Strictly speaking, this is not the first time Gu Shen has "killed" a Transcendent.

But this time, the influence of the Truth Ruler on his decision-making has been greatly reduced.

From beginning to end, every minute and every second, Gu Shen remained in a state of absolute rationality.

This is the first time he has "killed" under clear consciousness.

The girl and the shadow embraced each other, falling in the muddy filth. Her beautiful face gradually lost its color, a narrow hole appeared on her pale forehead, and warm liquid flowed out like a sleeping, hibernating bird.

After confirming the disappearance of her life force, Gu Shen finally withdrew from the state of the Truth Ruler. The feeling of weightlessness from falling from the peak instantly struck him. He slowly squatted down, the whole world spinning around. Relying on his strong willpower, he could still hold on to the last trace of clarity in his heart.

The first thing Gu Shen did was to check the silver scissors. The silver scissors in the pool of blood no longer shimmered, but became dull. His previous speculation was correct. This was not a seal, but an ability attached to the scissors. After the death of Qu Shui, the scissors became an ordinary object.

Then, he silently stared at the girl who had fallen asleep and dialed Hu Danian's phone.

"Hello, who is this?"

Hu Danian, who had not slept well for a week, was awakened by the phone call and was obviously in a bad mood.

"It's me, Gu Shen."

"The insomnia of the stone sculptures and the serial murder case on the riverbank are two separate cases." Gu Shen calmly said, "The serial killer... is with me."

"What???" Hu Danian instantly became alert.

It took him five seconds to react.

Struggling to digest the huge amount of information in Gu Shen's short sentence, Hu Danian quickly asked, "Are you... okay?"

"Yeah... still alive." Gu Shen glanced at the scene and said, "But my situation is not good. I can't hold on for too long. I need you to handle the scene... I'm currently in Cave 97 under the riverbank..."

Although this place is remote, no one will pass by in the middle of the night.

But it's hard to say when it gets bright.

After using the Truth Ruler twice, Gu Shen's mental power was on the verge of collapse... If he forced himself to hold on, he could last for at most ten minutes, half an hour?

After a brief exchange of information, Hu Danian anxiously said, "Hold on, I'm coming!"

He hung up the phone.

Gu Shen took a deep breath again. The feeling of overusing his mental power was terrible... It was like opening a black hole in his head, and his willpower and spirit were being sucked into the black hole. He had a feeling of being drunk and disoriented. He felt that he could break apart at any moment.

No!

He couldn't fall asleep!

Gritting his teeth, he summoned the blazing fire again. When the warm firelight dispelled the darkness, his whole body felt much warmer.

In order to keep his consciousness clear, Gu Shen forced himself to think.

"Transcendent Arche..."

This phrase came to mind.

When solving the case of group insomnia, Gu Shen felt the Transcendent Arche that Chu Ling mentioned for the first time.

His blazing fire was a highly potential Transcendent ability, but it was still small and needed to absorb the Arche to enhance himself... However, the Transcendent Arche of the stone sculptures was very limited. The benefits gained from repeatedly removing the spiritual imprint through hypnosis were too small.

After all, it was just a D-grade seal that had split.

And considering the task at hand, Gu Shen was not prepared to take the risk of extracting the Transcendent Arche from the stone sculptures... This seal would most likely be carefully examined, and he didn't want to expose his Transcendent ability in front of others.

At this moment, with the blessing of the blazing fire, the colors in his field of vision changed.

The world on the riverbank was no longer pitch black, but divided into patches of colors, and the most prominent among them... was Qu Shui.

When the world faded from the darkness, the girl became the only black figure.

Lying in the colorful world was a small ink dot, as if it had absorbed all the darkness in the world.

"Is this the Transcendent... Arche?"

Gu Shen looked at the dead girl in the world of the blazing fire.

In the real world, after Qu Shui died, blood flowed from her forehead, forming a pool of blood. But in the vision covered by the blazing fire, strands of shadows gathered and converged towards her, which was the result of her ability autonomously dispersing... But now that she was dead, the shadows washed back and forth in the pool of blood, unable to be contained.

Some shadows had already started to dissipate.

Based on this sign, it wouldn't be long before all these Transcendent Arche dissipated and no longer gathered on her.

"The Transcendent Arche... will dissipate in this world after their death."

He silently concluded.

"No... 'dissipate' is not accurate."

Even though he was exhausted to the extreme, Gu Shen's thinking still worked quickly.

