Time, in the Forgotten Realm, was measured in the slow pulse of Qi and the gradual fading of scars.
Gen sat in a perfect lotus position on the cold, dark rock. His eyes were closed, his breathing a deep, steady rhythm that seemed to sync with the silent drift of the luminous mist. A subtle, golden aura, thin as morning sunlight through mist, shimmered just above his skin. It wasn't the explosive corona of the Eternal Body, but the quiet, circulating glow of deep recovery. He guided his energy, a warm river of Jingdao reinforcement flowing from his core, out through his limbs, then back, mingling with the cooler, more precise currents of Shidow that he coaxed from the ambient, strange energy of the void. His right arm, once blackened from the null-energy backlash, was now merely a patch of darker, sensitive skin. Most of his other wounds—the gashes, the deep bruises—had knitted into pale, new scars. The two Acupoints within him, Root and Sea, hummed in steady, synchronized tandem.
On the opposite side of their small, claimed territory on the altar island, Lorel mirrored his posture. Her aura was different—a soft, pink-tinged silver that whispered of Shidow's manipulation, underpinned by the steady, creative white pulse from her Heart Acupoint. She had learned to weave them together, using manipulation to guide and refine the energy she created, making her Supremacy Swords not just powerful, but precise.
After a long while of silent cultivation, Lorel's eyes opened. She stood, her movements fluid and sure, the stiffness of her injury long gone. "Gen," she called, her voice clear in the perpetual quiet. "It's time for us to try."
A smile, genuine and unburdened, grew on Gen's face as he opened his eyes. It had been about a month now, subjectively, since they were sealed here. All that time, they had done nothing but train, meditate, and tend to their minimal needs. There was little else to do. The initial, awkward tension of their state of undress had, over the weeks, evaporated through sheer necessity and proximity. Gen, who had at first been slightly disturbed and overly careful, now looked at her—clad in her simple chest wrap and trousers, hair loose—with no issue, seeing a comrade, a partner. Lorel, while still occasionally flustered, had gradually grown used to it. The earlier embarrassment had vanished, replaced by a comfortable, silent understanding.
"First thing I do after we leave this altar," Lorel announced, stretching her arms, "is take a bath. I feel filthy."
Gen rose to his feet, rolling his shoulders. "I don't really feel the difference with or without a bath. If it wasn't for the dirt, I'd be fine." He patted his stomach, which gave a low, audible grumble. "I need food. I'm hungry."
Lorel laughed, the sound bright and unexpected in the desolate void. "Me too. But there's no food in this place. At least not here." Sustaining themselves purely on Qi for a month had been another form of brutal training, increasing their resistance and refining their internal energy cycles, though it had left their skin paler, their frames leaner. "We can only bear it a little longer."
Gen nodded, his expression turning serious. Together, they walked to the very edge of the altar island, where the dark stone met the formless purple abyss. The ghostly formation that sealed them shimmered faintly a few yards out, an invisible wall.
"Are you ready?" Gen asked, taking a deep breath that filled his lungs with the cool, scentless air.
Lorel nodded beside him, her eyes sharp. "Ready."
Gen moved first. He didn't shout or strain. He simply *changed*.
The **Eternal Body, Second Door** activated instantly. The golden aura didn't flare out; it *condensed*, pulling inward before erupting as a dense, humming shell that hugged his skin like a second layer of solidified light. The compressed power made the air around him waver with heat haze. His aura was incredibly dense, his figure imposing, radiating a tangible pressure.
Lorel couldn't help but take another look at his form, the play of powerful muscle under that shimmering shell, before quickly snapping her gaze forward.
"Are you still hurt or something?" Gen asked, noticing her glance.
"No, no, I…" she shook her head rapidly, brushing the topic away, a faint pink on her cheeks. "Let's go."
She raised a hand. Seven points of brilliant pink light ignited in the air behind her, fanning out like a lethal peacock's tail. The **Supremacy Swords** materialized fully, each humming with a keen, dominating will, spinning slowly in a deadly array.
At the same moment, the ghostly being of the formation appeared before them, its translucent form coalescing from the mist. A familiar, challenging smirk was on its spectral face. For the past month, they had used this guardian not just as a barrier, but as the ultimate training dummy, learning its patterns, testing their coordination against its relentless, light-based attacks. Now, it was time for the final exam.
The formation being tapped its foot on the non-existent floor. A dazzling burst of solidified light, shaped like a storm of razor-edged petals, shot toward them.
Gen's body flickered with insane speed. He used **Jingdao** to reinforce his legs, and **Shidow** to manipulate the pockets of dense, strange air around him, granting him explosive, three-dimensional movement. He became a blur of golden light, weaving through the storm.
Lorel didn't charge. She floated upward, held aloft by a platform of manipulated air. With a wave of her hand, the seven Supremacy Swords shot forward. Born of her will to be supreme, they tore through space, leaving arcs of lingering pink lightning as they hammered again and again on the formation guardian's defenses, seeking a weakness.
Gen flickered towards the ghostly being, dodging beams of condensed light it fired at him. He didn't block; he weaved. Then, he pointed. At the tip of his index finger, a point of absolute blackness appeared—the **End of the World Finger**, condensed not into a blast, but a point of annihilating pressure, reinforced and focused by **Jingdao**.
The formation being formed a shield—a powerful, interlocking curtain of prismatic light.
Gen's finger touched it.
***CRACK-SHATTER!***
The shield didn't just break; it exploded into a million dissolving shards of light. The force of the negation blew the guardian back, skidding through the air.
At the same instant, Lorel's will struck. The seven Supremacy Swords landed not as separate strikes, but as a single, sequenced judgment. One after the other, they pierced the same spot on the guardian's flickering core.
***THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD-THUD!***
The formation being reeled wildly, screeching a sound of tearing energy. Its form flickered violently, a web of cracks spreading from the point of impact. It didn't dissipate completely, but it froze, its power disrupted, the sealed space around the altar island shimmering and growing unstable.
Gen and Lorel exchanged a single, triumphant look.
Without a word, they burst forward together. They didn't attack the guardian again. They shot past it, through the now-weakened barrier of the formation, leaping off the edge of the altar island.
For a heart-stopping moment, they fell into the purple void. Then Gen grabbed Lorel's arm, using a burst of Shidow to pull them toward the nearest floating debris—a massive, moss-covered chunk of petrified forest. They landed with a solid *thud* on its uneven surface.
"Success!" Gen said, a happy, boyish grin splitting his face.
Lorel nodded, breathing heavily, a smile of her own blooming. "Finally, we're out." She looked back at the altar island, now a distant, dark speck. "But… how do we get back to the real world?"
Gen shrugged, his grin fading into thoughtful determination. "In the Tower of Wonder, we didn't decide to go out. The old man opened and closed doors. That means there should be a similar mechanic here. A being, a door… something. We just need to find it."
Lorel nodded. She took one last, long look in the direction of the altar, where Duo Yi's body lay in its quiet corner. A shadow passed over her face.
Gen's voice was quiet, firm. "Don't worry. Once we're strong enough, we'll come back. We'll smash this whole place to get her back. She'll have a worthy burial."
Lorel met his gaze, seeing the promise there, and gave a firm, grateful nod.
And so, the half-dressed duo set off, moving across the vast, surreal landscape of the Forgotten Realm. They leaped between floating ruins, navigated rivers of glittering dust, and passed through silent forests of crystal.
Some days later, they found an anomaly: a waterfall. Not of sand or light, but of clear, cascading water, pouring from the broken edge of a floating continent into a deep, placid pool that hovered in the void. It was the only normal, refreshing sight they had encountered.
Gen, still shirtless, cleaned himself quickly and then lounged leisurely against the trunk of a sturdy, floating tree at the pool's edge, his eyes closed.
Lorel, more hesitant, waded into the water until it covered her shoulders, only her head above the surface. She watched him warily. She was well aware he wouldn't try anything foolish, but she couldn't quite calm herself. *What if he suddenly jumps in?*
Gen, for his part, wasn't sleeping. He was practicing the **God Asylum** internally. The scroll felt like a curse to him now, a chain of guilt. But to decide not to train it would be to accept defeat, to let Juo Si and the others win by making him fear his own power. He had vowed to himself to train it to its maximum, to master it so completely that they would regret ever giving him access.
Little did Gen know, the strange, resonant energy he was trying to wrap his will around was subtly interacting with the latent energy *within* the water.
Slowly, the pool began to churn.
A massive, whale-like figure, formed of condensed water and ancient Qi, surged up from the depths of the pool with a sound like a tidal wave, its mouth open wide towards Lorel.
Lorel screamed in frustration. "GEN JIANG!"
Gen's eyes snapped open. He stood up in surprise, seeing the elemental beast. "Sorry!" he called out, scratching his head, as if he'd knocked over a cup.
Lorel, her hands held over her chest just below the waterline, cursed at him with her eyes.
Gen's own eyes sharpened. A deadly glare fixed on the water-whale. Suddenly, a dense, powerful aura spread from him, not attacking, but *enveloping* the area. It was the dominating will of the **God Asylum**, not to destroy, but to command. The sheer, oppressive pressure of it forced the nascent spirit of the pool to submit. The whale-like figure dissolved with a mournful gurgle, diving back into the depths from whence it came.
Several minutes later, her chest wrap securely back in place, Lorel moved ahead, not talking to him.
Gen trailed behind, slightly puzzled. "It was a mistake, I didn't do it intentionally," he offered.
Lorel didn't listen, walking faster.
Gen sighed. "Why are you even so angry? I didn't see anything. Anyway…"
Lorel's head suddenly froze. She stopped moving entirely, causing Gen to bump into her from behind and stumble back slightly.
Moving past her, he asked, "Is there an issue?"
Lorel pointed, her earlier irritation forgotten, replaced by sheer engrossment. "Take a look."
Gen followed her gaze.
Before them, carved into a series of massive, interlocking floating rocks, was an ancient city. It wasn't ruins; it was pristine, silent, and whole. Twelve houses, each of a different, elegant architectural style, were aligned in a strange, spiraling order as they rose towards the void above. The structures seemed to hum with a low, inviting frequency.
"What is this place?" Gen breathed.
Lorel smiled, her eyes alight. "Might be our way out. Let's go."
Gen wanted to ask about the earlier matter, then decided not to pursue it. This girl was too complicated. One time she was happy, one time she wasn't talking to him, and now she wanted him to follow her. What was that even? His still-youthful mind didn't understand the complexity of it all yet. But their bond had deepened immeasurably over this shared ordeal. So, he simply followed.
For an unknown reason, he found himself more and more comfortable with her presence. It wasn't only because they were here alone.
"Are you coming, Gen?" she called out from below, already leaping down towards the first of the floating rocks. Her hair streamed behind her in the windless void, and her smile was as bright as the sudden, fierce joy in his own heart.
He wasn't bothered Looking at her, he smiled. The old, reflexive tension was gone. He wasn't bothered by the thought of Lorel the Older Betrothed, the duty-bound match his father had arranged. That abstract figure had dissolved in the blood, sweat, and silence of the Forgotten Realm. The person leaping ahead of him, with her bright smile and fierce will, was just Lorel. And Gen realized, with a clarity that cut through the lingering hunger and fatigue, that he really, really liked her.
Without another thought, he jumped forward and followed her down.