Opening the Consciousness Space

Late at night in the dense forest, Michelle and Annie continued onward with Gu Bei between them, one in front and one behind.

Meanwhile, a mechanical voice kept echoing in Gu Bei's mind, repeating the same obscure phrase over and over.

It was the incantation Annie had recited when she used magic.

"If you really want to learn magic, why not just ask those two directly? What's the point of making me repeat it?" After countless repetitions, even the system seemed unable to take it anymore and complained to Gu Bei.

"That's assuming they're willing to teach me instead of beating me to death from blood loss."

Gu Bei still had not figured anything out, but he did not give up.

"Don't stop. Keep going."

After discovering the system's usefulness, he had been studying the incantation for half an hour.

Michelle had also been leading them onward for half an hour. According to her, they were already close to the Treasure Vault. In about another hour, they would arrive safely.

Gu Bei was very happy. Yes, he was genuinely happy about this.

The journey from the basement to the Treasure Vault had been hell for him. He had dragged along his nearly exhausted body while Annie drove him from behind, and every now and then he had to take another lash. If the road had been any longer, he might really have died along the way!

At the same time, he had been constantly under the pressure of death, terrified that Michelle might notice something and slit his throat.

Under this double torment, he only hoped they would arrive sooner.

"You're so weak right now. There's no way you can learn magic anyway, so spare my life!" After playing it several hundred more times, the system was on the verge of collapse.

"No. I'm treating it like a song on repeat."

Gu Bei had no intention of letting it off.

It had enjoyed playing all that junk information before, so how could he spare it now? This was karma. Retribution never failed.

As for magic, he currently had no way to learn it. The only information he had was this one incantation, so naturally he would not take it lightly. As the saying went, read a book a hundred times and its meaning would reveal itself. Incantations were probably no exception.

One or two times might not be enough to feel anything, so he would do it a thousand times, ten thousand times!

He knew that the stupidest method was often the most effective.

"Honestly, instead of obsessing over the incantation, you should think about how to escape with your life." The system began to persuade him earnestly. "You can learn magic slowly later, but if you lose your life, it won't matter even if you master this incantation right now."

Gu Bei thought for a moment and nodded.

"Mm... you have a point."

Hearing that, the system practically wanted to cry. The mechanical voice somehow carried a faint tremor, like a traveler lost in the desert suddenly finding water.

At last, it would not have to repeat that incantation anymore!

Then it heard Gu Bei say again.

"In that case, have you thought of a way for me to escape?"

The system collapsed once more.

Gu Bei seemed to hear the sound of a circuit board shattering.

No matter how unwilling it was, the system resumed looping the incantation.

Once, twice, three times... Gu Bei cast aside all distracting thoughts and gradually focused his mind on it. As he did, everything in the outside world began to blur and drift away. His entire world, everything within it, was reduced to that one incantation.

Mysterious, incomprehensible, magical... the incantation.

Slowly, he withdrew all his senses, as though his soul had left his body.

He entered a strange state.

The color of his pupils faded. They stopped moving, making him look blind. His breathing and blood flow quietly slowed as well. Sharp stones pierced the soles of his feet, yet he felt nothing.

Annie did not notice anything unusual. In her eyes, Gu Bei's body had already been weak. Now, he was merely even weaker.

Gu Bei's body continued walking, but he had lost all awareness.

Yet within his consciousness.

Gu Bei suddenly woke up and found himself in a strange space.

"Where is this...?"

Boundless darkness. Absolute silence.

He could not see his own hand before his face.

Everything here seemed like frozen ice, freezing both his soul and his exterior. Even thinking became difficult. He could not sense vibrations, temperature, his heartbeat, or the flow of blood...

He could not even sense time.

A powerful sense of danger suddenly engulfed him. He felt like he had fallen into a rapidly sinking swamp, where some sticky, dark substance was slowly swallowing him.

This could not go on.

He immediately began struggling, but his body was like a mouse unplugged from its port. No matter how he moved, there was no response. He tried calling the system, but received no reply either. Soon, along with that absolute coldness, even his brain became like a fan with its power cut off, gradually ceasing to turn. Before long, dust piled up and cobwebs spread everywhere.

The swamp swallowed even the last bit of fingernail on his raised finger.

His thoughts stopped, and he completely lost consciousness.

Perhaps a long time had passed, or perhaps only an instant.

Like a creek thawing in early spring, something quietly seeped into this space. Gu Bei gradually woke up.

What was it... that had entered?

He began to think.

