The system is four years ahead of schedule, but Weird is still a cub.

"Remember my instructions." Shen Ge said, glancing at Cass, who stood beside him with a solemn expression.

"Lead the way."

“Yes, King of the Land.” Cass bowed respectfully and led Shen Ge away from the bridge.

Guided by Cass, they arrived at the maintenance area at the very bottom of the geothermal energy tower.

There is a hidden door disguised as an ordinary wall, with Forerunner runes engraved on it that are long since worn away.

Cass placed his palm on the center of the rune, and with a deep hum of energy, the wall slowly opened inward, revealing a bottomless vertical passage.

"Our ancestors called this place the 'Silent Abyss.' According to the murals, only this path leads to the final prison where the 'Heart of Winter' is imprisoned. But for thousands of years, my people have tried to explore it dozens of times, yet none have returned. The laws within the passage... are completely different from those of the outside world."

He pointed to the entrance to the abyss, where no seawater was flowing in; it was as if an invisible membrane separated the inside from the outside.

"My mission was to bring you here. The road ahead is beyond our reach. Please... be careful."

Shen Ge nodded without saying anything more and stepped into the dark blue light.

Upon entering, a completely different and strange feeling enveloped my entire body.

The terrifying water pressure outside, enough to crush steel, vanished without a trace, replaced by a feeling of weightlessness akin to a vacuum.

There was no flowing water, no sound; the silence was so profound that Shen Ge could hear her own heartbeat clearly.

The walls of the passage were not made of rock or metal, but of a strange, translucent crystal.

Shen Ge reached out and gently touched it. Instead of a cold touch, her fingertips experienced a fleeting, silent image—

An engineer wearing a bulky Pioneer suit is holding some kind of energy welding device, performing final reinforcement work on the spot he touches, his face full of exhaustion.

"What a novel experience," Shen Ge exclaimed, continuing to descend, the surrounding scenery becoming increasingly bizarre and fantastical.

In the passage ahead, space seemed to be folded. The seawater on the left had solidified into a perfect transparent crystal, while on the right it was boiling silently, and the rising bubbles vanished instantly after touching a certain boundary.

These two extreme phenomena are perfectly separated by an invisible boundary, yet there is no sign of any energy exchange, which completely violates the laws of physics.

This is not a passage, but an independent space forcibly anchored here by the pioneers to isolate the real world from the "Heart of Winter".

Just after Shen Ge had gone several thousand meters deeper, a barely perceptible whisper began to resound in the depths of his consciousness.

"Why struggle..."

The sound was initially indistinct, like noise coming through countless layers of media, but as he went deeper, it became clearer and more targeted.

"What's the point of going back? Your world is already shattered; it's just another hell. Everything you've done is meaningless."

The voice seemed to be able to directly peer into his deepest memories and thoughts. It knew he came from another world, and it knew he longed to return.

Shen Ge's eyes remained unchanged as he continued to descend.

For him, this level of mental interference was not enough to affect him.

When the simplest inducement failed, the whispers became more logical and insidious.

“Look at those people behind you. Alai, Hephaestus, the inhabitants of the Iron Heart… You think you are their savior, but all you bring them is endless battles and death. The people you save are merely delaying their fate of being consumed by the demonic energy. You are not a savior, you are a prolonger of suffering.”

"What makes you different from us? Your power comes from 'devouring,' and your essence is destruction. Doesn't every pulsation of these primordial, bizarre cells crave more flesh and energy? Admit it, you and us... are the same kind of people."

This time, the eerie whispers precisely struck at the source of Shen Ge's power and his core conflict with the world.

However, Shen Ge merely snorted coldly. His will, which had been tempered by countless life-and-death experiences and was already as firm as a rock, would not be shaken by words.

"Shut up."

The two words exploded in the passageway, causing the incessant whispers to pause.

"You think a mere mental erosion can sway me?"

Shen Ge's eerie eyes had already seen through the true nature of this area. It was not a simple enticement, but a "threshold" used to filter intruders. Anyone with a slightly weak mind would be corrupted by the eerie energy here and lost forever.

