In the silent little courtyard stood that same dilapidated wood shed.
Huo Yuhao stood quietly inside.
Looking at the scene outside, Huo Yuhao simply watched it all in silence...
Then Huo Yuhao slowly walked out of the wood shed and into the courtyard.
Huo Yuhao placed his hand on the courtyard gate, then slowly opened it.
There was nothing in the world outside: no flowers, grass, or trees, no chirping insects or birdsong, no blue sky or white clouds, no trace of anyone. There was only silence.
Huo Yuhao wanted to step out, just as he had stepped through this gate and gone outside when he was ten.
This time, no one from his past appeared. There were no raging flames or ruins, no...
But when Huo Yuhao tried to take that step, he felt as though that tiny threshold were a towering mountain, a deep abyss, impossible to cross...
As his consciousness awoke, Huo Yuhao did not open his eyes immediately. Instead, he entered his Sea of Consciousness.
Huo Yuhao could now feel that his body had mostly recovered. Although some hidden injuries had yet to heal completely, that was only a matter of time.
Inside his Sea of Consciousness, everything remained as it had been. Not a single item was missing: that box, the Undead Scourge Staff inside the Bracelet, the nearly ruined Ice Extreme God of War Armor, the Ice Spirit Spear, and the Golden Dragon Spear.
Then Huo Yuhao looked at the remnant soul that had drifted into his Sea of Consciousness.
The remnant soul's condition had also changed. From barely a scrap at first, it finally looked somewhat like a remnant soul now.
Of course, it had only recovered to this state by relying on the nourishment of the Gold of Life within his body