Chapter 117
"You cannot do this, Ling Xu," whispered the Cancer plague Consciousness, its voice no longer calm and measured like when it explained the realm of Humanity, no longer sharp and vigilant like when it watched The Silent One turn reality into a blank canvas, but gentle, incredibly gentle, like a mother stroking the hair of her feverish child and saying that it is alright to rest, alright to let go, alright to admit that you are tired, that you cannot continue, that you need help.
"Your body cannot endure it. Your foundation cannot endure it. You have already crossed the limit, Ling Xu. You have already done far more than anyone should ever be capable of doing. Now stop. Let go. Let me—"
But Ling Xu did not listen.
Or perhaps he did listen, but simply did not care, because to him, nothing was more terrifying than losing Huan Zheng, nothing was more horrifying than allowing that lazy man who had died eleven times for him to awaken from unconsciousness only to hear that Ling Xu was gone, that Ling Xu had become a monster, that Ling Xu could never return.
And with complete awareness, with determination that could not be shaken by anything, he ignored the warning of the Cancer plague Consciousness, ignored the pain spreading from the tips of his hair down to his feet, ignored the fact that every passing second brought him closer to total destruction, and continued pushing, continued forcing, continued trying to maximize the potential of the Cancer plague he possessed even while his body screamed, even while his soul screamed, even while his entire existence screamed that this was suicide, that this was madness, that this was something he could never take back once he crossed the point of no return.
And there, amidst the clash of equally overwhelming energies between Ling Xu and The Silent One—between the Cancer plague pulsing with an increasingly unstable rhythm because its owner was forcing it beyond its limits, between the golden radiance of the soul of the God of the Vast Cosmos that, despite being only a fragment, still felt like an ocean that had never known the meaning of retreat, between those two powers colliding in the air like mountains crashing into one another while neither side wished to yield even as both cracked apart and crumbled into dust—The Silent One saw an opening.
Not a large and obvious opening like a door flung wide open, not a gap that anyone glancing toward Ling Xu would notice, but a small and narrow opening visible only to eyes trained for thousands of years to search for an enemy's weakness, an opening born from Ling Xu's body beginning to fail under the Cancer plague's forced potential, from the cracks forming within the foundation of his cultivation despite being coated by the flesh of the Cancer plague, from his increasingly short and fragmented breaths because his lungs could no longer process air properly.
And The Silent One—or rather, the soul of the God of the Vast Cosmos controlling every movement of The Silent One's body with inhuman precision, with speed impossible for the naked eye to follow, with intent that never hesitated because he had slaughtered more beings than there were stars in the sky—took that opportunity.
He raised his right hand, and at the tip of his index finger, an Ink Arrow began to form—not an ordinary arrow made of wood and iron, not an energy arrow that could explode or disperse into particles, but an arrow made from the very same ink he had used to write the sentence "I will kill you." in the air, the same ink that transformed reality into a blank canvas, the same ink that, once it struck its target, would inscribe death into the script of the novel Wheel of Cultivation: The Last Descendant of Reincarnation, making that death irreversible, unavoidable, unchangeable by anyone because it had already been written, had already become canon, had already become part of a story that could never be rewritten.
"Goodbye, Ling Xu," The Silent One whispered, his voice no longer deep and heavy like when he displayed the remnants of his power, but flat and hollow once more, returning to the voice of The Silent One who had never learned to feel anything beyond obedience to the will of the God of the Vast Cosmos that had possessed him.
And the Arrow Ink shot forward.
Not like an arrow released from a bow, but like words spilling from the mouth of an enraged writer, like sentences hastily scribbled across paper soaked with tears, like ink dripping from the tip of a pen onto a blank canvas with a speed no one could ever stop—piercing through Ling Xu's chest, piercing through his heart that still beat with an increasingly sluggish rhythm from exhaustion, piercing out through his back, bursting from his body like a child born from a womb never prepared to give birth yet forced by nature to deliver regardless of the flowing blood, shattered bones, and torn flesh.
And Ling Xu—whose eyes remained open, whose third eye still glowed with a dimming grayish-green light like a candle running out of wick, whose mouth remained half open as though he wished to say something but never had the chance because the Arrow Ink was faster than any words he could speak—felt his body shatter.
Not shattered like a building collapsing in an earthquake, not shattered like a glass falling from a table and breaking into fragments that could never be pieced together again, but shattered like words written upon sand when the tide comes in, shattered like a dream too beautiful to ever become reality, shattered like something that had never truly existed at all.
His hands vanished first, followed by his arms, then his calves, and finally—slowest of all, heaviest of all, most agonizing like a loss that could never be replaced by anything—his head vanished, completely burned away, completely devoured by the ink that destroyed not only flesh and bone, but also erased his existence from the script of this novel, erased his name from the list of living characters, erased everything he had ever done and everything he had ever experienced from the memories of readers who might one day read this story.
And Ling Xu's body, no longer possessing hands, arms, calves, or even a head, fell backward, fell flat onto the ground with a sound that was not particularly loud because his body had become far too light, because most of him no longer existed, and the moment that body touched the earth, the moment the surrounding dust scattered as though in shock, in reverence, or simply because it no longer knew how else to react, Ling Xu's body disappeared.
Disappeared like mist driven away by the morning sun, disappeared like breath escaping from one's lips during winter, disappeared like something that had never truly existed in the first place.
To be continued…