Blind Box World - SSS-Rank Eye of Truth

Chapter 59: The World Inside the Pillar of Light

After passing through the wall of murky yellow light, the scene that struck Ethan’s eyes left him momentarily stunned.

This place was an entirely different world.

Not the devastated wildland with the dead city they had just left, nor anywhere Ethan had ever seen in the books of Aurora Academy. This was like an isolated world unto itself, sealed within its own pocket of space, entirely cut off from the world outside.

Before his eyes, stretching all the way to the horizon, were countless pyramids.

But these pyramids didn’t resemble any structure built by human hands. They weren’t raised from stone, but from bone. Blocks of ivory-white bone stacked upon one another in a bizarre configuration, some sharp-tipped and thrusting straight up into the sky, some twisted as though wrenched crooked by a colossal hand, some so misshapen they looked ready to collapse at any moment. Between those pyramids ran roads paved with something pitch-black, reflecting a cold light.

When Ethan lifted his head to look at the sky, his whole body went rigid.

Because above his head, instead of a sky, was an ocean.

A colossal ocean hung upside down in midair, its surface facing downward, surging and rippling, and yet not a single drop of water fell. Light passed through that layer of water, casting a hazy green glow down onto the ground, sinking this entire world into an atmosphere both hushed and eerie.

"What... what the hell is this?" Lěng Ruò Yān stood beside him, looking up at the upside-down ocean, her voice cracking with astonishment.

Ethan couldn’t answer either. Because even he had never imagined a place like this could exist in the world.

Far off, among the pyramids of bone, there was something giving off a faint purple light.

Its shape was unclear, just a purple halo quietly flickering behind those misshapen structures, like a lighthouse glimmering dimly in a night sea.

Laira looked in that direction, her brows knitting faintly.

"That thing," she said quietly, one hand unconsciously coming to rest on her chest. "It’s calling to the Solar Flame Seal."

Ethan turned to look at her with a start. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah." Laira nodded, her gaze still fixed on the purple halo in the distance. "I felt the resonance back when we were outside. But after coming in here, that feeling has gotten clearer and clearer. The seal inside me is trembling, like it wants to answer that thing’s call."

Ethan fell into thought.

The Solar Flame Seal was the thing Laira had received from the Abyss difficulty of the Abyss Tower, a thing he still didn’t fully understand. If it was resonating with the thing in that purple halo, then that thing was certainly no ordinary article.

But before he could think further, suddenly, a pressure descended from the sky, bearing down on all three of their bodies.

It wasn’t an attack.

It was like an invisible current of law, spreading throughout the whole space, threading into every cell of their bodies, then beginning to probe, to evaluate.

Ethan felt the eye on his forehead grow faintly hot, as if trying to analyze the thing that had just pressed onto him. But that current of law was too ancient, too vast, to the point that even the [Eye of Truth] could only vaguely sense a part of it.

Fortunately, that pressure did him no harm. After sweeping over the three of them once, it withdrew, leaving behind a strange feeling of emptiness.

"What was that just now?" Ethan asked with a frown.

Laira closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the change within her body, then slowly opened them, her expression somewhat grave.

"It’s the law of this place," she said. "I understand now. This ruin has its own law, imposed on everyone who steps in."

"What law?"

"It limits tier." Laira looked at him, her gaze serious. "In here, anyone with a tier lower than Gold Tier 9 keeps their original power. But anyone stronger than Gold Tier 9 is dragged down, sealed back to Gold Tier 9."

Hearing this, a spark of light immediately flashed in Ethan’s mind.

"You mean," he said slowly, "even a Diamond-tier Awakened, even one stronger than that, after coming in here is left with only the power of a Gold Tier 9?"

"That’s right." Laira nodded. "The law of this place only accepts a maximum tier of Gold Tier 9. No one is permitted to cross that line."

Hearing this, Lěng Ruò Yān frowned again.

"But even a Gold Tier 9 is still terrifying," she muttered, her face full of worry. "We’re only Bronze. A bunch of Bronze facing a whole place full of Gold Tier 9s, how is that any different from throwing eggs at a rock?"

Hearing her say this, Ethan and Laira turned their heads at the same time, looking at her with an extremely puzzled expression.

Being stared at by the two of them like that, Lěng Ruò Yān suddenly felt a little guilty, and her face reddened too.

"What are you looking at?" She snapped in embarrassment. "Did I say something wrong? I... I just don’t want to die, that’s all! And besides, if I were still out there, the rest of that Harpy flock definitely wouldn’t have let me off! Coming in here with you two was something I had no choice about!"

Hearing this, Laira let out a laugh full of contempt.

