Chapter 315-The Manga Pariah's Guide to Self-Salvation

Wind filled Bai Muqing's robes, rushing through the hollow of her heart. Even as she plummeted, drained of strength, her hand remained outstretched—still reaching for something.

Her premonitions had always been accurate. Instinct had compelled her to abandon the task Ye Zheng had given her. When the black rift erupted with an extraordinarily violent fluctuation, she had unhesitatingly approached that dangerous, mysterious space, gripping the edges of the rift with both hands and releasing [Divine Domain] to unprecedented intensity.

The instant the explosion swept through, [Divine Domain] had melted like a tiny snowflake scorched by flame. She had nearly let go—but sheer, stubborn willpower held her there, held her until Ye Zheng appeared.

High above, the white figure drifted down as lightly as a feather. Just as she was about to plunge into a rapidly expanding Demonic Domain, supple tree roots caught Bai Muqing around the waist and set her gently on the ground.

"...Auntie?"

Bai Muqing came back to herself and staggered forward. Shu Wan immediately steadied her.

Wen De rushed over, too urgent for pleasantries. "Where's Ye Zheng? Where did she go?"

Shu Wan's eyes held the same desperate need to know. Bai Muqing answered: "She went upward... I don't know where that is either."

Wen De was clearly unsatisfied with such a vague answer and wanted to press further, but Shu Wan exhaled with relief. She patted Bai Muqing on the back, then recalled something and pulled her hand away with a trace of awkwardness, her tone sincere: "You've worked hard, Muqing."

She had killed Bai Muqing's father—unavoidably, but still.

Shu Wan could tell that Bai Muqing didn't mind... or rather, it wasn't that she was indifferent, but that she was like Ye Zheng—always placing certain things above everything else, herself included.

"If that's Ye Zheng's choice, perhaps we don't need to worry."

Shu Wan gazed at the sky. Her expression didn't match her reassuring words, but by now she could read Ye Zheng completely—as well as she knew herself.

"She has something important to do, and so do we, don't we?"

The East District was overrun with Demonic Domains. Bai Muqing had nearly exhausted her abilities. Their only option was to enter the Demonic Domains, find that man, and kill him—perhaps that would end everything.

"He's looking for the Holy Sword. Find the sword, and we find him."

Bai Muqing's breath was feeble, but her tone remained steady, every word clear.

The man's luck had been uncanny. While she'd been hunting him, he had stumbled upon the Holy Sword lost inside a Demonic Domain. At the critical moment, the sword had shielded him from her attack.

That sword could not be destroyed and could not be controlled by her. She had finally forced him to drop it, and it had fallen into another Demonic Domain. Just as she'd been about to seize the chance to kill him, the black rift in the sky had surged with staggering energy. She hadn't hesitated—she'd gone straight up.

But Bai Muqing knew in her heart that even if she'd stayed, she couldn't have killed him. That life-preserving law was maddeningly stubborn, and she had no idea how to shake its invisible grip.

"Let's go."

Bai Muqing expelled the stale air weighing on her chest. Wen De and Shu Wan exchanged a glance, then fell in behind her, drained of her abilities as she was.

Even if fate had ordained their failure, they would gladly keep their appointment with the impossible.

A staggering number of Demonic Domains had crammed themselves into the East District, spilling beyond its borders to ravage the surrounding residential areas. The already exhausted residents fled in panic and helplessness—escaping one Demonic Domain only to stumble into the next, unable to see any way out of this hell.

A high-danger Demonic Domain had engulfed a residential neighborhood. Faced with the roaring behemoth, ordinary people grabbed their nearest weapons and rations and ran.

An old woman shuffled at the edge of the crowd. She was ancient—had outlived her husband, and her children were nowhere near. Fortunately, Demonic Domain monsters always preferred to chase the young and lively; that she'd lasted this long was a miracle in itself.

Her reading glasses had shattered at some forgotten intersection. Close-up, her vision blurred, but at a distance it was remarkably sharp. So when she turned her head and saw a girl with short black hair leap onto the back of a massive one-eyed monster, she blurted out the name instinctively, clapping her hands in excitement.

"It's Her Holiness—Saintess Ye Zheng is here!"

The old woman's speech wasn't entirely clear, but the instant that thunderous name rang out, the fleeing crowd turned back with uncanny unanimity, heads bobbing like ocean waves as they craned to see.

Ye Zheng had personally demolished the pedestal that had been built for her. But the seeds she'd planted ran too deep, the hope she'd given too vast. People couldn't help but resent her—yet when they thought of hope, hers was still the first face that came to mind.

Under their stunned, involuntarily hopeful gazes, two more young women with short hair closed in on the monster, coordinating with the dark-haired girl and the other ability users to bring it down.

Those standing close enough could see clearly—none of them were Ye Zheng. Their faces were unfamiliar; they weren't from around here.

The three short-haired girls gathered together. They appeared to be friends, yet their features and equipment made it obvious they came from different places.

One wore finely crafted light armor with a family crest pinned to it, her bearing slightly haughty. The other two were rougher around the edges, their expressions easygoing—like anyone you might pass on the street.

