“Um, so... where is the sighing?”
Entering the Wall of Sighs for the first time, Theia looked around in curiosity.
The terrifying Forbidden Zone she had imagined was actually... a bit too quiet right now.
As far as the eye could see, there was only churning grayish-white mist.
The ground consisted of damp, dark soil littered with withered vegetation and bizarrely shaped rocks.
Visibility was extremely low; one could only see clearly up to ten paces away.
Any further, and everything dissolved into a hazy grayish-white.
The air carried a musty, damp chill that felt icy when drawn into the lungs.
After the bidding at the selection meeting ended, they had been quietly tailing them.
The flying vessel, concealed under the Shroud of the Gloomy Night, hovered silently directly above Ryan, the leader of Blade's Edge.
When Ryan had asked Blackbeard if he had anything else to say,
Theia had been giggling on the side, covering her mouth:
“I bet that little dwarf thinks we gave up and ran away.”
Following Blade's Edge all the way, they quickly arrived at the Fifth Node.
Afterward, Ryan and his team took their guide and plunged straight into the mist.
Once they confirmed that the guide could indeed ward off those “invisible things,”
they picked up their pace entirely, following the route marked on their map.
They ran recklessly toward the depths of the wall,
without using any concealment magic
or even erecting a protective barrier.
With sheer determination, they just put their heads down and dashed forward.
For the Wall of Sighs, this seemingly reckless behavior was actually the most efficient approach.
The invisible, untouchable, and highly aggressive spectral demons...
almost no conventional methods could prevent them, leaving no choice but to endure them head-on.
However, the spectral demons' aversion to the “dying”...
made this Forbidden Zone far easier to traverse while carrying a guide...
than other demon-infested wildernesses.
Because of this, the speed of the Blade's Edge team never slackened.
Aside from having to detour around a few dangerous areas marked with red crosses on the map,
they were basically running at full speed the entire time.
No matter how fast they were, however, they couldn't outpace the flying vessel controlled by Lin Gui.
The flying vessel floated quietly a few meters above the team, moving in sync with them.
Lin Gui had kept 【Eyes of the Netherworld】 active the entire time.
His gray eyes calmly scanned their surroundings.
Since they had followed Blade's Edge into the Wall of Sighs,
aside from catching a glimpse of a few wandering light blue specters at the outer edge in the beginning,
these specters had blurry forms—some resembling distorted human shapes, others irregular spheres of light.
They drifted aimlessly, making faint, rustling sounds that resembled sighs.
Other than that, Lin Gui hadn't seen a single demon approach them along the way.
He couldn't help but sigh softly in admiration:
“This is truly amazing.”
“Not a single decent demon has actively approached us.”
“Are they really that afraid of the 'dying'?”
“What is the logic behind this...”
After speaking, Lin Gui looked down, curiously studying the elderly guide on Ryan's back.
Within the vision of the Eyes of the Netherworld, the old man's soul presented a peculiar state.
It was a soul that was constantly “dissipating.”
It was faint and thin, like a wisp of fading smoke that could go out at any moment.
But one feature was extremely obvious.
The old man's soul as a whole resembled a weak flame.
The flame was not still; instead, it flickered slightly and continuously toward a fixed direction,
as if drawn by some invisible force in the distance.
Lin Gui speculated that this direction... should be toward the so-called “Netherworld Sea.”
Legend had it that the Netherworld Sea was the final destination for the souls of all living beings after death.
This was not a completely groundless fantasy.
Some had even claimed to have reached that place.
Namely, the master of the field of Soul Magic—
Augustine, the Tower Master of the Purple Tower in the City of a Thousand Towers.
A centenarian who had spent his entire life studying Soul Magic and was said to have “died” several times.
According to the scattered records he left behind:
the Netherworld Sea was an ocean constructed from endless soul power.
It was a shore that existed on the “other side” of the world, unreachable by any means other than death.
When a living being was on the verge of death but not yet dead, their soul would begin to feel its pull.
Lin Gui stared at that flickering “soul flame.”
Perhaps this was the key to why the guide could travel safely within the Wall of Sighs.
Their souls already had one foot in the realm of death.
And this was precisely what the spectral demons within the wall loathed, or even... feared.
While controlling the flying vessel to stay in sync, Lin Gui kept his eyes glued to the old man below.
He wanted to observe closely how this warding effect was actually produced,
to see if he could find the key, or even... try to replicate it.
What he didn't notice...
was that at some point, Theia had leaned her head over from behind him.
Her chin rested lightly on his shoulder, her warm breath close to his ear.