"For all that talk, when it comes down to it you’re just a coward." She quirked her lips. "Your mouth is always fierce, but the moment something happens your legs turn to jelly."

"You—" Lěng Ruò Yān was so angry her face went even redder, but for the moment she didn’t know how to argue back.

Because Laira was right. Just now when the Harpy Queen chased them down, the one who was so frightened she nearly dropped down onto the ground had indeed been her.

She glared at Laira, her three puppets standing upright behind her full of resentment too, but in the end she couldn’t get out a single word to argue back, and could only turn her face away in frustration.

Seeing the two of them about to pick a fight again, Ethan spoke up to cut in.

"All right, stop arguing." He looked around at the desolate scene, frowning as he spoke. "I find one thing a bit strange."

"What thing?" Laira turned to him.

"Don’t you two see?" Ethan pointed around them. "Just now outside, a whole dead land packed with monsters, from the Bone Demon Serpent down to hundreds of bizarre creatures, all of them went into this pillar of light. And yet now, after we’ve come in here, this place is unbelievably deserted. There isn’t a single monster in sight."

Hearing this, Laira swept her eyes around once too.

It was indeed so. Apart from the three of them, this whole world of bone pyramids was silent to a frightening degree, without any sign of any other creature at all.

"Perhaps..." Laira mused for a moment, then said. "Perhaps that gate doesn’t take everyone to the same place. It scatters people out in many different directions, and each one who steps in is taken to a separate area."

Ethan nodded. This explanation was fairly reasonable. Otherwise, with the colossal number of monsters just now, this place would long since have become a chaotic battlefield.

But he had just let out a breath of relief when the air around them suddenly changed.

A familiar piercing shriek rang out from behind them.

Ethan whipped around, and his face changed faintly.

A Harpy flock had suddenly appeared, flying out from behind the bone pyramids, blanketing a whole corner of the sky. And leading that Harpy flock, none other, was the very Harpy Queen who just now had been driven off by the woman in black.

It seemed Laira’s explanation was indeed correct. The gate scattered people out in many directions, and most unfortunately, they had been scattered into the same area as this Harpy Queen.

"It’s her!" Lěng Ruò Yān saw the Harpy Queen, her face immediately going white, her voice trembling too. "Why is it her? We... we’d better run, quick!"

But strangely, hearing the Harpy Queen’s shriek, Ethan and Laira, far from showing any fright, on the contrary, the corners of both their mouths lifted at the same time.

It was a smile. A smile like that of a poor child who had just picked up gold.

Because the very instant the Harpy Queen appeared, Ethan had instinctively glanced toward her, and this time, the eye on his forehead gave no warning at all.

The [Eye of Truth] had worked normally on the Harpy Queen.

Ethan immediately understood the meaning of this.

Outside, this Harpy Queen was a high-tier Awakened, surpassing Gold many times over, strong to the point that his eye couldn’t even see through her weak point. But now, inside this tier-limited ruin, everything was completely different.

Gold Tier 9 was the maximum. This Harpy Queen, however strong she was outside, in here was left with only the power of a Gold Tier 9.

And once his eye could see through her, then...

Heheh.

Ethan and Laira looked at each other, a spark of excitement flashing in both their eyes.

They remembered it very clearly.

Back when they were in the Anomalous Coordinate, from the time Laira was still just a Black Iron-tier Crimson Dragon fresh out of the Blind Box, she had already been able to resist the power of a Gold-tier Awakened. That was precisely the frightening thing about a Mythical rank (SS) Partner, her tier might be low, but the quality of her power far surpassed those of the same tier.

And now, she was no longer Black Iron. Together with Ethan, she had cultivated up to Bronze Tier 5.

A Bronze Tier 5 Crimson Dragon, plus the ability to see through weak points with the [Eye of Truth] and the Resonance skill for instant transmission...

Facing a Harpy Queen sealed down to Gold Tier 9, the scales of victory and defeat were now entirely different from before.

"Run already!" Lěng Ruò Yān saw the two of them standing there frozen and smiling, thought they’d been frightened out of their wits, and shouted anxiously. "What are you standing there smiling for? That monster nearly killed us outside!"

But Ethan only shook his head faintly, his gaze still fixed on the Harpy Queen, the corner of his mouth curving up more and more.

"No need to run," he said.

"Have you lost your mind?!"

"You don’t understand." Laira had already stepped forward, a halo of deep red flame beginning to kindle around her, and this time, in that flame there was no more fatigue or strain at all. "Outside, this bird was the hunter, and we were the prey. But in here..."

She licked her lips, her red-orange eyes staring at the Harpy Queen like staring at a piece of meat.

"...it’s the other way around."