A Way Out: A Way Out
"This is my first experiment, in this predicament that has neither a beginning nor an end."
"It has no beginning and no end, and all the concepts associated with it, the things connected to it, and the people who love and hate it are just like a rolling mass of flesh and blood, a life that defies convention."
Dreamlike words were slowly uttered from Wood's lips--
He was a man who should have died long ago; he should have died at the hands of the gunsmith, but he survived by accident.
Four years ago, during the operation to wipe out the far north of the 77th Administrative District of the Nine Realms, Wood, as the leader of the Madness Butterfly Sect, escaped from the pursuit of the Nameless Ones.
A part of his soul remained forever on the cold, icy plains, in that desolate and silent Northern Territory.
Wood clearly remembered that it was a pitch- Five Fingers night. For District 77, there were only aurora borealis caused by the restless Original Seed. The Lord of Cinder in District 69 would occasionally peek out halfway before flying off to the human settlements 1,100 kilometers away.
As for why the Madness Butterfly Sect would choose to take root in such a horrible place?
Wood had a ridiculous yet persistent reason.
He wanted to dig through to the Earth's core.
Unlike his fellow Guiyi Sect, whether he became a carnivore or accepted the Blessed Holy Blood, it was all to satisfy Wood's pursuit of power; power was merely a tool.
He has an ideal! An ideal is different from a dream!
Ideals are achievable; they can be clearly planned and then gradually realized! They are not mere daydreams!
If we continue to work diligently in District 77 for another sixteen years, anything the Kola Deep Hole Drilling Project couldn't do, anything the Soviets engineering equipment couldn't solve, can be solved in this strange Northern Territory, where mineral resources are abundant and heavy metals and pyroxene energy are plentiful.
Unfortunately, Wood encountered the most formidable enemy of his life.
In the eerie, dark fossil jungle, he fled desperately, just to avoid the shadow of Death God.
The rustling sound of footsteps came from the distance of the forest, and the hood and helmet of the Flash Butterfly Armor gleamed with a light like that of a wild wolf's eyes.
He still clung to a sliver of hope, believing that as long as Ming De's loyal hounds couldn't find him, they would naturally be defeated by the harsh environment, and he could simply grab a few of the Madness Butterfly Sect's cadres to settle the matter.
However, he underestimated the gunsmith's determination and the nameless man's fighting spirit.
The truth is quite the opposite. If the Cult Leader isn't captured, the anonymous man will never give up—if even the notorious bandit chief, who deserves to be torn to pieces, hasn't died, why would he care about the lowly henchmen who surrender?
Finally, Wood stopped at Wind Feather Canyon in District 77, where he howled in despair in a treacherous area where wind speeds approached 60 meters per second.
He sensed it; Death God was right behind him.
Mr. Wood is very, very old. He has maintained the frail body of a seventy-two-year-old, Blessed Holy Blood cannot save him in the slightest—because his soul power is too special. If the Holy Blood Formula is changed at will, he may be able to obtain younger skin and a stronger body, but the [A Way Out] technique, which reverses time and foresees the future, may fail.
Once he loses this power, how will he fulfill his ideals?
This was something Wood could not accept, could not tolerate, and was a lifelong pursuit he was willing to dedicate his life to achieving.
"I've finally found you." The gunsmith was only twenty-seven years old at the time.
When Wood saw the face of the newly appointed leader of the Nameless Gang, he thought the young man was unbelievably young, with an unexpected air of naivety and immaturity.
The old man didn't intend to run away; instead, he tried to reason with the gunsmith.
"What did I do wrong?! Why did you chase me to this godforsaken place?!"
He didn't understand at all and screamed hysterically.
"What kind of remote and desolate place is District 77? What Human Hell is it? It has absolutely no development value for Ming De!"
"I just want to fulfill my dream! Why? To be a gunsmith! Why!"
"Just this once! Just this once! I'm begging you! I'm begging you!"
"I won't cause any trouble for the surrounding stations! I need human flesh, I need to live! I need to survive! This is just business, right!"
"I'll drill through the earth! I'll see what's down there! There must be a way! Gunsmith! There must be a way!"
"The Arcane Library should work with me to achieve this ideal! And coincidentally, your boss, Ming De, is just like me!"
"We all want to know the answer! That's what we all do!"
"Even if we do geological surveys ten thousand times, it's just cold, hard data! I need to see it with my own eyes! I need that wealth and power."
Wood's voice was drowned out by the strong wind, and the gunsmith couldn't hear what the old bastard was saying.
The moment he drew his weapon, Wood was almost in despair—
"I'm clearly doing the right thing! Why are you doing this to me?"
"It is intimately connected with every living being on this planet."
"Growing and multiplying"
Suddenly everything fell silent. The moment Wood was shot, the bullet flew back and returned to the chamber.
"Laughing wildly! Howling in despair! Dying!"