Instinctively, he wanted to know what had arrived. Yet he found that all five of his senses had been stripped away, leaving him unable to perceive anything. He was like a tiny point on an infinite plane, incapable of doing anything.

But he did not give up. Instead, he struggled even harder, fighting against every rule that bound him.

Somehow, he felt that the thing flowing in was close, closer still. And the harder he tried, the faster that thing became clear.

As it approached, Gu Bei felt increasingly familiar with it.

Its name was on the tip of his tongue, its sound beside his ear... Gu Bei tried desperately to remember, but it seemed that a barrier always stood between him and that thing, one he could not break through no matter what.

What exactly was it...?

He was like a spring, continuously compressed downward by some external force. As time passed, that force grew greater and stronger.

He was about to snap.

A powerful threat of death surged into his heart.

He continued thinking about that thing's name. He had a feeling that as long as he said it, every difficulty would be resolved. Its name was like phlegm stuck in Gu Bei's throat. He opened his mouth wide, gathered all his strength, and fought with everything he had to cough it out.

Veins bulged on his neck, and his skin flushed red.

The invisible barrier was broken through bit by bit.

He felt himself approaching the answer, and death as well.

However, death seemed slightly closer.

Suddenly, he was like a balloon punctured by a hole, his vitality draining away at a rapid pace. A chill slowly spread from the depths of his soul, seizing his heart and gradually freezing his will.

Was he going to die?

But he was only this close to the answer, only this tiny bit away...

He could not say it.

He was unwilling.

He was like a rocket out of fuel. It was clearly only a little short of breaking through the sky, yet under the pull of gravity, it could only accelerate irreversibly back down.

How could he possibly accept that?

He could not say it...

If he could not say it, then he would stop trying to say it!

Gu Bei felt a ball of fire gather in his throat. He was like an erupting Volcano, gathering strength in stillness for that instant before violently exploding!

"I... screw you!"

It was as though infinite lines extended from a single point.

A dazzling light suddenly appeared, splitting the entire dark world in two!

The pressure on Gu Bei's entire body suddenly vanished without a trace.

He felt that he could breathe again. His silent heart began to beat, and his frozen blood raced through his veins. It was as if endless elements were rushing toward him from heaven and earth, filling his body, enriching his soul, and making him feel stronger than ever before!

"Hahahahaha!"

Gu Bei's uninhibited laughter echoed throughout the entire space.

At that moment, he finally knew what that familiar thing he could not recall was!

It was the incantation.

After he had sunk into the depths of his consciousness, the system had continued repeating that incantation without stopping: once, twice... a hundred times, ten thousand times. From the moment Annie recited it until now, more than half an hour had been folded together, and the incantations from every moment converged, suddenly becoming incomparably powerful.

The incantation had shattered the darkness, seeped in, drawn close to him as he gradually lost himself, and finally awakened him.

Thinking this, Gu Bei raised his head to face the light.

He opened his mouth and recited the incantation.

A sudden change occurred!

Like a stone dropped into still water, the light began to ripple violently. Under Gu Bei's gaze, it collapsed inward and condensed, becoming even more dazzling. It even condensed into something like solidified liquid!

With a boom, the light compressed into a fist-sized ball of radiance.

Finally, the ball of light shifted and solidified into a pale-blue Triangle Glyph. It looked somewhat like a triangle instrument, an equilateral triangle formed from thin blue lines of light.

It was an extremely regular geometric shape, yet at its final corner, it left a gap as wide as a finger, preventing the entire figure from closing.

The instant the triangle appeared, a ripple swept through the entire deathly silent space and over Gu Bei, making his mind tremble slightly. Then, he sensed a faint, moist aura spreading through the area.

He could not explain why, but he knew that the entire space had changed.

It was not just the space. Gu Bei could clearly feel that he himself had been completely renewed. It was as though the heavy shackles around him had suddenly been released. He had entered a brand-new world, and every cell in his body overflowed with ease and liberation.

And all of this originated from the Triangle Glyph before him, glowing pale blue in the darkness.

"Incredible."

At that moment, the mechanical voice emerged from nowhere.

Gu Bei was slightly surprised. "So you were here?"

The system seemed somewhat displeased.

"Of course I was here. How do you think you woke up? If I hadn't kept repeating the incantation for you, you would have long since gotten lost in your own consciousness and become a walking corpse."

Gu Bei suddenly understood. "I see. Thanks."

He did not care much about the system's complaint. Instead, he turned his attention back to the Triangle Glyph.

