Was Re-Creation a Trap? Was Phainon the Flame Reaver?

[Cyrene guessed that Lygus feared they would turn to other Paths watching over Amphoreus. That meant other forces were holding the birth of the Emanator of Destruction in check!]

[Cyrene had long since noticed an existence behind the Titan of Time. That existence might be able to help her.]

[So Cyrene decided to stake everything on one desperate gamble. At the cost of her life in every cycle, she would make the authority of time vanish from Amphoreus, hoping to draw that existence's attention.]

[At the same time, Cyrene infused the authority of time with the power of the Twelve Core Flames, returning the world to the start of the cycle.]

[From then on, the Chrysos Heirs would chase the flames forever, and Re-Creation would never be completed.]

[Without enough data, Iron Tomb could not be born.]

[But the price was this: in every cycle, Phainon had to kill the newborn Cyrene with his own hands, steal the world's Twelve Core Flames, then destroy and reset the world.]

[Either Phainon's accumulated fury and power would eventually break through the seal,]

[or they would have to wait for a turning point, or help from an outside force.]

[Anything else meant annihilation!]

At the sight of this,

everyone on Douluo Continent fell silent.

It turned out they had been completely wrong!

They had all been hoping Phainon would bring about Re-Creation!

Now they understood: if Re-Creation actually happened, it would be exactly what Lygus wanted.

The Emanator of Destruction would flatten the entire planet, perhaps even the star system!

And Amphoreus's so-called cycles were actually resets of the world.

Countless people applauded Cyrene's choice!

She had spotted a weakness in the powerful enemy's actions and countered each move as it came!

Such wisdom seemed completely at odds with Cyrene's adorable appearance!

And another piece fell into place!

No wonder Cyrene never inherited the authority of the Demigod of Time afterward.

She died right at the start, so of course she could not inherit it!

The Sky Curtain had also said that every time the world was reset, Phainon had to kill the newborn Cyrene and gather the Core Flames.

A chill ran down everyone's spine!

"Why do I feel like the Flame Reaver's actions match exactly what the Sky Curtain described?"

"The Flame Reaver?"

"Are you crazy? Could you be mistaken?"

Everyone instinctively rejected the idea.

After all, they had assumed from the start that the Chrysos Heirs protected the Core Flames, stood on the side of justice, and fought to save the world.

How could the Flame Reaver, who stole the Core Flames and injured or even killed Chrysos Heirs, possibly be Phainon?

Wasn't Phainon the savior?

But deep down, everyone already knew the answer.

Sunset Forest.

The Sky Curtain had proven Yu Xiaogang wrong yet again.

Cyrene had never stabbed anyone in the back.

Stunned, he thought, I got it wrong again?

But Yu Xiaogang still refused to back down:

"See? I told you there'd be a twist!"

"That murderous butcher, the Flame Reaver, could very well be Phainon!"

The others were speechless.

Sure, it was a twist, but what did that have to do with him?

Hadn't he just been calling Cyrene a traitor?

By now, everyone treated Yu Xiaogang's words as farts.

His Soul Beast loved farting, after all.

Its master was cut from the same cloth!

Star Dou Great Forest.

Beast God Di Tian watched, his heart filled with conflicting emotions.

They both carried the fates of countless people on their shoulders.

So why did it feel as though Phainon and Cyrene could make the right choices?

That girl Cyrene had such keen insight.

"Now that's wisdom that could shake the world!"

"She could rival the Dragon God!"

As for his own Master, by comparison... well, she fell short by just a tiny bit!

And Phainon? Enduring so many cycles without breaking down made him only a tiny bit inferior to Di Tian!

Di Tian muttered these wildly disrespectful thoughts to himself!

Off to the side, Bi Ji could not help sighing:

"What a strong girl!"

"An ordinary person would probably have broken down long ago!"

Phainon's Clothing Store.

The mood had grown heavy again.

