There was a reason Harvey had arrived so late to the battlefield.
The flaws in his Five Consecutive Slashes of Mountains of Corpses and Seas of Blood were too glaring, allowing Silver Lantern to seize an opening and kick him flying. By the time he regrouped and prepared to charge back, Igola had flown over and called out to stop him.
Igola made only one demand: if Silver Lantern wanted to stop and explain herself, and if Yaxiu was willing to listen, Harvey was to pretend to stand down, catch her off guard, and kill her.
Harvey didn't ask why, nor did he say whether he agreed or not. He simply turned back toward the battlefield... Seeing that Yaxiu and Silver Lantern were still locked in combat, he raised his blade and joined the fray.
Although Silver Lantern no longer had sufficient sorcery power to maintain her Sanctuary, that was merely because using it to block damage consumed too much; she still possessed a sliver of sorcery power to cast miracles. Facing the combined assault of Yaxiu and Harvey, she seized every opportunity to drive her Illusion sorcery spirit, creating openings and relying on her own close-combat prowess to miraculously hold her ground.
It was fortunate that she had severely wounded Black Crow earlier; otherwise, she wouldn't have lasted a single second.
Yet Weise had no need to hold out—she knew very well that as long as she stopped fighting, surrendered, and confessed the truth, Yaxiu would shield the villainous Silver Lantern until the Truth Link was unraveled.
Wasn't letting Yaxiu learn the truth her goal all along?
What was she still holding out for? What was holding her back? What... was she afraid of?
Only now did Weise suddenly realize an issue. She had been so consumed with letting Yaxiu know the truth—so she could be understood, supported, and have a companion—that she had never stopped to consider what this would mean for Yaxiu.
She understood that Yaxiu's current mercy stemmed largely from their shared experience of life and death in the Flowing Gold River. It was a completely reasonable justification, one that not even Black Crow would blame him for.
Yet even so, it was already causing Yaxiu unbearable agony.
He could not accept letting the murderous Silver Lantern go free, yet he could not bring himself to strike down the Silver Lantern who cared for him. Two diametrically opposed desires clashed and tore at his heart, forcing him to keep an expressionless face to conceal the raging storm within.
If Silver Lantern were nothing more than an irredeemable villain, he could stand openly alongside Black Crow as an ally of justice, slaying evil and cleansing the world. If Weise were merely an innocent ordinary girl blindly in love with him, he could simply fret in private, agonizing over how to untangle his messy interpersonal relationships.
Instead, the two identities were inextricably entwined, subjecting Yaxiu to unending torment throughout the battle. When besieging Silver Lantern with the others, he would recall the kindness she had shown him in the Flowing Gold River and how she had yielded to him at every turn during their half-month chase. Yet when fighting her alone and granting her a moment to catch her breath, he would remember the people she had slaughtered, the disasters she had engineered, and her cold, ruthless, and cunning indifference toward life. He could neither sever his bonds as decisively as Black Crow nor violate the moral code carved into his own heart.
Weise should have anticipated Yaxiu's feelings long ago. Why had she never realized it until now?
The third Truth Link was meant to make one realize unequivocally that the people of Senluo faced only two endings: enter the Void Realm early to attain eternal freedom, or meet eternal death in Senluo. Weise could accept the former because she firmly believed death was not the end, but to Yaxiu, death was simply death.
Thus, in Yaxiu's eyes, this was merely a choice between a bad ending and an even worse one. Worse still, knowing this meant that he, too, would be forced to make a choice.
Because Weise had already chosen one path and acted upon it, even if Yaxiu merely stood by and did nothing, it would be tantamount to supporting her massacre of tens of millions of lives. Igola or Harvey would certainly never think that way, but people like Yaxiu and Black Crow would drown in self-reproach.
Perhaps "self-reproach" was too mild a word. Put another way, people like them would likely spend their entire lives immersed in the agony of their own powerlessness.
What if he tried to stop Weise instead? Did Yaxiu and the others have a better solution? Were they to hope for some miracle to save the realm of Senluo, or place their bets on returning to save the world after becoming gods themselves? What if the Senluo Azure Lord couldn't hold out for five or ten years? They couldn't possibly dissuade a resolutely determined Silver Lantern with nothing more than empty promises that "there must be another way," could they?
In a daze, Weise suddenly recalled that when she had accidentally strayed into the Dead City, it had taken her only three days to decipher the riddle of the third Truth Link, but a full three months to accept the truth, inherit the dying wishes of the Grey Fox Divine Era from over two hundred years ago, and become the first person to walk out of the Dead City alive.
Why had she forgotten that?
*Swish!*
Seizing the opening while Silver Lantern was lost in thought, Harvey swung his chain sword, unleashing two Mountain of Corpses and Sea of Blood slashes!
Weise dodged in haste, but the blade still grazed her thigh, gouging away a strip of flesh. Silver blood sprayed through the air in an arc, revealing a wound deep enough to expose bone! At that moment, Yaxiu's sword struck from the flank. Weise had no time to heal and could only fight on!
If this continued, she would truly die here. Her sorcery power had run dry, while the necromancer and Yaxiu still retained combat strength—not to mention Chikala, the "Flame of Ignorance"—
Alarm bells rang wildly in Weise's mind, a chill creeping up her spine and spreading throughout her body!
Where was Chikala?!
Right then, the adjacent wall burst open, and Chikala—shrouded in thick black flames—came hurtling through like a speeding dump truck, plowing straight toward Silver Lantern, Yaxiu, and Harvey!
