kvmb Chapter 332 Cosmic Emperor Isilis, the times have changed!
Chapter 332 Cosmic Emperor Isilis, the times have changed!
She gazed at her younger sister beside her, whose mind was consumed by thoughts of battle. A complex worry flickered in her eyes, and she could only shake her head helplessly. The flickering flame of war in her sister's eyes stirred an indescribable unease within her. Was it right or wrong to involve this innocent sister in all of this?
She had placed her younger sister in the meticulously constructed illusion to provide her with a tranquil haven amidst the chaos of the universe. Now, in a distant cosmos, a fierce monster war raged, rumored to be a brutal selection process for the so-called "Reionics." These fanatics hunted monsters like interstellar ghosts. And what if her simple-minded, headstrong younger sister were caught in that vortex...? She dared not even think about it.
"Ugh..."
Goldras sighed deeply again, a sigh heavy with worry and helplessness. After seeing her sister off, she stood alone in the empty space, slowly raising her arms and concentrating her mind to activate her superpowers. As the power gathered, a faint, shimmering spatial rift quietly tore open before her, its target pointing directly at the cold, desolate moon hanging in the dark sky.
Although human-built bases stand on the lunar surface, her ability to manipulate spacetime renders their technology utterly incapable of detecting her presence. Of course, all of this is contingent on her being sufficiently cautious to avoid causing any unnecessary disturbances.
Goldras's figure, like a wisp of mist, silently coalesced in the shadow of a crater on the lunar surface. Beneath his feet, the silvery-gray lunar dust, fine as gauze, appeared a desolate, pale white under the cold light of distant stars. In the distance, a few lights flickered on the hemispherical dome of the human base, like the slightly ajar eyes of a sleeping behemoth in the endless darkness, silent and distant.
She deliberately suppressed her energy fluctuations, minimizing her presence to the extreme, as if she had truly merged into this ancient silence. Sure enough, the base's detection network showed no reaction, remaining silent.
However, that moment—the intense sense of crisis she felt deep in the ocean, a sense that almost only arose when facing Ultraman Naga—did not dissipate despite being far from Earth. On the contrary, beneath this desolate lunar surface, she clearly sensed a new resonance.
The power was the same as the one she sensed at the bottom of the sea, similar in essence, yet subtly different in some indescribable way. This left Goldras deeply perplexed.
She held her breath, focused her mind, and concentrated all her senses on the unusual resonance that was "of the same origin but different in nature." The cold and lifeless nature of the moon rock seemed to become the best medium for transmission, allowing her to more clearly discern the subtle differences emanating from the depths of the earth.
The sense of crisis at the bottom of the sea... vast, ancient, and wild, like a colossal beast that has been sleeping for millennia unconsciously breathing, carrying the depth and bottomless pressure of the primordial ocean, a chaotic force woven from pure life force and destructive instinct.
The energy emanating from beneath the moon... while its core "frequency" or "mark" is strikingly similar to that of the ocean floor forces, its texture is entirely different. It is sharper, more fragmented, as if forcibly twisted and torn, imbued with unstable restlessness, and bearing the marks of... a precise and cold alteration. Like the same ancient tree, one branch grows naturally, etched with the marks of time; the other is grafted, infused with foreign matter, and tightly bound by metal rings, exhibiting a deformed, painful vigor.
"Could it be...?"
A thought that sent a sudden shiver down her spine quietly surfaced in her mind.
Could it be that beneath the moon... lies a sealed place?
But if it's a sealed place, why didn't TPC discover it?
Goldras's heart pounded heavily in her chest, as if drawn by the cold, modified power resonating within her. Without further hesitation, her form blurred once more, like a shadow drawn by lunar dust, following the clearest guidance of that unusual "frequency," she crept deeper into the crater, beneath the lunar crust.
Her ability to manipulate spacetime allowed her to penetrate the dense lunar rock as easily as passing through fog. All around her was boundless darkness and deathly silence; only the increasingly clear, painfully resonant sound served as her sole guiding light.
