Chapter 429

After the feeling of trance, the sensation of having feet on the ground returned.

Jie Ming stabilized his figure and scanned his surroundings quickly.

The light was dim, the air was dry, and it carried the faint cool scent unique to ancient stone.

Towering stone pillars supported the arched dome, and the walls were carved with... wait?

His gaze suddenly froze, and memories surged out like a tide.

This environment, he had seen it!

In the recording crystal image of the second reincarnation, this was the temple that hid the ambush of the Tier 8 Sickle-Skull leader!

It was here that he was forced to use the Light-Transformation Escape Technique of the Five-Aggregates Transformation Rainbow Mirror to barely escape.

The intelligence of being ambushed in his memory made Jie Ming's vigilance instantly reach its peak!

Jie Ming operated his spiritual power and mental power simultaneously, and his detection wizardry and spiritual sense spread out at the same time, searching for possible enemies.

However, the anticipated ambush did not appear, and the temple was dead silent.

Something is wrong.

He forced himself to calm down and observe more carefully.

Yes, the overall structure was very similar, and that rough, non-human architectural style was exactly the same.

But the details... were completely different.

In the information provided by the recording crystal, the walls of the temple in the second reincarnation were covered with twisted, weird symbols that could not be interpreted, full of a primitive, wild feeling.

And before his eyes, those "symbols" had turned into precise, complex energy wires flowing with faint blue light.

These energy wires were embedded in the stone walls as neatly as integrated circuits, exuding a cold sense of order.

More importantly, the central altar of the temple, which was empty in his memory, now had an energy ball the size of a building, stably emitting a soft blue light, suspended there.

This energy ball was quietly rotating under the protection of many altars, without powerful energy leakage, but it gave people a sense of being the core, as if it were the "heart" of the entire space.

"This is not the same temple." Jie Ming concluded immediately.

He activated the Eye of Omnipotence without hesitation.

In an instant, a massive amount of information about the surrounding environment flooded into his consciousness.

Material composition, energy spectrum, space curvature, residual law fluctuations, etc.

Jie Ming relied on the Five-Aggregates Transformation Rainbow Mirror to process this messy information at high speed, while he himself quickly removed interference items from the processed data and compared them with the baseline data...

A few seconds later, Jie Ming's expression changed slightly.

From the data, the problem was not with the temple itself, but with... the entire world!

Abnormal energy inertia, subtle system shifts in basic physical constants, time-space structure presenting an unnatural sense of "encapsulation"...

All these data pointed to one conclusion: this was no longer the "reincarnation plane" he was familiar with!

Fortunately, with the previous hints from the Star-Caster Artelius, Jie Ming had also temporarily crammed knowledge about time-type concealment methods during this period.

Although this knowledge could not give him a further understanding of time laws, he already had a concept for certain situations.

So after synthesizing all the data, a possibility surfaced.

"This is... a crack in... another timeline?" Jie Ming whispered to himself, and various information he had just learned recently flooded his mind.

The phase space he cast was to create an attached dimensional space next to a stable main space and rely on the phase space formed between the two spaces to hide.

And time-type also had similar concealment methods, and even the principles were quite similar—except that it did not make a fuss about "space," but about "time."

By temporarily creating or anchoring a micro-parallel "timeline tributary" outside the mainstream timeline, and "projecting" or "transferring" one's existence into this tributary world.

Since this temporary tributary world "does not exist" on the mainstream timeline, from the perspective of the mainstream timeline, the hider seems to have disappeared completely.

"No wonder... no wonder the wizard army conducted fifteen rounds of research and couldn't find any clues even after digging three feet deep." Jie Ming's heart suddenly cleared, "Because the so-called existence behind the scenes is not 'there' at all. It is hiding in an 'interlayer' woven by timelines that belongs only to itself."

And the characteristics of timeline tributaries determine that as long as the parameters are disturbed extremely slightly during creation, nearly endless branch variants can be generated.

Just like when phase shifting, even if the precise coordinates are offset by a nanometer, what you enter may be a completely different phase space.

Trying to accurately locate the opponent's true "lair" in countless timeline interlayers is as difficult as finding a specific grain of sand in the universe.

"So this is... no!" Jie Ming looked around at this weird "temple," "It probably isn't its core either, just a 'temporary cage' or 'processing room' it randomly selected to trap or deal with me?"

Then, what was the purpose of the opponent going to great lengths to drag him into this timeline crack while the camp's time-space protection was fluctuating?

Just to trap him to death?

Or is there another scheme?

Jie Ming suppressed the doubts in his heart and began to take action in the surroundings.

