A Dying Village with a Smile
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The new "Qinlu" resembled a corpse adorned with flowers. The glass houses that once sparkled beneath a black sun had faded, like the eyes of an old man on his deathbed. The children who used to chase light butterflies now hid in corners, staring at skies cracked like a mirror shattered on rocks. Even the river of light had stopped flowing, its stagnant waters like pools of poisoned mercury.
Jin, now sixteen, stood at the edge of the final fissure, his black eye with a golden star staring into the depths where a black shadow loomed. In his hand, he held a broken-winged golden butterfly—gifted to him by Lang Xian's spirit before it vanished.
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The Mysterious Message: A Wind Carrying the Moans of the Past
On a bitter winter night, when black snow fell like ashes from a burning world, Jin heard a whisper from within the fissure. The voice resembled Lang Xian's, yet carried an evil tone Jin had never known before:
"The boy with the eyes... come to me. I'm the one who'll give you the answers."
The fissure began to twist into a massive mouth, its teeth blades of dense darkness. Jin felt something pull him toward the edge—but suddenly, his broken butterfly trembled and flew inside, lighting the way like a candle in a graveyard.
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The Journey into the Belly of Darkness: A Hell of Others' Memories
Jin chose to follow the butterfly. After hours of descent through slimy corridors of petrified flesh, he reached a circular hall—like a cosmic womb. On the walls hung thousands of dead golden butterflies, each holding a memory from Lang Xian's past lives.
At the center sat the black shadow he'd seen before. Now it had a clear face: Lang Xian's, but with red eyes and a smile like a serpent's maw.
The Black Shadow: (mimicking Lang Xian's voice)
"Welcome, heir of my blood... do you know why you're here?"
Jin: (holding a dagger made from the bones of a dead butterfly)
"Because you want to restart the game… but I'm not him."
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The Shocking Reveal: The Golden Blood is Poison
The shadow laughed, raising its hands. From the ceiling, dozens of corpses descended, suspended by threads of black light. Each corpse was a version of Jin from different universes:
A child with one golden eye.
A blind young man.
An old man with a heart of glass.
The Black Shadow:
"The golden blood you inherited... is not a gift. It's a curse. Every descendant of the Lian bloodline is doomed to repeat the tragedy... until the Hylaion prophecy is fulfilled."
Jin looked at the hanging corpses, realizing he was merely one link in an endless chain.
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The Inner Battle: The Butterfly That Refused to Die
The battle began when the shadow tried to absorb the broken butterfly's energy. Jin leapt among the hanging bodies, slicing the light threads with his bone dagger. Each body fell, exploding into golden dust that filled the hall.
The broken butterfly, once seemingly hopeless, suddenly flared with light. Its wings healed, and it darted toward the black shadow, drowning it in a brilliance that burned even the darkness itself.
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Escape from Hell: A Price Yet Unpaid
When Jin returned to the surface, he found the village in chaos. The final fissure was bleeding crimson liquid, transforming into shadow wolf-like beasts. Kira and her tribe had returned—but this time, with an army of animated stone ruins moved by an unknown will.
Kira: (shouting as she battles a three-headed beast)
"The butterfly... it unleashed something unstoppable!"
Jin looked at the butterfly that had returned to him—now with whole golden wings, but a black spot at its heart.
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The Real Beginning of War
Just as the butterfly sealed the final fissure with its light, the village exploded into floating shards of glass. Jin found himself lifted by the giant butterfly's wings, gazing down at the crumbling Qinlu.
But a greater shock awaited above: hundreds of new fissures opened in the sky, each revealing a black shadow laughing…
The Black Shadow: (its voice emerging from every crack)
"The game was never about closing... but about opening wider!"
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The Black Flower and the Golden Tear
As the golden butterfly carried Jin away from Qinlu's destruction, he noticed the black spot on its heart began to sprout pure white butterflies unlike anything he'd seen. These butterflies didn't just shine—they absorbed darkness, spinning it into cocoons of light.
When he landed on strange terrain resembling fossilized dragon skin, he found himself in a valley yet unborn:
Black crystal trees emitting songs like muffled screams.
A river of golden mercury flowing upwards.
A colossal tree with roots made of dead stars, bearing fruits shaped like blinking eyes—gold and black.
On one leaf, he saw a glowing inscription in a strange script that looked like blood:
"He who plants in darkness… reaps unseen fates."
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Final Revelation: The Flower That Devours Itself
The golden butterfly flew toward the giant tree and merged with one of its fruits. In a flash, the fruit transformed into a black flower with bat-like petals and a golden-glowing heart. A deep feminine voice thundered from within:
The Mysterious Voice:
"Welcome, bearer of ancient blood… are you ready to see what the sanctums have hidden?"
Jin reached for the flower. As he touched it, it bloomed to reveal:
A library made of living flesh, its shelves lined with skulls singing ancient hymns.
At the center, a book bound in human skin with his name: "Jin: The Wolf Who Became a Flower."
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Cliffhanger: The Tear of the Forgotten God
Before he could open the book, he heard a cosmic explosion from afar. Turning, he saw the black shadow—Lang Xian's evil version—standing on the valley's edge. But something had changed:
A golden tear trickled from his red eye.
His hands turned into black roots digging into the earth.
The Black Shadow: (his voice broken for the first time)
"You… are not the game… you are the loophole."
The shadow burst into golden dust, leaving behind a black seed marked with a strange symbol: a golden circle enclosing a black star.
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At the farthest edge of the newborn cosmos, where universes swirled like colors on a madman's palette, Kira heard a whisper from the black seed:
"One shall pluck the forbidden fruit… and carry war to the throne of gods."
Jin picked up the seed and planted it into his golden heart. Suddenly, from his chest bloomed a golden flower with a black core… the beginning of a new world whose rules even he did not understand.