Truth, Inevitable End, Three Years

Ronan immediately abandoned his idea of seclusion and stepped out of the secret chamber.

The old corridor was empty, and the small door leading to the Prophet Eve's room was tightly closed. Ronan glanced at it and then walked straight to the other end.

Arriving at the Quivada Oasis once again, Ronan settled down and strolled across the oasis's landscape.

The severely corrupted plains occasionally emitted strange noises like the groans of a giant, and the soil, permeated with slime, writhed slightly like flesh and blood. Some otherworldly Magic Creature ran across the plains, and upon smelling Ronan's scent, they all gathered around him.

Self-separating from the Itai, they flapped their magnificent wings and flew out from under Ronan's robes, then combined to form a huge wing blade, carrying asphalt-like flames and rolling heat waves, which splashed wildly in all directions.

One by one, the Magic Creature were easily harvested like clumps of black wheat under the blade of [Golden Origin]. Ronan's lips moved slightly, and as the gold ravaged the area with Itai, crystal-clear ice shards fell from between his fingers. The ice shards condensed into exquisite snowflakes around him, and any one of them, when blown out, would stir up a frost storm on the corrupted plain.

Mirrors, like flowing mercury, constantly appeared around him, and occasionally Ronan's figure would suddenly explode into dozens of silvery figures.

As day turns to Black Night, a dark, deep sun rises over the land of the Quivada Oasis, like a bottomless abyss, frantically devouring all the evil and corruption around it.

Metal and fire, ice, space, Energy Affinity, and even the Undead Arts Aihaxia's Ghost Arrow... Ronan switched between various spells at will, like a tireless spellcasting machine. He would only stop when his mental energy was completely exhausted, summoning a certain number of Elemental Guardian with the Crown of Deep Knowledge, and then begin to meditate to recover.

Ronan remained in a "dreamlike" state. Occasionally, some messy and trivial information and images would be transmitted from the projection, at which point he would have to devote some of his attention to processing them.

The simultaneous "ascetic practices" on both sides will inevitably cause some interference to the main body.

Because of the huge difference between the flow of time in dreams and reality, and the influence of various factors, the actual situation is much more complex.

However, as Ronan continued to adjust and adapt, this influence gradually diminished.

Two months later, one night.

Beside the roaring orange campfire, Ronan was intently fiddling with a black metal plate in his hand, using the light of the flames.

A faint ripple of runes emanated from the metal plate, with some glowing, fragment-like substances floating on one side.

It was the metal plate that Ronan had obtained from the Silver Goblin Vault, which might contain clues about the "Golin's Hammer." Ronan would take it out to study during his leisure time, and he had already pieced together a small part of the pattern on the plate. At this rate, it would probably only take a few years to complete the whole thing.

Just as Ronan was gently fiddling with a tiny, glowing "fragment" on the metal plate, he suddenly stopped and his whole body trembled slightly.

"Buzz—"

A massive Torrent of information surged from the depths of my mind, and the shadow of Silver Serpent flashed before my eyes.

Ronan immediately closed his eyes, and in an instant, massive surges of soul power surged up within him like a tidal wave. The [Star Force Field] naturally permeated his body, expanding rapidly to the naked eye, presenting a transparent and distorted scene like rippling water around Ronan's body.

This process lasted for about the time it takes to two hourglasses before gradually fading away.

Once all the commotion had completely subsided, Ronan slowly opened his eyes.

"The advantage of using Soul Projection to enter dreams is that it doesn't take up real-world cultivation time, but the disadvantage is..."

Ronan took a deep breath and activated [Golden Soul]. Invisible Golden Fire rose from his body, steaming up wisps of soul impurities Ash Smoke.

"When the dream ends and the projection returns, there will be a 'settlement' process, during which you will have to endure a soul impact that is several times greater than that of a normal dream."

Of course, if the strength of one's soul gradually increases, this kind of impact will not be a big deal.

Ronan brought up the Character Panel and saw that the [Strength Progress] column showed "37%", which was 6% higher than the last time.

Ronan's eyes flickered slightly.

This time, he was still in the era of the Keldim Empire when he entered the dream, only the time was slightly later.

At that time, the "Central Hub" that the Keldim Empire had been searching for had been found, and the "Waterway Project" officially began to be implemented.

As a Waterway Supervisor in Keldim, he spent over eighty years underground in a small group of wizards, astrologers, imperial knights, and craftsmen, before finally dying in an underground Magic Creature riot.

This was, in fact, the first time Ronan had ended his life in the "Reincarnation Dream Realm" through an "unnatural death."

"During the construction of the waterway, signs of otherworldly Magic Creature were already discovered. The closer we got to the Quivada Oasis, the more spatial rifts we encountered, and the more frequent the Magic Creature's activities became."

Ronan, recounting his more than eighty years of experience as the Waterway Supervisor, analyzed. "The ancient wizards' battle against the invasion of otherworldly Magic Creature, which shattered the world's continent, did not completely eliminate the hidden dangers. Numerous traces are all concealed underground and on the other side of the continent."

