The Tree acknowledged Otto had been there, but gave him no outcome, only a crack

"But what if those five hundred years had never happened?" Xiao Xiao suddenly asked, her voice so soft it was almost inaudible. "If Otto hadn't been so obsessive, hadn't ground himself into a key, would the Tree have opened that window?"

"No," Huo Yuhao said. "Without an obsession that powerful, the Tree wouldn't even have opened its eyes. Otto reached the projection not because he was strong enough to stand against God, but because he was in enough pain—so much pain that even the Imaginary Tree was willing to open a crack for him. He ground that crack open with his life, inch by inch. He didn't rely on strength. He relied on his life. On refusing to let go for five hundred years. In those five hundred years, he had actually died many times already. Every time he was about to give out, the image of Kallen as she had been that day dragged him back out of the darkness."

"Then, for those five hundred years, was he living for Kallen or dying for her?" A'Dai asked in a muffled voice.

"Both," Tang San said. "He lived so he could die in the right place. He died so Kallen could gain another path to survival in a past that had gone wrong. But the Tree wouldn't give him that path. It only gave him a chance to prove that he wanted change badly enough. He proved it. With himself. Then the Tree said: good. Now give that chance back to me. I'm taking it away."

"Sounds like the Tree was even more of a swindler than he was," Xu Sanshi said through gritted teeth.

"The Tree isn't a swindler." Gu Yuena shook her head. "The Tree is rules. Rules don't deceive people. They only set conditions. Otto knew the