Finally, she "saw" it.
It's not with the eyes, but with the pure perception of a superpowered person.
It was an extremely open area.
It is not a naturally formed cavity in the earth's crust, but rather bears traces of civilization.
She saw non-human skeletons nearby, and upon taking a few steps closer, she saw an anciently decorated stone coffin.
Upon closer inspection, Goldras noticed strange writing and constellation patterns on the sarcophagus.
Goldras extended his fingertips, gently tracing the ancient patterns. A cold sensation spread beneath his fingertips, along with a...very faint trace of energy. This energy resonated with the distorted, bound "core," yet it was dimmer and drier, like embers burned out or weathered memories.
"Guardian...or, prisoner?"
She murmured to herself. The stone coffin itself did not have a powerful energy barrier; it was more like a symbol, or... an epitaph. The skeletons were scattered around the stone coffin, in various postures, some curled up, some stretched out, but without exception, their heads were all facing the direction of the stone coffin, as if they were still gazing or guarding it in their last moments.
She carefully read the fragments of information remaining on the surface of the sarcophagus. The script wasn't from any known universe, but the spiritual imprints it contained could be barely deciphered by her supernatural abilities:
"...Error...out of control...an irreparable tear..."
"...with the stars as chains, and the still sea as its tomb, let's bury 'it' and 'us' together..."
"...May the light that follows never repeat this bloody path..."
The wrong path of blood? Does it refer to the act of transforming that force?
Goldras's gaze shifted from the text to the constellation patterns. Her supernatural knowledge base quickly compared the arrangement of these constellations, revealing that it pointed to a star map from at least 30 million years ago, and not one commonly seen around Earth or the solar system. It belonged to a far more distant region of the sky, a region that might have already undergone dramatic changes or been annihilated.
What chilled her even more was that the lines connecting these constellations subtly formed a complex, multi-layered sealed geometric structure, and the "energy nodes" of this structure surprisingly overlapped with the locations of several major energy and detection centers of the current human base on the moon... in a disturbing way!
Was the choice of this location for humanity's base not accidental? Or was it guided by some higher level, making humanity unintentionally the "modern gatekeepers" of this ancient seal? And perhaps the reason TPC failed to detect the anomaly here is because the "anomaly" here has formed a dynamic balance with the basic energy field of the human base, or even been masked by it?
Just then, that "sharp" and "broken" resonance from deeper within the lunar crust suddenly pulsated intensely!
"Waaaaah—!"
It wasn't a sound, but a sharp, piercing scream that directly affected the mind! It was filled with pain, mania, and a violent will to break free from its restraints!
Goldras instantly took a step back, her body flashing with silver light that formed a thin barrier of spacetime. She saw that the dim constellation patterns on the sarcophagus seemed to have been activated by this pulsation, emitting an extremely faint glimmer of light, but it was only a fleeting, almost imperceptible flash, clearly indicating that the main body of the seal was extremely weak.
"This is bad... the weakening of the seal is more serious than we thought. Is it because of the activities at the human base? Or is it because... the war between the Reionics has disturbed some deep balance of power in the universe?"
She suddenly thought of her younger sister. If her sister's warlike nature, coupled with her unique potential, were to be drawn into the Reonic Wars, and if some being were to detect her subtle connection to some ancient power...
Goldras dared not delay any longer. She had to find out what was sealed beneath the moon! What was its relationship to the ancient being at the bottom of the sea? More importantly, what did its existence, and the current state of the seal, mean for her sister who might be drawn into the Reonic Wars?
She placed her hands lightly on the cold, moonlit ground, her superpowers acting like the most precise probes, following the source of the painful resonance. Ignoring the risk of being discovered, she deepened her perception once more, determined to touch the core truth of the distorted power.
Just as her perception was about to reach a certain critical point.
The power from the abyss did not erupt from below, but rather descended silently into the space beside her, like an invisible icefall cascading down and enveloping her entirely.
