Chapter 823: Opening Eyes (2)

The Yin-Yang Ghost Art, the Blood Fox Killing Intent, and the Dream Wing Gu had all been exhausted. I was now down to my last trump card.

The Reincarnation Mirror fragments in my jacket had fused into a complete mirror. I had used it once before; in fact, my using it was the very reason it had shattered in the first place.

Time had passed, and now it had returned to my hands. Ultimately, this mirror still belonged to me.

With no path to heaven and no door to the earth, the Dream Wing Gu was growing slower and slower. It was only a matter of time before I was caught.

"If I can't escape, I'll just try another method." I pushed the Dream Wing Gu to erupt with its remaining strength, widening the distance between me and Chen Mo. Burned by the Karmic Fire and pushed past its limits, the Gu was already overwhelmed. Its halo dissipated as it drilled back into my acupoints.

"Right now, it should just be me and Chen Mo left in this block." The Karmic Fire burned fiercer by the second, sealing off all avenues of escape. Watching the rapidly approaching flames, I took out the Reincarnation Mirror.

The mirror had no frame. Holding it felt like cupping a pool of clear water. It reflected the collapsing, chaotic street ravaged by the Karmic Fire, but it did not reflect me.

2.6 billion rebirths and reincarnations—it was a coincidence, yet also an inevitability. From the moment I made my choice the very first time, I had stepped onto a path with no turning back.

I didn't know what incantations or hand seals were needed to activate the Reincarnation Mirror, but when the complete mirror appeared, a natural sense of familiarity washed over me.

"So many reincarnations, yet one person is always missing. This must be why I am destined to walk alone." There were no instructions; the moment I grasped the mirror, the method to use it surfaced directly in my mind, like an instinct forged through countless trials.

Looking at the world inside the mirror, a very strange feeling washed over me—as if the other side of the glass was true reality.

The city block had already been incinerated. Massive swarms of spiders surged in from all directions. My eyes were slightly dazed for a moment before hardening with resolve.

I poured my mind into the glass. Spurred by my will, the Reincarnation Mirror rippled like water, its surface stretching outward in all directions.

At the same time, the vicious creature of the Animal Realm trapped within the mirror grew frantic with terror. As the mirror's surface continuously expanded, its body slowly shrank.

Activating the Reincarnation Mirror required a massive amount of energy. That peerless beast of the Animal Realm was the sacrifice.

Watching from afar, Chen Mo saw this bizarre scene with perfect clarity.

His face was pale. He hadn't seemed to anticipate that the complete Reincarnation Mirror would appear. He opened his mouth to shout, but we were too far apart for me to make out what he was saying.

Honestly, whatever he said no longer mattered to me anyway.

I reached toward the mirror's surface. The moment my fingertips touched it, my entire being was sucked inside.

The sensation was incredibly bizarre, like plunging into water and constantly sinking.

My will wrapped around my physical body. Every bone and piece of flesh felt as though it were being crushed by immense pressure. It was as if I was at the bottom of a great river, fighting my way upstream.

Countless intersections appeared, symbolizing countless choices, but propelled by an unseen force, I headed straight for a particular tributary.

My will was torn apart, my flesh and blood pulverized. The agony was indescribable, yet I could only endure it in silence; in that moment, I couldn't even manage a scream.

Finally, the pushing force behind me began to wane. In the split second I entered the tributary, I forced myself to look back. The sky behind me was riddled with cracks, shattering piece by piece.

"What is that?"

Before I could spare another glance, my body was entirely pulverized, and my will was shoved completely into the tributary.

Like a drowning man finally gasping for air, my eyes snapped open.

My spirit was sluggish, my will feeling as though it had been completely crushed and then reforged. I didn't even know how I had survived such torment.

"2.6 billion reincarnations. If every single one was this excruciating, it's no wonder my will has been tempered into something as flawless as a diamond, shocking even Xue Zhuo."

I surveyed my surroundings. Inside the dilapidated, shabby rental apartment, Zhu Li lay flat on the ground, his body plastered with talismans.

I was sitting beside him. Directly opposite me was the Black-Robed Anchor.

"Repetition? Reincarnation?" I was still gripping a light blue Dream Dao Talisman in my palm. Divine patterns flowed across its surface; this was at least an Upper Vehicle Talisman.

"The Dream Immortal Chant Child Talisman is still in my hand! I've returned to the moment before entering the dream!"

Instinctively, I reached into my jacket. The complete Reincarnation Mirror was not there; only a few mirror fragments remained.

"Has nothing changed? Were only my memories preserved?!" Even with things developing to this point, I didn't feel particularly surprised, as if I were already used to it.

I carefully examined every part of my body, finding no anomalies or differences. If the bone-deep pain hadn't still been lingering, I would have suspected that my recent experience was just a dream.

"No, one thing did change!" After checking again and again, I finally found the discrepancy.

The mirror fragment that had imprisoned the black hair and the vicious beast from the Animal Realm had dimmed significantly. It was riddled with cracks. Even stranger, the black hair symbolizing the obsession was still inside the glass, but the massive beast was nowhere to be seen.

"Could this be the price of activating the Reincarnation Mirror?"

It had used that peerless beast of the Animal Realm as a sacrifice, offering up all its flesh and blood and draining every drop of its energy, all just to send me back a single day.

"The divine patterns on the Dream Immortal Chant Child Talisman are bright, its Daoist aura concealed. It clearly hasn't been used even once." I stood up from the floor as the memories flooded back. "This is exactly when Black Robe assigned me the task to hunt down the Butcher's secondary wills. If I don't do it, the Butcher's strength won't be weakened much. But if the Butcher is too strong, it will be harder for me to obtain the Reincarnation Mirror fragments, and the initiative still won't be in my hands."

I didn't want my actions to trigger any more unforeseen variables. That was the only way to maximize the advantage of this reincarnation.

'The Butcher's secondary wills must be eliminated. Those seven crystals represent the seven emotions and contain fifty percent of the Butcher's strength. If I can absorb the energy within those seven crystals...' I calculated in my mind, ultimately deciding to continue following Black Robe's instructions to kill the hosts of the Butcher's secondary wills.

The difference was that this time, I would experience their dreams far more deeply and seize every last drop of energy within the crystals that originally belonged to the Butcher!

"Let's start with the first one."

Right before the Black-Robed Anchor split the sky, the Butcher had told me the method to use the emotional crystals so that I would take him with me when I left the Deep Dream Layer.

To break through the crystals' outer shells, I first had to gain the acknowledgment of his secondary wills, or experience the same scenarios to comprehend the seven emotions.

"The seven emotions and six desires are the foundation of human nature, a basic human instinct. My emotional persona is incomplete, with a portion of it suppressed by the Dragon-Locking Pillars in my sea of consciousness. If I can fully comprehend the seven emotions, it should be of great help in breaking those four pillars."