Chapter 96
Ling Xu knelt beside Huan Zheng's limp body.
His trembling hands reached for the man's shoulders—shoulders that once seemed lazy and never tense, now felt cold, far too cold, like a corpse that had just lost its soul moments ago—but he did not care, he kept shaking him, once, twice, three times, until the count slipped from his awareness because the only thing he realized was that Huan Zheng did not move, did not open his eyes, did not yawn lazily as he usually did.
And that was the most terrifying thing he had ever experienced in his entire life, more terrifying than his mother's death, more terrifying than losing both his eyes, more terrifying than dying eleven times and rising eleven times, because death at least had certainty, while the uncertainty of whether Huan Zheng was still alive or gone forever was a torment he had never imagined before.
"Huan Zheng… Huan Zheng, wake up… don't be like this… don't leave me…" he whispered between increasingly frantic shakes, more desperate, less caring that Pendiam still stood in the distance with a faint smile on his lips, that The Singer still lay unconscious in another corner of the ruins, that the world around them had returned to its colors as before the battle began, because nothing mattered more to him than the lazy man who had chosen to stay by his side since the first time they met in that dark and damp cave, since he decided to give forty-nine fragments of his Humanity despite knowing the danger, since he chose not to leave even though he could have walked away at any time.
And on the twenty-first shake—for some reason twenty-one, not twenty or twenty-two, perhaps because the universe was being kind to him for the first time in thousands of years, perhaps because Huan Zheng finally heard his call from the depths of dark and silent unconsciousness—Huan Zheng's eyes opened, only halfway, not fully, because his consciousness had not yet fully returned, still drifting between dream and reality, between the remnants of the fifth attack that never came and a void emptier than emptiness, but they opened, and that was enough, more than enough to make Ling Xu sob, crying tears of light that continued to flow from his empty eye sockets, soaking the white bandages wrapped around his head, soaking Huan Zheng's tattered robe, soaking the ground beneath them that had absorbed so much blood and tears and sweat and now absorbed a happiness he had never thought he would feel again.
"You… you bastard… you lazy fool… you scared me… don't ever do that again… never…"
In the distance, The Silent One did not move.
He simply stood in place, ensuring his body remained facing Huan Zheng and Ling Xu, who were still kneeling on the ground with their hands clasped, their foreheads touching, their breaths still ragged from a relief too immense for their narrow chests to contain.
His dark, burning eyes no longer radiated hatred or anger or excessive confidence, but instead a cold curiosity, a curiosity born from thousands of years of existence, from thousands of years watching beings weaker than him struggle to survive, from thousands of years learning that nothing was more fascinating than witnessing someone who had fallen rise again, because in that rise, in that painful process, the true essence of living beings was revealed—not like the perfect Gods who were never wounded, not like the cruel demons who never cried, but like humans, like mortals, like something fragile yet strangely difficult to destroy.
"Before we continue this battle, The Lazy One—or perhaps before you die for the second time tonight—I want to ask you something," The Silent One said, his voice no longer echoing as when he invoked his physical nature, no longer breaking as when he realized Huan Zheng could force him to step back three steps, but flat, empty, like the surface of a lake undisturbed for too long by wind, human, or beast.
And when Huan Zheng—still half-conscious, still lying in Ling Xu's lap with half-open eyes—nodded faintly, a barely noticeable nod, one that felt like permission to speak, Pendiam continued, his voice suddenly heavier, deeper, filled with a curiosity he could no longer conceal.
"Why did the Supreme Court of Humanity hunt you down and label you a murderer? Why did they consider your actions an unforgivable sin, even though what you did was for the sake of those closest to you? And what troubles me most, The Lazy One—why did they stop pursuing you after your foundation and cultivation realm collapsed, falling from the Leg of Humanity to the Star Foundation, or more precisely the Lower Star? Wasn't that the perfect moment to finish you? Wasn't there nothing easier than killing a cultivator who was falling?"
Huan Zheng moved the fingers of his stiff right hand—fingers that once moved so lazily when yawning or scratching an itch that did not exist, now felt like frozen sticks in an endless winter, like tree roots that had died because the soil they clung to had turned into poison.
And with a stuttering voice, emerging from a throat dry with blood, dust, and despair, he tried to form the words that had been lodged in his mind, words that might become the last question he would ever ask before he truly ran out of breath, before he surrendered to the darkness creeping at the edges of his consciousness.
"Was it… was it you who—"
But before the sentence could be completed, before the word "masterminded" could leave his pale, cracked lips, The Silent One laughed.
Not a small laugh restrained behind thin lips, not a bitter laugh born from wounds that never healed, but a booming, shaking laughter that made every particle of dust still drifting in that artificial hell tremble, a laughter louder, wilder, more insane, and most terrifying of all, more disgusting than the two laughs he had produced before, a laughter that made Ling Xu feel nauseous as if he were about to vomit the contents of his empty stomach, a laughter that made Huan Zheng, still lying weakly in Ling Xu's lap, feel the hairs on his neck stand once again, a laughter that made The Singer, still unconscious in the corner of the ruins, suddenly groan softly in his sleep, as if even in unconsciousness, he could feel the corruption emanating from the mouth of the man he once considered a brother.
"You're asking whether I orchestrated everything, The Lazy One?" The Silent One said after his laughter subsided, his voice no longer flat, no longer empty, but filled with a horrifying delight, a delight born from the awareness that he had won, that he had deceived everyone, that nothing could stop him now—not even Huan Zheng, who had demonstrated the power of the Devourer of Adaptation.
"The answer is yes. I was the one who fabricated the case that framed you for attempted murder. I was the one who incited the leaders of the Supreme Court of Humanity, leading to your death sentence. And I was the one who urged all corners of humanity's domain not to continue the pursuit of you after you descended into the world of the gods."
To be continued…