The Ending of Senluo

Whose ending? "The three Truth Links should have a progressive relationship." On the rooftop, as Igola sat on the coffin lid and pondered the third link, Gwen murmured softly beside him. Indeed, it had to be a progressive relationship. The first link pointed out the truth of the world. The second link pointed out the Senluo Azure Lord's power to interfere with reality. Then the target that the third link pointed toward should be... Just then, Harvey flew over and said, "A mind sorcerer discovered that after a green beast dies, its soul doesn't dissipate. Instead, it adheres to the crystal fragments, even retaining a certain level of sensory and cognitive capacity..." Gwen hurried to carve this intelligence down. Harvey finished and looked at Igola on the coffin. "Get off." Igola stood up. Seeing that Yaxiu was preparing to fly back to compile information, Igola spread his wings, flew to the other side, and called out, "Come over here." In truth, the relationship between the necromancer and the deceiver was rather delicate: Igola had always looked down on Harvey's macabre aesthetics, while Harvey had no interest in a living Igola. They rarely exchanged words under normal circumstances. Friends, companions, fellow travelers... None of these words accurately captured their dynamic. If pushed to describe it, they were like two freshwater fish in the ocean, wandering together merely because they had been swept up by the same torrential flood... Igola flew into the shadow of some ruins. He glanced up at Black Crow standing guard on the high tower, watching the distance, and sighed, "Yaxiu just loves making trouble for me..." Harvey sat down on a boulder. "Haven't you gotten used to that yet?" "Don't talk as if you don't cause trouble yourself." "At least I don't need you to wipe my ass." Igola stopped bantering with him. "If I'm not mistaken, the third Truth Link is very likely pointing toward Silver Lantern's secret. More directly, it will whitewash everything Silver Lantern has done before." "Hardly likely," the necromancer said, shaking his head. "Even by my values, I can't think of any reason that could rationalize what Silver Lantern did. Even if, as she claimed, dying is merely entering eternity, and she uses that to gloss over her actions... Naturally, I wouldn't mind, but Yaxiu clearly can't just let that slide." "Yet Silver Lantern believes he can," Igola said. "She may have other motives, but her primary objective in coming to the Dead City is probably to make us—or make Yaxiu—understand what she has done. Based on the intelligence she has displayed so far, I don't think this is wishful thinking or self-deception on her part. Perhaps she knows some mental vulnerability of Yaxiu's..." Earlier, Yaxiu had mentioned that it was utterly abnormal for Silver Lantern to remain motionless and allow herself to be trapped until nightfall by the Four Pillar Cult. After solving the first Truth Link, Igola had also faintly grasped that woman's intention. She was probably somewhere in the city right now, waiting for them to unravel the final secret. Harvey said lazily, "So why did you call me over? I have no interest in understanding the schemings of you high-IQ folks." "Tamashi Slay All Crows." Igola murmured the name softly. "No matter what truth we uncover, that stubborn black crow will never abandon his enmity toward Silver Lantern. Because this isn't just about his faith; it's about his revenge. As long as he still wants revenge on Mercury Trojan, he cannot show mercy to any villain. Otherwise, Mercury Trojan will find a chink in his armor and shatter his mental defenses. "'Why are you only targeting me while letting Silver Lantern off?'... A normal person could laugh off words like that, but that damn crow would never accept such an accusation. "I had originally shattered his psychological defense, reducing him to a useless crow. Once he lost his principles, things would have been easy to handle. But of course, Yaxiu had to meddle..." "I'm not surprised in the least," Harvey said languidly. "In fact, I'm tempted to laugh at your lack of foresight—you actually dared to leave Yaxiu out of your calculations." "In short, if it really comes to that, I need you and your new servant to drag Black Crow away," Igola said. "Two Sanctuary sorcerers and a corpse—tying up an ordinary mortal who isn't even a sorcerer shouldn't be a problem, right?" "While I take issue with the term 'ordinary mortal,' it won't be a problem," Harvey said. "So, you're hoping to give up on fighting Silver Lantern?" "It's already very difficult for us to deal with Silver Lantern," Igola said. "Troublesome as the blood seed curse may be, opposing an enemy like Silver Lantern just for the blood seed isn't particularly wise either. "Now that we've broken with the Four Pillar Cult, we've essentially lost the capital to hunt down Silver Lantern—unless we're still willing to cooperate with Mercury Trojan. I wouldn't mind, but could you, Yaxiu, and Tamashi swallow that insult? "Besides, the main reason we hunted Silver Lantern was to resolve Yaxiu's semi-feeler issue. As long as we drop the hostility, we can free up our hands to search for inheritances leading to other realms. Once we leave Senluo, the semi-feeler problem will resolve itself naturally. "And..." Igola's face was concealed in the shadows. "There's no need to put him in a difficult position." "I, for one, would love to see his expression after he kills Silver