Cultivating in Reverse: My Sign-In System Wants Me Dead

Chapter 155: Chapter 155 - The Curse-Rune and the Waking Victims

Su Bai felt something slam into his spirit.

For a moment, his body stiffened.

His fingers remained on the skull. The black-iron Detonator in his other hand became cold enough to bite.

Su Bai’s eyes lost focus.

The hall around him disappeared.

At first, he thought the rune’s original effect had activated properly.

A blast of mind-shattering madness.

But the moment the backlash touched him, his Reversal Body stirred.

The madness twisted. The destruction bent. The explosion that should have torn at his spirit became something else.

Then a storm of broken memories burst open.

Su Bai understood at once.

The curse-rune had been created to seal a fallen soldier’s memories and identity.

If an enemy tried to consume them, the rune would detonate those final memories into madness.

But when the explosion entered Su Bai, the effect reversed.

The disaster became inheritance.

No.

Not true inheritance.

The rune was too old. The skeleton had been dead for too long. The memory had degraded across countless years.

What entered Su Bai was not a complete life, only fragments of it.

One fragment tore open, then vanished.

Another collided with it.

Another shattered before it could form.

Light without context.

Sound without source.

Names without faces.

Orders without meaning.

Fear without body.

Rage without breath.

A sky he could not see clearly.

A command he could not fully hear.

A battlefield too large to fit inside one dead soldier’s memory.

Su Bai felt as if countless pieces of broken jade were being poured into his mind at once.

Each piece reflected something.

And Su Bai sat at the center of it, trying not to be buried.

His fingers slowly withdrew from the skull.

His body folded into a cross-legged posture almost by instinct.

The tenth tribulation mark suppressed the disturbance.

Su Bai closed his eyes.

He did not resist the fragments. He guided them.

He let the useless madness pass, and kept only what had shape.

The nearby cultivators glanced over.

One young cultivator blinked.

"Brother Su?"

Su Bai did not answer.

Qiao Wen looked over as well.

Then his expression softened slightly.

"He may have entered sudden comprehension."

The others immediately quieted.

Even Chen Feng, who had been sitting near the entrance with his sword across his knees, only glanced at Su Bai before looking away again.

"He finds comprehension from a skeleton now?" Chen Feng muttered.

No one answered.

After traveling with Su Bai, that no longer sounded impossible.

If Brother Su said he understood something from dust, they would probably wait first before laughing.

The hall settled again.

Then...

Luo Shenshui woke.

His eyes opened suddenly.

For one breath, there was no awareness in them.

Only terror.

His pupils shrank.

His body jerked as if he were still trapped inside something tight and wet.

His mouth opened, but no sound came out.

Qiao Wen reacted immediately.

"Shenshui."

Luo Shenshui flinched so violently that Qiao Wen stopped moving at once.

Qiao Wen’s heart tightened.

He lowered his voice.

"It is me. your Senior Brother Qiao Wen."

Luo Shenshui stared at him. His breathing was ragged. His fingers clawed at the stone beneath him.

Qiao Wen did not grab him. He only stayed close enough to be seen and far enough not to feel like a threat.

"You are safe," Qiao Wen said slowly. "We found you. You will be fine now."

Luo Shenshui’s lips trembled.

His gaze moved around the hall.

His breathing slowly changed.

"Senior Brother..." Luo Shenshui whispered.

Qiao Wen nodded.

"I am here."

Luo Shenshui closed his eyes.

A tear slid down the side of his face before he could stop it.

"I thought... I thought I was still inside."

Qiao Wen’s expression became pained.

"No one will force you to speak now. Rest first."

But Luo Shenshui shook his head.

"No. I need to say it while I still know which memories are mine."

The hall became quiet.

Qiao Wen hesitated, then nodded.

"Speak slowly."

Luo Shenshui swallowed.

"I landed outside the safe area."

His voice was hoarse, as if each word scraped his throat.

"The mist was thick. I took an Immaculate Lotus-Heart Pill immediately. I remembered the warning. Find a landmark."

His fingers curled.

"I was trying to retreat when I heard someone calling for help."

Qiao Wen’s eyes darkened.

"A familiar voice?"

Luo Shenshui nodded.

"At first, I thought it was one of ours. The voice was weak. It kept saying it was trapped. It knew my name..."

His face paled further.

"I followed."

No one blamed him.

After seeing the borrowed face, everyone knew how cruel that lure was.

"Then the mist thickened," Luo Shenshui continued. "I realized something was wrong. I wanted to turn back."

His breathing grew unstable again.

"But the road behind me was gone."

Mu Qing’s fingers tightened around her sleeve.

Luo Shenshui’s voice became softer.

"I could still see where I had come from, but every step returned me toward the voice."

His eyes trembled.

"Then something touched my back."

Qiao Wen’s expression changed.

Luo Shenshui clenched his teeth.

"I do not remember falling. I only remember waking up without waking up."

The hall became colder.

"I could not move. I could not open my eyes. I could not circulate Qi properly. But I could still think."

