Ning appeared on Earth, next to Ely who had been standing with eyes full of tears. The moment he returned, she jumped onto his embrace.
However, when she did embrace him, she left him immediately as a confused look appeared on her face. There was a contradiction in her expectation and reality which was making it hard for her to understand what was happening there.
"Did you manage to get away from him somehow?" Ely asked. She could tell that his cultivation base was far stronger than her own and his body was just as equally strong.
That was something that was only possible for the real Ning's body to be.
Ning shook his head. "He got me," he said. "He's probably taking me back to his world to start experimenting on me soon."
"Then…" she asked.
Ning explained what he had done in the end and how he had all but himself with him at the moment.
Ely gave him a blank stare as she asked, "Does that mean… you are a clone?"
Ning gave a sad smile. "For me, I have no clone. All of these are my own bodies," he said. "Or, in a more truthful sense… none of them are. I don't have a physical body so you can think of everything as a clone."
"I guess it all comes down to how you view it," he said.
"You have the same memories, feelings, and experiences as the real Ning right?" she asked.
"I made myself the exact copy of me intelligence-wise, so there is no difference," he said.
Ely suddenly teared up and fell into his embrace again. "Then you are real for me," she said as she hugged him as tightly as she could.
Ning hugged her back, feeling glad to be accepted at all.
"What will happen to you now? You won't die, so will you be tortured forever?" she asked.
Ning shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "I don't feel pain as an energy, so that is something."
"You should have run away," she said. "You shouldn't have given yourself up."
"And leave you all to die?" Ning asked. "If you expected that from me, then you never knew me at all."
"I worry for you," Ely said, tearing up again.
"I worry for myself," he said. "But, let's not tell the others. Let's not have them worry for now."
"What will we tell them then? That you managed to escape?" she asked.
"Hmm, let's just tell them that I gave up my system for my freedom," he said. "I do not know when I will be returning, if ever, so that should be fine."
"Are you… are you really going to take a very long time to be free?" Ely asked.
"I asked the system how long it will take me to be free. It said that realistically, I won't be free until the Galactic will itself doesn't die," Ning said. "That being billions of years in the future."
"Billions… how far in the future is that?" Ely couldn't help but ask. The concept of billions of years was not something she was sure she understood. She wasn't even 10 thousand years old yet, not even half of it.
Even if she had an Immortal God realm cultivation base, would she still be alive by then? By the time Ning was finally free. She did not know, and that terrified her.
Ning held her tightly. "I'm here, you won't have to worry about time. No matter how long it is, I'm here to spend it all with you," he said.
Ely nodded and they finally stopped worrying about Ning and started worrying about themselves.
Ning could teleport using the skills in his ring, but he decided not to. With his system gone, he would not have the energy to do anything for a very long time.
So, unless it was an emergency, he would not use the energy in his rings. Instead, he simply flew away. With such a high cultivation base and Mana tier, he could make the rounds of the entire planet in a matter of seconds if he wanted to.
"Hmm?" He noticed something as he flew.
Ely looked towards him. "What's wrong? What happened?" she asked.
Ning pointed towards the black sky and below him at the ocean water. "I forgot to put the moon on since I was in such a hurry," he said as he stopped.
"Oh, right," she said. "I thought it was unusually dark today. Where are the stars?"
"There is no star here," he said. "We're in my inner world where I only have the sun and the earth. There is nothing else that exists in here other than that."
"Wait… what?" Ely asked.
Ning quickly explained what he had done.
"We're in your inner world? So we do not have access to any other world?" she asked. "Wait, what happens if the moon is gone?"
"Let's see," he thought. "Planet spins stupidly fast without the moon's gravitational pull. We don't get light at night. A very strong wind will start blowing very soon that will kill anything and everything. And then… what was the last one? Oh right, marine life will start dying. Those were the important ones as far as the moon is concerned."
Ely was horrified to hear that. "What do we do then?" she asked.
"Don't worry," Ning said. "I planned it all from the start. I knew something like this would happen, so the system made something for me?"
"What did it make?" Ely asked. "A moon?"
"No, just something to replace a moon," Ning said as he fished through the storage ring before finding the artifact.
It was a small crystal ball that he suddenly threw out of the planet. "Go, do your thing."
The small crystal ball suddenly blew up to become a massive moon, surprising Ely and everyone that was on the darker half of the planet.
"You created a moon?" she asked with a surprised expression.
"Huh? No," Ning said. "Look at it. It's an illusion that gives off light. Its main job is the gravitational pull that it provides for the earth while emulating a moon. We should be fine with this."
