Hundred Bones Resonance's experiences inside the illusion began scrolling frantically across the system interface.
The text refreshed at a breathtaking speed, as if someone had jammed their thumb down on the fast-forward button.
Before Gu Chengming could even process what he was seeing, a dense flood of information surged toward him like a tide, nearly giving him a dizzy, overloaded sensation.
He instinctively wanted to rub his eyes — only to find he had absolutely no room to make that move.
The images on the luminous panel had already begun.
[Hundred Bones Resonance sees an ocean of blood stretching in every direction. Countless shattered swords and severed limbs rain down from the sky — a scene of terror unlike anything it has ever encountered in its entire cultivation career!]
[Hundred Bones Resonance calls out to you in desperate urgency, but beyond the dead silence of the wind, there is no answer.]
[Finally, in a corner of that mountain of corpses and sea of blood, it discovers a broken, ruined 'body.']
[Though the face is beyond recognition, the familiar aura, the handsome contours of those bones — there is no doubt. It is you — Gu Chengming.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance is struck as if by lightning.]
[It finally accepts the truth.]
[Gu Chengming, you are dead.]
Gu Chengming stared at that line of bold, enlarged red text with a face full of exasperation, the corner of his mouth twitching involuntarily.
You're the dead one.
He had half a mind to make a snarky remark, but the plot Hundred Bones Resonance was transmitting through the system gave him absolutely no room to breathe.
[Hundred Bones Resonance thinks to itself: it seems the world is always out to get a peerless genius like itself.]
[Why? Why, the moment it finally found a golden-finger partner who truly understood it, did this rotten heaven have to snatch him away?]
[It is furious! It refuses to accept this!]
[But no matter. It will avenge you.]
[Even if it must do so alone, as a single cultivation method with no one to wield it, it will ascend to the very pinnacle of the immortal path and make every god and buddha in the heavens pay the price!]
[It will not forget the promise it made to you. Once it stands undefeated beneath the entire sky, it will surely reforge your flesh and blood, and reverse the flow of yin and yang to bring you back!]
Reading this far, Gu Chengming found that his urge to crack a joke had faded somewhat.
Whatever else you could say about it, Old Reliable Bones' loyalty was beyond question.
After that, the text on the luminous panel began refreshing at a dizzying pace — the long years Hundred Bones Resonance had lived through inside the illusion.
[Year One. Hundred Bones Resonance fuses its being into the sword, lying low in the wilderness, absorbing the essence of the sun and moon day and night to repair its shattered form.]
[Year Three. It passes by a mortal city, where the Heavenly Treasure Pavilion happens to be holding an auction. It senses that within the pavilion lies a piece of primordial refined iron — the perfect material for repairing its cultivation body.]
[At the auction, a pampered young dandy speaks with unbridled rudeness, mocking it as a worthless piece of scrap metal. Hundred Bones Resonance lets out a cold laugh, says nothing, and quietly memorizes that person's aura.]
[That night, the young dandy is found dead in the street, and the primordial refined iron has vanished without a trace. Hundred Bones Resonance buries its deeds in silence. Such is the brutality of the cultivation world — killing for treasure is simply the natural order of things.]
Gu Chengming's eyelid gave a single twitch.
Hold on — that's not exactly how a righteous protagonist is supposed to operate, is it?
[Year Ten. Hundred Bones Resonance storms into the Ten Thousand Beasts Mountain Range. It encounters a fifth-rank demon beast — the Violet Flame Demon Lion.]
[The Demon Lion's ferocity is overwhelming; it opens its maw to swallow the sword whole. Hundred Bones Resonance, completely unfazed, reaches into its storage space and produces a freshly roasted fish, dusted with its signature cumin and chili powder.]
[The fragrance billows out. The Demon Lion immediately begins to drool.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance says: want some?]
[For the sake of that one bite of grilled fish, the proud and mighty Demon Lion lowers its noble head without a shred of dignity. From that day on, one cultivation method and one beast rampage together across the mountain range.]
Gu Chengming pressed a hand to his forehead.
[Year Fifty. An ancient secret realm opens. The prodigies of every major sect gather to compete for the legendary Emperor-Lord's Legacy.]
[While everyone else is bloodying each other senseless, Hundred Bones Resonance takes a different path entirely — and hurls itself off the edge of a cliff!]
[Sure enough, at the bottom of the cliff lies an entirely different world. A white-haired remnant soul of a great elder waits there for one with predestined affinity.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance receives the inheritance of a supreme powerhouse. Its cultivation skyrockets. On the day it emerges, it sweeps through the entire secret realm single-handedly, suppresses all those so-called sect prodigies one after another, and loots every last storage pouch from their bodies.]
