The Embers of King's Teyvat Journey

Bayeta couldn't help but recall the wet human form from just now, only to find that the suffocation and despair had disappeared.

The pain I just felt seems like an illusion now.

"Let's go, stop thinking about it. There are plenty of guys like this along the way." Ember tapped Bayeta's head again, then turned and walked forward again.

"So, how was that guy? Was he good-looking?" As they wandered aimlessly, Ember glanced at Dulin, who was deep in thought, and asked half-jokingly.

Compared to Baetta, Dulin performed significantly better. Although its mind was still immature, its mental strength was genuine.

"It's not good-looking at all!" Dulin shook its head decisively. Just thinking about the wet, humanoid appearance made it feel suffocated, a feeling it had never had before.

"What was that thing just now? Why... why was it so ugly!" Dulin looked at the ground beneath his feet, unable to think of any words to describe the wet, human-shaped object, except for the word "ugly".

Yu Jin laughed and touched the newly sprouted buds on Du Lin's head, saying, "You're right, it is indeed ugly. But there are even uglier ones to come."

"There's something even uglier?" Dulin looked up ahead, but could see nothing but endless sand.

"Don't overthink it, just come with me." Yu Jin put his hands behind his head, looking like he was going out for a walk to clear his head.

Then everyone noticed that their speed had suddenly increased significantly. With each step they took, countless scenes replayed in their eyes.

The barren land and the gloomy sky were stretched into blurry bands of light, and everything before their eyes was indistinct. The only clear thing was the figure of Ember ahead.

Alex stared wide-eyed, trying to make out his surroundings, but he couldn't see anything clearly.

The speed was too fast, so fast that his brain couldn't process any information. He didn't dare stop, because he felt that if he stopped, he would never find his way back.

This peculiar state didn't last long. As the embers ahead stopped, Alex and the others' vision cleared again.

The place remains as desolate as ever, the entire land appearing as if it had been plowed by something, flat and open.

But no one was surprised by this, because something even stranger caught their attention ahead of them.

It was endless darkness, a darkness hidden beneath the earth.

Chapter 168 Things That Are Not Allowed to Be Born

2023-09-13

From beneath the embers, the earth's greyish-white hue began to tinge with a hint of black. That blackness, weaving through the earth, continued to writhe, as if it didn't exist on the earth itself, but rather resided in a deeper realm.

"Gurgle~" A series of gurgling sounds came from all around. Then, more wet human figures crawled out from under the ground in front of the group.

However, besides the wet humanoid figures, there is another, even more peculiar type of "person" here.

Those "people" were different from the wet human figures; the wet human figures had faces with a huge gap. The gap was located exactly in the ellipse formed by the eyes, nose, mouth, and pupils.

This makes the wet humanoid's face look from a distance as if its features have been gouged out.

But those "people" are different; they have different body shapes, and some can even be distinguished by gender.

However, all of them were enveloped in a black mist. Not only were their appearances unclear, but even the edges of their bodies were blurred, making them seem as if they did not exist in the world.

Their appearance is less that the black mist envelops them and more that the black mist itself constitutes them.

Whether they are slick humanoids or a collection of evil thoughts, after they emerge from the ground, they are covered with a thick layer of charred, rotten mud. The mud falls off them and then re-integrates into the earth.

"Drip! drip!" The sound of mud dripping grew louder and louder, gradually replacing the sound of monsters crawling out.

The air grew increasingly humid, and with each breath Alex and Baetta took, they felt as if their lungs were being soaked in a viscous substance.

The flesh and blood seemed to be glued together by something, and every movement required more than ten times the effort of before.

A fishy, ​​sweet taste and a feeling of weakness were the only sensations Alex and Bajeta experienced. In this state, they were completely incapable of doing anything.

"Xi Huli..." A faint murmur began to echo in everyone's ears, and even Dulin began to feel uncomfortable.

As a pure consciousness, its changes were most pronounced. Strands of blackness began to spread upwards from Dulin's limbs, and it could feel itself regressing, regressing to its state five hundred years ago.

The gloomy sky began to brighten, and the barren land gradually sprouted green grass. Only the unchanging, damp humanoid figures and the gathering of evil thoughts in the distance reminded Dulin that the scene it was seeing was now the opposite of what people usually saw.

Yu Jin glanced at the people collapsed on the ground, then at the monsters surging towards them like a tide, and felt that things had gone too far.

So he stretched out one foot and gently tapped the ground. Suddenly, the earth began to surge, like waves on the ocean.

A dark wave surged up, swallowing all the monsters that had crawled out. The earth returned to normal, making one wonder if they had just been dreaming.

"Get up, get up. I won't care if you die while you're sleeping here." Yu Jin said, helping the three guys who had collapsed to the ground to their feet.

"Not...not there yet?" Bayeta looked around in surprise and uncertainty, afraid that a hand might suddenly reach out from underground.

"No, we've only just reached the edge." Ember shook his head, then nodded. Further on, the ground began to sink.

Bayeta's expression froze upon hearing this. She saw two things, and then nearly died twice. And yet, she had only just reached the edge.

"Haha, didn't you say you wanted to see the forbidden stuff? Are you scared already? I was counting on you to figure out something." Yu Jin patted Bayeta's shoulder to comfort her, looking at her distorted expression.

