Zoro wore a sly, knowing grin and said with a smirk, –First, how much is your ‘little bit of Xu Ling Chronos’? Let me see the gap between our groups.-
–Hmm.- Yang Zicang placed one hand on the table before his chest and rested the other under his chin. He took a close look at this person who had been using his name for so long but whom he was meeting for the first time. After a moment’s thought, the ring and the quadrilateral on the young man’s chest glowed.
[I want to invest 100,000 full-authority Xu Ling Chronos for Zoro.]
Zoro was so shocked he nearly toppled backward off the stone pier. He leaned forward, glaring at the ring on Yang Zicang’s chest, and gritted his teeth, –You bastard! Where the hell did you get so much Xu Ling Chronos?!-
–It was a reward for clearing the Psionic Cassette challenge.-
–Psionic Cassette?-
–Mm-hmm.- The ring on Yang Zicang’s chest faded as he briefly recounted the challenge from two days ago.
–A psionic game cassette? And a hidden level?-
After listening, Zoro was dumbfounded. He pressed his face against the stone to cool down, grumbling,
–I thought when you said ‘a little Xu Ling Chronos,’ you really meant just a little. Ah, damn, this is the first time in a long while I’ve willingly given someone the chance to show off.-
–Ha, serves you right for selling my engine without permission. Now you know not to underestimate your boss’s strength. Hey, don’t go using my name to throw your weight around from now on.-
–Tch.- Zorro cast a sidelong glance at Yang Zicang. –Fine. You want to know about ‘Void Zero Chronos,’ right? Well, as the name implies, it’s connected to the ‘Void Zero’ bloodline.-
–Another bloodline?- Yang Zicang frowned slightly. –How many bloodlines are there anyway? Oh, don’t bother.-
–Hah, the archive isn’t as thorough as you imagine. Records of bloodlines are scarce. But there is one place that has some connection to the ‘Void Zero bloodline’.- Zorro pointed to the chessboard on the desk. –Take a look at this.-
–This is Go?-
–Yes, but since it was made by a ‘steward’ from this world, it’s slightly different from Earth’s version. It has twenty lines. Hah, that’s right—they play Go by placing stones inside the squares.-
Yang Zicang asked curiously, –So? What does that have to do with ‘Void Zero’?-
–That steward set a rule: anyone who can beat him in a game and is willing to pay a hundred years of Chronos or Void Zero Chronos can go to the ruins of ‘City 11’ to spend their vacation.-
Yang Zicang’s heart suddenly tightened.
–Go to the city? Without having to resign?!-
–That’s right, no need to resign. You can even communicate directly with friends from the outside world while you’re there. The only catch is you mustn’t leak any information about this place; otherwise, you’ll be sent back immediately and permanently lose the right to enter.-
He can actually go out without resigning! Over the past few days, Yang Zicang had already tried—completely unable to contact the outside world, not even able to communicate with the big star, Little Matt Chao. But if he could enter –City 11,- wouldn’t that mean he could go to the Lost Frequency Land through the –big star- at any time?
Yang Zicang looked at the chessboard.
But he was completely ignorant of Go!
[I, the great quadrilateral, am pondering: if I can go to City 11 at any time, then I might not have to resign for now.]
Yet after playing two games with the psychic chess pieces manifested from the board, Yang Zicang looked dejected. He let Zorro continue the match while he wandered around. Even when the psychic hand left by the steward started by placing on tengen, he was still no match.
It wasn’t just a difference in strength; in terms of Go skill, it was like comparing a professor to a kindergartner.
The plan of defeating it in a short time to get into City 11 and return to the Lost Frequency Land seemed impossible to achieve.
Sighing, Yang Zicang stuffed both hands into his pockets and walked through the mist that floated above the ground. Suddenly, among several towering rocks in the distance, he glimpsed a figure standing still—almost blending into the color of the earth.
–Doesn’t look like an afterimage?-
While Yang Zicang was discerning whether it was a strange rock, the towering figure turned its head and glanced in this direction, then leaped up, transforming into a bird with mottled wings akin to a black stork, vanishing with a whoosh into the void of the same hue.
Yang Zicang was taken aback. The face that had peered over was just like a mask crafted from a blend of metal and stone.
After confirming it had left, Yang Zicang stepped forward.
[I was wondering what that thing was just now.]
He stood near where the figure had been. From these rocks, ahead lay a slope that gradually extended for thousands of meters, with thick gray mist churning below. Further beyond stretched an endless expanse of dead fog.
……
Hong Haocheng moved nimbly through the buildings, like a humanoid cheetah. But as the aperture in his eyes faded, his extremely agile motions gradually slowed.
–The limit of the bloodline ability is only ten minutes.–
Fatigue surged from the depths of his body and soul. After resting a while, Hong Haocheng climbed to the second floor of a building with a broken staircase, then followed it up to the fourth floor. This was already the topmost level of the weed-covered structure.
