This was the first time Ren Yi had "looked directly" at Ren Man's True Form since the night of his awakening.
But compared to that first time, the feeling was entirely different.
When he had first "seen" it, he had just gained his Anomaly perception. Simple and ignorant, he had merely assumed some massive black body was blocking the sunlight.
At the time, he had even foolishly wondered if his older brother looked like some kind of giant black-furred monster.
However, he had quickly put the matter out of his mind.
What else could his brother look like? He probably just looked like a blackened, giant version of himself.
For a long time afterward, he hadn't consciously thought about it again.
It wasn't until Lord Cha asked him in the Instance, "What does your brother's True Form actually look like?" that Ren Yi suddenly realized something.
He didn't know.
He had indeed "seen" it, but he didn't know.
He lived and ate with Ren Man every day, yet he had never truly understood Ren Man's True Form; not even a faint outline remained in his mind.
Now, at this moment when he was fully capable of controlling his own perception, he calmed his mind to "look" once more.
What he felt was not a visual shock, but a kind of cognitive weightlessness. He realized profoundly that he was "courting death."
It was as if every bit of logic and every piece of knowledge he had built up since childhood was being violently shredded at this moment and tossed into an infinite chaos.
In the place where Ren Man existed, there was not a single reflection of light or shadow. Even the flow of air seemed to have frozen there.
There was nothing.
It wasn't simple darkness, but a hole gouged out from the grand canvas of the real world with a blade.
It had no color, because even the most basic concept of "black" had been completely stripped away and erased by it.
It was a void that transcended all definitions of color. If one looked at it for too long, even their own existence would begin to blur.
He did not belong to this world and did not follow any of its rules.
He simply existed there abruptly, like an eternal wound, silently swallowing everything around Him.
He possessed no volume, yet He had a depth capable of swallowing all sight.
Even when Ren Yi mobilized all of his Anomaly perception, he could not find the bottom.
Ren Yi stared into that void, feeling as though his thoughts were slipping off a cliff, falling straight into a singularity that logic could not reach.
His mind went blank; even the act of "thinking" became exceptionally difficult.
In his perception, the world was collapsing and dissolving bit by bit at the location of that void.
The surrounding air, the scattered light, and even the smallest dust particles seemed to let out a silent wail as they approached that "hollow," before being completely erased.
Ren Man's True Form was like an eternal absentee.
He stood on the opposite side of matter, dissolving the meaning of everything around Him with an absolute silence.
Ren Yi felt his perception, which he had already reined in, screaming in alarm.
It wasn't internal fear or an emotional fluctuation, but the instinctual rejection of this emptiness by his "living" and "existing" self.
His instinct could not comprehend an existence that had no form, no color, no volume, and whose very "existence" could not be defined.
In that boundless void, he could not see Ren Man's eyes or any organ that could represent a "gaze."
Yet, he could clearly feel a heavy pressure called a "gaze."
It wasn't a physiological eye contact or an exchange of looks, but a reckoning from a high dimension looking down upon a low dimension—a scrutiny of an individual by the rules themselves.
It made his entire perception go stiff, and even his breathing seemed frozen in time.
He finally understood why he had always overlooked Ren Man's True Form, and why no matter how he tried to perceive it, he could never leave a concrete impression.
Because he could not describe something that did not exist.
I'm sorry, Lord Cha. It seems I still can't tell you what my brother looks like.
Suddenly, in the center of the living room occupied by "nothingness," the logic that had fallen into stagnation and was on the verge of collapse seemed to be forcibly pried by some external force, breaking the silence of this void.
A drop of rain.
It fell from the depths of that void without warning. There was no sound, no trajectory, and it created no ripples; it just hung there lonely in mid-air, not far from the dining table.
It was restrained and crystalline, like the only piece of solid matter in the abyss.
Immediately after, the void—so massive it defied definition and occupied Ren Yi's entire field of vision—began to contract violently.
It was a collapse of immense visual impact.
The boundless chaos transformed in an instant into a long, pitch-black line.
Starting from where Ren Man stood, it looked like a deep gouge made by spilled ink, racing across the floor.
Finally, it extended vertically up the white wall, like a giant crack nailed into the real world, eerie and hideous.
Ren Man stood in place as the outline of his body gradually became clear again, returning to the cool-eyed young man in simple casual clothes.
He moved his neck somewhat stiffly, producing a faint cracking sound.
Then he looked up, staring at the ceiling lamp that was still emitting a weak, warm light.
He stared fixedly at the bulb for a while with a blank expression and a serious gaze, as if performing some extremely complex mathematical calculation.
After a moment, he slightly adjusted his stance.
The exaggeratedly long black shadow that had extended onto the wall acted like a venomous snake receiving a command to retreat; it instantly stopped spreading and began to shorten and flow back.
Following the most precise lighting proportions of the physical world, it retreated bit by bit from the wall back to the floor.
Ultimately, it shrunk obediently and seamlessly beneath Ren Man's feet, turning back into a shadow of a human form that looked as ordinary as could be.
If one ignored the faint lingering scent of emptiness in the air, the Ren Man before him looked like an ordinary young man who had grown tired of standing in the living room and was now spacing out.
Except, that single "raindrop" did not dissipate with it.
It still defied all physical laws, floating quietly above the dining table, motionless.
As the light hit its crystal-clear surface, Ren Man's attention was quickly drawn to the drop of rain again.
His brow furrowed and his expression grew solemn. On that face that was usually cold and lacked emotional fluctuation, a rare look of conflict actually appeared.
It was as if he had encountered some logical infinite loop that he couldn't figure out no matter how hard he thought.
After a long time, the drop of rain finally seemed to take shape within some invisible struggle. It no longer twitched slightly, but simply floated there peacefully.
Only then did Ren Man withdraw his gaze and turn his head. He finally noticed Ren Yi, who had "returned" to his True Form in the chair opposite him.
Because he had been "startled" just now, Ren Yi's True Form had completely lost control. At this moment, he was slumped in the chair in an extremely uninhibited shape.
Without limbs or a complete outline, he looked like a mass of grayish mist piled haphazardly on the seat.
Ren Man's eyes instantly became a bit dazed. He tilted his head slightly, observing the unidentifiable blob that was Ren Yi with a look full of question marks.
His expression was the living embodiment of the question: What kind of weird pose are you striking here?
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