"The Transcendent Arche... should always exist in this world, just like air. It cannot be seen by most Transcendents, but it does exist. When the Transcendent Breathing Technique is in operation, they are absorbed and contained. When the Transcendent dies, they are released.""A transcendent being dies, but the essence does not dissipate. It only returns to the invisible 'void' and then, through a certain cycle, goes to another place that can contain it... So even if it is an inanimate seal, as long as it meets the conditions for containing the essence, it can possess transcendent essence."

"I want to enhance the Blaze... I need to absorb various essences: the essence of my own breathing technique, the essence of seals, and the essence of transcendent beings. They can all become 'food' for the Blaze."

As soon as this idea came up, Gu Shen's gaze fell on Qu Shui.

"According to this situation, the Blaze... should be a psychic transcendent ability. But how can I take her essence?"

Gu Shen thought for a moment and realized that he only had one method left.

Immerse the Blaze into Qu Shui's mind.

In theory, the girl was already dead, her consciousness had dissipated, and naturally, there was no spirit.

But after removing the stone carvings a few times before, Gu Shen became familiar with his Blaze ability.

Unlike ordinary psychic transcendent abilities, the Blaze seemed to possess an incredible power of perception. He could sense the spiritual fluctuations carried by objects and living beings... These spiritual fluctuations could establish order under the influence of the Blaze and then construct a dream with symbolic meaning.

On Zhou Yexin's body... the Blaze saw the remnants of dreams from over ten years ago.

"The shadow on her body still carries powerful spiritual fluctuations... I can only try to absorb the essence in this way." Gu Shen rubbed his cheek forcefully, rallied his spirits, and decided to give it a try while he still had consciousness.

"Buzz!"

The small flame attached to his forehead, under Gu Shen's control, slowly detached and landed on Qu Shui's forehead. The wound that had been opened, emitting a burnt smell, was burned by the Blaze.

Although the Blaze currently only displayed the hypnotic power of psychic abilities, it was still a physical flame with extremely high temperature.

Except for the owner, Gu Shen, anyone who came into contact with the Blaze would be burned.

Since it had temperature, it could burn physical objects.

This also meant... if this small flame could one day grow into the raging tide that incinerates ten thousand ghosts in the 'Cage of Specters,' then destroying a city would be just a matter of moments.

In just two seconds, the blood flowing from the wound on Qu Shui's forehead stopped. With the descent of the Blaze, the high temperature caused the blood to evaporate directly.

On the colorful riverbank, the small black shadow finally made contact with the blazing flame.

The world returned to darkness.

The river water surged and roared.

Gu Shen leaned against the muddy stone wall in Cave No. 97, his head slightly lowered, sinking into a "deep sleep."

...

...

Very tired.

Very, very tired.

Tired to the point of not wanting to open his eyes... wanting to just keep sleeping.

His body felt like a waterweed, repeatedly crushed by the weight of the ocean's waves.

Falling.

Falling.

A loud "bang" exploded like thunder.

Gu Shen suddenly woke up.

He was lifted out of the bathtub by a large hand. His left cheek stung, and before he could react, another slap landed on his right cheek.

"You pig!"

The person holding him was a thin man. His round-framed glasses were fogged up, and his face was filled with ferocity. After the two slaps, Gu Shen regained his consciousness... the Blaze had immersed into Qu Shui's residual dream.

Although the original host was dead.

Gu Shen still couldn't freely move his body.

The current sensation was exceptionally real.

He could feel his limbs, which were as heavy as lead at the moment. Similarly, his spirit was extremely exhausted. It was completely different from the feeling of overdrawing his True Measure of Truth—his mind was constantly filled with a near-desperate feeling, on the verge of giving up his mental consciousness.

Is this... Qu Shui's father?

He felt that the man's face at this moment overlapped faintly with the silhouette he had seen in the Side-View World... they were quite similar.

As this consciousness emerged.

"Smack!"

A third slap fiercely struck, causing Gu Shen to feel dizzy and unable to help but want to vomit... he had immersed into Qu Shui's perspective.

The girl was hit and fell backward, with half of her body falling out of the bathtub. At this moment, Gu Shen saw "himself" in the mirror, a small and unattractive figure covered in scars, with several deep cuts on his wrists that were still bleeding. After being soaked in cold water, the flesh opened up, appearing horrifying.

On Qu Shui's wrists, were these scabs... left at this moment?

In his peripheral vision, he caught sight of a body... scattered and dismembered, with beautiful long hair soaked in crimson blood.