–Hmph, so you are here after all.–
He looked over forty meters away at a small ground-bound spirit sitting against the wall, its head just visible. After resting for more than twenty minutes, sensing the spirit stir and stand up, the young man cautiously opened his eyes.
A faint, fine ring of earthy yellow light flickered once more in his pupils.
[Soul Traveler, First Ring—Trail of Life.]
Behind the ground-bound spirit slowly rising to its feet, simple trajectory lines gradually appeared in the eyes of Hong Haocheng, whose ring of light had just flared up.
–I’ve followed you for three whole days—almost done now.-
This was the first time Hong Haocheng attempted to use the –route lines- he had already obtained to map out the terrain the other had passed through, without consuming its –track-.
It was really not easy to find a lone target suitable for mapping on this island. Hong Haocheng could only catch a glimpse of it moving toward the edge of the area during very brief windows each day, and counting his own rest time, the actual time he spent drawing the map was very limited.
Over three full days, he had consumed nearly five hundred kilometers’ worth of route lines before he was close to seeing the whole picture. This was mostly because a large portion of its trail overlapped with the trajectory of the –ground-bound spirit- he had previously obtained, which saved him a considerable amount of route lines.
The Moxel on his chest flickered, and within the red ring, a slowly rotating triangle was rapidly sketched.
[Scale planning.]
[Grid position unfolding. I will draw the target’s life trajectory at a scale of 100:1.]
The instant he fully perceived the lines behind the earth-bound spirit, a fragmentary map rapidly took form.
It was the terrain of this region!
–It worked! Finally, ha!- Hong Haocheng exclaimed in delight.
The young man raised his fingertip, red threads flickering, and a holographic map formed of polylines appeared at his fingertip.
He glanced at it closely, then looked up toward the island’s depths, two or three li away. Though he had never been there, he now knew all its terrain.
……
That morning, Yang Zicang, who had resolved to change groups over the past two days, felt both relieved and somewhat heavy-hearted.
Was he really going to slink away like this? How embarrassing…
Jiao Ma seemed to have a premonition, frequently glancing over this way all morning, forcing Yang Zicang to duck his head even lower.
After a short rest, Yang Zicang placed his hand back on the glow tube on the table, closed his eyes, and meditated, sensing the vague phantoms within the chaotic wavebands. Lately, under the influence of these wavebands, his mind had increasingly come to feel a serene and spacious comfort, as if he were drifting above a vast forest ocean.
Such was the potent effect of the –Spiritual Energy Circulation Pattern.-
Yang Zicang felt that he was on the verge of reaching the Second Ring, Ninth Grade of spiritual power. Just as his attention involuntarily started to drift, a dark flash accompanied by a faint mental noise suddenly streaked through.
Yang Zicang was jolted with a start, immediately channeling all his attention into locking onto that fleeting wave of noise.
–Though I don’t know what you are, as long as I can get a clear look at you, you’re not getting away!-
This abrupt, striking waveband indicated a level that was definitely not low! The twisting scene, speeding away, wove through countless chaotic specks and rays of light, while through the crystal device, Yang Zicang’s mind swiftly trailed it.
–It’s been twenty-six days! There’s no way I’m walking away empty-handed. You’re the one—stop right there!-
The glow tubes on the table flickered with intense fluctuations, like densely layered sound spectrograms. This corner radiated a ceaseless play of light, pulsing on and off, illuminating Yang Zicang’s tightly shut eyes.
–Looks like there’s hope this time.-
Old Xing walked over with a teacup in hand, and Jiaoma got up and joined him upon seeing this.
–Such violent fluctuations—and Zicang’s been keeping them up for so long, eh.-
In the stream of nothingness, Yang Zicang steadied his mind, rapidly syncing with the flash he had locked onto. Since he knew nothing about that world’s environment—not where the entity belonged, nor what it looked like in its complete form—he had no way of shaping his mind into the corresponding –terrain- to match it and pin it down.
So, he’d just make his mind become it!
Yang Zicang struggled to make his elusive spiritual power shift, using the glimpsed light as a source of information and mimicking it to trace the outline of the other’s form.
–Hurry!- he urged himself in his mind.
His consciousness had started to waver several times already—a sign of impending failure. Fortunately, his spirit managed to roughly outline the shape of that black light noise.
Suddenly, within Yang Zicang’s Sea of Consciousness, a massive wave roared and surged like the crash of the tide.
[According to the feedback from the –Basic Consciousness Imprint,– I have just reached the spiritual rank strength required to bear the –Second Ring, Ninth Stage of the Bloodline Ring.–]
He had actually broken through at this very moment!
A surge of joy filled Yang Zicang’s heart. From the sea of spirit that had been so hard to maintain, a stream of even purer energy suddenly emerged.
At the same time, Lucid Sense activated on its own, sending a faint coolness throughout his body that soothed both body and mind.
The instant this purer spiritual energy appeared, the distant, wavering black energy became clear in his eyes—it was formed by countless overlapping terrain folds, a messy, garbage-like display of wave noise.
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