[Polite Curtain Call: Even the most magnificent play must eventually bring down the curtain. When you bow, every member of the audience must stand and applaud.]
[Affix Identification Reward: A small amount of prophecy faction experience, a small amount of sorcery power.]
[Limited Affix Privilege: You may trigger Polite Curtain Call once.]
When Yaxiu and the others deciphered the third affix, they realized this was the true secret to clearing the bubble.
If a sorcerer had known about Polite Curtain Call beforehand and bowed to the orc sorcerer and the Gloom-Haze Dragon, the two of them would have turned into audience members applauding, naturally falling out of their actor state.
Even so, a sorcerer still needed means of intangible attacks to deal with these foes—such as wind sorcery, sound sorcery, mental shock, temporal aging, and the like. Yet these were all relatively niche factions; after all, stepping into intangible arts was inherently far harder than tangible ones.
Although this dream bubble was likely one of the higher-difficulty types, it showed that the Void Realm was beginning to test a sorcerer's comprehensive capabilities: scouting affixes, defending against instant kills, and mastering multiple attack methods to handle different situations... A sorcerer with a single trick up their sleeve would soon hit a wall in the Distant Sky Realm, struggling to make an inch of progress. Branching out and comprehending related principles was an essential skill that Sanctuary Sorcerers had to master at this stage.
After all the affixes were identified, the bubble suddenly shrank into a single point and shattered completely on its own!
Everyone tumbled into the true Distant Sky Realm, floating in midair amid infinite radiance, surrounded in the distance by the bubbles of dream illusions. But with no time to admire the scenery, they immediately raised their Sanctuaries to fend off the Wind, Flower, Snow, and Moon Synchronization Forbidden Rite!
At that moment, Yaxiu suddenly remembered something and hurriedly spread his gold and silver wings, rushing toward Sonia—Crimson's Blessing could only maintain a Sanctuary for three seconds, after which it would shatter!
"Wait!"
The village girl raised a hand to stop him, hesitating for a moment before saying, "It seems... I can already condense my Sanctuary."
"So fast?" Yaxiu paused, then let out a sigh of relief. "That's great."
"Why did the bubble pop so suddenly?" Diya grumbled. "We haven't even picked up the loot yet."
Weise suddenly spoke up, "Sink into your souls and take a look."
Everyone looked inward at their souls and soon noticed a large bubble composed of multiple smaller bubbles within, ready to burst with just a single thought.
"Ah," Sonia remembered. "These are affix bubbles!"
"After a sorcerer clears certain dream bubbles, the bubble might shrink directly into the sorcerer's soul and generate affix bubbles based on the affixes they experienced that day!"
"As long as you pop a bubble, a three-winged sorcery spirit corresponding to that affix will be born!"
"The professor said affix bubbles appear randomly, unrelated to the bubble's difficulty. One might show up in the very first bubble, or none might appear even after a dozen. But only affix bubbles can give birth to rare sorcery spirits that sorcerers cannot summon on their own!"
Yaxiu blinked. "There are sorcery spirits that sorcerers can't summon?"
"Of course," Diya chimed in. "For instance, my new 'Witness' sorcery spirit cannot be summoned. Or rather, the race capable of summoning it no longer exists—no living creature today can attack others purely with their sight... Only inside dream bubbles could an affix like 'witness' appear and give birth to a spirit like this."
"So that's how it is..." Yaxiu murmured. "Then how did you get your Witness spirit?"
Diya blinked. "Grandmother gave it to me."
"Didn't you have a terrible relationship with your grandmother?"
"For certain reasons, I forgave her."
"Congratulations." Yaxiu went back to inspecting his bubbles. "I have eight composite bubbles here, exactly matching eight affixes. So do we just pop one at random?"
"Huh?" Sonia was taken aback. "Why do I have nine?"
Diya said, "I have nine, too."
"I have ten." Weise looked up. "Add the collectibles we've obtained, and the numbers match."
Everyone froze, then turned their eyes on Yaxiu one after another. Yaxiu spread his hands. "I don't know anything."
"Come to think of it, the effects of collectibles are very similar to affixes," Weise murmured. "Could it be that these collectibles are all affixes that once existed? This is your power, Spectator—how could you not know?"
"Because he had amnesia before," Sonia said.
In truth, all I said back then was that I lost Heath's memories... Although he felt a slight urge to explain, seeing the Witch and the Sword Princess so utterly convinced—and not knowing how to explain his ignorance of the collectibles' origins anyway—Yaxiu just let it slide.
The look Weise directed at Yaxiu immediately rippled with thoughts—just like the Sword Princess and the Witch, she instantly thought of tropes like "the awakening of a supreme powerhouse." After all, pulling people together into a team inside the Void Realm was already an extraordinary feat, and with his endless trump cards, any reasonable person would assume he was a max-level account starting anew on a smurf.
She quickly masked her gaze, however, and said calmly, "You can't tell the difference between the bubbles from the outside... We can only leave it to luck."
*Pop.*
As the bubbles in their souls burst, four fantasy sorcery spirits were born.
Diya had the worst luck, obtaining the relatively common 'Bubble' sorcery spirit. But she didn't care what she got; after all, she had an entire empire at her disposal. Coming to the Void Realm was purely to condense sorcery power and spend time with Yaxiu. To her, Void Realm gains were merely entertainment—much like a billionaire heiress playing video games with her husband. While running into a rare sorcery spirit was certainly great, she didn't rely on it for a breakthrough.
