The toll of a bell rang out once more.
The vast sea stalled; the howling gale froze.
Between a deathly silent ocean and sky, a diminutive figure leaned upon a cane, walking step by step toward the Border Realm, all alone. As if weighed down by extreme age, each forward step brought a slight stumble, pausing with every stride, faltering and unsteady.
He rested his weight upon the ebony cane in his hand.
Yet for some inexplicable reason, despite such an emaciated and wizened frame, the moment that negligible weight struck down along with his cane, the entire present world shuddered faintly.
The vast ocean trembled, the mountains echoed, bursting forth with a colossal chime.
Even the distant shadow of the Profound seemed to waver faintly ahead of this solitary man.
Elder Zhen's expression shifted slightly.
Within the Profound, colossal silhouettes loomed into faint view one after another, fixing their gazes intently upon the newcomer, filled with dread, vigilance, and suspicion.
The undisputed strongest artificer beneath the Grandmasters of the Association, the Association's unquestioned trump card, standing merely a half-step away from the realm of Grandmaster—Clock Tower!
As a disciple under Scavenger, he had entered the Imperial Senate over a hundred and ten years ago, overseeing the maintenance and operation of the Empire's axis. He was hailed as the artificer closest to the pinnacle of power, the Empire's Uncrowned Dragon.
At this moment, merely his entrance, his presence alone, put the entire Profound on high alert!
"...Now?"
Elder Zhen lifted his gaze. "Playing your decisive trump card so hastily—aren't you being a bit too impatient?"
"Fast or slow, it's all the same. Sooner is better; I'm annoyed," Tianlu rested his chin on his hand, completely nonchalant. "Besides, nobody made a rule that you can't open with your trump card right from the start, did they? Or is the Profound so lacking in people that you dare not accept the challenge?"
"Then let us continue," Elder Zhen declared, casting his eyes downward behind him.
Soon, from within the writhing shadows, countless pale hues resembling drifting snow coalesced, pinching together into a faint outline that materialized before Clock Tower.
"It's you again, Bai'e."
Clock Tower gave an enlightened smile, as if with a wistful sigh. "I recall a scene like this some two hundred years ago. Back then, we stood outside the grounds, shoulder to shoulder as witnesses...
"And now, we stand as foes once more."
He said, "What a pity."
"Crawling out of the Empire's tortoise shell with such difficulty, only to turn out so old you've started wallowing in the past, Li Lin?"
Bai'e said coldly, "You spent your whole life dedicating yourself to your bullshit legacy and your clan. For the sake of your Empire, you severed your path to the realm of Dragons and Sages, falling to this pathetic state. With only a bag of old bones left, you still come out here to wallow in sentimental sorrow... Toiling aimlessly for a century without achieving a thing—did you finally realize your regrets come too late?
"Or are you counting on our past friendship to have me point you toward an illuminated path?"
"I'm merely reflecting on how swiftly everything has flown by..."
The aged artificer sighed softly. "A lifetime passes in the blink of an eye, hurrying along, waiting for no one. Even though I still have plenty of time, yours... is almost up."
At that instant, he looked up at his 'old friend', brimming with sympathy and compassion, offering a solemn farewell.
He said, "Goodbye."
Upon his wrinkled, weathered face, phantom light resembling scales silently emerged, like a dragon in the mist revealing its contours—a single scale, a stray claw.
Bai'e's expression changed drastically.
Too late.
Before the words could fully fade, a majestic bell toll chimed, resounding throughout the entire Border Realm. It even broke through the Border Realm's barrier, reverberating between ocean and sky, setting the firmament flickering and the ocean boiling.
In the snap of a finger, the heavens flickered between light and dark countless times. The boiling ocean surged skyward, dancing and shivering amidst the bell chime, keening incessantly.
All the onlookers instinctively held their breath the moment the bell sounded, longing to step back.
Within Tianshu, artificers instinctively lowered their heads to look beneath their feet.
In the cracks between the floorboards of the pavilion, a wisp of wild grass silently sprouted and withered away just as fast. Blossoms bloomed and faded; in the blink of an eye, the pavilion swayed, decaying and crumbling.
Like an instant across the seas, a thousand years, ten thousand years!
That was...
—Celestial-Human Chronowedge: [Eternal Motion]!
A terrifying power forged through the Path of Embers, blending the transmutations of matter and time, integrating the essence of the Barren Ruins and the Eternal Gate.
Seas turned into mulberry fields; all things in perpetual motion.
Using his own stillness to engrave the vicissitudes of time and the turning of eras.
Amidst the vast tolling of the bell within the Border Realm, a thousand years passed in a snap of the fingers... Bai'e's figure remained frozen in place forever, his crumbling face still bearing remnants of fury and confusion.
"You... just what..."
Li Lin remained silent, not uttering a single word.
Behind him, a fissure surfaced upon the shadow of the Clock Tower, yet it still stood towering, looking down upon all creation.
And so, no other sound remained.
Bai'e turned to ash and smoke.
An artificer chasing the eternity of matter had ultimately returned to dust.
In that instant spanning a millennium, he had long since perished; all that remained were fractured final words destined never to receive an answer.
The last surviving wisp of pale ash drifted in the wind, rising toward the heavens, carried far away.
"What fine daylight."
Li Lin looked up, gazing into the heavens embracing the ashes, unable to keep his thoughts from wandering: Had the sky two hundred years ago been this bright and clear?
It seemed it had rained, yet it also felt scorching.
He could not remember.
Memories had grown far too blurred; time had long altered everything.
It didn't matter. All things were in eternal motion; with enough patience, amid the seas turning into mulberry fields, one could always wait out a similar season.
And so, the old man remained waiting in place.