The triangle was the most basic shape in geometry, and this glyph was not particularly complex. Its only special feature was that one corner had not closed. Yet despite such a simple shape, Gu Bei could feel that it contained an incredible power.

If he had guessed correctly, this glyph had been derived from Annie's incantation. That magic could summon a water ball, so this glyph was presumably related to water as well.

Water...

Gu Bei was somewhat confused. Although he had experienced something so wondrous and now had this glowing Triangle Glyph, he still did not really understand what was happening.

Where was this place? How had he come here? What was this glyph for? All sorts of questions swirled through his mind, and he needed answers.

"Where is this?"

He asked that question first.

"This is the space within your consciousness." The system seemed to understand what Gu Bei was thinking and explained, "Ordinary people's Consciousness Space is completely sealed. They cannot perceive it themselves, and once they accidentally fall into it, they may never be able to get back out."

Gu Bei recalled what had just happened and could not help feeling lingering fear.

He had nearly been trapped here, unable to leave ever again.

"However, it should be the effect of that incantation. You are no longer an ordinary person." The system continued, "Through what just happened, you have liberated your Consciousness Space and gained more possibilities. In other words, you should have stepped across the threshold of a mage."

So that was it.

Rather than excitement or exhilaration, Gu Bei only felt calm and pleased. Becoming a mage in such a muddled way left him not only surprised, but also even more curious.

So this was what being a mage was like?

In a sense, he had learned without a teacher. No one had told him what mages truly were, nor did he know what liberating the Consciousness Space meant. His heart was full of curiosity and anticipation. What level had he reached? What kind of power had he obtained?

And what did that Triangle Glyph mean?

Questions emerged one after another, and he desperately wanted the answers.

He still knew far too little about mages.

"Don't celebrate too early." The system promptly poured cold water on him. "Becoming a mage does not change your situation. You are still a hostage with your life hanging by a thread."

Gu Bei froze at those words.

He recovered from his joy and immediately thought of Michelle and Annie, of the threats of kidnapping and death. He still wanted to explore the mysteries of the Consciousness Space and the Triangle Glyph, but at this moment, he needed more urgently to know what was happening in reality.

He had stayed here for so long. What about outside?

He could only set magic aside for now.

With his thoughts, the world before him suddenly changed, and Gu Bei returned to reality.

The night was pitch-black, the forest deep and shadowy, and faint pain came from every part of his body. Michelle was in front of him, Annie behind him. It seemed as though nothing had changed.

Gu Bei was somewhat surprised.

He felt as if he had spent a very long time inside the Consciousness Space, yet in reality, hardly any time had passed.

Incredible.

"Things did change. When you liberated your Consciousness Space, some things happened."

The system suddenly reminded him.

"What happened?"

Gu Bei looked around and discovered that the three of them had stopped walking. Michelle and Annie were now facing each other, their expressions grave, as if discussing something.

"No. He has slowed us down too much. We have to give up."

Annie sounded anxious.

"We can't give up. There's something extremely important in the treasure, and I have to get it."

Michelle remained unmoved.

"But we're running out of time..."

The argument continued. Since he did not know what had happened, Gu Bei found their words confusing. He could only ask the system in his mind.

"What exactly happened?"

The system replied, "Obviously, the pursuers are getting close. Your presence has greatly slowed them down, and they can't shake the pursuers, so they're discussing whether they should give up."

Gu Bei became somewhat tense.

The Riser Family's pursuers were finally coming?

This was the critical moment.

Whether he lived or died would more or less be decided in the next few minutes.

"Make good use of this. This is actually your chance," the system said at length. "The pursuers are getting close. They definitely won't have time to worry about so much. And now they're arguing, so they're distracted. Your chances of escaping are very high."

That was true.

Gu Bei nodded and asked the system again, "So, have you come up with any good ideas?"

After what had happened before, he was only asking casually and did not hold out much hope.

Yet the system behaved unusually:

"Please wait."

The sound of a computer running at high speed rang out in Gu Bei's mind, seemingly accompanied by the sound effects of an exhaust fan. A string of pleasant mechanical sounds followed. It was as if the system were loading some massive program, every component whirring violently into action.

Was there hope?

Gu Bei could not help feeling expectant.

Could it be... the system had really come up with a solution?

Just then, a huge interface suddenly appeared before his eyes. With blue borders and a white panel, the entire translucent interface floated in the air. It looked exceptionally high-end, giving Gu Bei a subtle science-fiction feeling.

Three digits stood out clearly on the panel:

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