348 Power of Faith

"I'll buy us time! The two of you, hide!"

I sent the message through Qi Speech, sharp and quick. The pressure of Aixin's divine presence made even my thoughts tremble, but Alice and Da Ji didn't hesitate. They vanished into the storm of crimson light, cloaked beneath Da Ji's illusion, a veil of frost and shadow so refined that even my Divine Sense would blur trying to pierce it.

I drew a deep breath, letting divine energy surge through my limbs. My Human Soul shimmered beside me, reshaping itself into my likeness, followed by the rest of my summons doing the same. They copied my aura and spiritual wavelength perfectly, forming a ring of false "Da Weis" around me. It was a gamble, but I needed to split Aixin's attention.

A cruel, divine laughter rippled across the skies.

"I CAN SEE YOU!"

Before I could even react, her palm descended upon me. It was a blinding continent of molten gold. The sheer heat vaporized entire mountains, turning the crust beneath me into rivers of magma.

I roared, slamming Divine Might and Divine Speed into my body. My muscles burned, and my divine spark flared painfully. I swung Soulsunderer and Silver Steel together, casting War Smite, channeling the impact downward. The ground exploded as I tore a tunnel into the burning rock, propelling myself deeper and deeper into the planet.

The sound of cracking crust filled my ears. "Come on… faster!"

I triggered Zealot's Stride, stacking it with Flash Step. My body blurred into golden streaks as I plunged through molten layers. Every meter I dug, Aixin's colossal hand followed. Her fingers ripped through continents like wet paper.

"YOU CANNOT ESCAPE, LITTLE GODLING!"

The ground shook as her fingertip brushed the planet's core. Even underground, I could feel her presence, an overwhelming storm of quintessence that screamed divinity as she tried to squeeze the planet with me in the middle.

My Animal Soul, Heaven Soul, and Asura Soul fought above me, clashing with fragments of divine light that seeped through the cracks. One by one, their vessels shattered. Their voices flickered in my mind, then went silent.

I exhaled through gritted teeth, retrieving their souls with a thought. "Good work… rest for now."

I re-cast Holy Sword, merging the Heaven Soul and Asura Soul into my blades. Radiant energy wrapped around both weapons, golden and white, feeding me more strength. My Animal Soul remained loose, guiding my instincts. helping me carve through the stone and magma like a creature born for burrowing.

The world's crust began to collapse. The molten sky thundered above, and yet Aixin's voice remained calm and clear, echoing through every corner of my being.

"DA WEI, SURRENDER YOURSELF!"

My Hell Soul responded instead, its laughter wild and cruel. Through our shared link, I felt his vessel unleash Judgment Severance over and over again, flooding Aixin's divine light with chaotic bursts of holy and hellish energy. The backlash tore through him, burning his form away. His voice cracked as he vanished.

"Pathetic goddess…" he muttered before disappearing into me.

I turned sharply, changing direction underground. My Ghost Soul darted ahead, using Castling to swap places with me just as Aixin's fingers pierced the mantle. For a heartbeat, I thought I had escaped.

Then her hand struck the planet's core with fury.

My Ghost Soul's sight filled my mind with Aixin's titanic face staring down through the molten abyss, her eyes filled with divine fury. Her fingers pinched delicately, and in that moment, she seized the Ghost Soul's vessel.

Her whisper reached even the deepest parts of my mind. "Did you really think such tricks could deceive me, Da Wei?"

She squeezed.

Agony tore through me as the link shattered. I coughed blood, my vision blurring, the pain spreading through every nerve. The Ghost Soul screamed, his essence fracturing into light, then fading back into my dantian.

He mumbled weakly, "That's twice, you stupid progenitor… twice in my entire lifetime my soul was eviscerated…"

I gritted my teeth, forcing a breath. "You'll be fine. Just… take a nap."

The moment he settled, I felt Aixin's Qi Sense, locking onto me again like a celestial beacon. The world trembled beneath her words.

"DA WEI!"

Above, the red planet began to die. It cracked and crumbled, pieces of its shell spiraling into the void. Molten debris fell upward, drawn by the Hollowed World's gravitational field. Even in ruin, the planet's descent didn't stop. Instead, it continued its slow fall toward that obsidian shell in the distance.

