Defiance of the Fall

Chapter 651: Overbearing Truth

“We might have an advantage, but there are a lot of variables at play. There’s something odd going on with his place,” Kenzie said, and there was hesitation on her face. “There are items meant to deal with spatial anomalies in the labs, and this isolation chamber has somehow followed into this world. It's like we're missing something.”Zac nodded in agreement. There were some things that they hadn’t figured out yet. Why was an item like the Spatial Drill built inside a Bloodline Re

Kenzie had no problems opening this gate either, and the hundred-ton gate soundlessly slid open after she touched her hand against the console. The group walked through, and Zac almost felt like he had been caught in an illusion loop just like the corridor inside during the Eastern Trigram Hunt. The environment looked almost identical after they walked through the twenty-meter thick wall, with the exception that there were no buildings inside this layer.

The group kept moving forward, passing one gate after another. Eventually, they reached the 9th layer, this one solely made from the golden metal they had seen more and more of inside the walls. By this point, they could feel extremely powerful emissions on the other side, and it almost felt like a god was trapped inside.

It wasn’t just a matter of intensity, but also quality. It felt like the fluctuations hinted at something vast, something far beyond their understanding. It was just like when Zac had witnessed the corner of the chaos pattern. It gave the impression that the very air around him held the answers to all his questions about his cultivation, but the information was too esoteric for Zac to gain anything at all.

Zac was pretty confident this was the last layer judging by the quality of materials and the power of the emanations. The layer was a lot smaller by now as well. The insides couldn't be more than five hundred meters high, and thrice that across; a tenth the size of the outermost dome.

There was also another set of buildings next to the gate, but they actually couldn't get inside according to Kenzie. There were a huge number of security protocols guarding it, and not even their genetic code could help them get inside. Zac didn't want his sister to use Jeeves to force its way inside at this juncture, so they instead turned to the final gate, which thankfully didn't have the same sort of defenses.

“Here I go,” Kenzie said as she placed her hand against the console.

This time it took almost a minute, but the doors eventually slid open, which instantly increased those mysterious fluctuations by multiple orders of magnitude.

It still didn’t feel dangerous or detrimental, except for the mental pressure that stemmed from the energy. It almost made Zac question everything he had learned about cultivation and the Dao so far, like he was just a child making stuff up while playing in the mud. The energy around him was the real truth, and if he didn’t give up on his wayward ways he'd never reach the peak of cultivation.

Zac quickly activated [Soul Guardian], the sixth and final skill he’d learned in the Dao Repository. A small golden avatar appeared above the soul in his mind as an inscrutable pattern appeared on his forehead. The skill had taken the spot of [Mental Fortress] and acted as a dummy to take on all kinds of mental attacks, but even his E-grade mental defense skill couldn't provide any protection against something like this.

However, he quickly stabilized his mind, discarding those poisonous thoughts. He knew his path wasn't a lie, but it was simply a matter of grade. The concepts hidden in the air around them were clearly far beyond anything he or anyone else in the group could fathom, but so what? They were not of his path, and his own insights would be able to match these by the time he reached C-Grade as well.

That conviction gave him a sense of tranquility that he hadn’t really felt since entering the odd isolation building, and it felt like it had somehow solidified his own path even further.

It looked like Kenzie had quickly adapted as well, and the Anointed were extremely stoic. Zac had to give it to them. Their power wasn’t a match to his own, but their mental fortitude and conviction were extremely strong. They had the makings of powerful cultivators, provided Ibtep's mission was a success.

Billy looked fine as well, seemingly even enjoying the atmosphere. The one who had the worst of it was clearly Ogras, and his face kept undergoing rapid and erratic changes. One second he looked ecstatic, only to be plunged to the depths of despair the next moment. Sweat was pouring down his face, and his hands twitched. Zac frowned at the scene, but his sister was quicker as she walked over to him.

“Hey,” she said with a soft voice as she placed a hand on his chest. “Don’t think too much.”

It seemed to work, as his facial expressions gradually calmed down. He exhaled a deep breath he had been holding in before he nodded at Kenzie with gratitude in his eyes. Only then did Zac relax and turn toward the mysterious object in the center of the room.

The Dimensional Seed.