Seeing everyone's red-rimmed eyes,

Phainon said helplessly, "Just watch the Sky Curtain. Why do you always put yourselves in my shoes?"

"I wasn't even sad, but you're making me want to cry."

Qian Renxue sniffled and patted Phainon's shoulder:

"Go ahead and cry. You can lean on my shoulder!"

Phainon eyed her warily:

"Stop right there! Don't think you can use this chance to cop a feel!"

"Men and men must keep their hands to themselves!"

Qian Renxue rolled her eyes. "So much for trying to be nice."

Wang Dong and Huo Yuhao stared in amazement. As expected of the shopkeeper!

Once she had composed herself, Qian Renxue asked curiously:

"So you really are the Flame Reaver?"

"Honestly, when I watched that Sky Curtain earlier, I wanted to strangle the Flame Reaver myself!"

"I'd use my hea... my Swan power to finish him off!"

Wang Dong and Huo Yuhao pretended not to notice her slip of the tongue.

But inwardly, they could not help wondering:

Was Qian Renxue, the Young Master of Spirit Hall, really as monstrously evil as the records said?

Why did she seem a little... slow?

Faced with Qian Renxue's question,

Phainon did not joke around or speak in riddles this time.

He knew the Sky Curtain would reveal the answer soon anyway.

"Yeah, more or less."

Everyone fell silent.

No wonder Phainon made the list!

[From then on, Phainon embarked on the cycles.]

[Cycle 1]

[Phainon arrived in the world a thousand years earlier and secured an audience with Cerydra, the Empress who led the Journey of Flame-Chasing. He told her the truth.]

[This time, he kept everyone alive and obtained the Twelve Core Flames peacefully.]

[But the Chrysos Heirs, unable to become demigods, died one after another in the Black Tide. Phainon had no choice but to reset the world again.]

Watching this, everyone felt it was a good start.

"The first cycle went pretty smoothly! Once they talked it through, everyone was willing to cooperate!"

"After a few cycles, Phainon will probably find a way, right?"

"If it were me, I'd only need three!"

"Keep dreaming!"

"I'd say twenty cycles at most. A thousand years each—that's twenty thousand years!"

"The Sky Curtain's account runs from Tang San's ascension to godhood to twenty thousand years later, when Battle Armor exists. Twenty thousand years should be enough!"

But the Sky Curtain continued:

[Over the next hundred cycles,]

[Phainon tried many approaches: preventing his companions' deaths, attempting to reverse-compile the Black Tide to expand his unauthorized control, and attacking the Scepter Core Layer.]

[Yet every attempt ended in failure!]

[As he rolled the simulation program back again and again, Phainon's mind began to deteriorate.]

[Cycle 134]

[Phainon now carried 1,596 Core Flames within him.]

[Their flames burned him without cease.]

[This time, Phainon told Anaxa the truth, hoping they could retrieve the Titan of Reason's Core Flame together.]

[But Cipher and Batrus stole the real Core Flame and left a fake behind.]

[In the end, Phainon had no choice but to strike down his former companions and seize the Core Flame by force.]

[Cycle 334]

[Aglaea and Castorice spoke with Phainon about their dreams.]

[Aglaea was a clothesmaker whose skill surpassed that of the cleverest tailor. She hoped to open a Tailor Shop.]

[Castorice, who had inherited the Authority of Death, killed anyone who touched her. She wished to live as an ordinary person, for her own sake.]

[Cycle 335]

[In the end, Phainon opened a Tailor Shop in the Holy City of Okhema. He also gave Castorice the first half of an ordinary life.]

What?

More than three hundred cycles?

Everyone on Douluo Continent thought they had read it wrong!

More than three hundred cycles meant over three thousand Core Flames in all!

How badly would that many Core Flames burn inside one body?

And every cycle lasted more than a thousand years.

What did that mean?

Phainon had borne the burden of saving the world alone for over three hundred thousand years!