I stared upward, chest heaving, feeling both despair and grim amusement. "Still moving, huh? Guess you're just as stubborn as I am."

It wasn't too late yet. We could still make it back.

I sent my thoughts outward. "Da Ji, Alice… now! Hurry! We still have a chance to return to the Hollowed World. We'll use this Falling Realm as our bridge!"

Moments later, twin auras flared on the distant horizon, Da Ji's frost and Alice's crimson curse energy. They emerged from the shattered landscape, streaks of light cutting across the burning sky.

Da Ji landed first, no longer in her massive fox form. Her nine tails still floated behind her, glowing faintly like ribbons of moonlight. Alice descended beside her, her armor cracked and smoke rising from it, yet her eyes were sharp and determined.

"We're here, Da Wei!"

"I have a plan," I told them through Qi Speech, the link pulsing faintly with my intent. "And no, it doesn't involve me dying!"

Da Ji's voice came sharp and dry in response, "You better. Because if it does, I'll drag you back myself and kill you again."

Alice followed with her usual cool tone, though I could sense the unease beneath it. "What do you need us to do?"

"Just focus ahead," I said, keeping my voice steady while I tried not to stare at the enormous silhouette of Aixin above. Her radiance was so overwhelming it turned the void around her pale. "Prepare yourselves… it's going to be a tough fight…"

That was an understatement. My thoughts flickered back to Gu Jie and her deliberate vagueness. There were always limits to what she could say. Prophecies were fickle things, and she once told me that too much revelation only bred misfortune. Yet, the fragments she did reveal had been seared into my mind.

"You will have your chance, Da Wei," she'd said. "When the void itself folds upon the world, you shall find the head of the snake that offended you. He hides in a prison of darkness, surrounded by whispers of his own sin. There, your blade shall decide his end… or yours."

At the time, I thought void-like meant outer space, the emptiness I now swam in. But as I looked toward the Hollowed World, at that black, obsidian shell shrouding its surface, I knew better. That darkness wasn't space… it was something else. It stared back. Something inside that blackness was watching.

A shiver crawled up my spine.

Da Ji's voice broke through my thoughts. "What are you going to do?"

I exhaled slowly. "Buy time."

Without waiting for a response, I activated Castling with my Human Soul. Our bodies switched in a flicker of light. My Human Soul appeared beside a shattered cluster of asteroids, while I found myself beneath one of the stray moons nearby, where the Human Soul hid and suppressed its presence to almost nothing. Unlike the Human Soul, I let my spiritual pressure burst. Through our shared senses, I whispered a single command.

"Run."

My Human Soul obeyed, igniting Divine Speed, Zealot's Stride, and Flash Step in one burst. It turned into a streak of silver light, darting through the debris fields, heading straight toward the Hollowed World's surface.

The pressure of Aixin's divine aura pressed down on me, turning my breath to steam. Still, I shouted, voice echoing through the void.

"AIXIN! IT'S ME YOU WANT, SO HERE I AM!"

My spiritual pressure flared, burning bright enough to turn the nearby dust clouds into rippling waves of light. I could feel Aixin's attention pivot, her gaze locking onto me with celestial focus.

I stowed Soulsunderer and Silver Steel back into my pocket dimension. They'd be useless here. Instead, I gripped World Aegis tightly, the shield vibrating with divine resonance. Golden cracks of energy danced across its edge as I charged it with Divine Might.

I used Zealot's Stride to accelerate, hurling myself across the surface of the nearby moon. With a final step, I slammed the shield forward and shouted, "Shield Bash!"

The impact thundered through the void. The entire moon lurched and then shot forward like a comet. The explosion of dust and molten rock behind it painted the stars in gold.

The moon streaked toward Aixin like a divine projectile, glowing brighter the closer it came.

Aixin simply raised her hand.

With the faintest flick of her wrist, she slapped the moon aside. It shattered into a billion fragments, each fragment vaporized instantly by the heat of her radiance. The entire debris field turned into a curtain of incandescent ash.

A cold, divine voice rumbled through the cosmos. "Do you truly think such tricks can deceive me?" Her eyes narrowed, burning with a terrifying light. "It matters little. I see him. I see you."

