The surrounding space rippled violently, like the surface of water!
In an instant, the bright heavenly light above vanished. Salyan felt a sudden wave of weightlessness, and by the time he steadied himself, he had already fallen alone into a realm of pure darkness.
Well, not entirely alone—the Pujis was still perched on his head.
Salyan reacted quickly. Almost as soon as he landed, he cast both an illumination spell and a spatial reconnaissance orb.
A soft halo of light pushed back the darkness in a small radius, while the orb scanned the surroundings, only to report… nothing.
His expression grew grim, but not merely because of being trapped in an unknown space.
In that fleeting moment of spatial shift, he had sensed a faint but utterly pure wave of evil magic—and its source… came from the direction of his teacher, Iros!
“Was it… the Divine Tree’s doing?”
Salyan desperately hoped it was just an accident, and not something his teacher had deliberately caused…
“Where… is this place?”
Either way, the urgent matter at hand was to escape this bizarre prison of darkness.
To Lin Jun, the spatial shift felt oddly familiar—much like the sensation of riding his own elevator. The only difference was in the destination.
And the culprit was obvious: Iros!
At the last moment, Iros had used some kind of abyssal magic that Lin Jun couldn’t comprehend.
But how? Wasn’t that kind of control supposed to be limited to administrators? And the Divine Tree was clearly dormant—it couldn’t possibly have done this itself.
So what exactly was this elven archmage plotting?
…
This was a vast, empty space. Salyan wandered for a long time, but found nothing except silence and void, as if everything had been swallowed by endless darkness.
At last, only under the Pujis’s guidance did he discover something unusual.
Which only made Salyan feel even worse.
His proud, self-created spatial detection magic was proving less useful than this round little Pujis.
Of course, he knew the two detection methods worked on entirely different principles and naturally had different strengths, but the humiliation of being repeatedly corrected by a mushroom squatting on his head made him feel like his pride—just like his skull—was being sat on and rubbed raw.
Still, Salyan was a mature elven mage. He would never ignore the Pujis’s hints out of mere pride.
Suppressing his frustration, he followed its guidance until he came upon a massive black cube suspended in midair.
It was impossible to tell what material it was made of. Its surface was perfectly smooth, utterly devoid of light, fixed motionless in the air with an unnatural eeriness.
Lin Jun found it strangely familiar, though he couldn’t place it at first.
Salyan carefully circled it, studying it for a long while, even casting another reconnaissance orb. Yet the orb’s feedback indicated… nothing. As if the cube didn’t exist at all.
Left with no alternative, Salyan finally extended a cautious finger to touch it.
The instant his fingertip met its smooth surface, he screamed in agony, collapsing backward as if struck by a hammer. He clutched his head, writhing and howling on the ground as though enduring unbearable torture.
Lin Jun, who had made sure the scouting Pujis jumped clear in time, watched Salyan’s suffering—and suddenly recognized what felt so familiar!
Wasn’t this exactly like the “garbage information” from the Abyss?
But unlike the torrents of chaotic, fast-flowing data he had encountered before, this cube’s information seemed forcibly fixed and contained.
Well, there was only one way to find out.
While Salyan was still writhing in agony, unable to pay attention, the Pujis stretched out a mycelium tendril and gently touched the cube’s surface.
In an instant, a vast and shattered vision flooded Lin Jun’s mind:
A boundless expanse of gray-white fog cloaked the heavens and earth. The land stretched endlessly, rotting and lifeless.
In the distance, an ancient, crumbling palace complex was being lifted from the ground by some incomprehensible force. Slowly it rose into the sky, then silently broke apart, disintegrating into fragments before vanishing into nothingness.
The flow of imagery seemed slow, but Lin Jun could sense the time span it represented was unimaginably long.
No wonder Salyan was screaming in pain.
Lin Jun absorbed the entire record in an instant, while Salyan still lay groaning in torment.
To be fair, Lin Jun thought he was lucky. Those who had touched raw, flowing abyssal data in the past had all ended with their heads bursting like watermelons.
Fortunately, this cube’s contents had been stabilized and limited. Otherwise, Salyan would already be dead.
It was a long while before Salyan finally dragged himself out of the ordeal, collapsing weakly on the ground, gasping for breath.
“Wh-what… what is that?” he mumbled to himself, trying to dispel his fear with words.
But then, from the darkness, a voice he knew all too well answered him:
“That is the former sight of another continent, beyond the sea and the fog. And it is also the future of this land beneath our feet.”
Iros stepped out of the shadows. With a wave of his hand, a clear glow of “Clarity” magic fell upon Salyan’s brow, soothing the lingering pain and confusion in his mind.
“Teacher… what exactly… is going on?” Salyan asked shakily, propping himself up with trembling arms.
Iros did not answer directly. Instead, he turned and began walking forward. “Follow me.”
Iros walked steadily ahead, Salyan trailing in silence.
It looked like countless times before, master and disciple traveling together. Yet Salyan’s heart was torn with conflict and unease.
His teacher’s attitude already spoke volumes. He wanted to ask, to demand answers, but didn’t know where to begin—and didn’t dare imagine what might happen if he did.
If Iros truly meant him harm, it would be effortless.
The gulf in their power was simply too vast.
At length, Iros brought Salyan to another black cube, this one much smaller.
With a look, he signaled for Salyan to touch it.
Taking a deep breath, Salyan forced down his fear and doubt, and extended his finger once more.
To his surprise, there was no painful flood of data this time. The cube contained only a single, simple line of text:
“The Eternal Night of all things arrives as fated. The Ark is our final sanctuary, and also the beginning of a new world.”