"I want to find it, I must find [A Way Out]!"
His physical body traversed 11,000 kilometers, flew over the barrier of the Pompeii Sea, and returned to the Da Liang Kingdom four years ago amidst the crisp sound of the shutter, just as Aizong Mausoleum was about to be abandoned and the Heavenly Palace project had just been launched.
The gunsmith stood frozen. Legend has it that this snowfield is plagued by strange and bizarre psychic disasters that can cause people to lose their way and experience all sorts of hallucinations.
Just now—he had clearly pulled the trigger, the bullet had completely left the barrel, and the flash of light illuminated his eyes. But the bullet and casing had returned to the chamber, as if everything that had just happened was an illusion.
There was never a Wood Abby, no leader of the Madness Butterfly Sect, no one mentioned in the mission report.
He played hide-and-seek with an unseen and intangible demon in this cold highland, and ultimately returned empty-handed and disappointed.
Four years later--
Judas lost Gloria Sebastian, but he found Wood Abby, and found this second life-saving feather.
"This is my last experiment, in this predicament that has neither a beginning nor an end."
"It has no beginning and no end, and all the concepts associated with it, the things connected to it, and the people who love and hate it are just like a rolling mass of flesh and blood, a life that defies convention."
"I don't know how to explain this to you, my leader, my supreme idol."
Wood followed the sycophantic routine. The white-haired old man knew in his heart that he should have died long ago, but the gunsmith's bullets weren't big enough, and his killing intent wasn't strong enough—that's why he was spared. Soul Power brought him back to Judas's side to continue serving his life sentence in Shambhala.
Inside the magnificent Kaiwu Pavilion, Judas was discussing recent events with this key technical staff member. He did not remove his mask, but instead visited his subordinate disguised as Hunwei, wearing a wide cloak and applying bright green lipstick to his golden mask.
"Gloria Sebastian is dead, and I'm very worried."
"So I came to visit you, hoping you are still in good spirits."
"Time is also our enemy; it gradually changes our personality and erodes our will."
Judas slowly and deliberately, emphasizing each word repeatedly.
"Put your boring and idiotic research plans aside. Your talents will be used entirely for my purposes, Mr. Wood."
"You're my second line of defense. As long as you don't sneak off to war zones to do your underground exploration work like before, and you tell me the truth—I can agree to any condition and accept any reason."
Long ago, Wood was already Judas's talisman.
However, even this tool in Judas's eyes had its own thoughts—
He was not as arrogant as Gloria, never excessively pursuing "freedom," nor was he some arrogant Red Stone People. He could grovel before Judas and endure in silence.
Although he had the attitude, Wood often used his A Way Out superpower to travel to faraway places to gather information and conduct research related to the exploration of the Earth's core. He was an idealistic Cult Leader —and he was able to put his ideas into practice.
Aside from frequently reciting riddles, this old man, like every scholar at the Blue Stone Magic Academy, possessed an almost superstitious fervor for modern science.
He considered himself a visionary, and his ideas often clashed with Judas's pragmatism—each time he had to lose in order to secure some research funding.
[Final·CaughtSeize the last moment of the finale], this is also a gift given to Judah by Fickwood Abby. It is a highly respected [audience] in the Alliance and the second life-protecting feather.
As long as he doesn't suffer fatal injuries, Judas can use Wood's soul power to return to the previous film studio. In the primitive society of Great Xia with its poor transportation conditions, Judas can also use this superpower to move quickly and travel back and forth between various overtime locations.
However, [A Way Out]'s capabilities extend far beyond that; to consider it merely as a save point would be to underestimate Wood's power.
This little old man held a deep obsession with his ideals, and this powerful spiritual strength could create miracles that are hard for ordinary people to imagine—including the things that Judas cared about most.
"If Ming De launches a full-scale attack this time, I will flee to the Mobius Ring." Judas made the worst-case scenario plan. "Sendai, Dongma, Zhuzhou, and Taiye in the southeast have all fallen. The Emperor of Great Xia is still pretending to be dead. He is waiting for me to send a message, asking me to personally visit the capital. This trip is extremely dangerous. If he finds a chance to turn the tables—he will definitely turn against me."
"Are you sure you want to escape to the Mobius Ring?" Wood explained again, "I can't change fate, I can only reveal a part of the truth—truth doesn't change because of human will, and I think you understand that better than I do."
The "Mobius Ring" is a strange Spirit Realm created by Wood using [A Way Out].
To be precise, it is not the Spirit Realm in the traditional sense, nor is it a dream world or the underworld, nor is it a place that can be reached by physical planes like the nine levels of hell or the purgatory. As long as humanity's research into psychic energy is in-depth enough and the application of engineering drilling technology is gradually updated, sooner or later we will be able to drill through the Earth's core, get close to Mother Earth, and observe these strange bioelectric fields with the naked eye.
At the geometric level, the Mobius strip is an infinitely looping space with no beginning and no end.