I felt my blood freeze. Through the shared sense of my Human Soul, I felt the echo of her gaze turning toward him, the decoy hurtling toward the Hollowed World.

"You think yourself clever, Da Wei, but I will not be fooled."

Her colossal wings spread, blotting out the stars. "You run to the Hollowed World, but I shall follow. Your tricks will not work on me, Da Wei! My father will see your 'being' delivered by my hand!"

I summoned Starbreaker from my pocket dimension, the void shattering around me like broken glass as the massive hammer emerged. Its surface pulsed with golden veins of celestial energy, heavy enough to bend the light around it. The weapon was a legendary relic, made for smashing gods, not mortals. It was perfect against someone like Aixin.

The problem was… Starbreaker was wild. Its accuracy was terrible, just like Hellcleaver. If I missed, it could pulverize an entire mountain range, but right now, precision didn't matter. I only needed one good hit.

I clenched my jaw. "YOU SHOULDN'T TURN YOUR BACK ON ME!"

I inhaled deeply, drawing upon everything that made me who I was. I leaned on the experiences of my Six Souls, their private training, their discoveries, and their failures. I leaned on my physical body, one forged from the remnant of David_69 with an art meant to slay gods. And I leaned on the countless memories I had lived through, every borrowed life from Divine Possession, and every victory and defeat that shaped me.

The weight of a hundred Manasouls burned within me like molten light. I no longer held anything back. The void around me trembled under the sheer density of divine energy I was channeling.

In the stillness before the clash, my mind drifted, and flashes of the past burned across my sight. Lu Gao, standing alone against heaven itself during his Divine Transformation. Yuen Fu, whose martial faith birthed arts that defied despair. Dave, the first man to pioneer skill fusion through reason and madness. And myself… the me who once cowered before the Supreme Void, and learned what hopelessness truly meant.

But Aixin? She was not the Supreme Void.

She was not even close.

She was powerful, yes. But in the end, she was still within the reach of my blade, my hammer, and my will. To me, she was nothing.

I could've done worse.

"Heavenly Thundering Flash!" I shouted, and lightning erupted from my armor, searing my flesh as I accelerated. My body split the void into streaks of blue-white light.

My armor cracked in several places, divine plates melting from the sheer pressure of my own energy output. All around me, motes of light, the Manasouls I had scattered earlier, ignited like stars in the darkness.

"Heavenly Punishment!"

Over a hundred golden swords tore through the debris field, streaking toward Aixin in blinding arcs. She didn't even flinch. The blades slammed into her divine skin and disintegrated instantly, as if they were mere sparks against the sun.

But I didn't need them to hurt her.

They were my distraction.

I released World Aegis, sending it back into the pocket dimension, and gripped Starbreaker with both hands. The hammer's weight dragged my entire body downward, but I forced it up, the head of the weapon glowing brighter than a supernova. The veins along its surface pulsed violently as I began to burn my Divine Spark, just a little.

The pain was unbearable. My essence screamed in protest, but I ignored it.

"IMMORTAL ART: EXALTED GODSLAYER!"

I swung.

The stars disappeared as if hiding.

The void roared.

Aixin tried to defend with a swipe of her hand.

The moment Starbreaker made contact with Aixin's radiant skin, a cataclysmic shockwave erupted, warping the fabric of space itself. For a second, her enormous silhouette trembled. But then, the impossible happened.

Starbreaker began to melt.

The metal hissed and turned red-hot, dripping in glowing rivulets that evaporated before touching the ground. The hammer disintegrated from the handle up, until the only thing left in my grasp was molten air.

Her light burned through me. My skin blistered and peeled. My armor turned liquid and fused to my body. I couldn't see anymore, since my eyes burst under the pressure of divine radiance.

Still, I didn't let go.

Through my Divine Sense, I could still perceive the world in outlines of light and motion. I felt her towering presence twist. I heard her divine shriek echo across the collapsing sky.

"IMPOSSIBLE!"

Her hand, the one she'd raised to swat me away, fell. The severed limb tumbled through the void, spewing golden ichor that ignited the darkness like a newborn sun.

I could feel my Human Soul tug at me from afar.

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"Castling."