From the outside, the only thing they shared was their short hair—a trend Ye Zheng had started.

Those who still followed Ye Zheng might be considered heretics, but who would attack people who had just killed a monster and protected them?

Across the land, countless followers of Ye Zheng were converging. Some wanted to see the truth with their own eyes. Some wanted to stand at Ye Zheng's side. And others, feeling an unprecedented, reckless freedom in this world unraveling at the seams, sprinted for their lives toward the cruelest hell they could find.

People streamed into the East District; others streamed out. Above the district, Dragon-Humans nimbly dodged the dense Demonic Domains and flew to the neighboring residential areas.

They had regained their minds, but the long loss of control had ground away much of their human emotion. Their companions were each other, not ordinary humans—yet something deep inside still called them to act.

The Dragon-Humans resonated with one another, moving as a flock. They didn't know which companion's fierce wish had sparked this drive, but they answered the call to help all the same.

Inside a Demonic Domain somewhere in the East District, Lucy was supporting Sierra when her foot struck something hard with a crunch.

They both looked down. A familiar longsword lay at their feet. Sierra muttered, "What kind of freaky luck do you have?"

Sierra's complexion was an alarming shade of pale, her fingertips tinged purple, her breathing rapid.

This Demonic Domain had no visible monsters—only a dense white toxic haze that had triggered her congenital heart condition. The last flare-up had been in the Blood Flower Demonic Domain, provoked by Ye Zheng, but it hadn't been this severe.

Lucy, on the other hand, was extraordinarily fortunate. Her ability butterflies carried toxins, giving her a natural resistance to poison. She was sturdy in every sense of the word.

She was like the unlucky foil who constantly clashed with the protagonist, while Lucy was the bumbling idiot hero who stumbled out of danger every time.

"I hate you." Sierra spoke her mind.

"Is there anything you don't hate?" Lucy replied, slightly exasperated.

She propped Sierra against a tree to support her weakened body, then crouched beside the Holy Sword to examine it.

Percy had told her that only the true Chosen One could lift this sword. But Ye Zheng had said the God of Hope didn't exist. So who exactly decided who could wield it?

Could it be the sword's own choice?

Lucy tried to lift it and found it impossibly heavy—like trying to move a boulder. It didn't budge.

The thick fog obscured her vision. Her hands groped along its surface by feel, and suddenly, at the midpoint of the hilt, she felt a bump.

She was practically lying flat on the ground when she spotted it—a golden bead set into the hilt. Its color was so close to the sword's own that it had gone unnoticed.

Curiosity got the better of Lucy, and she tried to pry the bead loose. But the moment she touched it, her expression turned grave. She raised her head and stared into the depths of the haze.

A tall figure materialized in the greenish-white fog, metallic light reflecting straight into her eyes.

This was bad—she and Sierra were in no condition to fight "Percy"!

Lucy scrambled to her feet, instinctively moving to grab Sierra and retreat. She took one step, then turned back to stare at the sword on the ground, her expression torn.

Before she'd finished wrestling with the decision, one foot was already planted firmly on the Holy Sword.

She couldn't let him get it. This sword was too strange—if he reclaimed it, even more people would be in danger.

Besides, they hadn't come to the East District to keep themselves safe.

Lucy stood on the sword, watching the approaching figure warily. His expression was thoroughly dark, his appearance somewhat haggard.

They'd all been scattered and pinned down by the Demonic Domains he'd summoned. What more could he possibly want?

"Lucy, move your foot!"

The man spotted the Holy Sword pinned underfoot and his face contorted with even greater fury. Lucy felt the vibration humming through her sole—the sword clearly didn't appreciate being stepped on either.

She tried to hold the sword down. Her strength had always been considerable, but this time, before she could even brace herself, the Holy Sword flung her into the air.

She crashed onto the ground nearby. Behind her, Sierra's face twisted savagely as she thrust out her hand to nullify the man's ability. But the Holy Sword flew toward Lucy entirely beyond anyone's control, slicing through her fragile butterflies, its point about to pierce straight through her chest!

*

In the boundless dark of the void, Ye Zheng ascended along a single thread of water.

This was the very first thread she had sent out—the one that had traveled the farthest. By all logic, something so thin should have been obliterated by the explosion's aftershock, yet somehow it had only snapped partway. Ye Zheng reconnected the halves into one unbroken line reaching upward.

The space Ye Zheng now occupied was profoundly strange. Space and time seemed compressed; the thread was no more than five hundred meters long, yet she couldn't perceive what lay at its end. The space above seemed infinite.

Worse still, with the collapse of the linked passage created by Main System, Ye Zheng could feel the turbulence beyond the passage walls that System had warned her about.

In the darkness, even deeper black mouths yawned open on every side, their gravity fierce—pulling at her, trying to suck her in, trying to tear her apart.

Ye Zheng suddenly recalled being exiled across world lines by Wen Xiaoxing's [Fate Singularity]—that inescapable loneliness and boundless malice pressing down on her.

System was disconnected. In this desolate space, no one would help her.

Ye Zheng climbed upward, ever upward, and never once looked back.

