"Fall!"
The White-Gold Horned Lizard brought a claw down toward Yan's head. But just then, three illusory arrows—one green, one purple, and one gold—suddenly appeared behind its head and shot into it with lightning speed.
The lizard's lively black eyes went vacant for a moment. Then it clutched its head with both claws and let out a howl of excruciating pain.
"Roar!"
The instant the White-Gold Horned Lizard was struck, Yan finally broke free of the paralysis.
"Die!"
Although he had no idea who had launched that sudden sneak attack, Yan wasn't about to let such a perfect opportunity pass.
He pressed his palms together, veins bulging on his forehead. A gigantic spatial rift, dozens of meters wide, suddenly tore open around the White-Gold Horned Lizard. Its terrifying force furiously shredded everything inside, and since Yan was so close, he too was caught in the rift.
At the critical moment, Yan desperately used Teleportation to escape.
Still writhing in pain, the White-Gold Horned Lizard didn't have time to use its Phantom Body technique. It was swallowed by the spatial rift.
"Shhh..."
The spatial rift sealed shut.
"Ha! Ha! Ha..."
Yan appeared a hundred meters away, covered in blood. His chest heaved like a bellows, and he collapsed on the ground. His left leg and left arm were gone—the price of being caught in the spatial rift.
"Young friend!"
Several voices called from a distance, but Yan was gravely injured and utterly spent. His vision blurred. Before he could think any further, he lost consciousness.
He didn't know how much time passed before Yan slowly opened his eyes in an endless, vast expanse of pitch-black Void World.
"Where... am I?"
Yan slowly regained consciousness. He instinctively tried to look at himself, only to discover that he had no body. It was as if he existed in this Void World as pure consciousness. Even what he thought of as "seeing" wasn't done through eyes.
"Whoosh... Whoosh..."
A howling, freezing wind swept through the world. Yan felt his newly recovered consciousness gradually slowing and growing hazy.
"A body. I need a body."
A primal longing from deep within him spread through his consciousness like wildly growing weeds.
The next moment, following his instincts, Yan flew in a certain direction.
All around him stretched nothing but empty, pitch-black space. Only the bitterly cold wind howled and roared without ever seeming to tire.
After an unknown length of time, just as Yan felt his consciousness was about to flicker out, a blurry, white-gold glow appeared within its reach.
Then, like two magnets with opposite poles, his consciousness and the white-gold glow instinctively drew together. Yan felt his consciousness pour into the glow like a rising tide.
"Ugh..."
A light shone against his eyelids, and Yan instinctively opened his eyes.
He found himself lying in an elegant, old-fashioned bedroom. Gentle sunlight streamed in through the window, revealing exquisite carvings of all kinds of birds on its frame.
The room was lit just right, making it feel comfortable and relaxing to be inside.
"Where am I now?" Yan sat up in bed and instinctively stretched his arms. To his surprise, his severed left arm and leg had grown back. He was also wearing robes like Master Sun's, the kind worn by members of the Celestial Master Palace.
Yan looked around, utterly bewildered. His memories still ended in that endless, pitch-black world.
He remembered that his consciousness seemed to have entered a white-gold phantom at the very end...
Wait. A white-gold phantom?
Yan suddenly recalled the White-Gold Horned Lizard he had fought earlier. But the moment its image came to mind, he felt his body beginning to change into its shape. Alarmed, he hurriedly banished the lizard's image from his thoughts.
As soon as his thoughts shifted, the transformation stopped. But Yan was still shocked.
"What was that just now? Why can I turn into the White-Gold Horned Lizard?"
The numbness in his mind from just waking up faded, and all the questions he'd had before losing consciousness came flooding back. In the end, Yan's thoughts settled on his connection to the White-Gold Horned Lizard.
"Could it be that it and I were originally one?" Yan had a thought that seemed absurd even to him. But the more he considered it, the more he felt there was no other explanation that made sense.
Just then, the door opened. A teenage boy in an unusual Daoist robe came in carrying a basin of water, with a clean towel draped over it.
Seeing Yan already sitting up, the boy first froze, then said, "Senior, you're awake! Please wait here. I'll go tell my master and the others right away."
With that, the boy set down the basin and hurried off, leaving Yan reaching out with an arm before he could get a word in.
"..."
Yan felt a little helpless. But judging by the boy's clothes and his own, he guessed that the people who had ambushed the White-Gold Horned Lizard at the critical moment and saved him were experts from the Celestial Master Palace in Jing Kingdom's capital.
They were probably among those who had managed to escape the battle in the capital.