It was an instinctive pull, a desperate and selfless act. Through our shared senses, I saw him standing before Aixin, wreathed in his own divine light, as he unleashed Judgment Severance again and again. Each Ultimate Skill tore at the fabric of the void, burning his own quintessence to fuel every spell. I wanted to stop him, but the connection between us pulsed with finality. He'd already decided. The last thing I sensed from him was a faint whisper of relief before the link snapped.

When I opened my eyes again, I was whole once more. Blessed Regeneration had done its work, but everything else was a ruin. My armor was gone, melted down to fragments that clung to me like soot. My body steamed with the remnants of celestial heat, and I tasted blood that had already burned dry.

Around me, the stars began to vanish. What replaced them was an endless, oppressive black, a shell that swallowed the Hollowed World whole. Bits of glowing debris from the shattered red planet drifted toward it, vanishing into the darkness as if devoured.

To my right, Alice appeared, her aura cold and steady despite the storm of lingering divine energy. To my left, Da Ji materialized in her humanoid form, tails flickering faintly with residual flame.

"That was reckless, brother," Da Ji said, her tone half-chiding, half-relieved.

I gave a dry laugh, brushing off the black dust clinging to my skin. "You're not wrong."

Alice's voice followed, calm but sharp. "So… what kind of fight are we expecting this time?"

"I don't know," I admitted, scanning the horizonless dark. "We'll see soon enough."

I reached inward and retrieved my Human Soul, feeling his faint pulse as he drifted back into the constellation within my dantian, beside the still-slumbering Ghost Soul. He was exhausted, but alive. I let him rest.

When we landed on the surface of the Hollowed World's dark shell, the texture beneath our feet was strange. It was neither solid nor void, as if the ground itself breathed. The air was dense, still, and silent, yet I could hear my own heartbeat echo across it. Despite the absolute darkness, my eyesight remained unimpeded. Shadows here were not made by the absence of light, but by the will of the realm itself.

Da Ji looked around, ears twitching. "Where are we?"

I turned, gazing behind us, only to see more darkness. No horizon. No boundary. No stars. Yet I could feel… a presence.

"Not sure," I said quietly. "But we're still inside the shell. Or maybe… beneath it."

Far behind us, I could see the drifting remnants of the red planet, massive fragments glowing like dying embers. They floated lazily through the dark, illuminating nothing, before dissolving into shadow.

Alice's expression hardened as she lifted her hand. Her spiritual pressure surged, filling the black expanse with the faint radiance of her Ascended Soul. Da Ji followed suit, her own aura flaring in a crimson wave. The two of them stood ready, every muscle tense.

I let my Divine Spark pulse freely. Within this void, the faint glimmers of faith trickled toward me like drops of rain. They were small, but enough. I could safely maintain Exalted Renewal here, should the fight turn bad.

I saw him.

At first, I thought it was a mirage, a faint outline sitting cross-legged in the distance. But as we approached, the form solidified. A young man sat in the middle of the dark void, calm and still, as if the chaos of the universe meant nothing to him. His long black hair spilled over his shoulders like liquid shadow, and his robes hung in tatters, ancient and frayed. Yet despite his ragged appearance, an indescribable stillness surrounded him, like the calm eye of a storm.

He raised his head slowly. His dark eyes met mine.

"So," he said in a low, almost amused tone, "you finally made it."

I took a step forward, keeping my senses wide open. "Who are you?"

The young man tilted his head slightly, the corner of his mouth curling upward in mockery. "Who am I?" He chuckled softly, the sound echoing unnaturally through the void. "You ask that as if this is our first meeting."

My blood went cold.

He smiled wider.

"But I believe," he continued, voice soft yet heavy with something ancient and cruel, "this is not the first time we've met… is it, Da Wei?"

"Yuan Shen," I said, my voice steady though my pulse was not. "Where is Shouquan?"

The young man smiled faintly, still sitting cross-legged in the darkness. "Always straight to the point, I see…" His tone carried a trace of boredom, as if we were old acquaintances rather than enemies fated to kill each other.