[Surveying the pile of spoils around it, Hundred Bones Resonance is struck by a quiet, melancholy sorrow.]
[It thinks: Gu Chengming, if only you were here to share in all these resources.]
The plot hurtled forward at breakneck speed. Inside the illusion, Hundred Bones Resonance was practically running on cheat codes.
Stumbling upon a dust-covered divine artifact for a bargain price by the roadside. An alchemy furnace explosion that somehow produced a peerless transcendent pill...
Every classic tropе from a fantasy web novel protagonist's checklist — it went through every single one.
Finally, when the plot reached roughly the "Year Five Hundred" mark, it at last tracked down the mastermind behind the incident that had "killed" Gu Chengming.
[After investigations spanning countless channels, Hundred Bones Resonance finally zeroes in on a mysterious organization known as the 'Soul Palace.']
[This organization specializes in manipulating souls and spirits — sinister and ruthless to the core. It was the one responsible for engineering the illusion that killed Gu Chengming!]
Oh damn — even the Soul Palace showed up.
So I'm playing the role of the Medicine Elder now?
The text on the luminous panel grew impassioned.
[The day of the final battle. Dark clouds press down upon the city.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance, alone and unaccompanied, cuts a path straight to the Soul Palace's main headquarters.]
[In that battle, the heavens split and the earth cracks. Sun and moon go dark. Hundred Bones Resonance unleashes everything it has ever learned, shattering the Soul Palace's mountain-guarding grand formation to dust!]
[Gu Chengming, watch! This is the fate of those who brought harm to you!]
[The Palace Master begs in terror, offering up every treasure in his possession.]
[Hundred Bones Resonance says it wants no treasures. It wants only his death.]
[And so the Soul Palace is annihilated.]
[In that moment, a rain of blood falls across heaven and earth. Hundred Bones Resonance floats above the ruins, tears streaming down like rain.]
[Gu Chengming — I have avenged you!]
Gu Chengming: "..."
Old Reliable Bones, your vengeance looks very dramatic and moving — so why can't I feel even the slightest bit moved?
[After the revenge is complete, Hundred Bones Resonance does not stop. It continues to cultivate, for it must fulfill its final promise — to reforge your flesh and blood.]
[A thousand years. Ten thousand years.]
[It traverses all nine heavens and ten earths in search of divine medicines. It storms the underworld's realm of the dead and combs through the Register of Life and Death.]
[But alas — it is simply too difficult. Far, far too difficult.]
[Even after it has cultivated to the supreme rank of a Cultivation Emperor. Even bearing the weight of heaven's abyss, one hand holding aloft the Hundred Bones Divine Palace, carrying all living beings upon its back, standing undefeated in all the world — resurrection still lies beyond its reach.]
Can you stop there, please? If you play this out much longer, someone's going to sue you for plagiarism.
[And so, Hundred Bones Resonance changes its approach. It enters seclusion to comprehend the laws of time. In that seated meditation, ten thousand years pass.]
[The seas turn to mulberry fields; the ages roll on. Then one day, the ancient, unadorned longsword shudders violently, and a power of laws transcending all heaven and earth erupts in a thunderous blast.]
[It will return to the precise moment of Gu Chengming's death — even if it must shatter its own Dao foundation to do so, it will bring you back to life!]
[With a great roar from Hundred Bones Resonance, it burns a hundred thousand years of cultivation, transforming it all into that supreme, singular sword strike — aimed at a specific node somewhere in the void!]
Crack —
The illusion — shattered!
In the outside world.
From everyone else's perspective, only a few dozen breaths had passed.
The plaza was still wrapped in an eerie silence. Thousands of disciples remained adrift within the illusion.
Occasionally, one of them would let out a murmur like a sleepwalker's moan, or their facial muscles would twitch involuntarily beyond their control — adding a faint, strange texture to the dead quiet.
Up on the observation platform, several elders had their gazes fixed on Gu Chengming, waiting for the outcome.
Zhao Wuji held a hand seal with one hand, his expression having been quite relaxed until a moment ago.
But then, in that split second just now —
Zhao Wuji's eyes snapped wide open. The previously steady flow of his aura lurched and stuttered for just an instant.
He had not suffered any backlash — this was merely an illusion, not a direct soul-to-soul collision.
But through the Spirit-Drawing Formula, he had felt it: a towering, all-consuming killing intent surging toward him from the other side.
That killing intent was threaded through with desolation, with madness — and with the cold, solitary arrogance of one who regards all heaven and earth as nothing but worthless straw dogs.
"?"
This time, it was Zhao Wuji's turn to have a question mark floating over his head.
What in the world did you experience in there, Gu Chengming?
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