Mage Manual
Chapter 668 - 527: Another World Line’s Self

Chapter 668: Chapter 527: Another World Line’s Self

Night had fallen, and the murky sky, devoid of stars and moon, seemed like an eternal darkness descending upon the land, as if it could devour all things colorful.

Around the hospital camp, there stood four statues—a valiant general, an elegant middle-aged scholar, a kind old man, and a pure young girl. The statues appeared to form a barrier of light and darkness, with a chasm-like blackness outside and a bright, bustling camp within.

In the office on the top floor of the hospital, she watched the believers below starting tonight’s festivities—bloody gladiator fights, reproductive mating, storytelling of ancient times, games, and entertainments... It wasn’t just the believers of the Four Pillars God Sect who took part, even those captured ascetic Tribulation Fire Mages quickly assimilated, showing no resistance at all.

No one found this strange, because the other believers of the Gods of Four Pillars had, in days, months, or years past, been followers of other Great Skills, but once deprived of the Great Skill, they would instantly be attracted to the Gods of Four Pillars, abandoning unreachable ideals to openly accept a hedonistic reality.

Not to mention these ascetic Tribulation Fire Mages—they were the easiest to fall. They believed they resisted desires and tribulation through willpower, but were unaware that it was the influence of tribulation itself; the more they received from it, the more profoundly they were infected, gradually becoming hard-striving, selflessly just, with weakened desires.

However, the term ’infected by tribulation’ would obviously cause offense, yet rephrased as ’resisting tribulation to maintain will’, it won support from a host of believers. Among the many factions of the Land of Senluo, the Holy Temple of Tribulation was unlike the others; it did not demand that believers devoutly worship tribulation, but rather to be vigilant of tribulation, resist it, and scrutinize it, becoming the faction with the strongest cohesion and a formidable competitor in the Divine War.

Yet, she glanced at the tiny Flame White Tiger on her shoulder and the other Great Skills lazily napping in the office.

Losing the Great Skill meant losing everything.

In this prolonged night, people could only protect themselves with two things, ideals and desires—or perhaps they were one and the same.

The Holy Temple of Tribulation had become a term of history. Even if a Mage inheriting the will of tribulation became the next Great Skill, it would not be tribulation, but a new flame.

On the Land of Senluo, the vast majority of people were like fallen leaves, including Mages. Sometimes they were blown up by tribulation’s wind, sometimes by the wind of justice, drifting wherever the current took them, utterly incapable of controlling their own fate. If the wind stopped, they could only fall into the soil of desire, where they would slowly rot away.

She no longer watched the liveliness below, returning to her desk to continue sorting through the four cards.

Moments later, she confirmed all four cards were genuine. The Holy Temple of Tribulation, with its profound heritage, possessed cards whose value even surpassed that of the Tribulation Fire Technique, for they were "Illusion Mirror Dragon Shopping Cards"!

These cards, which required no identification and were valid until the year 9999, were considered strategic resources of the Land of Senluo. Whoever had these cards could easily obtain resources from the Divine Era!

"Where did you get these shopping cards at this time?"

Hearing the question from beside her, she was slightly shocked and quickly stashed the cards away, but she relaxed when she turned her head and saw the uninvited guest: "Oh, it’s you."

"You should say, ’Oh, it’s me,’ shouldn’t you?" said a demure young girl, suddenly appearing on the adjacent sofa. She closed the book in her hand, glanced at the blue flame squirrel lying there, and said, "Pleased to meet you, Yooran Weiser."

"Pleased to meet you, another version of myself from a different timeline," the squirrel laughed. "You seem much older than me."

Other Great Skills looked confusedly at the squirrel speaking to itself and then at the silent Female Mage sitting in the chair, not understanding the situation, as if caught in some kind of illusion.

"Why? I clearly look exactly like you."

"Voice, intonation, eyes," Squirrel said. "This is probably what people find annoying about the Truth Faction."

The demure girl nodded. "Makes sense. But, you don’t seem surprised by my appearance?"

"Let’s see, you must be the 24th ’me’ I’ve met," Squirrel said. "The Illusion Mirror Dragon seems to pay attention to me whenever it’s bored."

Squirrel wasn’t surprised by the demure girl’s arrival, as this wasn’t the first time this had happened. On her very first day as a Mage, she had encountered another version of herself from a different world line in her room, and later came to understand that it was the Illusion Mirror Dragon’s mischief.

Every time the Illusion Mirror Dragon took an interest in her, it would bring her different world line versions of Yooran Weiser. Although most could get along friendly and at least trade knowledge, there were a few who would start with a fight.

Even though the intelligence from different world lines was hard to use as a reference, ’their’ knowledge of magic was undoubtedly real. Perhaps because they were all her, they exchanged knowledge of magic with ridiculously high efficiency, mastering a new Magic Faction every time they met a new self.

Although Squirrel was eager to extract new magical knowledge from the demure girl, she keenly picked up on a problem: "Why would you think that I shouldn’t have a shopping card at this point in time?"

The demure girl pointed at the Flame White Tiger. "Did you just come back from the Tribulation Fire Technique camp and successfully seized the Great Skill of Tribulation Fire? These shopping cards are from the Holy Temple of Tribulation, aren’t they?"

"That’s right, what about it?"

"My world line is quite similar to yours," the demure girl said with a smile. "I’ve been to the Tribulation Fire Technique camp before, but I didn’t win against the person in possession of the Great Skill of Tribulation Fire, so of course, I didn’t get these rewards."

"You actually couldn’t defeat him?" Squirrel was somewhat surprised. "Although he could perfectly host the Tribulation Fire, he was quite weak, and he even had some moral standards. It would have been a bit troublesome if he started by annihilating other believers and then guerrilla fighting us, but unexpectedly, he wanted to try to scare us off first and, sure enough, fell for my armed color."

"Ahahaha," the demure girl said casually. "Maybe it was a different person. The one I met was not as kind as the one in your world line. Not only did I fail to annihilate the Holy Temple of Tribulation, but under his leadership, they even grew stronger and counterattacked us."

"But it’s also because of that, I survived."

Squirrel narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"After I seized the position of ’sense of touch,’ I realized that ’sense of touch’ had long wanted to get rid of me. But at that time, the Holy Temple of Tribulation was so formidable that she had to rely on me to continue resisting the tribulation."

"Now that the tribulation has been extinguished," the demure girl said with a smile looking at Squirrel, "do you think ’sense of touch’ has any reason to let you live?"

Bang!

Just as the demure girl finished her sentence, a gunshot echoed through the night!

With her back to the window, sitting in the chair, the enigmatic and seductive female Mage’s head was blown off by a single shot!