Such mockery.

"Do you truly care as much as you think you do? Or did you actually manage to hold onto something?"

The You Sui grandmaster arrogantly lifted his eyes, looking down: "The 'Non-attack Creation' is truly divine, crafted with ten fingers; omnipotent and omnipresent.

However, the flaw lies with you, for you reach into the void, and thus grasp nothing—what you see, what you choose, is nothing but a wasteland."

He said, "This is your essence."

"Even now, does the grandmaster still expect to sway me with that stale talk of Zhi Fu?"

Ji Jue coldly retorted, "Words are powerless, how about repeating your old tricks, to see if I will bow down to you?!"

Jian Yuan's eyebrows slowly raised.

Confusion, realization, and an undeniable mockery.

He couldn't help but burst into laughter.

Bending forward and then reclining back.

"So it is, so it is! Ha, hahaha, hahahaha...hahahahahaha!!!"

"There's something, I forgot to tell you..."

Jian Yuan almost laughed to tears, sporadically saying, "Maybe you misunderstood, but the 'Candle Illumination Ceremony' you underwent previously was not directed towards Zhi Fu's 'Secret Ritual' at all."

He paused, his smile growing more malevolent:

"On the contrary, it's the essence passed down for thousands of years by the 'Embers Path'!

Even I as the host cannot fully know what you saw. Because what it illuminates is the future you wish to see, the world you aspire to create.

It guides the path you want to take in your heart...

But what did you see?"

He taunted:

"—Is it destruction or death?"

Ji Jue remained unshaken, glaring coldly, "Wasn't it you who indoctrinated me with the talk of Zhi Fu before this?"

"In just three days, how can it compare to the lifetime you've upheld since birth? How does it compare to Ye Xian's repeated teachings?"

Jian Yuan stepped forward, looking down on him, asked word by word: "How much of this was my guidance? How much, is your inner true desire? And how much, is the leakage of your essence?

What you saw, isn't it just yourself stripped of adornment and disguise?!"

Thus, amidst Ji Jue's silence and stupefaction, he savored that indifferent expression hiding disturbance and anger, his laughter intensifying, as if watching a blade gradually being refined in the furnace.

"I've said before, a craftsman never mistakes the material.

From the moment I saw you, I knew what kind of monster you are—"

Jian Yuan leaned down, eye to eye with Ji Jue, his green eyes turbulent, piercing through all pretense: "I have never seen such a twisted soul, such a contradictory makeup.

Your heart is empty, you scoff at all sanctimonious things, relying on something nonexistent as a pillar, like a prisoner, drawing a cell around himself.

I see it.

You are just like the legendary Sisyphus, day after day in a cycle, exhaustedly moving forward, yet not knowing where to go, nor daring to stop.

Until one day, you completely lose yourself...

That's why you are in such pain, why you so desperately crave death!"

"No wonder the Great Calamities are so fascinated by you!

Compared to someone like you chasing nothingness, what am I, who is insanely cruel?"

Jian Yuan extended his hand, pointing at Ji Jue's heart: "The arrogance of Zhi Fu, the emptiness of Absolute Abyss, the madness of Slaughter, the desolation of Vortex, the twisting of the tower, the hunger of the wolf, all here...

You do not care about your own life, and although you seem to struggle so fiercely, one day, you won't care about anyone's life, because you are that kind of person, you will become that kind of monster!"

Ji Jue remained silent.

No reply, as if frozen.

From this silence, he seemed to hear his own heartbeat, its mournful intermittent drops, so deep... Blood flowing in his veins, like the tide washing the shore, reverberating in emptiness.

So much so, he didn't catch Jian Yuan's words clearly.

Perhaps he was right, this is his essence, this is the ugly side hidden beneath his smile, he is such a freak.

He could no longer run away.

But those weren't so important anymore.

His gaze was drawn to something more crucial.

As if passing through Jian Yuan's obstruction, he focused his gaze on the fleeting illusions revealed amidst the Mutated Pollution, the last remnants of those who had perished.

Those unfamiliar and blurred faces.

Pushing and shoving, or retreating and fleeing.

Crying, cursing, calling or yelling, but no sound could be heard.

Like struggling futilely in the mire, reaching out repeatedly, trying to grasp something, yet grasping nothing.

Only when they embraced each other did tears fall.

Slipping through his palms, falling to the ground, splashing up the last glimmer of illusion.

Ji Jue lowered his head, coming to his senses, only to realize that at some point he had once again extended his palm.

The empty palm still had nothing.

Such futile efforts.

Yet he suddenly started laughing.

Mocking grin.

Mocking Jian Yuan, mocking himself.

"No."

He lifted his head, showing his empty palm to the craftsman before him, telling him:

"I care."

Silence, Jian Yuan did not speak.

Merely looking down on him, his gaze growing gradually colder.

Like looking at a piece of wood that ultimately cannot be carved, a blade in the furnace covered with rust and dust, happily dissolving into a twisted shape.

Ultimately...

Hopeless!

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