The Waterway Project of the Keldim Empire revealed all this, releasing those Magic Creature from their ancient seal.

Ronan's expression was complicated.

Having entered his dream twice, he, as a "person who witnessed" it, is gradually getting closer to the truth of the fall of the Keldim Wizard Empire.

He couldn't determine who should be blamed for all these mistakes.

As a powerful empire that ruled over 90 percent of the continental area of Upper Ring, Keldim had a further ambition: to open up Middle Ring. Thus, the "Waterway Project" was born.

When they realized they had inadvertently touched upon some ancient taboos, the empire, at its zenith, believed it was capable of resolving the subsequent series of problems.

On the other hand, from the moment the idea of the "Central Hub" was put forward, Keldim has invested far too much in this grand project, betting everything on the magnificent blueprint after the completion of the "waterway network".

They can no longer turn back.

Despite discovering the existence of a seal beneath the earth that could unlock the Magic Creature of another world, they still forcibly pushed through it, leading to the subsequent catastrophe and the fall and destruction of Keldim.

Even if the "Waterway Project" had been decisively abandoned at that time, the empire would inevitably decline over time due to the massive investment in the early stages and the resulting depletion of its resources.

To put it bluntly, the fate of the Keldim Empire was almost sealed.

After Ronan finished organizing all the gains from this dream, he sighed softly as he faced the burning campfire before him.

During this dream, the memories of the Primordial Spirit Writing were not delayed, and nearly 7,000 more were added to the original 20,000.

Ronan continued to use projection to enter the dream.

After he was able to visualize Silver Serpent in his mind and use Soul Projection to Reincarnation into Dream, Ronan discovered that the world he entered each time was no longer completely random, and he had a certain degree of autonomy in choosing.

Based on his previous experience in the dream, he could find the petals on the Black Dandelion that "smell similar".

For example, this time—

A dandelion petal gently falls, and Ronan enters a new "cycle".

When he opened his eyes in his dream, he saw—in the quiet, damp waterway, on a small boat, several wizards dressed in robes in the distinctive style of the Keldim Empire were carefully placing a square box emitting a mysterious glow into a strange altar hidden in the stone wall.

"Holy Shrine Altar?"

Ronan blinked and tried to take a step forward, but was immediately met with a stern rebuke from the side.

He instinctively gripped the pickaxe in his hand tighter.

Oh.

This time, he became a low-level craftsman responsible for building waterways.

The petals of the Black Dandelion fall one by one, reality and dreams coexist.

Time flows silently like water on a white sandy shore, heading towards the unknown distance.

The scorching magma, like thick Blood Plasma, surged through the cracks and charred fissures of the earth's rock, turning the entire space a dazzling orange-red. The air was filled with the pungent, putrid smell of sulfur. Occasionally, bubbles would rise from the magma river below, bursting and splashing viscous sparks that hissed and burned wisps of blue smoke onto the rock surface.

Ronan stood suspended in mid-air, silently standing in front of a jagged black rock pillar.

He remained calm, uttering the syllables of an ancient incantation in a low voice.

With a crisp "crack," the rock pillar, resembling the fangs of a giant beast, broke off at its base and opened, revealing a small, strange black altar.

The entire altar showed signs of melting and corrosion from the high temperature, but a small, square black box placed in the center of the altar was relatively well preserved.

Ronan carefully took it out and gently flicked a spot on the top of the stone box with his finger. With a "click" sound, as if a mechanism was turning, wisps of pure white flame seeped out from the cracks in the box.

Ronan's eyes flashed, and he took a deep breath.

In an instant, wisps of pure white flame from the stone box began to actively seek out Ronan's mouth, nose, eyes, and pores, and in the blink of an eye, a thin layer of pure white flame enveloped his entire body.

Ronan was bathed in pure white firelight, his robes unaffected, but the body beneath them emitted a series of fine, continuous crackling sounds.

This process continued until the pure white flames in the stone box had completely dissipated, and the pure white flames on Ronan's body had also receded into his body.

He put away the stone box in his hand and slowly stretched his limbs.

His already well-proportioned and slender body now seemed even more perfect. Translucent golden runic chains emerged from his body, each one taut, poised to break free. On his right wrist, a mark resembling a golden gear flickered incessantly.

"Click-click-click—"

With a series of crisp, cracking sounds, Ronan's aura gradually subsided, his billowing robes slowly fell down, and the translucent golden rune chains gradually disappeared.

When all the commotion had completely subsided, Ronan looked down at the back of his hand and could clearly see that the mark of the golden gear seemed to have faded a lot, and some small cracks had appeared around the gear, as if it would shatter at any moment.

"How many is this now?"

Ronan looked at the Holy Shrine Altar that was slowly melting and collapsing under the intense heat of the lava and muttered to himself.