Lantern with his own hands," Harvey remarked. "It would surely be fascinating." Igola looked at the necromancer. "Archibald..." "Just messing with you." Archibald Harvey patted his rear, spread his wings, and took off. "Don't sit on the coffin lid next time." Having settled the matter, Igola returned to the rooftop. By this time, Gwen had already recorded a great deal of information. "The wasteland era has lasted for over two hundred years..." "Although they are always culled in time, Deep Sea-rank green beasts have been appearing with increasing frequency..." "Because the power of the night's Strangling Green increases year by year, caravan runs have declined in frequency." "During the Fire Cat God Era, two 'Great Blackout' incidents occurred where everyone lost consciousness for up to a minute. It also happened once during the Blue Bird God Era." "Compared to a hundred years ago, average daily sunlight has decreased by thirty minutes." "Once a God Era begins, the green beasts go completely extinct." Unlike the previous two Truth Links, the valid intelligence required for the third Truth Link was not only extremely intricate, but also seemingly unrelated. Igola's deductive process was exceptionally difficult. He could only vaguely infer that the living conditions of the Senluo wasteland seemed to be steadily worsening. Then again, with so many cults waging endless war, it would defy reason if conditions didn't worsen... An increase in green beasts was normal as well. After all, the more people died, the more despair there was, and the Strangling Green would naturally grow stronger. What caught Igola's attention was that green beasts did not seem to possess the concept of death. Even if they were destroyed, devoured, or ground into dust, their souls still existed in other forms. Igola did not know whether they felt pain in such a state, but merely wandering in perpetuity, unable to do anything, was already an unimaginable torment. However, this despair was not without end. As long as a God Era arrived and the hearts of all living beings united behind one will, the green beasts would be thoroughly exterminated, putting an end to their fate of eternal wandering. As the intelligence accumulated, the doubt in Igola's mind deepened. None of this information could be deduced any further—how did it relate to the ending? It felt as though a crucial puzzle piece was missing, leaving the logical chain broken. Boom! A sudden noise erupted in the distance. Igola's first reaction was, 'How can we hear sound when time is slowed?' But on second thought, he understood—just as they could exert influence on physical objects, sound was essentially the vibration they imparted to the air, so it naturally had a certain effective radius. He looked up and saw the scene he least wanted to see: amid the high-rise ruins in the distance, Black Crow was chasing Silver Lantern. That black crow didn't even have a Sanctuary; wasn't he afraid of being killed by Silver Lantern—oh, right, he wasn't afraid. Yaxiu was nearby. Harvey was just returning to submit information. Seeing this scene, he knew things had gotten messy, so he unhurriedly offered the valid clue he had found: "The interval between the First God Era and the Fire Cat God Era was thirty years. The interval between the Fire Cat God Era and the Blue Bird God Era was five years. Between the Blue Bird and the Grey Fox, it was three years." Igola's heart stirred. He realized this was a very important puzzle piece. But without the key missing piece, he still couldn't... Suddenly, Igola recalled the method he used to explore the Distant Sky Realm. When ordinary Sanctuary sorcerers explored the Distant Sky Realm, they either broke into battle directly like Chikala or felt out the affixes like Yaxiu and the others. Igola, however, was different from all of them. He would look for the Dream Lord. The Dream Lord was the master of the dream bubble. Once the Dream Lord died, the bubble would shatter. Sometimes, when a sorcerer fought a Void Realm creature, innocent bystanders would get caught in the crossfire; accidentally killing the Dream Lord would cause the bubble to burst immediately. Yet few knew that the Dream Lord also knew the bubble's affix—or rather, the affix only came into being because of the Dream Lord's particular desires. However, the Dream Lord looked no different from any ordinary bystander, making them exceedingly difficult for a sorcerer to identify even if they knew this secret. Igola, on the other hand, was different. He could analyze factors like the bubble's environment, the appearance of the bystanders, and the surrounding scenery to gradually narrow down the scope until he found the Dream Lord, whereupon he would control them with a mind miracle. This method was naturally time-consuming, but as his proficiency grew, Igola could gauge within five minutes how difficult it would be to find the Dream Lord in a given bubble. If it would take under thirty minutes, he kept searching; if it exceeded thirty minutes, he moved on to the next bubble. Now, he could explore nearly ten bubbles a night. That was why he had acquired functional combat capability so soon after entering the Distant Sky Realm—he lacked Yaxiu's secrets and Harvey's Ghost King Shackles, relying entirely on his own diligence. During this process, Igola had discovered that besides shattering the bubble upon death, the Dream Lord caused other effects. For instance, when the Dream Lord was injured, bystanders