Out on the rooftop, Gwen whispered, "The space at the ground floor is so cramped. I'm afraid the others won't be able to dodge..."
"The whole point is that they can't dodge," Igola said, staring down at the ruined skyscraper. "Yaxiu and Harvey still have enough sorcery power to erect their Sanctuaries, but Silver Lantern doesn't. And in the worst-case scenario where they can't erect them in time, Yaxiu has ways to heal himself. At most, Harvey gets crushed to death along with Silver Lantern.
"So please, Silver Lantern," Igola muttered. "As a monster, you've lived long enough."
*Boom!*
Within the pitch-black ruins of the ground floor, Harvey and Chikala crawled out of human-shaped craters. The necromancer spat out a mouthful of bloody foam, his footing unsteady, while Chikala's sorcery power was completely exhausted, leaving him unable to sustain his Sanctuary.
The moment Chikala had crashed inside, Silver Lantern had immediately lunged toward Harvey. Harvey instinctively launched a double slash at her, and then—Harvey and Chikala collided head-on with full force.
Chikala's fire sorcery miracle, Harvey's Mountain of Corpses and Sea of Blood, and both of their Sanctuaries were shattered to pieces by the immense kinetic impact. Silver Lantern had devised a countermeasure in a fraction of a second, nearly turning a fatal crisis into an opportunity for victory.
Yet it was only "nearly."
Whether she ran out of time or lacked sufficient sorcery power, Silver Lantern ultimately failed to divert all the damage. Chikala's shockwave clipped her, sending her flying into the rubble like a kite with a broken string. Now, she could only stagger to her feet, covered in blood, the flesh of her right arm torn open, and every inch of exposed skin battered and bruised.
On the entire field, only one person remained completely unharmed.
After Silver Lantern redirected Chikala's collision, Yaxiu had completely evaded the impact—so comfortably that he hadn't even needed to raise his Sanctuary.
Without a word, he advanced in silence, thrusting his sword toward Weise. Using her Illusion sorcery spirit to suppress her perception of pain, Weise forced herself to focus and meet his charge.
Yet the moment they crossed blades, Weise sensed something was amiss—not just because this was a routine they had rehearsed countless times, but more importantly, because Yaxiu's strikes were feeble and devoid of any intent to harm her.
After trading blows for two exchanges, Yaxiu tossed his longsword into the air to transition into close combat, and Weise raised her hand to snatch the blade.
Normally, Yaxiu's next move would be to use offense as defense, striking at Weise's wrist to reclaim the weapon and prevent her from pressing her advantage. This time, however, Yaxiu broke from the routine.
He suddenly surged forward into her chest, his right hand reaching for her throat while his left arm whipped out to cut off her escape routes. If Weise did not counter in time, her vitals would be seized, leaving her with no choice but to surrender.
Yet by rushing in so recklessly, Yaxiu exposed numerous vulnerabilities. With a sharp sword in her hand, she could easily wound him and break free of the predicament!
*What in the world is Yaxiu trying to do?*
When Weise met Yaxiu's deep, pool-like eyes, she suddenly understood what he was thinking.
Just as she had given him two choices in the Flowing Gold River, he was now offering her two choices: either give up resisting and let herself be captured, or hurt him to make her escape.
There was an even deeper implication—if Weise chose the latter, it would mean she was voluntarily severing this ill-fated karmic bond. Yaxiu would have repaid the debt of their mutual survival in the Flowing Gold River, and the next time they met, not a shred of sentiment would remain between them.
Yet Weise could choose the former. Regardless of whether Yaxiu intended to protect her, so long as she guided them toward the key intelligence, she could naturally clear herself of her sins.
No matter how one looked at it, the rational move was to surrender, let herself be captured obediently by Yaxiu, and wait for the truth to be unveiled. She might even get to see the regret on Yaxiu's face, stand openly by his side, far outpace Sword Princess and Witch, and lock in her victory ahead of time... But what then?
Did she really want to drag Yaxiu into this impossible world-ending dilemma? Force him to choose an outcome he could stomach from between two disastrous endings?
Had this been before Nightfall, Weise would certainly not have hesitated. She had desperately wanted to see what Yaxiu would look like when his humanity was put to the test, whether he would be tortured into becoming another "true Yaxiu" whom she needed more.
If only there had been no Divine Fire Trial. If only there had been no Flowing Gold River. If only...
Weise had never imagined that someone as single-minded as herself could ever give up halfway. After preparing this plan for so long, when she was merely a step away from completion, she was about to tear down her own work with her own hands.
Perhaps someone would wait for you until night fell.
But you shouldn't go looking for him after the dark had already set in.
Weise tightened her grip on the longsword and met Yaxiu's charge head-on, as though his lunge for her vitals were not a grapple, but an affectionate embrace. Suddenly, Weise remembered the bedtime stories Wei'ounei had told her, filled with fairy tales of princesses and princes.
When planning her journey to the Dead City, she had wholeheartedly believed Yaxiu was her prince. But she had forgotten all along that she was, in truth, the Demon King whom no prince could ever accept.
A Demon King was meant to be wicked and cruel, detested by gods and mortals alike, without a single redeeming quality. Only then would the story remain neat and satisfying. Only then would the other characters be spared all anguish, and everyone could live happily ever after.
Then, the longsword pierced through the prince's back.
Chapter 628