At this moment, intense discomfort surged throughout his body.

Finally, it squeezed into his stomach.

The girl couldn't help but let out a "wah," wanting to vomit something... but her throat felt sour. Perhaps it was because she hadn't eaten for too long, she dry heaved, only spitting out some scattered acid water.

"Dad..."

A broken sob came out with difficulty from the girl's throat as she curled up, desperately begging, "Please don't..."

Except for Gu Shen, no one saw any of this.In the bathtub, a shadow of darkness grew larger and larger, like a shark ready to leap out of the sea at any moment.

This was not a dream... but a reality recorded by the Transcendent Arche... This was the scene when Qu Shui awakened her Transcendent abilities.

A man who had lost his sanity.

And a girl struggling to hold on.

This shattered and painful dream fully bloomed the moment the shadow in the bathtub rose and broke the water surface.

The man's face of shock and panic was instantly engulfed by the shadow. Countless shadows entered his eyes, nose, and lips, almost bursting his body apart. He was thrown against the wall by the immense force, sliding down weakly, while the girl still maintained her curled-up posture... There are always pitiful people in this world who are fooled by fate. At the moment of awakening their Transcendent abilities, due to the intense mental stimulation, they become uncontrollable.

She was one in a thousand lucky ones, but also one in ten thousand sufferers.

At this moment, Gu Shen felt as if he had suddenly regained his freedom... After enduring intense pain, he was no longer confined within the girl's small body, but slowly stood up, his ethereal consciousness turning into a blazing fire.

He entered this real dream as a third party.

The fire swirled, solidifying into a physical form.

Gu Shen silently watched the girl curled up in the corner of the bathroom, then glanced at the unconscious man.

The fire guided him... to watch this dream. This was the purest spirit left in Qu Shui's Transcendent Arche.

Once out of control, Transcendents have no rationality to speak of, their actions guided entirely by the Arche.

And in this Arche, what Gu Shen felt... was only suffering, only torment.

That's why her behavior was so perverse, so crazy.

Her father killed her mother and was about to kill her... Under such despair, even without awakening her Transcendent abilities, Qu Shui would have had a mental breakdown.

The fire appeared in front of Gu Shen again.

It flickered slowly, transmitting a clear mental fluctuation.

Gu Shen looked at the curled-up girl. In this dream, the "Transcendent Arche" he needed to absorb should be here.

Did he have to kill her again to seize the Arche?

Gu Shen fell silent.

After a long silence, he stepped forward.

...

...

"Cold... cold..."

The girl was shivering, hiding at the very edge, hugging her arms.

She didn't dare to look at anyone, every pore on her body trembling... Thousands of strands of shadow wrapped around her, intending to form a large cocoon.

The whole world darkened.

All light disappeared, all darkness swept in.

Until a clean, large bath towel was draped over her.

Qu Shui's body stiffened for a moment.

She struggled to lift her head, only to see a blurry figure. The figure was covered in black chaos, with a small but warm flame floating above his brow.

"Put it on... it'll make you feel better."

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The figure's voice fell into the trembling girl's ears, like a glimmer of light suddenly appearing, illuminating the dark world. The thousands of shadows closing in were blocked by a tiny flame from forming a cocoon.

Looking at the trembling girl, Gu Shen sighed softly to the fire, "If I have to kill her again... to seize the Arche, I can't do it."

Kill Qu Shui, because she had lost control.

On the river beach tonight, it was either you die or I live.

But the pitiful girl in this dream was a sufferer wandering in the void of dreams.

He showed no mercy to enemies... but he couldn't bring himself to hurt such a person.

Even in a dream, he couldn't deceive himself and act against his principles.

The fire seemed to understand Gu Shen's words, flickering once, then slowly pulsating.

After Gu Shen made his choice... the surroundings of this dream began to collapse, the color faded again, and the Transcendent Arche attached to Qu Shui, due to her death, began to dissipate on its own.

"Let it be."

Gu Shen said calmly, "There will be other opportunities to absorb Arche."

He turned to look one last time... ready to leave this dream completely.

Suddenly a voice stopped him.

"Big brother..."

In the collapsing dream, the tearful girl's voice bloomed slowly with the shattering of the mirror, "Thank you..."

The Transcendent Arche, symbolizing madness, rage, and venting, suddenly calmed down.

"The fire on your brow... it's so beautiful... I liked it the moment I saw it..."

The dream collapsed.

The girl smiled softly, extending her palm.

In her pale palm lay a small black cocoon.