would feel pain; when the Dream Lord bled, the bubble's environment would begin to deteriorate; when the Dream Lord was on the verge of death, the bystanders would cease behaving normally and instead become... Insane. Like an iceberg in his mind suddenly melting away entirely, Igola looked down at the ground covered in carved notes. Every joint clicked into place, and the deductive path became crystal clear. First, "Senluo is idealistic" and "the will of the Senluo Azure Lord can directly interfere with reality" were the two great truths already established. The reason why "the intervals between past God Eras were extremely short" was very easy to understand: it meant the Senluo Azure Lord wanted to enter the next God Era as quickly as possible to harvest a new god. "The wasteland era has lasted for over two hundred years" could only point to one conclusion: the Senluo Azure Lord's power to interfere with reality was not what it once was—He couldn't even initiate a God Era anymore! Otherwise, He would have had no reason to abandon this fertile soil capable of cultivating gods! "The deterioration of Senluo's environment," while reasonable from a realistic perspective, was utterly unreasonable in an idealistic Senluo. Here, the will of living beings could affect reality; moreover, everyone was a devout, fervent believer, whose collective will could even produce miraculous creations. With everyone yearning for a better life, the natural environment of an idealistic Senluo should have spiraled upward—how could it possibly decline? Yet the environment had deteriorated. That could only mean the will of living beings was being overwritten by a far vaster will. Furthermore, the "Great Blackouts" and the "Great Cataclysm"—events capable of affecting every person across the entire nation—had to be divine miracles. Under the protection of the Senluo Azure Lord, even if other Divine Lords wanted to cause trouble, they should have had follow-up maneuvers. Why would they simply wipe out the people of Senluo without occupying the land of Senluo? Therefore, the "Great Blackouts" and the "Great Cataclysm" could only have been caused by the Senluo Azure Lord Himself. All of this evidence pointed toward two truths: the Senluo Realm was an idealistic realm, a dream bubble jointly conjured by the people of Senluo and the Senluo Azure Lord. Because it was a dream bubble, the people of Senluo could become grand laws, and absurd phantasm creations could manifest. But because the will of the Senluo Azure Lord surpassed that of mortal beings, His decrees became Senluo's destiny, and His physical state was intimately linked to Senluo's fate. The Senluo Azure Lord was the Dream Lord of this bubble; everyone else was merely a passerby within the dream. The second truth was that the Senluo Azure Lord was on the brink of death! Only being on the brink of death would leave Him unable to maintain and operate the enterprise of God Eras in the Senluo Realm. In fact, the Great Cataclysm itself was very likely the result of His true body suffering a fatal, grievous wound, which wiped out hundreds of millions of Senluo's people in an instant! He was bleeding, which was why Senluo's environment deteriorated year after year; He could not initiate a God Era, which was why the wasteland had lasted for over two hundred years! Therefore, the question posed by the third Truth Link—"What is the ending?"—was asking: "When the Senluo Azure Lord meets His death, what ending will the Senluo Realm arrive at?" When a person dies, their vital instincts inevitably trigger an outburst of the most agonizing despair. Igola did not believe a Divine Lord could withstand the despair of death either. In fact, because He was desperately trying to save Himself, dragging out a momentary death into an agonizingly protracted ordeal, it would ultimately breed a profoundly chilling malice. He had likely been severely wounded and on the brink of death two hundred years ago, merely clinging to life until now without any sign of recovery. If the death of the Senluo Azure Lord meant the destruction of the Senluo Realm and the extinction of all living beings, that would simply be an inevitable apocalypse. But thinking back on Silver Lantern's actions, Igola suddenly realized another, even more terrifying possibility: what if the Senluo Azure Lord died, but the Senluo Realm continued to exist? As the Dream Lord of an "idealistic Senluo," the Senluo Azure Lord's despair would be enough to corrupt the entire land, turning into a Strangling Green that persisted even during daylight, strangling everyone to death, and then... All things would meet the most despairing end. In a flash of insight, the deceiver completely understood Silver Lantern's thinking. Although the most important puzzle piece was still missing, he was certain this was the truth Silver Lantern wanted Yaxiu to know. He abruptly stood up and grabbed Harvey. The necromancer said, "Alright, alright, I'll have Alice come out right away and go with me to stop—" "No." Igola gripped the necromancer's shoulder tightly, a chilling murderous intent flashing in his eyes. "We're going to kill Silver Lantern." Harvey paused slightly, his expression unchanging, though his eyes clearly asked, 'That's not what we agreed on.' "She isn't deceiving herself, nor is it wishful thinking. She's simply selfish." "Silver Lantern must die," Igola said, enunciating every word. "There's no need to put him in a difficult position."