After an indeterminate time, the arm gripping the water thread tensed. She froze for a moment, then a smile of sudden understanding lit her face. She yanked the water thread hard downward, and her body soared lightly upward through the chaotic gravity—

Like a fish leaping from the depths of the ocean to behold the glow of dawn for the first time, Ye Zheng's wide eyes shimmered with wonder.

After the explosion, amid the swarm of turbulent currents, the water thread had subconsciously sought out a familiar space—one it had visited before.

A two-dimensional world flowed beneath her feet. This was the singularity of [Fate Singularity]—the point where all world lines belonging to King of the Demonic Domain... or more precisely, all world lines belonging to Ye Zheng, converged.

Last time, she had used [Stream] to soak that manga manuscript, twisting the flat world into a three-dimensional Möbius strip, and from countless world lines she had found her way back to her own.

Looking back, she had been infinitely close to a higher-dimensional state then—space and time flowing beneath her feet, bending to her will.

But this time—this time—

Ye Zheng tilted her head back in awe. The last time she'd been in this singularity space, she had sensed a gaze watching her from somewhere even farther away—one that didn't repel her.

Now, she finally understood where that gaze came from.

[Ye—Zheng—]

A stuttering, crackling voice called her name inside her mind.

[I've finally located you!]

System's cheerful electronic tone rang out again. But the moment it took in the scene, it recoiled in shock—information overload.

Above the ring of the two-dimensional world flowing below were countless small windows into other worlds. It could see the world Ye Zheng belonged to. It could see its own world too.

And it saw many modern worlds similar to yet different from its own—even a scattering of ancient worlds and futuristic ones.

Among them, someone was reading the manga King of the Demonic Domain. Someone was playing a pixel game with a character modeled after Ye Zheng. Someone was reading a novel with Ye Zheng as the protagonist, its webpage design dated...

Every one of these was a world that had formed a link with Ye Zheng!

Main System had never even detected these worlds, yet they undeniably existed.

Ye Zheng's gaze swept across world after world. For a moment, she didn't know what to say, and let out a silent sigh of wonder.

So the people who had given her strength—and to whom she had given strength in return—were far, far more numerous than she had ever imagined.

Ye Zheng reached upward. The water thread coiled around her wrist climbed higher, locking onto a world window where a helicopter sat on a field. Several people were frantically hauling things toward it, their agitated voices carrying through.

Among the cacophony of sounds, Ye Zheng zeroed in on one voice with precision—after all, it had been threatening her not long ago.

And this world was rendered in the finest detail; its link appeared to be the most stable.

—It had to be the world where Main System was located.

The razor-sharp water thread shot toward that world without hesitation. Just as it was about to make contact, the window turned transparent and began to flicker unstably, buffeted by turbulent air currents.

[Warning! Self-destruct sequence initiated. Time remaining: five minutes...]

A jarring red warning flooded Ye Zheng's vision once more, the mechanical voice shrieking.

"System?"

After a moment, her familiar System shouldered aside the piercing alarm—but what it said only deepened the gravity on Ye Zheng's face.

[Wang Tao has detected your anomaly. He's going to destroy Main System and sever your link with every world!]

"What happens if the link is severed?"

[You established your connection with all readers through Main System's power, and my existence also depends on it. If Main System is destroyed, I won't be able to open a passage for you. You'll most likely be trapped here forever—until you die.]

"What set him off? He's actually choosing mutual destruction?"

Ye Zheng laughed, but her eyes were dark and heavy. The tranquil space around her was already visibly rippling.

[He can't sever your link with Main System, so this is the only method he could think of.]

[He may be able to transfer his full consciousness into Percy and continue living in your world. But once he destroys Main System, he'll never be able to transfer his consciousness again—and no more Demonic Domains will visit your world either...]

"That actually sounds like a decent ending."

Without Main System's backing, he would be nothing more than an ordinary person with abilities. Even if the manga's law continued to protect his life, he wouldn't have an easy time of it.

Most importantly, with Main System gone and the bridge between the two worlds destroyed, her world would be free of the Demonic Domain threat.

But the flaws were equally glaring. The people who had exploited Main System would go unpunished—they might even build a new one. And then there was the matter of her own ending, which was far from ideal.

"Would they accept this ending?"

Ye Zheng asked. She already had her answer.

Because she didn't accept it either.

If every path fate left her led to death, then she was free to choose any path—and then transcend death itself.

"System, how many Popularity Points are needed to rewrite Ye Zheng's death ending?"

[One billion Popularity Points. Ten million Action Points!]

"Good. Right now, that feels like a small goal."

[Those worlds don't have Main System. Your links with them are fragile—I can't extract your Popularity from them!]

"Then I'll reach out and connect with them myself."

Her gentle words drifted into the void. Ye Zheng extended her hand. Chaotic air currents lifted her hair as her body grew translucent, like water slowly flowing into a new shape.

In the blink of an eye, her hand dissolved into countless threads of water-colored light—like blue veins branching outward.

Some were severed midway by the turbulence. Others pierced through the chaotic black expanse to reach the worlds that still held steady.

"System, get ready."

Before Main System self-destructed—seize one billion Popularity Points!

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