So this was it, the snake that Gu Jie's prophecy had spoken of. It made sense now. Shenyuan, the supposed clone of Yuan Shen, was the one who killed my disciples. The entire trail of blood and ruin had led to this moment. I'd had enough of his manipulation, enough of his games through the Heavenly Temple. If Yuan Shen was their puppeteer, then ending him might finally sever the web choking the Hollowed World.

I folded my arms, forcing my rising anger back into composure. "I believe our first meeting was when I killed Shenyuan, a clone of yours," I began, my tone sharp as a blade. "The second time was at the Promised Dunes, where you slaughtered an entire city. The third was when I killed Bai Zheme back in the Empire and used Divine Possession on him. And the fourth—" I sneered. "—was in that mock church the Heavenly Temple built to corrupt the power of faith I was receiving. Every single time, you've gone out of your way to oppose me. So tell me, why?"

Yuan Shen looked at me, his expression empty, voice as calm as still water. "Why? Because the Supreme Beings let me live… and more than that, I serve their interests. That's all there is to it."

I shook my head slowly. "No. It's not that simple."

He raised a brow.

"No matter how small, every life has a reason," I continued. "Someone can't just exist for the sake of existence. Even a puppet feels the pull of the strings. People live, die, and act because they believe in something, because they choose to. You're not exempt from that."

He smiled faintly, a sad sort of curve on his lips. "That's easy for you to say. You're alive. Me?" His eyes dimmed to gray. "I'm just a tool. A construct. I can't be motivated, can't live, can't die. My existence is meaningless. So let's skip the talk, Da Wei. I'm sure you've been dying to meet me properly, haven't you?"

The air around him shuddered. With one breath, Yuan Shen unleashed his spiritual pressure, a crushing tide that bent the void itself. The weight of an Ascended Soul [Level 47] bore down on us, a vast ocean compared to my river.

He lifted a hand lazily. From his palm, dark, thorny chains erupted and spread outward like serpents of midnight.

"Immortal Art: Never Ending Bond of Regrets."

The chains screeched as they split the air, lashing toward us with murderous intent.

I centered my breath, feeling the Six Souls within me pulse in response. Two were still recovering, but Exalted Renewal had been running for hours, each passing second strengthening my flesh, qi, and soul.

I raised both hands, golden energy gathering around me. "Judgment Severance!"

A colossal golden cross erupted behind me, radiating divine brilliance. It spun and sliced through the oncoming chains, shredding them into motes of ash. For a moment, the light held, but the cross began to darken, corrupted by Yuan Shen's art.

Beside me, Alice raised her hand, her [Level 12] Ascended Soul flaring like a blood-red sun. The air cracked as she called forth her own spell.

"Summon: Santelmo!"

A crimson flame with a face screamed into being, burning away the corrupted fragments of the chains. The light it emitted made the void tremble, but the spell's power waned quickly, since she still lacked an Immortal Art, and the gap between her and Yuan Shen was vast.

Meanwhile, Da Ji unfurled her tails, each glowing with frost and shadow. Her illusions spread like a mist, wrapping us in an ephemeral haze. The air turned bitterly cold. Yuan Shen's chains slowed slightly, momentarily confused by her technique.

I reached out with my mind. "Divine Possession!"

The bond took hold, my Hell Soul flowed into Alice, and the Animal Soul merged with Da Ji. Their auras surged instantly. Alice's crimson armor darkened to black flame, and Da Ji's fox form shimmered with beast-like power. Through my Immortal Art: Divine Appointment of the Faithful, I shared with them what little power of faith I had left, amplifying their strength.

Golden light bled into the void, meeting the shadow that Yuan Shen commanded. The clash between faith and regret made the world tremble.

"Zealot's Stride! Divine Speed!"

I vanished from where I stood, crossing the distance in a blink. Silver Steel shimmered into my grasp from my pocket dimension, glowing with Divine Smite.

I swung, aiming for his throat.

Yuan Shen parried effortlessly with a single dark chain that reformed from his palm, the clash sending a shockwave that scattered fragments of divine light. He looked at me with that same bored expression, voice dripping with mockery.

"How much of a waste are you, Da Wei?" he said softly. "You don't even understand the kind of power you possess… or the kind of existence you truly are."