Yaxiu obtained the 'Acting' sorcery spirit. It didn't possess the invincibility effect of "The Play Begins," only allowing the sorcerer to perform emotionally as if following a script—a rare but practically useless spirit. Still, Yaxiu thought of a very interesting angle to experiment with and stored it into his soul with satisfaction.
However, when Weise and Sonia brought out their new spirits, Yaxiu took a sharp breath. "You two better watch out—you might trip over flat ground for the next few days."
Sonia's new sorcery spirit resembled a ruby, while Weise's was a ray of inspired light—the very spiritual embodiments of the collectibles 'Crimson's Blessing' and 'Inspiration Spectacles'!
Yet Sonia shook her head. "It isn't nearly as practical as the original."
[Crimson Blessing]
[Three-Winged Sorcery Spirit]
[Restrictions: None.]
[Passive Effect: Automatically raises a Sanctuary upon suffering any external attack, lasting 3 seconds, with a 10-second cooldown.]
["May your flames shine forever bright."]
/
[Inspiration]
[Three-Winged Sorcery Spirit]
[Restrictions: None.]
[Basic Effect: Reason and deduce regarding a specific target based on existing intelligence.]
[Passive Effect: You will suddenly recall distant and relevant clues and trains of thought pertaining to the current situation.]
["I close my eyes to touch inspiration, reading the braille left for me by truth."]
Crimson Blessing was fine enough. While a three-second Sanctuary was not overwhelmingly mighty, its greatest asset was automated defense, preventing the Sword Princess from being ambushed under any circumstances. But the fact that this sorcery spirit possessed only a passive effect and no active ability was an eye-opener for Yaxiu and the others.
Inspiration was far more subtle. Not that it was useless; on the contrary, in an adventurous environment like the Distant Sky Realm where deducing affixes was essential, this spirit would undoubtedly shine. But compared to the collectible Inspiration Spectacles, Inspiration seemed far too meager.
Still, after a harrowing battle, these rewards were enough to soothe everyone's weary souls. Yaxiu exhaled. "Let's call it a night."
Everyone nodded. Although only three hours had passed tonight, their soul energy was already eighty percent depleted. Reaching the next dream bubble would require flying over at a slow pace, and the grueling chase that had lasted over half an hour earlier—where they could only take beatings without fighting back—had drained every last drop of their stamina and focus. If they pressed on, an inadvertent blunder might well cost them their lives.
Though the adventure was over, that didn't mean they had to return immediately. Sonia said, "Since we have time now, let's chat."
"Sure," Yaxiu said. "Talk about my experiences in the Gospel Country?"
Diya didn't mind either way. Weise was just about to nod in agreement when she saw Sonia shaking her head repeatedly. "Not that tonight. Let's talk about your current situation first."
Wait, wasn't the Sword Princess eager to hear it just a moment ago? Why wasn't she interested anymore...? Yaxiu scratched his head and said, "Right now, I'm just pursuing the Silver Lantern with my companions."
"This is the first time I've heard you have companions," the president of the Paw-Stretching Club mumbled.
"They're the companions from my jailbreak. You know them too—the mind sorcerer and the necromancer," Yaxiu said with a smile. "We ended up teaming up afterward."
"But didn't you say they were bad people?"
"They really are through-and-through prospective feed for Lalafells," Yaxiu said, floating in the air with his arms crossed. "But as companions, they're actually quite trustworthy."
"The mind sorcerer plans meticulously, is considerate of others, and has a bright, cheerful smile."
Diya recalled the sinister glint in Igola's eyes and the wicked smirk curling his lips. Back then, one of the main reasons Lisi insisted on sleeping with Yaxiu every night was her trembling fear that the Swindler would strangle her in her sleep.
Weise recalled the mind sorcerer's Mind Shriek, and the interlocking traps he laid using fire oil, ground spikes, and explosives. Wherever she fled, traps awaited, and Crow Cull was even lying in ambush along her escape route... Before being pulled into the Void Realm, the person Weise had dreaded most was the mind sorcerer, followed by Crow Cull.
"The necromancer is a man of few words and exceptional talent—an artist immersed in his own world."
Diya recalled Harvey maintaining Alice every night, recalled the food Harvey prepared for Alice, recalled Harvey... She couldn't think about it anymore; the Little Witch in her mind was practically throwing up.
Weise recalled the necromancer's negative-energy miracle that seemed like despair incarnate, and how he merged with a corpse to transform into a Nether Knight, charging straight through the food factory town. While it had indeed thwarted Weise's escape, it had also plunged all the townsfolk into sheer terror. She later heard that Yaxiu and his group had been driven out; the necromancer's stunt of making the whole town eat shit had surely contributed the lion's share to that outcome.
"They sound pretty decent," Sonia remarked, slightly puzzled. "How is it that any two death-row convicts you casually picked up in prison can turn out good?"
Diya and Weise felt as though ants were crawling in their throats, but they ultimately resisted the urge to complain, turning their heads away.
"Or maybe they're only relatively normal around me," Yaxiu conceded with some self-awareness. "Or perhaps I've already been assimilated by them, so even when they do abnormal things, I just take it in stride."
"No, you're not strange at all," Sonia said. "Then tell us about your upcoming plans in detail."
Yaxiu found it strange. "Why do you ask?"
"To help you strategize, of course—and find a way to deal with that little trumpet Silver Lantern."
Chapter 546