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[Scene: After the Guardian Battle – The Cracked Sanctum Floor]
The silence left behind by the shattered guardian was unnerving.
No triumphant energy. No glow of victory. Just silence… and a low hum, like the sanctum itself was thinking.
Max stood, fan still open in his right hand, his Origin Eyes faintly glowing.
Lian Yue exhaled.
"Why does it feel like the air changed?"
Max didn't answer. His gaze was locked on the floor ahead—where a faint trail of glowing blue dust trickled into a small, spiral-etched crack between slabs of obsidian.
A breath of ancient qi spilled from below, like a wind escaping a sealed coffin.
"Something's down there," he whispered.
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[Scene: Descent into Memory]
They cleared the rubble around the crack and discovered a spiral staircase descending at a slant—an unnatural construction that seemed to spiral around the edge of time itself. Light dimmed with every step downward.
Suddenly, a blue glow enveloped the air, and a semi-transparent spirit coalesced, floating in the center of the curved hallway.
An old man… draped in long scholarly robes, hair falling like frozen starlight, his expression unreadable.
"The Flame-Bearer… finally arrives."
Max instinctively stepped forward.
"Who… are you?"
The spirit gave a thin smile, sorrow and wisdom bleeding through his translucent face.
"I am a memory. A remnant of the First Warden of the Sanctum. My duty was to guide those who carry the Mark of the Origin Flame…"
His eyes turned solemn.
"But few came. Fewer still left."
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[Scene: The Past Revealed – Sanctum Origins]
The walls around them lit up with illusory images—wars of cultivators wielding stars, giants carved from void, and a golden-robed man with a burning crown forging the sanctum out of falling stardust and echoing time.
"This sanctum was not built as a tomb… but as a seed."
"A library of laws. A temple of tribulations. A forge for the destined."
Max and Lian Yue watched, entranced, as the illusion revealed the ancient Architect—his name lost to history—who had embedded nine divine trials into the deepest chamber.
"But ambition breeds treachery," the spirit said bitterly.
"A sect once invaded… seeking to corrupt the heart of the sanctum. The Architect shattered the core and scattered its pieces across the realms."
"You stand at one such fragment."
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[Scene: The Illusion Ends – Clue to a Library]
The vision faded.
Max stepped forward.
"You said this is a piece of a greater whole."
"Yes," the spirit nodded. "And within lies the path forward. Not by blade or brute strength… but by wisdom."
He raised his hand—and in the air appeared a ghostly symbol, a strange emblem made of overlapping concentric rings, like a keyhole bound by stars.
"Seek the Sealed Library," the spirit intoned. "There… the Architect's truths lie dormant."
"But beware, Flame-Bearer—all light casts a shadow. Even the ones you ignite yourself."
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[Scene: Hidden Warning – Subtle Malice Behind Opportunity]
Just as the spirit began to fade, Max felt something strange.
His Origin Eyes pulsed. A ripple… a fracture behind the illusion.
"Wait—what was that?" he muttered.
The spirit was gone. But for a split second, another aura—malicious and cloaked—seemed to wink out behind the remnants of the vision.
Max frowned.
"Lian Yue… did you feel that?"
She hesitated.
"There was… something. A shift."
Max's heart drummed in his chest.
Something felt off.
Too convenient. Too timely.
A sealed library. An ancient voice. A cryptic warning.
He wasn't sure whether this was fate… or a well-crafted lure.
"Whatever's behind that library," he said under his breath, "it might not want us to understand it. It might want to use us."
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[End of Chapter 12]