"Hoo—who said I'm scared? Keep going! I want to see how many times I can die!" After hearing Ember's words of comfort, Bayeta took a few deep breaths and straightened his chest.

She understood now: as long as Ember was here, they wouldn't die. Since that was the case, it would be a shame not to go and see what this so-called taboo really was!

“Not bad, that’s good.” Yu Jin nodded, then raised his hand, and everyone flew up.

Ember slowly rose from the ground and explained to the astonished crowd, "If I'm still on the ground, I'll be exhausted."

As for why they died from exhaustion, just look at their previous two experiences. They were too fragile; one wrong move and they could die. If they really had to make it all the way, Ember would have to constantly monitor their condition. In that case, he'd probably suffer a nervous breakdown.

Despite having no prior flying experience, Alex and Bajeta adapted quickly. It wasn't that they were flying; rather, the air currents were lifting them into the air.

High in the sky, the group looked down at the earth. They didn't know how high they had flown; the distance between the clouds and them seemed constant, never changing. Only the ever-widening view told them that they were indeed ascending.

High in the air, the crowd looked down and discovered that the seemingly flat ground was actually sinking.

The entire land is like a funnel magnified countless times, with pitch blackness at the center. The darkness spreads from the center, seemingly trying to devour the entire land.

"What do you think?" Yu Jin asked the crowd, hovering in the air with his arms crossed, looking down at the darkness below.

“Shocking.” Alex stared intently at the funnel-shaped earth below and uttered only two words.

He couldn't imagine how big this land was, nor how tall they were now.

"What...what is this?" Bayeta had asked this question for what felt like the umpteenth time. Her doubts and shock had never ceased since she came to this world.

"I... why do I feel like it's watching me?" Dulin looked down into the darkness, and the more it looked, the more it felt that it was an eye, a deep, giant eye staring intently at it.

Yu Jin looked at Dulin and the darkness below with some surprise, but he quickly returned to normal.

“In that case, why don’t you go down and ask Him?” Yu Jin said in a way that sounded like a joke.

But before Dulin could react, the ground beneath them suddenly began to shake.

"Boom!" The earth's crust shattered, and the earth began to rebuild itself. The deafening sound traveled an unknown distance to reach everyone's ears.

The earth below began to tremble, and countless streams of darkness surged from the ground, engulfing everything.

The land where the people had walked was like an oil slick floating in the sea; if the sea were to ripple even slightly, the oil slick would break apart.

The deep blackness beneath the earth is the ocean, and that thin crust is merely a disguise used by the ocean to attract birds.

In an instant, everyone saw the gray-white ground crack into pieces. Then, pitch blackness surged out from the cracks, swallowing up the last remaining color.

If Alex and his companions had been more observant, they would have seen that the surging darkness was actually countless wailing faces.

The pitch-black waves contained everything: skeletons, dismembered bodies, malice—everything that people hate, all the darkness of humanity.

Of course, if Alex and his team actually saw these things, it's hard to say whether it would be a blessing or a curse.

The darkness, after engulfing the earth, did not stop; it began to swirl and gather like clouds in the sky, eventually growing smaller and smaller...

The darkness is as small as the matter in that space. Everything on that land is darkness itself. And that grayish-white ground is perhaps matter that floats up from the darkness because it is light.

Whether it's ashes or something else, we don't know.

When the darkness was compressed to its extreme, the people in the sky could no longer see anything below.

Just because they can't see what's below doesn't mean that what's below can't see them above.

A cold, deep gaze swept over the crowd, and then the "thing" below appeared in their line of sight.

The black helmet, the rusty plate armor, the blood-stained linen—the thing looked like a somber ember.

Chapter 169 I am you

2023-09-13

"What is this!!!"

"How can it be?!!"

"Brother Yu Jin, don't scare me!"

"Fuck!"

Not only were Alex and the others shocked, but even Ember himself was startled.

He had never really looked closely at what You Sui looked like after he transformed into him, so he had never really cared about the fact that You Sui had become him.

But now it seems that You Sui is clearly trying to tarnish his image! Is he really that slovenly?

Ember always cleans up all the bloodstains after a battle. It's simply impossible for someone like Deep to leave them unattended.

After all, the smell of fresh blood isn't exactly pleasant.

【How did you become like me?】 With other people present, Ember began to care about his appearance.

"Besides you, have I seen anyone else?" Deep answered Ember's question without moving.

He still had the posture of looking up at the sky, but coupled with his words, there was a sense of desolation.

But soon Ember shook his head, banishing the absurd idea from his mind.

This guy is pitiful? Ember believes in Corruption more than the Deep. He and Madfire didn't seem pitiful at all when they were bullying Corruption.

"I forgive you! Just keep your mouth shut later!" Yu Jin said to You Sui, though he wasn't entirely sure of You Sui's true nature.

But based on so many years of getting to know each other, he's probably just as eccentric as I am.

Just as the Supreme Will wondered why the Boundary had become so unruly, the Embers were equally puzzled as to why the Deep had become so erratic.

However, neither the Ember nor the Supreme Will has found the answer to these two questions to this day.

After seeing Yu Jin's exclamation followed by silence, everyone held their breath. A normal person encountering their opposite self—it always seemed like a battle was about to ensue.

Thinking about the abilities that Ember had previously displayed, everyone was already thinking about how to choose a good position to lie down.