. The fog closed in around him, the river's dark embrace surrounding him on all sides. There was no up, no down—just the gentle pull of the water, drawing him deeper.
For a moment, the world was silent. The cold numbed his body, but his mind remained sharp. His breath was calm, his heartbeat steady. The labyrinth had hardened him, had made him into something more than human. He had faced death more times than he could count, had fought creatures far stronger than him, had survived in conditions that would have broken most men. This river, this moment, was just another step in the journey. Another test.
Then, slowly, he began to sink deeper into the river's depths, the fog and water merging into a seamless expanse of white and black. His body drifted downward, the cold water pressing in on him from all sides. He couldn't see where he was going, couldn't feel the river's bottom, but his instincts told him to trust the current. It was leading him somewhere, guiding him through the fog toward a destination he couldn't yet perceive.
Suddenly, his memories started blurring and he started to lose his sense of self.
Time seemed to stretch, the moments blending together as he floated through the river's endless depths. His mind became unprecedently clear, focused on his True Name. He started to fight against the river to maintain his sense of self. He held onto his True Name and it maintained his existence.
He had read that names have power. Fortunately it was true.
He knew there was no turning back now, no return to the labyrinth. Whatever lay ahead would be faced with the same resolve that had carried him through the darkness.
The river flowed on, silent and eternal.
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