Chosen: Beyond Fate

Behind Lian Cheng, the bone wheel continued its relentless rotation. Tumors pulsed like hearts, and the eyeballs embedded within them overlooked everything.

And yet, the Abomination’s gaze, capable of instantly corrupting even Chosen Ones into aberrants, was completely ineffective against Ji Jue.

Within this demonic black zone, Ji Jue’s spirit matter light continued to shine, unshaken in the slightest. Even the earlier erosion from the Undying Disease had failed to change him in any way. Even now, even after fusing with the bone wheel, Lian Cheng felt no relief from the fear gripping him. Instead, Ji Jue’s mocking smile only made him more paranoid.

Once he made a move, he would show no mercy. He would go all out.

“Die!!”

Amidst the thunderous rotation of the bone wheel, Lian Cheng extended his hand in midair. The aura of the Ascension Path merged with the dark, corrupt fluctuations of the Abomination, fusing countless streams of spirit force into one unified strike. And then, from above, came down an execution of absolute judgment.

After being repeatedly refined and transformed, pure spirit matter turned into a violent shockwave that directly targeted the soul, now further tainted with Abomination corruption as it fired downward.

One strike, two strikes, three strikes, four strikes...

The soul-shocking impacts overlapped without a gap, forming a dazzling yet grotesque dark trajectory in midair as they pierced straight toward their target.

Shrill screams echoed. Crying and screaming filled the air.

With a pull of the chain in Ji Jue’s hand, the monster fetus was suddenly yanked into his grasp. It appeared instantly, like a shield, positioned directly in front of an incoming soul-impact strike powerful enough to instantly shatter any consciousness.

There was no technique involved whatsoever. It was a literal, face-first tanking of the attack, absorbing all of Lian Cheng’s attack head-on. The overwhelming amount of spirit matter and flesh collided, producing a heavy bang.

No, perhaps that was not the sound of collision. It was more like the final wail of blood vessels about to burst in the brain.

For a brief moment, the monster fetus’s already stitched-together small head swelled to twice its original size. Thick streams of blood seeped out from its eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. The two spirit matter heads squeezed out of its fleshly body had exploded instantly.

But immediately after, under the forced reconstruction of Pacifier, they were forcibly stitched back together again. It could only struggle in despair, screaming as it was forced to endure wave after wave of spirit matter impact. It didn’t matter if its soul shattered, if its consciousness split, if it suffered a mental collapse, or if its memory was wiped clean. None of these side effects mattered in the slightest.

As long as Ji Jue had Pacifier, everything could be rebuilt in an instant. Whether its mind was ground into idiocy by soul impact or mutated into a grotesque aberration by violent corruption, none of it could bring the process to an end.

“This all you’ve got? This all you’ve got?! Huh?” Ji Jue nearly laughed out loud as he swung the screaming monster fetus in his hand. “Did you hear that? It’s asking if you’ve eaten yet, and it’s telling you to put some strength into it.”

The monster fetus’s cries grew even raucous. Mockery and cries pricked like needles at Lian Cheng’s face, making his expression flicker between flushed red and ashen fury.

“I want you dead!” Lian Cheng roared.

The bone wheel behind him reassembled into its matrix again, and the eyes embedded in flesh blazed with light. A far more violent surge than before was about to burst forth. But before it could, a chilling bell rang out. It sounded as though it came from the underworld.

“You have no more tricks left, huh?” Ji Jue asked. “Then it’s my turn now.”

At some point, he had taken out the Soul-Summoning Bell and shoved it into the monster fetus’s hands. Once again, it rang.

Ding!

The first chime of the Soul-Summoning Bell awakened all lingering remnants within his perception field. The bell seemed welded onto the monster fetus’s hand. Impossible to shake off, it let out its first clear chime, the summoning and calling from the underworld instantly spreading across the Time Ruin. It was like holding a piece of red-hot iron.

The monster fetus’s screams rose in intensity. A miserable crack appeared across its head, and countless strands of spirit matter leaked out, unable to withstand the terrifying pressure and extraction from the Soul-Summoning Bell.

All the spirit matter it had devoured over these past days was being completely drained away.

The restrictions previously imposed by Professor Ye had already been completely undone under Ji Jue’s Dissociation Technique. In the first place, those restrictions were never particularly tight or permanently fixed. On the contrary, when they were applied, Professor Ye had deliberately reduced the resistance of the corresponding spirit matter circuits to Dissociation Technique. They collapsed at the slightest touch.

Who knew when one would have to fight for their life out in the world? Back when Professor Ye had descended into a Time Ruin and explored rift realms to plunder ancient tombs, she had encountered countless dangers and so many life-or-death moments that even she could no longer remember them all.

One should go all out when fighting for their lives. Restrictions were fine for everyday use as a mild precaution, but when it truly mattered, they should be ripped off without hesitation.

To hell with it, I’ll go all out.

The ringing of the bell echoed throughout the chaotic Time Ruin. A residual spirit matter waterfall erupted from the ruins, covering every bit of land and filling every layer of space.

Sickly green, ghostly light was everywhere, dense to an almost intolerable degree. Under Ji Jue’s ruthless sacrifice of the monster fetus, countless remnant spirits were forcibly awakened from dormancy.

