Chapter 282 [Ember Training Cane]

Xia Nan's gaze followed "my" perspective, shifting from the corpse on the ground to the tightly closed doors of the Church behind him.

He thought to himself.

There was no doubt. Given the familiar cleric's robe and the severed neck and left arm—the dried corpse from earlier had wounds in the exact same spots—this seemingly dead cleric was the very opponent he had just fought.

But if this scene was not a hallucination, but a real event that had occurred in another time and space, how had the cleric—whom he had watched "me" kill—resurrected? How had he turned into that living, dried-up corpse?

And why had the grayish-black staff with the orange Flame Crystal at its tip, which "I" had clearly taken from the cleric, returned to the altar?

Xia Nan was thoroughly perplexed.

Yet for some reason, as he thought through the possibilities, the first thing to surface in his mind was the sorrowful, pitying eyes of the Goddess statue. They were bright yellow snake eyes with vertical slits—identical to those on the cleric's serpentine head.

The memory was not over.

The perspective swayed. Amid the grinding of metal armor, two iron-gauntleted hands pressed against the Church doors.

They slowly pushed them open.

Rumble—

The piercing sunlight made "me" squint, unaccustomed to the glare after so long inside the dim Church.

A bustling, wide street came into view.

In both atmosphere and structural integrity, it was a world apart from the narrow, rubble-strewn path he remembered taking to get here.

Even so, Xia Nan recognized the long street at a glance. It was the exact same route he had taken from the entrance of Ash Valley straight to the Church.

Only now, the dilapidated, deathly still atmosphere—previously shrouded in thick fog and stone dust—had been banished by the bright sunlight and the lively crowd.

The collapsed ruins that had suffocated the road were restored to their original, exquisite order. Small houses sharing the Church's architectural style lined the stone-paved street in elegant, tidy rows.

The street was packed shoulder-to-shoulder. The cries of peddlers mingled with the laughter of playing children, creating a scene of extraordinary liveliness.

Yet amidst this utterly ordinary, bustling foreign scene, Xia Nan felt a faint sense of unease.

It was like a tiny fly resting on a pristine white wall, or a single strand of hair stuck to a bright screen—an inexplicable, jarring discomfort.

It was the suspicious black spots on the vibrant skins of the vendors' fruit, the stench of rot hidden beneath the cloying sweetness. It was the emaciated, filthy-feathered pigeon the children chased, which could only coo and desperately flap its wings, unable to take flight.

It was the hollow eyes above exaggerated smiles, the sharp, ear-piercing shrieks of innocent yet grotesque laughter...

It was as if an indescribable gray veil had been draped over the world. A deeper, ineffable aura silently permeated the air.

"I" suddenly looked up.

Through those eyes, Xia Nan caught sight of the orange sun hanging high in the sky. Though it was high noon, it was as dim and murky as dusk.

"I" tied the staff entrusted by the cleric to my waist and walked down the street.

Perhaps due to a position of considerable status, or perhaps combined with the identity of an outsider, "I" drew unusual attention from the passersby.

Even the most mischievous children waited obediently by the roadside when "I" passed, keeping their heads bowed. Only after "I" had walked by did they dare to secretly peek up and stare in curiosity.

Given that his current perspective relied on this body from the past, it was obvious that "I" also noticed the countless gazes drilling into my back. Those stares seemed respectful but were actually a tangled mix of fear, numbness, and a trace of hidden desire.

"I" chose to ignore it all.

Resolute footsteps echoed monotonously against the stone bricks.

At the end of the road lay a small plaza.

In its center sat a beautiful, exquisitely crafted fountain, its clear waters bubbling continuously.

A tall, immensely fat knight clad in full heavy armor stood quietly by the pool. His mix of muscle and fat stretched the iron plates outward, bulging heavily as he stared at the fine ripples on the water's surface.

"The master gave the Ember to you?"

Deep eyes beneath the barrel helm swept over the staff at "my" waist, and a muffled voice like a beating drum rang out across the plaza.

The metal flail in his hand swung gently back and forth. The chain and iron head clashed, producing a faint, crisp rattle.

"It's no use..." The heavily armored knight tilted his helmet slightly, seemingly observing the numb-eyed crowds watching from afar. "The fire is fading. No one can escape."