Her emerald eyes narrowed slightly as she curiously examined Lin Gui's gray-turned eyes.
Her eyes were filled with wonder, but she didn't make a sound to disturb him.
After watching for a while, she turned around to face Eve, who was sitting obediently.
She leaned in closer and whispered:
“Eve, Lin Gui's eyes have turned gray.”
“Is that the magic you mentioned before, the one that lets him see through souls?”
“As a mage, do you know what kind of spell this is?”
Hearing this, Eve smiled wryly.
Lowering her voice, she explained to Theia:
“Soul Magic is the most profound and difficult branch in the field of magic.”
“Whether during the Golden Age or the current City-State Era,”
“mages have had very limited exploration of it.”
“Nowadays, the Soul Magic spells known to the public can be counted on one hand.”
Recalling briefly, she counted them off softly:
“The most common one is 'soul tracking,' which is used to lock onto a target.”
“And 'Clarity,' which we are currently using.”
“There's also 'Mental Derangement,' which is an offensive type.”
“Aside from those, there are very few records.”
Theia blinked and pressed further:
“Then what is this spell Lin Gui is using... the one that even changes his eye color?”
Eve shook her head, her gaze falling on Lin Gui's back.
“I'm not sure. Perhaps... it's a secret technique he developed himself.”
“Just like 'Shroud of the Gloomy Night.'”
“As far as I know, among the existing Soul Magic,”
“there are none that can directly perceive the concrete form of a soul.”
Theia clicked her tongue, her expression somewhat exaggerated.
“In that case, isn't Lin Gui... a bit too amazing?”
Eve looked at the focused black silhouette ahead.
Her eyes grew deep and complex.
She remained silent for a moment before replying in a very soft voice:
“'Amazing'... is probably not enough to describe his level of mastery.”
If one only considered Lin Gui's own mage rank and mana,
he wasn't actually all that outstanding, and could hardly be called a genius.
A twenty-three-year-old High Rank mage...
In the City of a Thousand Towers, he wouldn't even have the qualification to apply for long-term residency.
Although Lin Gui and Eve seemed to be only one major rank apart,
the mana gap between major ranks far exceeded the total difference from Low-tier High Rank to High-tier High Rank.
For Lin Gui to break through a minor tier, he usually only needed to accumulate a few thousand mana.
But crossing a major rank required a threshold of over twenty thousand points at every turn.
Furthermore, the further one went, the difficulty of the required mana and comprehension for a breakthrough grew exponentially.
Moreover, Eve had only just turned eighteen this year.
Unlike Theia, the ranger who claimed to be “forever eighteen,”
Eve was a genuine eighteen-year-old girl.
As for Theia, her remaining at the Low-tier Transcendent rank...
was mostly because her years of wandering had worn away her drive to advance.
Before meeting Lin Gui, she barely trained.
Because becoming stronger held little meaning for her.
Her family was long gone, and friends were a luxury.
With no one to accept her and no one needing her, why struggle?
This resulted in her being left far behind by her former classmate, Laisa the Forest Elf,
despite having studied together.
Lin Gui was not a conventionally gifted magic genius.
Eve was absolutely certain that if he were to take the entrance exam for the City of a Thousand Towers,
his results probably wouldn't be very ideal.
However, his understanding and application of magic itself...
had long since overturned many common assumptions in the magical field.
At the very least, Eve looked at Lin Gui's focused back with complex anticipation.
A top-tier concealment magic driven by High Rank mana, yet capable of bypassing Legendary perception;
tempering the basic Levitation spell to a state of perfection, as natural as instinct;
and those gray eyes that could peer into the essence of souls...
any single one of these would be enough to make anyone else a grandmaster of their field,
sought after by everyone in the City of a Thousand Towers.
Yet, all of this was concentrated in a single person.
Recalling the secret prophecies passed down by word of mouth through generations of Holy Saintesses,
Eve took a soft breath and murmured in a barely audible voice:
“I really hope... I can keep witnessing you truly soaring through the sky.”
“It's a pity that on this journey, I must get off halfway too.”
She subconsciously raised her hand and lightly covered her chest.
From her fingertips came a steady, albeit slightly sluggish heartbeat.
But beneath that flesh, deep within her soul perception,
the 'heart' belonging to her was undergoing a subtle change.
Its beating rhythm was gradually synchronizing with a certain 'pulsation' in the far distance.
A heavy, ancient pulling force was slowly strengthening.
This meant that time was running out; they were coming for her.
The Dark Tide was approaching, and the 'Hero's Expedition' was about to begin once more.
And she, too, had to embark on that predetermined journey destined for destruction.
Rate on N.U.