"I don't give a fuck… just die…"

In this endless dark void, there was no sky or ground. There was no horizon to guide you, and no up or down. Every direction felt the same, like drifting in an ocean of shadows. I had to rely on my Zealot's Stride to move and on the drifting debris from the shattered planet as temporary footholds.

I chased Yuan Shen, swinging Silver Steel at him with all the speed I could muster, but he moved with impossible grace. With just the faintest tilt of his head or the smallest shift in his weight, he avoided every strike. It was as if my attacks were happening a second too late, or worse… as if he could see the future.

I clicked my tongue and summoned Soulsunderer from my pocket dimension, gripping it in my left hand. The air trembled as I mixed in Divine Smite and Thunderous Smite, twin flashes of gold and silver chasing him through the void. Still, not a single blow connected.

Each failed strike reminded me of something… of that cursed loop during my rampage in the Summit. The curse was called Never Ending Bond of Regrets. It was designed to trap me in an infinite cycle, grinding my soul until I lost all sense of self.

Yuan Shen's calm voice echoed through the void. "Are you not curious?" he asked, tone almost gentle. "About your true origin? About why the Supreme Beings have such a vested interest in you?"

He raised a hand, and a dark saber materialized from the shadows, its edge rippling like liquid night. I didn't answer him. I simply tightened my grip on my swords and met him head-on.

We clashed on a massive piece of debris, a broken fragment of the red planet that served as our battlefield. Sparks of divine and demonic energy danced across its surface as we moved faster than the debris could rotate. My Silver Steel struck with blinding arcs of holy light, and Soulsunderer followed through with heavy, cleaving blows that could shatter mountains.

Yuan Shen parried everything with an almost bored precision. His dark saber bent and weaved like flowing water, his movements a perfect rhythm between offense and defense. Each time I thought I had him, he was already gone, reappearing inches away with that faint, mocking smile.

From behind him, I felt Alice closing in, her presence masked by Da Ji's illusions. Even I could barely sense them through that thick fog of qi and frost. It was a testament to how far Da Ji had come; her illusions were so seamless, so layered, that even I, bound to her by soul, couldn't fully see through them.

Alice burst out from Yuan Shen's blind spot, her floating cursed weapons, swords, axes, and spears, spiraling toward him like a storm. Yuan Shen didn't even look back. With minimal movement, he slipped through the assault, his body shifting like smoke.

"Halo of Restriction!" I shouted, casting the spell three times. Rings of silver light snapped into existence around him, binding him in place.

I pushed more of my faith into Alice through the Divine Appointment of the Faithful, letting her channel the Hell Soul. Her crimson hair lengthened, turning into a river of blood-red flame. Her pupils slit, and black horns curved from her forehead. The air thickened with the scent of iron and rage.

"Divine Transformation!" she cried. "Crimson Soul Rend."

Alice summoned her scythe and swung it with a motion that blended magic and martial arts. A crimson aura bled from her form as her scythe cleaved through the dark. But Yuan Shen simply snapped the silver halos and parried her strike with one smooth sweep of his saber.

He made a quick hand sign, and the void trembled. Thorny black chains erupted from everywhere, binding Alice in place.

I dashed forward, already closing the distance with Zealot's Stride! My movement blurred into light as I folded in Divine Speed and Flash Step. I struck with both blades, but to my shock, they phased right through his body as if he were mist.

From the haze, Da Ji appeared in her monstrous nine-tailed form, her claws shimmering with divine frost. She dove straight toward Yuan Shen, tearing through the air.

Except—!

My world shifted. Suddenly, I was staring at Alice, still wrapped in those thorny chains. And then I realized the truth: Yuan Shen had switched our positions. It was a spatial displacement to the level I was unable to perceive, even in my Divine Sense.

Da Ji's claws connected, not with him, but with me.

"Shit—!" I cast Shield of Faith just in time. The attack sent me reeling backward, several claw marks marking my body, while frostbite clung to my skin.

Alice broke through her bindings, but before she could move, Yuan Shen again switched places with her. Da Ji screamed as the thorny chains slithered toward her. Yuan Shen lifted his saber, intent on ending her.

"Not happening!" I shouted.

I used Castling, trading places with Da Ji. Yuan Shen's killing strike met me instead.

