Mental space.
The sensation of falling once again enveloped Adam's entire body. He opened his eyes. Then, Adam froze.
This time, there were no false scenes, no familiar classrooms, and no eerie staircases. Adam simply floated silently within an indescribable space. Countless pale blue light orbs drifted around him, like an ocean formed by billions of fireflies. Each orb rotated slowly, its surface flowing with blurred images.
"This is..." Adam frowned. He reached out, his fingertip lightly touching the nearest light orb.
In an instant, images flooded his mind—
In a desert filled with swirling sand, an ancient city was burning. A woman held the corpse of her child, kneeling silently before the ruins. Her eyes could no longer cry tears; she only gazed vacantly into the distance at the receding banners of the conquerors. Then, she died. The despair and suffering she had initially imagined were revealed to be trivial compared to what came after death.
Adam jerked his hand back. The images vanished, but that despair remained in the depths of his perception, like a cold viper coiled around his heart.
"These are..." He looked around at the countless pale blue orbs, and an unbelievable realization naturally surfaced in his mind. Could it be—
He took a step forward, and the surrounding scene shifted instantly. On a road made muddy by torrential rain, people in rags struggled forward. Someone fell and never got up again. The living continued forward numbly, inwardly envying the dead who, in their own understanding, had gone to heaven. When they died in turn, they naturally learned that neither heaven nor hell existed; there was only a painful immortality.
Adam remained silent, walking among these illusory figures, feeling the thick haze woven from despair, pain, and fear. He took another step, then another. The scenes kept changing, but the despair remained eternal. Before death, everyone was equal.
Adam stopped. He stood in place, watching the pale blue light orbs float, rotate, collide, and shatter like bubbles around him, only to reform once more.
Billions of orbs. Billions of agonies.
This was the source from which that entity drew its power. This was the collective painful will of every person who had died throughout tens of thousands of years of human history.
"Please help me..." A tiny voice whispered in his ear, like the buzzing of a gnat.
"The pain... it hurts too much..." Another voice, clearer this time, carried an indescribable shrillness.
"AAAAAAAH—!"
A shriek suddenly exploded, and countless voices flooded into Adam's ears simultaneously. However, he remained unmoved.
"Give it a rest." Adam shook his head speechlessly. These ravings, this pain, these seemingly real expressions of emotion—it was all too forced. Deceased individuals who truly experienced that eternal torture would not have enough willpower to express their demands so clearly.
"Is this all you've got? Trying to use this trick to find my specific location in the mental space?" The corner of Adam's mouth quirked upward. "Do you take me for a fool?"
During the fall, Adam—having suffered a small setback earlier—had naturally draped a layer of protection over himself. The inspiration for it came from the Absolute Exclusion Harness he had seen earlier. Clearly, Adam had successfully made it so the entity could not "see" him. This forced the entity to use such clumsy techniques.
He paid no more attention to the increasingly sharp ravings and began to carefully observe the surrounding space. After all, Adam had proposed this plan because he indeed had experience with mind-diving; it was just that his original Foundation universe didn't have the "Afterlife" anomaly, so most of his experience was technically void here.
Beside Adam, the pale blue orbs continued to drift, but upon closer inspection, one could see that their trajectories were not entirely random. A faint, subtle network ran through them, connecting all the orbs like blood vessels, eventually converging toward some invisible depth. That was the location of the entity within the mental space.
Adam pondered for a moment. Better to be safe. Charging in blindly would likely be like a home-delivery service for the enemy.
Got it.
Adam let out a soft breath. He raised his arm, his gaze landing on the densely packed pale blue orbs. Destroying these consciousnesses and ending their pain—which would also destroy the entity's power source—was indeed a good idea. Of course, Adam couldn't do it personally.
Adam focused his mind, and his reality-warping ability operated once again. A phantom figure slowly took shape beside him.
As expected. The previously aimless pale blue orbs suddenly turned, like a pack of sharks scenting blood, and crashed frantically toward the location of the decoy. Billions of ravings erupted simultaneously, turning into a terrifying mental torrent that slammed hard into the phantom.
BOOM!!!
The decoy trembled violently under the impact, and fine cracks began to appear on its surface. Adam gave it one last look, turned, and stepped away. Behind him, the decoy shattered with a roar.
A phantom starry vortex suddenly expanded, swallowing all the surging pale blue orbs. The orbs struggled, twisted, and shattered within the vortex, finally turning into countless fine points of light that dissipated into the void. At the same time, a massive amount of soul fragments poured into Adam's body along a hidden connection.
Adam closed his eyes, feeling the reality-bending strength within him climb frantically. This taste was truly excellent. He opened his eyes and looked into the depths of the space. There, a gargantuan will had awakened. The entire mental space was trembling; invisible ripples spread from the depths, sweeping through every inch of space. The remaining pale blue orbs shook violently in the ripples, letting out even more piercing shrieks.
Adam's mouth curved upward. Look for me. Take your time.
"Goodbye now!"
In the next moment, Adam moved like a fish, darting freely through the deep sea of consciousness, leaving a purified trail behind him. The pale blue orbs he passed shattered one after another, turning into the purest nourishment that poured continuously into Adam's body. If this entity were capable of emotion, it would likely be swearing profusely by now.
"Wait, this is interesting." Adam frowned. A one-way message from the Console reached his ears. "The battle outside has already started? The shield... so that's how it is..."
He muttered to himself, turning his head toward the entity's position, the light in his eyes growing brighter and brighter.
...
At this moment, in the physical universe.
"Shield energy levels are falling! The rate of decline is accelerating! It's about to disappear!" the researcher at Site-404 shouted, his voice filled with uncontrollable ecstasy.
The O5 Councilor stared fixedly at the screen, the rapidly ticking numbers reflected in his pupils. Then, he took a deep breath.
"The shield is broken. All units, focus fire on the entity!"