"Look at them... look at me." His muddy voice was thick with unyielding exhaustion and despair. "We are all shackles upon this world."

"Kill me." He spun around abruptly, staring fixedly at "me". "Fight. Let me return to glory... before the Ember."

"I" did not answer.

But the sharp greatsword, already drawn and gripped tightly in my palm, made "my" stance perfectly clear.

Thus, the battle began.

Confined to the fixed, first-person perspective inside "my" body, Xia Nan could observe very little.

However, he could tell that "my" physical attributes were immensely powerful, backed by rich combat experience and an incredibly solid foundation in swordsmanship.

Even without displaying any special abilities like a combat technique or spells, "I" managed to suppress the fat knight, keeping him on the back foot despite the massive size disparity.

The heavy metal flail howled through the air but never once found its mark. Instead, the seemingly clumsier greatsword left gouge after gouge across the bloated iron plates.

After merely a dozen exchanges, "I" seized an opening. Dodging an incoming strike with a quick sidestep, I slammed the pommel of the sword viciously into the back of the fat knight's barrel helm.

Thud!

The massive, fleshy body staggered backward, blood seeping through the gaps in the iron helmet.

Losing his center of gravity, his heel caught on the edge of the pool. Like a collapsing mountain of iron, his massive frame tilted backward and crashed into the fountain.

"I" silently sheathed the sword.

Without sparing another glance at the corpse in the pool, my cold gaze swept over the crowds on either side of the plaza. I stepped over the stone rim and continued toward the town's exit.

After passing through the final, cramped alleyway, the air seemed to freshen slightly. Although that omnipresent sense of decay had not vanished, the boundless wasteland beyond the low wall allowed the long-stifled "me" to breathe a small sigh of relief.

Brushing my left hand gently over the staff at my waist, "I" stepped forward, intending to cross the crude wooden fence by the stone wall and leave this place.

To take the "Ember" the cleric had spoken of to the royal capital and find a final shred of hope.

Perhaps because I was finally leaving the town, Xia Nan could feel "my" previously taut nerves relax for a split second.

My gaze drifted up subconsciously, looking toward the side of the town entrance.

My body suddenly went rigid.

Right there, on a low stone pedestal at the edge of the short wall, a towering, divine figure stood in absolute silence.

The cold sunlight spilled quietly over it, illuminating its flawless, alabaster body and clearly outlining that familiar silhouette—the elegant, gentle posture, the sculpted stone dress that seemed to flutter in the wind, and those pitying, tranquil, bright yellow snake eyes.

Xia Nan had no idea what was happening.

Nor did he know what kind of experiences "I" had gone through, or what had provoked this.

From his perspective, he only saw that the moment "I" laid eyes on that Goddess statue, my body abruptly halted its movements.

I spun around, let out an explosive roar, and swung the greatsword, charging straight at the statue.

Erupting with full force, the sharp blade cleaved the statue in two at the waist. As the idol collapsed, my body seemed to undergo a change as well.

The bright field of vision gradually dimmed, a blood-red tint creeping in around the edges.

Finally, accompanied by a bizarre, serpentine hiss that seemed pressed right against my ear and echoing within my skull, I lost consciousness and collapsed backward.

Thump!

The back of his head collided violently with the ground. The cold, hard touch of the stone bricks and the subsequent flare of faint pain instantly snapped Xia Nan awake.

Opening his eyes, the first thing he saw was a pair of mottled stone legs etched with the marks of time. Bare toes pressed lightly against the pedestal, and the contour of the thighs could faintly be glimpsed beneath the frozen flutter of the stone skirt.

But from the waist up, there was only empty space, as if it had been cleaved in half.

Xia Nan sat up, dazed for a few seconds before realizing he had regained control of his body. He had completely exited the Secret Realm.

"Am I... back at the entrance of the Ash Valley Ruins?"

Then, as if remembering something—

He spun around!

What entered his vision was the thick fog, visibly and rapidly dissipating as it was blown away by the howling winds. With visibility improving, he could make out the ruins of the small town scattered deep within the valley.

However, the towering, majestic Church—the most intact structure of them all—had vanished without a trace.

"Huh!?"