Extreme cold.
It wasn't the coldness of temperature, but rather the absolute "stasis" and "death" of energy, even faintly carrying a cold texture that shared the same origin as the "broken" power below, yet had been tamed and worn away of all "activity".
Goldras froze instantly, not from being restrained, but because her sense of time was severely disrupted and slowed down by this descending force. The silver light barrier around her seemed to be trapped in a viscous gel, its flow becoming extremely sluggish. She could even "see" her raised arm, leaving an almost still afterimage in the air.
A shadow silently materialized three steps in front of her.
It was not a physical entity, but rather an outline woven from the moon's extremely thin dust, cold radiation, and that "deadly" power. Humanoid, yet unusually tall and slender, like an elongated, colorless ghost. Its face had no features, only a smooth, dim plane reflecting distant starlight. In its "hand" seemed to lie a strangely shaped, long staff, also composed of luminous dust, its tip pointing in the direction of the sarcophagus.
"Push open the stone coffin..."
The voice kept repeating that sentence on repeat, like a song on repeat.
Goldras's mind was on high alert. A trap? Or had the defense mechanism changed its behavior under certain conditions? The sarcophagus was clearly closely related to the sealing core; opening it rashly would be disastrous.
However, the "shadow" didn't give her much time to think. With the repeated commands, the nature of the "static" force field enveloping her subtly shifted again, from hindering movement to a forceful guidance. The surrounding space began to flow smoothly and irresistibly, pushing and enveloping her body and energy, slowly but steadily moving towards the ancient stone coffin. Even the moonstone beneath her feet seemed to become viscous, "sucking" her in that direction.
At the same time, the "shadow" itself also changed.
The illusory staff in its hand, composed of dust and cold light, gradually solidified, and the head of the staff lit up with clearer, dark blue patterns. The patterns extended, crawling like living things towards the constellation patterns on the surface of the stone coffin.
As the patterns spread, the originally dim designs on the stone coffin began to glow with a faint blue light, echoing the patterns on the staff and forming a brief but complete energy circuit.
Just then, pure power suddenly surged from the skeletons on the ground, temporarily suppressing the power of the stone coffin.
Without further hesitation, Goldras quickly unleashed his time-travel ability and broke free from the place.
Then, several voices crossed space and entered his ears.
Goldras's figure re-formed in the shadow of another crater on the far side of the moon. The slight dizziness from the time travel had not completely subsided, but the lingering conversation in her ears made her feel as if she had fallen into an ice cave.
Isilis? The Cosmic Emperor Isilis?
The name stirred dangerous ripples within the fragments of ancient knowledge she inherited.
An ancient tyrant who once ruled countless star systems with absolute violence and ruthlessness, whose true form was said to possess terrifying power capable of shaking the stars, was banished or sealed away by numerous civilizations in an even more ancient era. Could the distorted and altered core of suffering beneath the moon be connected to this emperor? And what is this so-called "path of blood"...? Does it refer to an attempt to dangerously modify, divide, and seal away the emperor's power?
And the voices that linger in those skeletons, calling themselves "us," are they the remnants of the civilization that carried out the seal back then? Or are they guardians who voluntarily sacrificed themselves here?
"You bunch of dead men, how dare you ruin my plans!" Isilis's voice, even if it was just a wisp of will or a clone descending from afar, was filled with violence and unquestionable arrogance.
"If you were the real Isilis, we would indeed be unable to deal with you, but are you now?" The Guardians' response was calm yet sharp, pointing out the crux of the matter. This was not Isilis's complete form; it was likely just a portion of her sealed power overflowing from her consciousness, or an influence projected through some medium.
"Isilis, the Emperor of the Universe, times have changed!"
Goldras looked at the TPC lunar surface base and several ships from afar, realizing he might have messed up.
To make amends, let's talk to Lin Yeming first!
At least give him some preparation so he won't be caught off guard.