A flourishing meadow of grass.
Negary was wearing a simple black feather robe while standing barefooted in the grass. Standing next to him was Lan Shan who was narrowing her eyes in a good mood as she held up a parasol for Negary.
"Is this where you came into existence, milord?" Lan Shan scanned through this area, not noticing anything unique about this location.
〖 Ah, you can say that 〗as Negary waved his hand, a set of dried bones emerged from the grass.
Seeing this skeleton, Negary slightly frowned.
A thousand years had gone by in the Flame world.
Except this time flow wasn't very accurate at all, since if he took the original time flow of the Flame world into account, a few ten thousand years should have already gone by.
After Negary invaded the world's Information Sea, this was the conclusion he had drawn.
After Nala ignited the First Flame once again, it only burned for 300 years. The Age of Flames officially came to a close after those 300 years, followed by 300 years of the Age of Turbulence.
This current age was 400 years after the end of the Age of Turbulence, which was called the Age of Metal.
In this era, everyone believed their bones to be created from metal, which had given birth to a new system of power.
〖 In that case, the so-called Age of Metal must be a result of those entities' experiments as well 〗
From what he could tell from Eternal Heat and Life Bearer's fusion into Eternal Light, the indescribable entity that was the White Light had been experimenting with a single topic: the fusion of powers.
In that case, his understanding of the White Light and Black Abyss' collision that created the Flame world should probably be adjusted, although Negary fully expected this adjustment to also be faulty as well.
Due to the shift of the eras, the Flame world's fire characteristics seemed to have weakened, as time was now moving at an exceptionally slow rate, almost the same as other Sand Realms.
Of course, regardless of whether a thousand or ten thousand years had gone by, the fact that this skeleton remained up to this point was already an anomaly.
〖 There are two possibilities. Firstly, Wang Yuan's world itself wasn't simple, most likely not just a normal Sand Realm 〗
Wang Yuan's understanding of his own world wasn't particularly deep, so Negary didn't have complete knowledge of it either.
Although he had sent someone over to investigate, the investigator's range of motion was limited and was unable to discern the world's unique characteristics.
And the second possibility was that Wang Yuan's skeleton was purposely left here. The Age of Metal, and metallic bones, what a great coincidence this was. If Negary hadn't confirmed that the world's misfortunate characteristic was still in effect, he would have thought that those entities wanted to create a [Protagonist] with a golden finger – the bones of God.
〖 Or perhaps, both of them are true 〗Negary carefully observed Wang Yuan's skeleton.
It currently had a certain level of similarities to Meng Luo's beast tooth, which were things that carried a higher essence compared to the world itself.
〖 The world that Wang Yuan once lived in was definitely not a greater realm, but that world must have had its own unique characteristics 〗
With a wave of his hand, Negary took the skeleton.
Meng Luo's beast tooth was now in Negary's hand. The reason for its high quality was the fact that it was the unique catalyst for a greater realm.
Dim Silence had received even more damage than previously expected. At the time, Negary was facing a great threat in Eternal Light, so he had triggered the countermeasure he left inside Dim Silence while he still could.
At the time, Dim Silence had a temporary truce with Negary, so he was about to borrow the beast tooth catalyst to head into a greater realm, taking advantage of the greater realm's natural isolation to cut off both his covenant with Negary and the countermeasures Negary had implanted inside him.
In the end, he was one step too slow. Negary's countermeasure managed to interrupt his ritual, causing his newly-formed body to instantly die. What remained of his consciousness was also caught by Eternal Light's white flames attack that was meant for Negary and once again fell to his deathbed.
Using what remained of his capabilities, he attracted the [Protagonist] to have the beast tooth become Meng Luo's golden finger, thus ensuring his own safety.
Dim Silence's original plan was to wait for the [Protagonist] to succeed, then absorb some sort of energy – Source Energy was his best option – then resurrect again. He had very few choices left except to hope that the [Protagonist] would fare as best as possible.
Meng Luo didn't disappoint him either, as a large amount of Source Energy was indeed collected for him to absorb as he wished when all the Desolate Totems were devoured.
Unfortunately, under those circumstances, he couldn't do anything at all. He'd have a death wish if he tried to absorb and use that chaotic Source Energy, resulting in him being assimilated and becoming a part of that serpent if nothing unexpected had happened.
In the end, Dim Silence could only turtle up and wait. Once Negary showed up later on, he effectively lost all options and was summarily erased.
However, even while Negary personally erased Dim Silence, he could clearly feel that this guy hadn't actually died completely yet.
His ability to divide his own existence was simply too potent. First a corpse in the Moon Tree world, then another corpse in the Inexistent World of the SCR world, then he managed to continue laying dead in the Desolate Sacrifice world for a while.
Not only that, the beast tooth was present in the Desolate Sacrifice world because he had actually obtained it before and knew exactly how to use it, which meant that he might have also gone to the greater realm connected to the beast tooth and left a corpse there as well.
This guy's understanding of alternative aspects of Reality was exceptional, and considering that he wasn't an expert fighter, most of his efforts were most likely spent on various ways he set up to protect his own life.
This was evident in how he managed to discover the Inexistent World in the SCR world; but instead of trying anything else, he had sealed a part of his own existence within it, thus being able to resurrect after his original body had died.
Most likely, he did something similar in the greater realm as well.
Clearly, Dim Silence's capabilities, wits, and even talents were exceptional, but he was simply unlucky.
He was born in the elven race with a decent essence of life form and relatively great talents, but he had the Moon Tree over his head, which made sure that he had to form a covenant with the Moon Tree in order to achieve his Pathway.
While the Moon Tree world was growing stronger, the Seven Gods arrived, killing and forcing him to lay dead in the Aspect of Silence.
After finally getting a chance at resurrecting, he fell into a trap, losing this Moon Tree world authority to Chromie and what remained of his power to Darr.
And then after finally resurrecting in the SCR world and recovering a bit of his strength, he was caught by Negary when he was about to flee.
After paying a heavy price to escape from Negary's hands and arrive in the Desolate Sacrifice world, just as he was about to successfully escape, he was killed by Negary once again. And when he tried possessing the beast tooth to help the [Protagonist], the [Protagonist] ran into an unprecedented issue.
It was as if the only choices available to Dim Silence at all times were a terrible choice and a horrible choice.
Just thinking about it, even Negary felt sorry for him.
After retrieving the beast tooth, Negary summoned Lan Shan to accompany him back to the Flame world. The first reason was that he wanted to visit, considering how deep the murky waters in this world were, and secondly, he needed to borrow this world as a springboard to head into Wang Yuan's original world.
Since he had returned, it was only appropriate for him to visit a few old friends. Although people who could be considered his 'old friends' were practically nonexistent during this Age of Metal, there were still two of them.
Within the New Royas Kingdom, a certain statue seemed to have sensed something and woke up. He was able to feel an ominous but familiar presence.
In the garden of a certain manor, the statue of a sword-wielding young girl remained still as it had always been.
