"I seem... to have guessed who you are."
With his slightly self-mocking words, the atmosphere around them suddenly froze.
Lynn stood on this land woven by Destiny Threads, gazing at the countless translucent threads of destiny falling from the firmament before him, each representing a possible life trajectory.
In the face of this power that envelops everything, Lynn felt like a speck of dust, merely a pawn being casually manipulated by the Divine.
"From the moment you asked me to sacrifice my true name, I guessed your true identity." He coughed lightly, his breath somewhat weak, "You are me."
"Of course, this is merely a guess."
"What truly confirmed this guess was your earlier phrase—better shattered like jade than intact like tile."
The Prisoner of Destiny seemed to suddenly fall into silence, with only the Destiny Threads still surging incessantly.
Seeing this, a slight smile appeared on the corner of Lynn’s lips: "This was my favorite saying on Blue Star in my past life, yet the language of the Saint Laurent Empire itself has no such peculiar and awkward expression."
"Clearly, even after countless years, you haven’t changed this linguistic habit."
As soon as he finished speaking, those threads symbolizing destiny seemed to stop writhing and dancing all at once, as if abruptly paused, frozen in the void.
However, unexpectedly, though the other party showed unprecedented loss of posure, they did not directly answer his question.
"Are you ready to accept this trial?"
The voice of the Prisoner of Destiny, like a resonance woven by countless souls, sounded both like a distant echo traversing the torrents of time and a deep whisper resounding by his ear.
Seeing this, Lynn took a deep breath.
Sometimes, silence is the best answer.
Moreover, at this stage, he had no choice to make.
In the next moment, countless Destiny Threads suddenly surged towards him, rapidly weaving into a densely dark cocoon, pletely enveloping him.
Inside the cocoon, the space was strange and distorted, and time seemed to freeze at this moment.
"Have you heard such a story?"
The voice of the Prisoner of Destiny penetrated the cocoon wall, clearly reaching Lynn’s ears.
Lynn remained silent, choosing to listen quietly at this moment enveloped by boundless darkness.
"Once there was a king, who asked a shepherd boy: ’How many seconds in eternity?’"
"The shepherd boy replied: There is a mountain of diamonds, climbing takes an hour, circling it takes an hour too. Every hundred years, a bird flies to the mountain and pecks at it once with its beak. When the entire diamond mountain is worn flat, the first second of eternity has just passed."
The Prisoner of Destiny paused for a moment, seemingly giving Lynn some time to ponder.
"In reality, eternity is a journey without an end. Finite life cannot imagine infinite eternity, just as mortals cannot truly prehend the universe’s boundary. The trial you are undertaking now will proceed on such an eternal scale."
This statement sent a chill down Lynn’s spine, an indescribable fear coursed through him like electricity, spreading from his back to his entire body within an instant.
"To inherit my Authority, you will fall into endless cycles, to experience the infinite possibilities of destiny. In each of your rebirths, suffering will follow you like a shadow, and the oute shall ultimately be tragic and shattered."
"This process will repeat over a time longer than eternity."
The air within the cocoon seemed to bee heavier, Lynn could almost hear the echo of his own heartbeat.
"No one can maintain themselves through such a test, either they go pletely mad or pletely fall, being another lost droplet in the torrent of destiny."
"No soul can withstand the erosion of eternity, no matter how resilient an existence is, it will only be crushed by reincarnation, until it pletely vanishes."
Upon hearing this almost despair-inducing reminder from the Prisoner of Destiny, Lynn wanted to say something, but found his voice trapped in his throat unable to e out.
Meanwhile, the cocoon of destiny threads rapidly contracted, suffocating pressure closing in from all directions.
Lynn clearly perceived his consciousness plunging into an abyss, countless fragments of light and shadow beginning to whirl around him—that was the first life awaiting him.
And the trial of the Prisoner of Destiny had just begun.
Lynn’s consciousness fell like a giant stone sinking into the deep sea, continually descending in the endless darkness.
...
When Lynn awoke once more, the experience of crossing time swept over him again.
In the next second, a sharp whinny of a warhorse tore through the dead silence, followed not by the sensation of awakening, but by a bone-chilling cold and an indescribable feeling of being pressed.
He suddenly opened his eyes, only to find his vision blurred, capable only of feeling intense jolts.
Lynn realized he was tightly wrapped in something soft and thick, each jolt causing his small body to sway uncontrollably.
The sharp sound of clashing blades echoed in his ears, mingling with the coarse shouts of men and the sporadic wails of the dying.
Clearly, a fierce battle was taking place around him, and Lynn was at this moment in the midst of a battlefield, inside a speeding carriage!
"Protect Master Lynn! We must break through!"
The throat of the squad leader had already gone hoarse from shouting, and there was a trace of hopeless severity in his voice.
Immediately after, came the dull sound of a blade cutting into a body, someone grunted, and a few warm droplets splattered onto Lynn’s face, carrying a rusty, metallic scent.
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