"Sacred Bulwark! Armor of the Indomitable!"

The first spell amplified my reflection damage, the second bolstered my defense with each hit I took. The moment the saber struck, the thorny chains enlarged into blades that impaled me from all sides. Pain exploded through me, white-hot and endless, and I felt my heart stop.

Spell Resonance triggered. My lips parted. "Divine Word: Raise!"

Light erupted from my chest, tearing through the dark. My heart began to beat again. I resurrected on the spot, still skewered by those thorns.

I gritted my teeth and cast Divine Word: Life and Blessed Regeneration. My wounds sealed as fast as they opened, but the thorns were hindering my healing. However, I was not done yet as I cast Sanctified Resurgence, empowering my stats each time I healed. My strength surged again and again.

"Retributive Restoration!" I roared, letting the health I recovered feed back into destructive force.

I let go of Soulsunderer, returning it to my pocket dimension. I slammed my free hand into Yuan Shen's throat, holding him in place. Monkey Grip, empowered by faith and quintessence, locked him in place.

"Now take it all!"

My accumulated reflection damage burst outward, light blazing from my wounds, tearing through the void as I unleashed Divine Smite from my palm around his throat. Yuan Shen's form flickered, his dark aura wavering from the impact. But when the light dimmed, he was still intact, seemingly unscathed and unbothered.

"You don't seem to understand," Yuan Shen said. "In this dark world, I am eternal."

My palm stayed locked on his throat, and yet he didn't look like a man under my mercy. The thorned chains that pierced my flesh thrummed with pain, tearing through me in a thousand tiny cuts while paradoxically bolstering my defenses and reflecting damage back at anything that drew blood from me. However, the reflected damage that should have reached Yuan Shen merely phased through as if he were intangible.

"You are starting to annoy me," I remarked. "Can you just die in peace and not make this difficult for both of us?"

"How about… no…?" spat back Yuan Shen with a sneer.

The sound of metal clinking resounded.

From the black behind Yuan Shen, a figure slumped and dragged itself into view. He looked wrecked, bloodied, spirit-bent, and wrapped in the same ruinous thorn-iron, but here the chains were not merely decoration; they bound his soul and croaked the light out of him. Around his wrists, the links dug deep; around his limbs, the thorns had become a prison. Even wounded, even chained, he lifted his head when he saw me and managed a rasped, tired voice. "He's trapped."

The old man had been Shouquan.

"Is this an illusion?" asked Alice, suspiciously.

Da Ji's tails coiled, and her face hardened. "It's not," she said, low and certain. "But we must be careful."

I stepped forward, keeping Yuan Shen between Shouquan and the void. "Stand down," I said, the words like iron. "It's Shouquan. I can tell." I let my mind reach through the steady pulse of his existence beneath the chaos. Yuan Shen's eyes glittered at the exchange, amusement lighting up the edges of his lips. "Explain, Shouquan. What happened to you?"

Shouquan coughed, and when he spoke, the words were thin and urgent. "After the Summit, this man took me and imprisoned me in this domain. Da Wei, I suggest you go. In this realm, Yuan Shen may be eternal, but he cannot leave. Something of higher power put him here for a vile reason you do not need to be a part of. Let me handle this and watch over him."

It fell into place like a snapped chain. Yuan Shen's proliferation of shadows, the clones he had sent to the Hollowed World to act as proxies… this dark prison explained the pattern. He was dangerous, yes, but contained. If a higher power had locked him into this black shell, then his outward reach had been engineered, not natural. It was cleaner and more terrifying than I'd expected: the snake I hated had been bound by someone else's writ.

Shouquan pushed himself up on shaking arms, as if the effort of raising his head might break him apart. "You have to go. The Falling Realm will complete its descent into the Hollowed World soon, and then you'll be trapped in here forever. Now's not the time to fight him—"

I smiled despite the taste of iron in my mouth and the thorns still rasping my flesh. The smile was small and fierce. "You seem to forget what kind of person I am, Shouquan. When I set my mind to do something, I do it. So no, I reject your advice."

Yuan Shen laughed at that, the sound like dry leaves. "Truly a hero among heroes," he murmured, eyes glittering. "But how are you going to defeat me?"