Having passed this invisible test, the road ahead is no longer disturbed by whispers.

After descending for an unknown amount of time, the tunnel finally came to an end.

Suddenly, a vast, spherical space opened up before them. And in the very center of this space, suspended, lay their destination, their final obstacle—

The first "door".

It was a perfect sphere with a diameter of over 100 meters. It was not any known form of matter or energy, but a purely "silent" region.

It neither emits nor reflects light; light is completely absorbed when it gets close.

It makes no sound and transmits no sound; the absolute silence makes the surrounding space seem extremely unreal.

Shen Ge could even sense that his own immense power as an eighth-tier Ghost King was silently "erased" as he approached the edge of the black sphere.

This is an "empty set" that exists in reality, a black hole of information.

Shen Ge narrowed his eyes slightly. He raised his hand, and a wisp of invisible, strange energy shot out and slowly drifted toward the black sphere.

There was no earth-shattering explosion, no flash of energy annihilation.

The instant that wisp of strange energy touched the surface of the black sphere, it simply vanished. Silently, without a trace, as if it had never existed.

This is the final defense set up by the pioneers: a "conceptual wall" that cannot be attacked or crossed.

Any matter, energy, or even strange properties like "invisibility," once it enters its range, will be instantly decomposed into basic information and returned to nothingness by the law of "silence" it contains.

Kas's ancestors probably didn't even have the right to get close to it.

"That's interesting." Shen Ge was very curious. If one could master such a strange and powerful ability, just how powerful would the enemies of the Pioneers have to be?
Or is it that this "Heart of Winter" is not actually the work of the pioneers?

But that's not the point. The point is that trying to get through here by conventional means is nothing short of a pipe dream. But for him now, rules are meant to be broken, or rather... eaten.

Shen Ge stopped trying and slowly closed his eyes. The next second, he suddenly opened them!

Centered on him, the terrifying domain of the eighth-order Ghost King suddenly unfolded!

But this eerie realm is not for attack; rather, it reveals a deeper level of power.

Shen Ge did not release any energy shocks, nor did he activate any special abilities. He simply covered this space with the most core fundamental law of the "Primordial Mystery".

He locked onto a target, the black sphere.

“I am 'devouring'.”

Within his realm of illusion, the law of devouring reigns supreme!
The perfect black sphere, the insurmountable "gate of concept," began to show a strange distortion on its surface.

It was not caused by an external impact, but rather its core internal structure was being forcibly altered and deleted!
Shen Ge's eerie domain is like an invisible maw, frantically devouring the law of [Silence].

The black sphere, representing "absolute silence," trembled violently, and ominous cracks appeared on its surface. What emanated from these cracks was not light, but chaos and nothingness torn apart by the "devouring" law.

It's like a pre-programmed "magic tool," but right now its "program" is being completely formatted from the underlying logic by a "administrator" with higher privileges.

Finally, with a silent collapse, the [Gate of Silence], which had stood guard for thousands of years, shrank rapidly inward like a building with its skeleton removed, eventually turning into a pure black mist of eerie energy, which was completely swallowed up by Shen Ge's eerie domain.

The immense strange energy contained within only caused a slight ripple in Shen Ge's unfathomable strange energy—not much, but not insignificant either.

Shen Ge stepped into the space that had once been an absolute forbidden zone. Behind the "door" lay the true location of the "Heart of Winter."

After passing through the Gate of Silence, Shen Ge was greeted by a breathtaking view.

The anticipated overwhelming surge of bizarre energy did not materialize, nor did it reveal the terrifying core of an ancient god. Instead, a completely different world emerged.

He felt as if he had stepped into another time and space.

This is a vast and magnificent pioneer city, with towering streamlined buildings, semi-transparent suspended pipes weaving between the buildings, and futuristic-looking aircraft hovering silently on docking platforms.

The city's layout is precise and aesthetically pleasing, showcasing the brilliance and confidence of a highly developed civilization.

