God

Yu Ci's gaze swept back and forth between the mirror and the sky, finally confirming his suspicion. He took a long breath, pushed aside his wandering thoughts, and leaped. Like an ape, he used all four limbs to scramble up the cliff face, reaching the highest point of the peak in no time. Yu Ci narrowed his eyes as sunlight pierced through the forest canopy, shining directly down. His mind was still a bit hazy, but since he was awake, the nightmare no longer held its terrifying grip. Yu Ci was about to dismiss it with a laugh, but his heart stirred again with a feeling that was real and familiar.

It was the reaction of the Five Directions Spirit Communication Talisman.

This talisman was one of Yu Ci's most complex specialties. It could detect intense reactions from any living beings nearby, feeding that information back into the user's mind as a warning. He remembered that he had drawn it by force before falling unconscious, and it had miraculously succeeded.

The talisman's duration was about two to three hours. If it was still active now, it meant his period of unconsciousness wasn't as long as Yu Ci had imagined... Wait, that wasn't right.

Yu Ci looked at the sun again, confirming it was at its zenith. Yet, he clearly remembered that it had just turned night when he fell asleep. No matter how you calculated it, seven to eight hours had passed, and the Five Directions Spirit Communication Talisman couldn't possibly last this long.

But the pulsing in his mind was undeniably the talisman's reaction.

As he pondered this puzzle, he suddenly felt something strange to his left. On the ground, a faint green light flickered – wasn't that the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror used to draw talismans? Perhaps sensing his attention, the mirror's green light grew even brighter.

Yu Ci confirmed he hadn't used his true energy to activate the mirror. His gaze fell upon its surface, and his face was instantly filled with astonishment, leaving no room for anything else.

Within the green light, in the mirror, an Eagle was clearly flying. Yu Ci rubbed his eyes and looked again. No mistake. Hooked beak, grayish feathers, with many dark bands, its eyes a dull yellow, and its tail feathers pointed – it was undoubtedly an Eagle. This fierce mountain predator was circling at a low altitude. Below the mirror's surface, he could even see the verdant mountaintop.

He snatched the mirror abruptly, holding it before his eyes.

Why would an Eagle fly into his mirror... No, what he meant was, why would the bronze mirror reflect the image of an Eagle? It was as if this mirror, which had been with him for many years, had suddenly become the eye of a Demon or Monster, filled with a thrilling power.

As this thought arose, he suddenly turned his head. His gaze happened to pass over the mountain wall behind him, as if an invisible pointer was guiding his sight directly towards the southeastern sky.

There, a black dot was circling in the air.

An Eagle! An Eagle identical to the one in the mirror!

From this vantage point, the view was much wider, with vast forests stretching out as far as the eye could see. Yu Ci strained his eyes, not looking at the sky, but following an earlier sensation, parting the sea of trees to search for a target amidst the foliage.

The invisible pointer remained, moving with his will, indicating the exact direction. This was the effect of the Five Directions Spirit Communication Talisman, but its range was more than ten times its normal scope.

However, even with the direction confirmed, Yu Ci's eyesight wasn't good enough to penetrate the dense leaves. He didn't intend to. After confirming the general location, he lowered his head, his gaze fixed on the surface of the bronze mirror, which was still emitting a green light. The image in the mirror was crystal clear. The faint sound of his own gasping was like heavenly music. Yu Ci wasn't sure if he was deliberately exaggerating his posture to express his excitement.

In the mirror, a gray rabbit appeared, accelerating to its limit, darting through the trees and grass, constantly changing direction to escape the deadly threat from the sky.

This was the scene displayed by the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror, incredibly clear and real.

As Yu Ci's thoughts shifted, the close-up view of the rabbit in the mirror suddenly changed. It was as if the Demon's or Monster's eye had moved away from it. The scope of the world displayed in the mirror rapidly expanded, eventually encompassing the Eagle high in the sky, the rabbit in the woods, and the entire mountain forest that contained them.

The green light intensified greatly. Yu Ci clearly felt a power stirring within the bronze mirror. Immediately, he saw all the scenes displayed in the mirror stand up!

That's right, they stood up!

If the original mirror image was a spread-out landscape painting, then now, the painting trembled, and the mountains came alive, the water flowed. The mountains were majestic, yet only an inch high. The flowing water gurgled, as fine as a strand of hair. Whether it was the Eagle circling in the sky, ready to strike, or the rabbit fleeing in panic on the ground, they all became the size of lice, yet their expressions were vivid, identical to their real counterparts, and they changed in sync with the movements of the living beings outside, without any delay.

At this moment, all the living beings in the forest before him were shrunk a thousandfold, projected into the misty green light above the mirror's surface.

Looking at this lifelike miniature world, Yu Ci's mind was inevitably drawn into it. And as he did, a wondrous thing happened again. He felt as if he had merged with the invisible " Demon eye" in the void, floating in this world. With the change of his thoughts, he constantly shifted position, changing angles, not only observing the Eagle and the rabbit, but encompassing the activities of all living beings.

He could see sparrows hopping among the branches, venomous snakes salivating beneath tree trunks, even mole crickets peeking out from fallen leaves, and ants burrowing in and out of the soil.

He saw even more. He could see the cracked bark on the trunks of ancient pines, the fine textures on exposed rocks, even the leisurely floating clouds high in the sky, and beneath the surface, the winding roots of giant trees.

Yu Ci held the bronze mirror like a fool, with only one thought in his mind:

A treasure, a true treasure.

After a long pause, he suddenly went mad, took a step, chose a direction at random, and ran. He scaled mountains and crossed rivers, changing routes multiple times. Later, he completely lost himself in the vast mountains, surrounded by towering ancient trees. Disturbed creatures chirped and squawked, and the forest seemed to have come alive.

The miniature world on the bronze mirror was also alive.

Mountains and streams, forests and meadows, snakes and insects, birds and orioles, eagles and wolves, everything, with his wild charge, flowed and shifted within the green light.

Suddenly, he stopped without warning. In the green light, the miniature world also came to a standstill. But the stillness was relative; the creatures within were still flying and running, displaying a thousand different jungle scenes. And in the center of this world, his own figure appeared.

He stared at this miniature world, completely mesmerized.

This was a vast area centered on himself, with a radius of fifty li, extending ten li upwards and a hundred zhang downwards. If the displayed area was expanded to its limit, floating above the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror, the light image was like an inverted sea bowl, predominantly greenish-blue, representing the vast forest. The countless fine patterns within were the rich colors presented by innumerable species.

The rock and soil layers, extending a hundred zhang deep, occupied only a thin layer at the bottom, with a deep color. The top was light blue, almost colorless, representing the sky. These vastly different colors, combined, were not aesthetically pleasing, but they presented an incredibly detailed world that could be held in one's hand, perhaps not much sturdier than a bubble. This intense collision of reality and illusion drove Yu Ci almost to madness.

"Calm down, calm down!"

He really needed to calm down. This divine function of the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror had fallen from the sky, hitting him squarely on the head, stunning him so much that he couldn't even begin to understand its origin.

Was this manifestation of the world within a small space, this Spiritual Power, inherent to the Zhaoshen Bronze Mirror, or was it attached from the outside? If it was inherent, why hadn't it appeared before? If it had always been there, and he had accidentally triggered it, how had he done so? Was there a time limit after activation? Could it be repeated? Could it be canceled?