Wood's [A Way Out] uses photography to record Judas's life events and simultaneously presents a photograph from the future.
Before the photograph is developed, it remains black, and before the developing solution has fully taken effect. Then, using the psionic technique of [A Way Out] to photograph the photograph itself, Judas will enter a cycle without beginning or end.
The scenes in the photographs extend infinitely. Within the overlapping frames, the photographs within the photographs are repeatedly developed, constantly revealing one "future" after another, like two mirrors reflecting each other, extending into infinite space. This operation also causes Judas to repeatedly return to the time points recorded by the Mobius Ring, completely leaving the material plane. In the eyes of ordinary people, Judas "disappears" from this world.
In this strange state, Judas must go through at least one complete cycle of reincarnation in order to continue moving forward with the standard time of the material plane.
This might be a bit hard to understand, so let me give you a simple example.
[A Way Out] can trap Judas on October 1st, using the [Mobius] Spirit Realm to hide him on that day. Apart from Wood, no one knows where he went—in fact, he is stuck in the "past." For Judas, the material plane may already be October 2nd, 3rd, or 4th.
As long as the [Mobius] created by [A Way Out] continues, he can remain hidden on October 1st indefinitely until the cycle is ended by [A Way Out], Wood personally enters the Mobius to take a new photograph of Judas, at which point Judas can return to the normal material plane.
"Have you dealt with the swift-bladed pursuers who have been following us these past two days?" Judas felt uneasy whenever he talked about this.
Wood replied, "It's been taken care of."
That being said, the old man still left room for maneuver—
--[A Way Out] has almost no offensive capabilities.
The moment the brothers of Quickblade entered the Aizong Mausoleum, they were affected by [Mobius]. They were trapped in their own timelines, constantly repeating this mission, starting and ending again and again, and experiencing this story repeatedly.
They neither starve, nor tire, nor die, nor fully come back to life, struggling repeatedly in the strange Spirit Realm.
Without any backup, they could only repeatedly send a jumble of messages emphasizing time.
Occasionally, these Mobius Rings would touch and interfere with each other, resulting in the soldiers of the Third Squad encountering two platoon leaders, or three or four, and many more bizarre spatial distortions.
"Where is the body?" Judas wanted more food.
Wood quickly replied, "I've already taken care of it."
Judas moved closer to Wood and pressed, "Really?"
How could the old man with the feathers dare to tell the truth?
He always wanted to repay the debt of gratitude.
--It was to repay the gunsmith's kindness in sparing his life.
At the end of the fjord in District 77, if the gunsmith had been holding the hunting goddess Devana instead of the low-pressure Jingguang, he would have had no chance of survival.
He should have died long ago, but Heaven thought this old man's life was not meant to end.
Wood was more farsighted than Judas; Judas's limited thinking would blind Judas and cause the leader of the council to misjudge the situation. But Fickwood didn't want to enlighten this "elder" who looked much younger than himself.
--Ming De will never let this go easily; the overly cumbersome government affairs will wear down Judas's mind. All of this will slowly lead this old-time devil to his doom.
Instead of killing the scouts with the quick-knife, Wood hid them with Mobius. His drilling project was about to make a breakthrough, completely breaking through the Aizong Mausoleum site. The underground temperature, like that of the Northern Territory, represented by Niflheim, was getting colder and colder—perfect working conditions for deep-hole drilling equipment.
He hoped to find an opportunity to quickly send Judas away and return the scouts with the swift blade.
No one would notice that in this small town, there was a seeker of truth quietly pursuing his ideals.
No Ming De army came to cause trouble for him because of lost soldiers, nor did Judas come to cause trouble.
Judas jolted Wood awake. "What are you thinking?"
"I'm thinking," Mr. Wood bluntly stated, "That life feeds on life, in a never-ending cycle, and all suffering and conflict stem from carnivorism."
"I still stand by my ideas, and now even Ming De can't dig any deeper."
"If we cannot fly upwards, we must draw more primordial energy from the heavens."
He firmly believed in his choice.
"Then let's solve this problem at its root. The Original Seed is the designer of life; I'm going to ask it."
Judas sneered--
"--Who do you think you are? Wood? Even the giants with runes can't fight against Mother Gaia. On this planet, all living things are vying for its essence. You just dug a hole, wanting to see Mother Earth with your own eyes."
"How can we fundamentally solve this problem? How can people be human if they don't eat meat? They can only be eaten by other creatures! If I didn't help you, if I didn't feed you human flesh—you wouldn't live past eighty, you would have turned to dust long ago! No money! No power! No such abundant resources! What do you have to talk about ideals with?"
Wood immediately bent over and leaned forward, repeatedly agreeing, daring not to disobey his leader's opinion.
His brain, however, sent a different message: he could not betray his own heart.
"I will take the first step, and someone else will follow in my footsteps to take the second."