They opened their eyes. Ji Jue’s hand moved again, gripping the small hand of the monster fetus, and struck the bell a second time.

The second chime of the Soul-Summoning Bell triggered the ferocity of all lingering spirits. The first thing to explode was the monster fetus’s head. Like being thrown into a meat grinder, under the unrestricted and violent extraction of the Soul-Summoning Bell, its two spirit matter heads were instantly crushed to pieces.

Yet, in the next moment, they were forcibly reconstructed again, barely maintaining their form. Its small body rapidly withered, like a charred corpse, falling apart piece by piece.

Ji Jue stuffed the fully packed skull spirit matter cage hanging at his waist into the monster fetus’s arms. It was unclear how many patients and aberrant beings it had harvested from, but together with the lingering spirit matter of eight or nine Chosen Ones, everything was swallowed in an instant. The overwhelming emerald light, stirred by the ringing of the bell, had already turned into a raging tidal wave. It surged without mercy, sweeping across everything.

The overlapping, piercing wails of countless souls echoed, forming an inescapable psychic shockwave. Blood gushed from Ji Jue’s nose and mouth, and even Lian Cheng’s vision went dark as he was suspended in the air.

The withered and shattered hand of the monster fetus released its grip, and the Soul-Summoning Bell fell into Ji Jue’s hand. He clenched it tightly, the bell still faintly hissing.

This was the final obstacle, one that could not be entrusted to anyone else, nor bypassed by any other method. He took a deep breath, facing the overwhelming surge unleashed by Lian Cheng, and rang the third chime.

Ding!

It sounded like an ordinary bell, yet it sent a chill down everyone’s spine. From deep within their souls, they could feel a terrifying shadow spreading. Within Ji Jue’s own consciousness, what rang out was a thunderclap that seemed capable of shattering his very soul.

Even though most of the pressure had already been borne and extinguished by the monster fetus, the final burst of terrifying force from the Soul-Summoning Bell still plunged his vision into darkness. The Pacifier barrier protecting his soul trembled fiercely, nearly unable to hold as fissures appeared across.

An unprecedented pain tore through his soul. His internal spirit matter was instantly drained dry, almost as if his soul had been completely wrung out. Immediately after, he had to switch to his emergency spirit matter supply. The reserves stored within his wristwatch plummeted like a freefall.

Since entering the Time Ruin, even when we faced the erosion of an Abomination, Ji Jue had never suffered such severe damage. Yet, at this moment, he felt as if he were being reduced to ashes by the terrifying suction force of that damned bell.

Fortunately, the monster fetus had absorbed part of the burden first, and he had the buffer from the skull spirit matter cage, the watch’s spirit matter reserve, and the support and protection of Pacifier.

This Blessed Creation, specially designed for Rebirth Realm Chosen Ones, finally revealed its true power. The raging torrent that had been pressing forward came to a sudden halt and stopped right in front of Ji Jue. Even though it should have been enough to tear him to dust and obliterate his soul entirely, that single breath of distance felt like the insurmountable gulf between heaven and earth. It was as if time had stopped.

Within the entire Time Ruin, the rising flames, drifting dust, collapsing ruins, rampaging monsters, and all fluctuations of spirit matter froze. Or rather, they were being held still by an unseen hand.

A rumbling shockwave tore through the Time Ruin.

Above the sky, the bone wheel trembled in furious agitation, as if trying to continue its rotation, but it could no longer move. It was already being tightly gripped by an invisible force.

Ji Jue lifted his head and said softly, “All prosperity in the world is created by this hand. Everything that exists in this world is shaped by ten fingers.”

Behind him, a snow-white wing slowly unfolded. Then a second, a third, and a fourth. Countless white wings with no visible origin overlapped, extended, and rose into the sky, enveloping everything.

Upon those wings, eyes slowly opened. There seemed to be thousands or tens of thousands of them. All of them gazed down upon all existence. As countless wings overlapped and shifted, innumerable arms slowly unfurled, revealing their true form. Countless fingers intertwined, as if caressing the ever-changing phenomena within the Time Ruin.

Though it was created from countless residual spirits like grains of sand, this indescribable existence still made Lian Cheng’s heart quiver uncontrollably.

What he saw was unfathomable and incomprehensible. He could not even begin to understand what this was. A mere makeshift construct was seemingly enough to stand against the bone wheel that controlled the entire Time Ruin, and even suppress the manifested authority of the Lord.

“Never seen this before, have you?” Ji Jue wiped away the thick blood steadily seeping from his nose and mouth. He grinned. “Don’t be afraid. A minor cheat like this doesn’t count as proper cheating.”

The solemn entity spread its wings, opened its eyes, extended its arms, and unfurled its fingers toward the heavens. The world fell still. All phenomena within the Time Ruin were once again taken into those innumerable hands.

This was Pacifier Creation, the result of burning through all the power of the Soul-Summoning Bell, consuming every last residual spirit, and being shaped by Ji Jue using the strongest existence he had ever witnessed as a reference.

It was a form recreated by imitating the appearance of the corrupted Mercury from her collapsed workshop. It was Spirit Creation, the Sage’s Remnant Shadow.