Stunned, Xia Nan instinctively moved to dash into the ruins.

Setting aside the loot on the three adventurers, his biggest gain from this expedition—the staff known in the Secret Realm's memory as the "Ember"—was still inside the Church!

If the Church was gone, then he...

Just as the thought crossed his mind, he barely took a step when a sudden, inexplicably hard sensation pressed against his waist. He instinctively looked down.

In the next second, the fiery glow of burning embers reflected in his pitch-black eyes.

Without him realizing when it had happened, the Ember staff was tied securely to his belt—exactly as it had been on "me" in the Secret Realm.

He reached down and untied it. Feeling the faint warmth radiating from the wooden staff, Xia Nan focused his attention on the object in his hands.

Instantly, the translucent text symbolizing the Attribute Panel materialized in the air before him:

...

[Ember Training Cane]

Type: Consumable/Item

Level: /

Description:

The Flame Crystal at the tip of the staff contains an ancient inheritance from the Zaret Ash Ember Church. Crush it to comprehend the mysteries within.

Note:

"The flame will eventually extinguish, but humanity's hope will not."

— Inscription on the wall of the East Laboratory, Royal Capital Incantation Research Institute

...

His encounters in the Secret Realm were fading rapidly from his mind like a passing dream. The details of that bizarre town were becoming blurry and difficult to recall.

But through a few key milestones—the cleric with his severed head and left arm, the fat knight dead in the fountain, and the Goddess statue cleaved in half...

Xia Nan could be certain that the buildings and enemies in the Ash Valley were exactly the ones he had seen in the Secret Realm.

For some unknown reason, an indescribably bizarre transformation had occurred, causing the buildings to decay and collapse while mutating some of the living inhabitants into highly aggressive dried corpses.

Right now, perhaps because he had triggered the Secret Realm...

The Church, along with the corpses of the adventurers inside it, had vanished.

As for Xia Nan's spoils, aside from the [Iron-Stomach Flail] he had hidden away earlier in a secret spot deep within the ruins, all that remained was the [Ember Training Cane] in his hands.

It was quite unexpected. Seeing its shape, he had initially assumed it was a piece of spellcasting equipment meant strictly for mages.

He had not expected it to be a consumable storage item used for teaching inheritances.

Given its eerie origins, the old Xia Nan would never have dared to use this item casually.

Fortunately, his golden finger—the Attribute Panel—explicitly stated its usage method and indicated that it hid not a curse, but a genuine, otherworldly inheritance.

Lifting his head, he spread his Perception, sweeping the surrounding area. Seeing no danger, Xia Nan wasted no more time.

He reached out, his fingers gripping the orange Flame Crystal flickering with ember-like fire at the tip of the staff.

He applied a little pressure.

"Crack."

It was a crisp sound, like a breaking eggshell.

A fiery crack bloomed across the crystal's surface near his fingertips. Like a breach in a dam, blinding light and searing heat instantly burst from within the crystal, transforming into a massive ball of orange-red flame that completely engulfed Xia Nan's body.

As if sensing certain key objects on his person, the flames silently split into three distinct portions.

The largest cluster, accounting for almost half of the flames, twisted into a rapidly shrinking orange-red vortex. It was absorbed by the Silver Ring on the ring finger of Xia Nan's right hand—the terminal of the [Dream Weaving Corridor]—causing its surface to glow.

A third of the orange-red flames wrapped around the complete inheritance held within the crystal and shot straight into Xia Nan's head.

Text, sounds, images... A massive influx of information flooded his mind.

The timeframe was too short to analyze it carefully.

But based purely on the knowledge he managed to digest in those few hasty breaths, he could roughly determine that this thing from the remote, otherworldly town—this so-called "Ember"—appeared to be a... combat technique!?

Beyond that, the last few wisps of firelight remaining in the air flowed past the Decapitating Longsword on Xia Nan's back and surged straight into the depths of his backpack.

It merged with the smooth-surfaced silver ingot—the loot left behind after the death of Trevelyan, the Knight Commander under the Earl of Sticky-Tree Territory, whom he had met in Molten Scale Town.

It tainted the ingot's originally flawless, silvery-white exterior with a bizarre hue resembling burning embers, causing it to radiate a scorching heat from deep within the backpack.