However, the city is "dead".

The whole world was a monotonous gray, like a faded old photograph. There was no sun or moon in the sky, only a uniform and bleak curtain of light. There was not a breath of wind in the air, and every corner of the city was shrouded in eternal stillness.

Even more bizarrely, the city was teeming with "people".

Countless figures in pioneer uniforms shuttled back and forth in the streets, buildings and transportation pipelines. Some rushed to the laboratory, some sat around the conference table for a heated discussion, and others accompanied their families in the city park.

But all of this was done silently.

They were like a pre-programmed video loop, forever repeating the same fixed actions, their facial expressions frozen in a single moment—

Whether it's focus, anxiety, or warmth.

They are the "remnants of consciousness" of the pioneers.

Shen Ge took a step forward, and the afterimage of a researcher who was rushing along with his head down passed right through his body without causing any ripples, as if he and this world existed in two dimensions that did not interfere with each other.

“I see… ‘Heart of Winter’ is not a box, but the world inside the box.” Shen Ge quickly understood the situation.

"This is... a fragment of a dream."

Unlike the shattered world of flesh and blood he had entered after exhausting all the fragments, this fragment appeared exceptionally intact, carrying the "collective memory" of a civilization.

"The Heart of Winter" is not a prison; it is more like a database that completely sealed away the Forerunner civilization in its final moments before its demise.

Shen Ge walked on the quiet street, like a lonely visitor walking in a historical cemetery.

He saw the afterimage of a mother, who was smiling as she knelt down to straighten the collar of her young daughter's clothes. The daughter looked up at him, her eyes filled with innocent dependence.

He saw the afterimage of an officer, who was loudly issuing final instructions into a communicator, his expression serious and earnest.

He also saw in a laboratory the afterimages of several white-haired scientists, circling a huge energy model, conducting final calculations, completely ignoring the alarms that were already blaring outside.

These frozen moments of joy and sorrow form a silent elegy for the end of the world. An inescapable despair and grief permeates the entire world.

Just as he was passing through a holographic projection plaza, something unexpected happened.

In the center of the square, a gigantic female silhouette was broadcasting a final message to the entire city. Her voice was gentle yet firm: "...All non-combatants, please immediately move to shelters. Repeat, this is not a drill. Whatever the future holds, please remember, the flame of civilization shall never be extinguished..."

This was a scene that had been repeated countless times, but this time, the image of the woman's afterimage suddenly flickered violently, like a television screen with a poor signal.

Then, her once resolute face began to contort, and something seemed to writhe beneath her skin. Seven jet-black "tears of blood" slowly flowed from her empty eye sockets, nostrils, and the corners of her mouth.

She slowly turned her head, her tainted face facing Shen Ge's direction, and grinned a chilling smile.

That broadcast, repeated a million times, transformed into a malicious whisper, clearly entering Shen Ge's mind:
"The spark? It's gone... We... we've all been left behind... This is the end, no one can get out... forever!"

This is the true face of "pollution".

It is not a physical monster, but an "information virus" lurking at the deepest level of this dream world. It does not create anything new, but like a computer virus, it tampers with and distorts the existing "data" here, turning memories that carry hope into a breeding ground for despair.

With this first "program glitch" occurring, it was as if a domino effect had been triggered.

The gray tones of the entire city began to deepen, and the sorrowful atmosphere in the air was tinged with a hint of madness.

Beside Shen Ge, the afterimage of a husband who had been talking to his wife suddenly turned to static on his communicator. The tenderness on his face vanished instantly, replaced by extreme violence. He slammed the communicator to the ground and stomped on it repeatedly, as if trying to grind something invisible into dust.

In a research room further away, a scientist's silhouette suddenly threw away the data tablet in his hand and rushed frantically towards the observation window, violently slamming his head against the indestructible crystal glass again and again.

"Bang... bang... bang..."

In the silent impact, his forehead became a bloody mess. With his own blood, he wrote a crooked warning on the glass:

"Don't believe it...it's lying..." (End of Chapter)