Chapter 143
While the intense battle raged on at the Nursery Facility, Su Ci had entered the rift and was now navigating through a dense blood mist.
A faint light encased his body, weak but sufficient to repel the overwhelming resentment that clung to the air like a tangible force. Not a trace of it could penetrate his protective aura.
A-Yan’s figure had already disappeared from his sight, but that wasn’t a significant issue. With a strand of his hair tied to A-Yan, Su Ci would always be able to locate him, no matter where he was.
The challenge was finding him before anything truly catastrophic happened.
Su Ci’s brow furrowed as he traversed the suffocating field of resentment. His expression gradually shifted, becoming more and more perplexed.
Suddenly, a tear opened in the mist ahead of him. The resentment forcefully pushed him out of this domain, and he landed amidst the ruins of a desolate landscape.
His arrival was like a pebble breaking the surface of a still lake. The deathly silence of the ruins erupted into chaotic motion.
Countless vengeful spirits emerged from the shadows, their resentment—saturated with negative emotions—rushing toward Su Ci like a tidal wave, threatening to engulf him entirely.
For an ordinary human, this environment would induce madness in an instant.
But Su Ci stood unwavering, like the sturdiest reef amidst stormy seas.
He attentively sensed the lingering obsessions of these vengeful spirits. Then, a thought struck him, and he turned his head, spotting monsters emerging atop the collapsed structures.
In addition to the creatures born of resentment, there were red-eyed wild beasts perched on the ruins, roaring furiously at him.
Their cries carried not only rage but also deep pain and despair.
Su Ci’s frown deepened.
The resentment-born monsters didn’t attack him. Instead, they opened their mouths, emitting a sound akin to murmurs. The murmurs grew louder, converging into a chilling, cautionary roar:
“Human, leave this place!”
Su Ci raised an eyebrow at the words.
Perhaps, having seen him eliminate nearly a hundred monsters in one swoop, the force that had dragged A-Yan away—the so-called “mastermind”—had decided not to direct these creatures against him.
But it seemed there was a misunderstanding.
“Leave this place! Human, leave this planet!”
The monsters continued to channel the mastermind’s will, attempting to use the collective power of the vengeful spirits to manipulate Su Ci.
It seemed that even this mastermind had never encountered a “human” as powerful as Su Ci.
Unable to subdue him, it resorted to trying to drive him away.
Unfortunately for the entity, the figure before it was not truly human.
Su Ci pressed his lips together. With A-Yan’s fate uncertain and time running out, he had no intention of wasting any more time here. He casually unleashed over a dozen purification spells, clearing all the nearby monsters.
This act, however, clearly enraged the mastermind behind the scenes. The blood mist over the ruins churned and thickened as more monsters and vengeful spirits appeared, determined to trap this “human” here forever.
But—
As thousands of monsters surged toward Su Ci, the young man’s figure vanished from sight.
Reappearing within the dense, resentment-filled space, Su Ci followed the faint connection he had and pushed through the barriers of resentment. In just moments, he reached his destination—
A spherical chamber.
In the center sat a figure in a red robe and mask, cross-legged, surrounded by golden chains binding his body. The chains extended into what seemed like an endless void.
As Su Ci entered, the figure lifted its crimson eyes, gazing at him.
Floating before the masked figure was A-Yan, his body fully restored to its adult form. His once black hair now shone platinum, and though his eyes remained closed, his presence radiated divinity.
“Human!”
The surrounding void echoed with a crazed voice. It roared in disbelief, “How did you get here? The Earth Spirit again! It must be interfering!”
Su Ci remained silent.
This so-called mastermind didn’t seem particularly intelligent.
Perhaps awakened by the void’s cacophony, A-Yan’s long-closed eyes fluttered and slowly opened. He first saw the masked figure, his expression momentarily dazed. Then, noticing something else, he turned to look at Su Ci.
“Su Su…”
His voice, once dry and hoarse, had recovered slightly, though he still struggled to form complete sentences.
“Hahaha! Spirit of the Rules! Once I consume you and absorb your power, I will escape this cursed place and reign over this world, this universe!”
“Earth, in the end, you have lost! I, the Spirit of Resentment, am the most powerful existence in this realm!”
With that, the entity ignored Su Ci and directed the dense blood mist to engulf A-Yan completely.
Sensing the danger, A-Yan had no time for pleasantries. He retrieved his heavenly script from his spatial button. As the pages flipped, platinum-colored Rule Power surged outward.
In an instant, a purification array materialized around him.
Having previously constructed hundreds of purification arrays and even an entire river purification barrier alongside Su Ci, A-Yan’s mastery of purification formations had reached unparalleled levels.
Among all the younglings, A-Yan’s progress was by far the fastest—though to be fair, he wasn’t truly a “youngling,” so the comparison might be a bit unfair.