He first quickly patrolled this world and soon confirmed two pieces of information.

First, according to detection, the effective range of this world seems to be only a few tens of thousands of kilometers centered on the temple.

Second, apart from the dilapidated buildings filled with energy wires and the barren land with a unified style, nothing was gained in the entire branch world.

There is no life, no resources, only the blue energy ball suspended on the altar is the only anomaly point in this dead world.

He returned to the temple and approached the altar cautiously.

The Eye of Omnipotence operated at full power, trying to analyze the structure and properties of the energy ball.

Just as he was about ten meters away from the altar, preparing to perform a deep scan...

Hum!!!

An indescribable will that made the soul tremble descended without warning!

This will had no specific "appearance," but was more like an "existence declaration" that acted directly on the world's rules themselves.

It was cold, indifferent, and carried no emotion.

Jie Ming could clearly "feel" that this will was like a searchlight, centering on the temple, and performed several fast and thorough "scans" of this timeline crack world.

Every time the scan swept over his body, it made him feel a tremor originating from the instinct of life.

But strangely, the will did not seem to "see" him.

"It's the mark left by Lord Artelius..." Jie Ming understood immediately.

That mark was not only a signal device, but obviously also possessed extremely high concealment characteristics, temporarily shielding the perception of this "world."

That was why he did not encounter an attack immediately after entering this world; this will was probably projected over because the existence behind the scenes discovered that the situation had changed.

However, just the moment he breathed a sigh of relief, the invisible "barrier" covering his body seemed to reach its limit and shattered silently like a soap bubble.

The next moment, that grand and cold will instantly focused on Jie Ming!

Discovered!

Jie Ming's hair stood on end, and his survival instinct exploded instantly.

The brilliance of multi-layered instantaneous protective wizardry lit up around his body, and physical defense, energy deflection, and soul protection were superimposed instantly!

At the same time, he applied his computing power to the extreme, and his hands moved quickly...

Phase space, activate!

His figure blurred, and he was about to escape into the safe parallel phase space to avoid this lock-on.

However, this time, the invincible trump card for saving his life failed.

In this world composed of timeline tributaries, the rules of space seemed to be covered by some higher authority.

The phase space entrance that Jie Ming had just constructed swayed violently like a candle in the wind, and then collapsed and dissipated on its own under the invisible pressure of that grand will!

Forced back from the space switch, Jie Ming groaned, and his mental power was in chaos.

Fortunately, the powerful physical resistance provided by the body-tempering technique helped him withstand the damage, and he was not seriously injured, but he could no longer care about those now...

That will locking onto him had already transformed into a substantive attack!

Invisible twisting power surged from all directions, and the data collected by the Eye of Omnipotence that Jie Ming had been keeping open allowed him to judge instantly that this was a negation and erasure applied directly from the "existence" level!

The space around Jie Ming began to become "unreal," colors faded, and textures blurred.

It was as if he, along with the small area he was in, was being forcibly erased from the "picture" of the world!

All the protective wizardry he released was like paper in front of this power, the light dimmed rapidly, and failed to have any blocking effect.

The tough body brought by the body-tempering technique could not feel any stress point at this moment, but a terrifying feeling that the most fundamental "self" was being stripped and diluted was clearly transmitted to the depths of his soul.

Cannot resist!

Cannot understand!

This is a crushing at the power level!

Just at the critical moment when Jie Ming's consciousness began to blur, as if it would completely dissipate in this invisible erasure power in the next second...

A hand appeared abruptly before his eyes.

It was a hand that looked very ordinary, with starlike light spots flowing faintly under the skin.

It appeared without warning, as if it had always been there.

Then, this hand waved gently twice at the invisible erasure power around Jie Ming, as if brushing away a spider web or dusting off dust.

The movement was understated, and did not even cause much of a stir.

But Jie Ming felt instantly that the terrifying pressure that was about to dissolve his very existence had disappeared.

The fading world around him quickly returned to its original state, and the "reality" of space wrapped him again.

Before the feeling of exhaustion from surviving a disaster could surge, Jie Ming turned his head sharply.

He saw that beside him, a pitch-black, narrow, long space crack with silver starlight flowing on the edges had quietly bloomed at some point.

The inside of the crack was not empty like a traditional space crack, but filled with starlight, like the starry sky of the universe.

And the owner of that hand was stepping out of the crack calmly.

The gray robe was simple, the face was peaceful, and the gaze was as deep as the starry sky.

The Star-Caster, Tier 8 Great Wizard, Artelius, true body... descended here!

(End of chapter)