Gazing toward the deathly silent shadow of the Profound in the distance.
He raised his hand.
He said, "Next!"
No need to wait for oceans to turn to mulberry fields. Now, everything from days gone by would be recreated by his hand!
"Next!"
Inside the Hall of Quietude, Jiang Tongguang's voice rang out in urgent haste. "Hurry, hurry, hurry! Don't dawdle, time is short—"
Right before everyone's eyes, a faint ripple suddenly surfaced across the dusty mirror, reflecting the scenery on the other side. As soon as the first person vanished into the mirror's shadow, the second charged straight in, followed closely by the third, the fourth...
Having waited for so long, the artificers leapt into the mirror's reflection according to their assigned positions without the slightest hesitation. In a fleeting tremor of the Lock, they slipped through the narrow gap reserved specifically for them.
Descending with pinpoint precision from the present world, they plunged into the deepest reaches of the vortex.
Locked onto the Vale of the Profound!
"Thank you for your trouble, Grandmaster."
As Jiang Tongguang finally stepped toward the mirror, he gave a final nod to the middle-aged artificer before it, who had graying hair and downcast eyes. "I'll trouble you with the follow-up as well."
"One hour," Plowsmith sighed wearily. "Don't pin too much hope on it. Remember, it can only be maintained for one hour at most. Once that time runs out, no one can save you."
"It doesn't matter," Jiang Tongguang smiled one last time and plunged into the shadows.
An hour?
Whether for life or death, it was more than enough!
Upon the mirror's surface, the final ripples dispersed silently. Amidst the shifting rainbow lights, hideous shadows beneath the vortex emerged; countless sights intersected and rushed toward them.
BOOM!!!
The instant he leapt into the mirror, Ji Jue felt the familiar fall begin once again.
Just as when he had plummeted from the Sacrificial Temple of the Ancient Beginning beyond the present world, in that familiar weightlessness, the air he relied on to survive, gravity, and everything else seemed to rapidly recede from him.
Yet unexpectedly, he felt neither panic nor discomfort—instead, it was immensely soothing.
Like returning to swaddling clothes, so deeply reassuring.
When he had fallen in the past, he was aimless, as if swept away by storms and torrents. Now, it felt more like riding down a water slide: even if the world spun around him, he remained firmly on track, completely free of any chance of losing control.
He could even open his eyes to take in the scenery beneath the vortex.
Pity there was no scenery.
In the darkness, their silhouettes seemed to flicker continuously, breaking through layer upon layer of unseen walls in a chaotic rush. The world before their eyes shifted endlessly, dazzling and bewildering.
In a word, it was utter chaos.
Like clumsy CGI generated by an AI pulling from who-knew-what asset library: out of the dark rose the outline of ruined battlements, only for the silhouette to slowly dissolve into a wasteland strewn with cracks and skeletons.
The wasteland expanded rapidly, turning into a rampant oceanic flood; once the flood congealed and shifted orientation, it actually transformed into a lush, overgrown garden. Innumerable leaves and branches converged into a blurry human face, which seemed to sense prying eyes and whipped its head around—yet right before it turned, the world before Ji Jue shifted into a boulder-strewn hill...
In this ambiguous chaos, it was as if some form of transmutation was constantly brewing; often, merely shifting one's perspective made everything completely different.
Everything felt entirely natural and a matter of course, which made intruders like them seem like the true anomalies.
Within this void, who knew how many things discarded and severed by the present world lay sunken and buried? Overlapping and clashing with one another, apocalyptic spectacles were everywhere.
Without beacons or resonance, reaching a destination was nearly impossible even if it sat right before one's eyes; sometimes a single step forward meant plunging into an eternal abyss.
Only vile fiends of the Celestial-Human realm could carve out a stable territory beneath the vortex, or even turn around and siphon this boundless chaos to use at will.
And where they were headed now was a domain that ranked among the very few beneath the vortex, a realm of Stagnant Rot cobbled together from the painstaking creations of countless Profound artificers—the Profound itself!
Whether it was called a well or a vale mattered not; it was merely an observational difference stemming from individual perspective.
Yet when it all truly reflected in Ji Jue's eyes, he saw mountains and tides formed of infinite jade-green flames: a crucible violently siphoning boundless chaos, giving birth to endless transmutations!
The fire within the crucible shifted faintly, like an eye opening wide.
They plunged straight into the pupil.
The world spun violently as they tumbled into the dust.
Amidst the dead silence, stifled coughing rang out, accompanied by an endless barrage of shattering sounds.
Those were the protective talismans worn by the artificers.
It was like plunging into the deep sea in an instant: no matter how sturdy the defense, none could withstand the terrifying water pressure. To resist rashly would only disturb the behemoth dwelling within the abyss, leaving them no choice but to grit their teeth in silence and endure it.
Or pretend to suffer, hiding how completely at ease one felt.
"Cough, cough—"
Ji Jue coughed twice. Feeling it lacked sufficient vigor, he added two more coughs for good measure. Looking around, he found himself standing inside a dilapidated workshop blanketed in dust.
The crucible inside the workshop was still burning with silent flames, maintaining a barrier that sealed the interior from the outside world. At the same time, prearranged guidance resonating with the present world had silently pulled them down into the Profound as they fell.
For a moment, he couldn't help but marvel.
It really was the Association—what vast wealth and influence. Did they even have a branch office down beneath the vortex?
Boom!
Before he could think or react, the workshop jolted violently with a deafening crash. Outside the dust-covered workshop, a colossal shadow slowly rose.
In the murky darkness, an enormous eye filling the entire window slowly opened, drawing closer inch by inch.
Peering straight inside the workshop!
Chapter 811