"You'll see," I said. "Make no mistake… I will defeat you. But first, how about I set you free?"

I reached out then, not with steel but with a plea into the slender thread of belief that still clung to the Hollowed World; I tapped into the little faith that Jue Bu had harbored for me, the quiet confidence of a single soul who had once stood beside me. I let that ember answer, and Jue Bu's voice agreed to lend his Immortal Art. "Use it," he had said in that echo. "I grant you a portion of my power. Use it well."

"I will."

I focused everything into that spark: Jue Bu's Immortal Art, Reversal of Heaven and Earth, braided around my own Immortal Art, Divine Appointment of the Faithful, and tempered with the banishing edge of the Exorcise spell. It felt like trying to twist a mountain with your hands, but Jue Bu's art reached, and my faith lent it teeth. I poured it forward in a single, shuddering breath and watched reality shudder at the edges. Yuan Shen's form flared as if it were being turned inside-out. His smirk stretched, faltered, and then… he simply vanished.

Shouquan stared at the space where Yuan Shen had been, disbelief raw in his eyes. "What did you do?" he asked, voice cracking with incredulity and a little hope.

"How about you find out?" I answered, terse but not unkind. I had left a thread, one Manasoul embedded inside Yuan Shen, so I wouldn't completely sever that presence. Keeping a sliver of him alive meant I could still follow, probe, and if necessary, drag him back. The idea of losing him to the void forever was not something I wanted to gamble over; I wanted his end decided by my hand, not by the whims of whatever had bound him here.

The dark chains that had wrapped Shouquan loosened at my will, rustling like dead leaves. I cast Judgment Severance to purge the last vestiges of the binding, and the enormous golden cross tore through the rift of shadow, its blades of light slicing at the prison's edges. I modified the cross with an Egress spell weave, coaxing a narrow doorway to open, a seam in the black shell that cut like a keyhole into the Hollowed World. The rift buckled, then widened as if swallowing a breath.

"Let's go," I said, letting go of Silver Steel back to my pocket dimension. "We're going to make this work."

I put both hands on the edge of that seam. The dark was slick and stubborn, resisting with the weight of a dozen old gods, but the cross and the faith behind it made the tear grow. My palms burned, my veins filled with the taste of iron and ancient stone, but the seam widened under my fingers until it looked like a mouth opening to release a scream.

"Get ready," I told Alice and Da Ji through Qi Speech, and then I didn't wait for them to move. I jumped. I tore myself through the gap in the darkness with my bare hands, digging at the rim, and I felt the void fight and pull as if it wanted to stitch me back into shadow. Da Ji made herself small at my side like a fox slipping through a crack in a wall. Alice followed, her armor sparking, the old man Shouquan limping right behind us. The entire world bucked as the rift gaped wider, and we plunged through it together.

Light hit like a blade. When I finally stopped tumbling, when my knees found earth instead of void, we were hovering above New Willow, the city spread beneath us like a map of small lives and fragile hopes. Debris from the red planet still spiraled past, hooks of molten stone dissolving into nothing as they touched the Hollowed World's shell. The shell itself had a sheen now, parts folding inward where my cross had bitten, but it held.

Yuan Shen reappeared, less composed than before, his fluency of motion stuttering. The dark that had given him comfort was thin now; his presence had been reduced noticeably. He looked up at the sky where we hovered, and his voice held a new edge, uncertainty sneaking into the edges of his tone. "What did you do?" he asked, and there was anger there, but beneath it a glint of real alarm. Regardless, he showed bravado. "I can't believe this… Did you just free me from my prison? Oh, Da Wei, you sure love playing with fire…"

"Nah… There's nothing 'fire' about you… If anything, I have faith that I will never lose to you."

I felt my Divine Spark pulse as faith washed into me from the Hollowed World beneath. They were tiny at first, then swelling like a tide as the people below murmured prayers without knowing for whom they were ringing out. I let that current fill my core, let the faith I'd fought for and the Paladins' light I'd fostered replenish what Aixin had tried to burn away. Strength returned, warm and sure, knitting my burned skin and tempering my resolve.

"If faith is the power to move mountains, then today I'll move worlds… and maybe punch a few gods while I'm at it. How about we start with you?"

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