The negative emotions in the resentment were filtered out, leaving only the purest spiritual energy. A-Yan couldn’t help but close his eyes to stabilize himself.
Su Ci watched as A-Yan became cocooned within a massive blood mist chrysalis, his eyes narrowing slightly.
Without a word, Su Ci approached the masked figure.
The masked figure sat quietly, observing him. Through the mask, only crimson eyes were visible.
Ignoring the figure, Su Ci moved behind it. His right hand gripped one of the golden chains and crushed it with a single squeeze. The chain shattered into fragments of golden light, which then merged into Su Ci’s body.
As he felt the power returning to him, Su Ci clenched his fists.
The voice from the void—the Spirit of Resentment—reacted with shock as it noticed what had happened. Its tone was filled with disbelief.
“You’re not human! You’re—”
Before it could finish, Su Ci gave it no chance to escape. He reached into the void, grabbed, and yanked hard. A glowing red orb separated from the mist and fell into his hand.
Without the entity’s control, the resentment surrounding A-Yan disintegrated instantly.
A-Yan, still breathing heavily, was visibly weakened. His spiritual energy had yet to recover fully, and he couldn’t convert it into Rule Power. His purification shield wouldn’t have lasted much longer.
Gazing at the young man in the distance, A-Yan—no, Zhou Yan—smiled faintly. His platinum eyes, tinged with red, curved into crescent shapes as he grinned in a way that was both silly and endearing.
All the memories… had returned to him.
Su Ci, however, paid no attention to A-Yan’s gaze. Instead, he focused on the red orb in his hand.
A Spirit born of resentment? How… intriguing.
The red orb struggled incessantly, but no matter how hard it tried, it could not escape Su Ci’s grasp. Its once-arrogant tone was now replaced by a trembling voice.
“Earth Spirit! Why have you taken the form of a human?!”
It was utterly shocked, though its defiance remained. “Even if you’ve captured me, so what? Hahaha! Resentment saturates the heavens and earth. I am the ruler of this world… Argh! You… vile creature!”
The Earth Spirit, now wielding humanity’s purification technique, was its nemesis—its natural predator!
This skill, insignificant in the hands of humans, transformed into an overwhelming force when used by the Earth Spirit.
For the first time since its birth, the Spirit of Resentment felt a negative emotion it couldn’t wield: fear.
But fear did nothing for it now. It couldn’t empower the Spirit of Resentment, nor did it allow it to fight back. It couldn’t even mobilize its own resentment to strike at the Earth Spirit.
From Su Ci’s palm, the glow of purification radiated ceaselessly.
“Ahhhh!”
The Spirit of Resentment, enveloped by the purification light, let out a wretched scream. Its struggles grew increasingly violent.
Su Ci watched it coldly. A spirit born less than a millennium ago dared to act so arrogantly in front of him?
The nascent Book Spirit hanging on Zhou Yan’s chest trembled as it observed the Spirit of Resentment’s pitiful state. With a soft “whoosh,” it flew into Zhou Yan’s pocket, hiding itself away.
The outside world was far too terrifying—it wanted to go back to the Nursery Facility. QwQ
In the end, no matter how much the Spirit of Resentment cursed or begged, Su Ci showed no sign of stopping. As it dissolved completely, it spat out one final, venomous threat.
“I will return!”
“As long as resentment exists, a new Spirit of Resentment will be born. Even if I perish, there will be another, and another after that…”
So noisy.
Su Ci increased the output of his soul energy.
Finally, the red orb disintegrated under the purification light. The Spirit of Resentment was completely purified, and the space fell silent, leaving only the dense blood mist drifting in silence.
Closing his hand, Su Ci turned to the masked figure behind him. The masked man, in turn, looked back at him.
Their gazes locked, crossing paths.
“Impressive skill.”
The figure’s pale hands removed the mask, revealing an unparalleled, stunning face. With cascading golden hair and striking red eyes, his appearance was identical to Su Ci’s.
A faint smile graced his lips as he spoke, “It seems you’ve found a way to deal with resentment.”
Staring at this smiling version of himself, Su Ci frowned.
There was no doubt about it—this man was him.
Or rather, it was a part of him—a very powerful part—that had been corrupted by resentment, with its golden-red eyes as evidence.
“What is going on?” Su Ci murmured.
The cross-legged figure did not directly answer. Instead, he smiled, raised his hand, and tossed a white mask toward Su Ci.
Su Ci caught it.
The mask was light as a feather, pure white, with a smooth, jade-like texture. It bore no markings, leaving only the eye holes visible.
“All the events of the past are recorded within,” the figure said.
The moment Su Ci held the mask, he instinctively understood how to use it. Without hesitation, he placed it over his face.
In the blink of an eye, the world shifted. When Su Ci opened his eyes again, the scene before him had completely changed.
He had been transported tens of thousands of years into the past, to the moment when the planet was engulfed by the resentment of countless beings and he was forced to awaken from his slumber.