The fight between him and the White-Gold Horned Lizard had caused such a commotion that the others must have been drawn to it and happened to save him.
As he thought, Yan got out of bed and walked outside. He saw the teenage boy from earlier leading three elderly men with white hair and beards toward him in a hurry.
"Young friend, you're awake! How are you feeling?"
The old man in the middle, dressed in a blue Celestial Master robe, was the first to ask.
Yan gave a slight bow. "I'm almost fully recovered. Thank you, seniors, for coming to my aid. But I'm still completely confused about what's going on. Would you be willing to explain?"
"Hahaha, of course. Young friend, let's go inside and talk."
Yan followed the three men back into the room.
After a while, the three old Celestial Masters' explanation had given Yan a general understanding of the situation.
According to them, monsters had begun appearing across the various kingdoms about three years ago. At first, they were all ordinary monsters, like the ones Yan had encountered along the way.
The Celestial Master Palace and the various kingdoms had joined forces. Though they were stretched thin, the threat posed by the ordinary monsters had remained manageable.
But about two months ago, eight super-monsters suddenly appeared. Each led a large horde of ordinary monsters in an assault on a different kingdom's capital.
Those super-monsters were immensely powerful, far stronger than the Grand Celestial Masters stationed in the various capitals. Caught off guard, the kingdoms' capitals had all fallen. Many Grand Celestial Masters had died in battle, while the surviving Celestial Master Palace forces had barely managed to protect some of the survivors as they escaped.
"The super-monsters seemed mainly focused on making that strange pillar of light rise up in the capitals. If not for that, I'm afraid we wouldn't have had the chance to escape either," one of the Celestial Masters, surnamed Ji, said with a sigh.
"I see. But you said these monsters suddenly appeared three years ago?" Yan asked to confirm.
"That's right," said the leading old Celestial Master, surnamed Zhang. "We also tried to find out where the monsters came from, but never learned a thing."
"..."
Yan thought back, but he couldn't recall anything unusual happening around him three years ago.
So he temporarily set those thoughts aside and continued, "Then what's the situation across the continent now? What about the other kingdoms besides Jing?"
"Things are more or less out of control everywhere."
Another Celestial Master, surnamed Lu, gave a bitter smile. "Take Jing Kingdom, for example. The royal family suffered terrible casualties in that battle. Those who weren't in the capital have mostly been killed by the monsters since then. You could say Jing Kingdom has fallen. As for the other kingdoms, communications between regions have been cut off, so we don't know much. But I doubt they're faring any better than Jing. If the Celestial Master Palace weren't still struggling to hold on, who knows what the world would look like by now."
"I see." Yan nodded. Recalling the words that had faintly appeared in his mind—"Become the master of this world"—he began to form a plan.
He spoke slowly. "Given the situation, what do the three Celestial Masters need me to do?"
The three Celestial Masters exchanged glances. Then the leading one, Master Zhang, said, "Young friend, I can tell you're not from the Celestial Master Palace. But may I ask, how many puzzles have you solved in the Rhino Emperor Game?"
"I've solved 2,000," Yan told them.
"2,000 puzzles?"
"Really?"
"To think someone could be that talented."
The three men exclaimed in surprise. It was some time before Master Zhang composed himself. Smiling warmly at Yan, he said, "Please forgive us, young friend. The three of us were simply astonished. We're not much, but we are considered masters of the Rhino Emperor Game in the Celestial Master Palace. We've spent our lives solving puzzles, yet so far we've only reached puzzle 1,902. That's the most anyone in the Celestial Master Palace has solved in our time. For someone as young as you to have done it all on your own is truly astonishing."
Master Ji, standing beside him, added, "When we saw you fighting Zhou, the monster, we already suspected you'd solved more puzzles than the three of us. Now that the world is in such danger, it's a blessing for humanity that a peerless talent like you has appeared."
Master Lu picked up where he left off. "That's why my fellow disciples and I discussed it over the past few days. We want you to take charge of the Celestial Master Palace—at least the branch in Jing Kingdom. Given the current situation, it may be our only hope."
"Just as I thought." Yan felt reassured. With humanity in its current state, the Celestial Master Palace must be close to despair. To them, his arrival was nothing short of a lifeline.
After gathering his thoughts, Yan spoke slowly. "Since the three Celestial Masters are willing to entrust me with this, I won't refuse. But you saw that day that I'm no match for a super-monster. So... does the Celestial Master Palace have anything that could help me solve more puzzles? I need to improve my strength as quickly as possible."