His voice broke slightly.

"That was the worst part."

No one spoke.

"There was something outside me," Luo Shenshui said. "No. Not outside. Beside me. Inside me. It kept pulling at small pieces."

He lifted a trembling hand toward his chest.

Qiao Wen’s eyes reddened.

"It did not steal everything," Luo Shenshui whispered. "It tasted."

The word made several cultivators’ scalps go numb.

"It tasted me again and again. Then I felt something wearing those pieces."

His breathing quickened.

"I saw through a fog. Not with my eyes. With the piece it took."

The hall went silent.

Luo Shenshui stared at nothing.

"I saw my own face walking outside."

Qiao Wen’s fingers trembled.

"I saw it smile."

Luo Shenshui’s voice became unsteady.

"It smiled like me, but not like me. It spoke with my voice. It called for help. It used my fear to sound real."

He swallowed hard.

"Then I saw it look at cultivators."

His expression twisted.

"It was hungry."

A young cultivator went pale.

Luo Shenshui continued, each word harder than the last.

"I could feel it wanting to deceive them. I could feel it choosing which memory to use. A childhood story. A sect habit. A private joke. A wound. A promise."

His eyes filled with horror.

"I could not stop it."

Qiao Wen closed his eyes.

Luo Shenshui’s voice shook.

"I tried to scream. I tried to warn someone. But the only thing that moved was that thing wearing me."

He pressed his hands against his head.

"I saw myself become a trap."

That sentence struck the hall harder than a shout.

Some cultivators lowered their eyes.

Mu Qing’s face had turned white.

Even Chen Feng’s expression became ugly.

For a cultivator, death was frightening.

But becoming a weapon used to kill allies after your soul had been carved apart?

That was worse.

Luo Shenshui laughed once.

It was broken and small.

"I thought... if it killed someone while wearing my face, would that count as my karma?"

"No," Qiao Wen said immediately.

His voice was firm.

"That was not you."

Luo Shenshui looked at him.

Qiao Wen repeated, "That was not you."

For a long moment, Luo Shenshui could not answer.

Then he nodded weakly.

But the fear in his eyes did not vanish.

"Later, I felt pain," he whispered. "Something pierced the thing wearing me."

Qiao Wen understood.

"The piece it took from me came loose. I remember falling. Then nothing. Then... warmth. Like something returned."

His eyes moved toward Su Bai, who still sat cross-legged near the skeleton.

"Was it Brother Su?"

Qiao Wen followed his gaze.

"Yes."

Luo Shenshui stared at Su Bai.

The man who had saved him was currently sitting in meditation beside an ancient skeleton.

For a moment, Luo Shenshui did not know what to feel.

Gratitude, confusion, fear, and awe all crowded together.

Then he whispered, "I owe him my life."

Qiao Wen said softly, "More than once, perhaps."

Before Luo Shenshui could respond, another rescued cultivator stirred.

Then another.

The young woman from Verdant Rain Hall opened her eyes next.

Then a Myriad Swords disciple.

Then several others whose soul sparks had returned.

Each woke with fear.

Some gasped.

Some tried to sit up and nearly collapsed.

One reached for a weapon that was no longer there.

Another covered his ears and kept whispering, "Do not call me. Do not call me."

The group moved carefully.

No one rushed them.

Mu Qing helped calm the Verdant Rain Hall disciple.

Zhao Heng stood nearby, large and steady enough to make the wounded feel protected rather than pressured.

Qiao Wen helped Luo Shenshui sit up.

Chen Feng checked the awakened Myriad Swords disciple, though his method of comfort was simply to say, "You are alive. Stop panicking first."

Strangely, it worked.

After some time, the rescued cultivators understood that they were no longer in the cocoons.

Then the testimonies came.

Each had been lured.

Some had heard a senior brother.

One had heard his master calling from the mist.

Another had heard his dead mother.

The hall became colder with each testimony.

The voices had not all been fake bodies.

Some had been the mist itself learning how to pull at longing and fear.

Then came the same nightmare.

One cultivator broke down when he said, "I heard myself begging someone to come closer."

No one mocked him.

Because now they understood.

The borrowed faces did not simply kill.

They made the victim witness the betrayal of their own image.

When the last awakened cultivator finished speaking, the main hall was silent.

The conclusion was clear.

The soul fragments stolen from the real victims remained connected to the false shells.

That was why the victims could feel or glimpse what the fakes did.

That was why destroying the false shells had returned the soul sparks.

And that meant the five possible borrowed faces outside might still be connected to victims who had not yet awakened.

The group’s eyes turned toward Su Bai almost by instinct.

At some point, without anyone saying it aloud, Su Bai had become the person they looked to when the situation stopped making sense.

But Su Bai was still meditating.

The others waited.

No one interrupted him.

While waiting, Qiao Wen and Mu Qing explained what had happened earlier while the awakened cultivators were still sleeping.

And throughout the explanation, one name kept appearing.

Su Bai.

By the time the explanation ended, the awakened cultivators looked at Su Bai differently.