CHAPTER 22: THE ECHO OF NULL AND THE SQUIRE OF SILENCE
The transition into the Great Beyond was unlike any simulation Li Xiao had ever experienced. In his previous lives, there was always a world—a foundation of earth, air, or stars. There was always a body that felt heat or cold, and a heart that pumped blood or Qi. But here, in the vast expanse between multiverses, there was only the "Null." It was a colorless, weightless, and timeless sea of non-existence. To enter this place was to invite the erosion of one's own identity.
When Li Xiao's consciousness finally coalesced, he did not wake up in a bed or a forest. He "manifested" in a flickering, semi-transparent form. He was no longer the Omni-Fate Architect; he was Null-Squire #909.
[ Ding! Simulation: The Great Beyond - Day 1. ]
[ Current Identity: Null-Squire #909 (Expendable Unit). ]
[ Status: Identity Erosion at 0.5% per hour. ]
[ Objective: Absorb 'Null Fragments' to prevent total erasure. ]
Li Xiao looked at his hands—they were grey, ghostly, and constantly vibrating, as if the reality they were made of was trying to apologize for existing. Around him, thousands of other "Squires" moved in a rhythmic, mindless procession. They were the scavengers of the void, tasked by the 'Void-Lords' to collect the debris of collapsed universes.
"Move, #909! The Silence does not wait for the slow!" A voice boomed, though it wasn't a sound. It was a psychic ripple that felt like sandpaper against Li Xiao's mind.
A larger entity, a 'Null-Overseer' with a dozen flickering limbs, loomed over him. Its presence was so hollow that it created a localized vacuum, pulling at Li Xiao's very thoughts. Li Xiao didn't respond with words. He didn't have a mouth to speak. He simply focused his intent, realizing that in this realm, 'Will' was the only currency.
He followed the procession toward the 'Rift-Edge'. Below them lay the remains of a minor galaxy that had been unwritten by the Null-Walkers. It looked like a shattered mirror, with fragments of stars and planets floating in a grey soup. To a normal cultivator, this would be a graveyard; to a Null-Squire, it was a banquet.
"Harvest the meaning," the Overseer commanded. "Strip the memories of the stars. The Lords require the 'Essence of Was' to fuel the Great Erasure."
Li Xiao approached a fragment of a planet. As he touched it, a flood of memories rushed into his mind—the laughter of children, the scent of rain on dry soil, the pride of a king. For a second, his grey form flickered with color. He felt a surge of warmth. But then, the 'Null' within him reacted, trying to dissolve the memory into nothingness.
[ Warning: Memory Contamination detected. ]
[ Absorption of 'Essence of Was' in progress. ]
[ System Note: Your current form cannot hold 'Meaning'. You must refine it into 'Null-Qi'. ]
Li Xiao paused. The 'System' he had integrated was struggling to adapt to this alien logic. But Li Xiao, the Architect, began to analyze the structure of the Null. He realized that the Null-Walkers weren't just destroying; they were 'Inverting'. They took the 1 of existence and turned it into the -1 of the void.
"If I am to protect my New Origin, I cannot just fight the -1," Li Xiao thought, his silent voice echoing in the depths of his soul. "I must become the 0. The point where existence and non-existence meet."
He began to harvest the fragments, but instead of refining them into 'Null-Qi' as the Overseer commanded, he began to 'Store' them in a hidden pocket of his consciousness—the 'Obsidian Seed' he had brought from his throne. He was acting as a sponge, soaking up the discarded memories of a billion dead souls.
As the hours passed—or what felt like hours in a place where time was broken—Li Xiao noticed something strange. The other Squires were slowly fading. As they absorbed the 'Null Fragments', their grey forms became thinner and thinner until they simply vanished, becoming part of the void. They were being consumed by the very thing they harvested.
"So this is the fate of a Squire," Li Xiao mused. "We are the filters. We take the poison of existence so the Lords can remain pure in their emptiness."
Suddenly, a massive shadow fell over the rift. A 'Null-Walker'—one of the entities Li Xiao had seen gnawing at the borders of his multiverse—descended. It was a gargantuan, formless cloud of static, its every movement erasing the space it occupied.
The Overseer and the Squires knelt in terror. But Li Xiao didn't kneel. He stood amidst the grey fog, his grey eyes turning a faint, familiar violet. He felt a surge of 'Regret'—not his own, but the collective regret of the dead galaxy he was harvesting.
"You eat the stories of the world because you have none of your own," Li Xiao's thought-voice pierced through the static of the Null-Walker.
The entity stopped. It turned its non-existent gaze toward Squire #909. For the first time in the history of the Great Beyond, a scavenger had spoken back to a predator.
"What... are... you?" the Null-Walker's psychic ripple was like a roar of a thousand dead suns.
"I am the one who remembers," Li Xiao replied.
He didn't use the 'Sword Intent' or the 'Nascent Soul'. Instead, he released a tiny fragment of the 'Regret' he had stored. To a being of absolute nothingness, a single drop of 'Meaning' was like a drop of acid. The Null-Walker recoiled, its static form flickering wildly as the concept of 'Loss' began to infect its void-matter.
[ Ding! Null-Walker 'Infected' with Regret. ]
[ New Skill Unlocked: Void-Writing. ]
[ Current Status: Squire #909 is no longer expendable. ]
The Overseer rushed toward Li Xiao, its flickering limbs raised to strike. "Blasphemy! #909, you have introduced 'Weight' into the Silence! You must be unmade!"
Li Xiao didn't wait for the strike. He reached out and grabbed the Overseer's limb. Instead of his hand being dissolved, it was the Overseer who began to fade. Li Xiao was 'Feeding' the Overseer the memories of the dead galaxy, overloading its hollow existence with too much 'Meaning'.
"Taste the life you tried to erase," Li Xiao whispered.
The Overseer shattered into a million points of grey light, which were instantly absorbed by Li Xiao. His grey form solidified, becoming a deep, obsidian black—a shadow in the void that was darker than the void itself.
[ Evolution: Null-Squire -> Void-Scholar. ]
[ You have gained the ability to 'Read' the unwritten laws. ]
Li Xiao looked up at the flickering Null-Walker, which was still struggling with the concept of regret. He realized that this was his path. He wouldn't just defend his multiverse; he would 'infect' the Great Beyond with the very thing it feared most: A story.
"Lin Yue, Wei... keep the border strong," Li Xiao's silent message traveled through the obsidian seed, reaching his throne in the New Origin. "I am learning the alphabet of the end. And soon, I will write the final chapter for these monsters."
He turned away from the rift and began to walk toward the 'Central Spire' of the Void-Lords. He was no longer a scavenger. He was a virus in the
machine of non-existence, and the Architect was just getting started.