NOVPUBFacing Hanhai’s blood-weeping question, the "Tianjie Venerable" finally turned his head to "look" over.
His eyes still unopened, his voice was quite bizarre.
Intermittent, sometimes loud, sometimes soft.
"Who am I?"
"...Guess?"
As he spoke, he suddenly clenched his left hand.
In the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters, already dead silent with no other survivors aside from Hanhai and Taiyi, the anguished cries of disciples in their dying moments suddenly resounded simultaneously.
Impaled in midair, unable to move, Hanhai even saw transparent figures rising from the corpses of the disciples. 𝓷ℴ𝓿𝓹𝓾𝓫.𝓬ℴ𝓶
As if still caught in the instant before death, their faces were filled with terror and despair.
"Ahhhhhhhhh..."
What the "Tianjie Venerable" did was not merely "kill"!
He wanted the disciples of the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters to live eternally in the agony of the moment before their death!
What kind of grudge could lead to such a malevolent act?
Filled with extreme grief and anger, Hanhai exploded with his full strength, attempting to break free from control.
But he couldn’t shake the black gleams piercing his body at all, instead, the backlash caused him to bleed from his seven orifices, a sight most pitiful!
Hanhai could only watch helplessly as the man before him turned all the deceased disciples into a wretched existence that seemed neither alive nor dead!
"Tianjie Venerable, master of the path of slaughter."
"Such methods are definitely not within His capabilities."
"No, that’s not right..."
Hanhai’s eyes became lifeless, as he muttered to himself.
Moments later, as if having realized something, Hanhai’s body trembled: "Celestial Doctor? Are you the Celestial Doctor!?"
As Hanhai shouted out these words, the figure tormenting the disciples of the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters also paused slightly.
Then, a strange smile appeared on his face.
"Celestial Doctor..."
"Hehehe, yes. I am the Celestial Doctor!"
Upon these words, the world in Hanhai’s eyes changed thunderously.
The figure of the assailant, who originally had the appearance of the "Tianjie Venerable," instantaneously transformed into that of the Celestial Doctor!
Full of compassion, appearing righteous, yet he committed such an appalling deed!
The black Sword Light trapping Hanhai also turned into numerous black fine needles!
"It really is so!"
"Why! Celestial Doctor!"
Believing he had uncovered the truth, Hanhai issued a roar that shook the heavens and the earth.
"Why! Why!"
He kept demanding.
But the Celestial Doctor, as if hearing none of it, maintained the same expression from start to finish.
Only in those turbid eyes, there seemed to be a hint of admiration as he watched the "resurrected" disciples of the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters.
As if admiring his own masterpiece.
The reborn disciples first looked around dazedly, noticing their somewhat transparent bodies, then began to look around them.
Gradually, they too slowly became aware of what had happened to them.
Hanhai’s roaring made it clear to them who was the true culprit behind all this.
"Celestial Doctor!"
"Celestial Doctor!"
Their resentful and furious roars rose and fell in succession, echoing throughout the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters.
It was enough to chill one’s bones.
Yet the Celestial Doctor appeared as if he were listening to a wonderful symphony, his face actually showing an intoxicated expression.
This made the people of the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters even more unable to control their emotions, wishing nothing more than to tear the flesh of the Celestial Doctor.
But they were still under the control of the Celestial Doctor, only able to let out futile roars.
Yet they were unable to make any move to resist.
After an indeterminable amount of time, the Celestial Doctor seemed to have heard enough and his expression suddenly changed.
With his cold snort, endless darkness engulfed the people of the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters.
...
The scene abruptly ended.
When light returned, it was back to the moment shortly before, in the Grand Hall where Hanhai and Taiyi were conversing.
"It seems that this nightmare-like memory is the source of Hanhai’s torment," Li Fan pondered to himself.
Viewing the memory several more times from Hanhai’s perspective and confirming there were no other anomalies, Li Fan’s sliver of consciousness tried to leave this place.
However, to Li Fan’s surprise, he found no way out!
The scene in this loop had become incredibly close to actual reality.
If one could wake up from an Illusion Dream or from memories,
how could one return to reality from reality itself?
Cut off from the outside world, Li Fan tried many methods to leave but all ended in failure.
But Li Fan didn’t panic.
After all, it was only a fragment of his consciousness that had come here.
To his true form, the loss of this fragment of consciousness could be healed in less than a breath’s time.
Logically, since escape seemed hopeless and it would not cause damage to his true self,
this fragment of Li Fan’s consciousness could simply annihilate itself and be done with it.
But driven by the instinct to survive, this fragment of Li Fan’s consciousness still wanted to make another attempt.
To see if there was any way to break the cycle.
"Even I, an outsider, cannot escape this eternal nightmare. It’s even less likely for Hanhai, the master of this place."
"But the reason for the current situation is worth deliberating. Is it because Hanhai himself suffered too much stimulus and could not free himself, or is it something else…"
Though startled, Li Fan didn’t descend into chaos and continued to experience the nightmare from Hanhai’s point of view.
Once again, he went through the hellish scene, the cold snort of the Celestial Doctor, and the onslaught of darkness.
Li Fan focused his attention and looked into the darkness.
The darkness lasted only for a few breaths.
At first glance, it seemed to be a mere absence of memory causing pure darkness.
But Li Fan sharply detected that the time shrouded in darkness was divided into two distinct parts.
The first part was when Hanhai’s perception of the outside world was forcibly obscured.
Only after that did the interlude of the nightmare cycle begin.
However, as both parts manifested as pitch-black Death Silence, Hanhai, in his state of madness, could not differentiate between the two.
Only Li Fan, the outsider, could faintly perceive the subtle differences between them.
Even then, had it not been for Li Fan’s accustomedness to worldly tragedies and his heart as steady as stone, unmoved by the tragic events in the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters, maintaining absolute calm,
he would have found it very difficult to detect the stark differences between the two.
With this entry point, the fragment of Li Fan’s consciousness continued to wait within the nightmare cycle,
Trying to break through the darkness to witness what was happening outside.
"It seems that the ’Celestial Doctor’ didn’t stop just because he was tired of listening. That subtle change in expression…"
"Someone came."
Li Fan suddenly realized.
After enduring the cycle patiently for hundreds of times, bit by bit, from the faint light and shadows captured,
Like putting together a puzzle, Li Fan finally pieced together the events that had been obscured by the darkness in that instant.
Not long after the "Celestial Doctor" had suppressed everyone in the Celestial Palace of Clouds and Waters, a figure rapidly approached from the horizon.
The "Celestial Doctor" wore a mocking expression as his figure faded and disappeared without a trace.
And the figure that arrived later turned out to also be the image of the Celestial Doctor!
