Lin Jie lay on the ground, his limbs still sluggish.

Although the insect swarm had retreated, the toxins targeting the nervous system metabolized extremely slowly. His fingers could only twitch with the faintest of movements.

Right in the midst of this chaos, a sudden anomaly occurred.

Behind the Throne at the far end of the temple, the seamless rock wall underwent a strange collapse.

The rock was like an ink wash painting soaked in water; its hard texture rapidly softened and faded, ultimately forming an irregular hole about three meters in diameter.

A mist surged out. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

It was an extremely fine, grayish-white mist.

It wasn't damp like sea fog, nor was it choking like London's coal smoke.

The mist slowly flowed into the hall, hovering mid-air as if alive, enveloping that iron Throne.

Lin Jie strained to move his eyeballs, trying to see what lay deep within the mist.

Within that churning gray-white, the outline of a figure gradually sharpened.

Time became viscous in this moment.

The dust floating in the air stopped falling. The flames of the torches in the distance that hadn't yet burned out remained frozen in their leaping posture.

Footsteps sounded.

Very light.

It was the sound of soft-soled boots stepping on stone, accompanied by the firm *thud-thud* of a wooden staff striking the ground.

An old man walked out.

He wore a deep gray coarse linen cloak, the hood pulled low, covering most of his face. Only a pale yet not withered chin was visible, along with a few strands of gray-white beard.

His stature wasn't tall, appearing somewhat hunched.

The old man held a primitive oak longstaff in his hand. A natural burl that had grown on the head of the staff was worn smooth and glossy from handling.

He stopped beside the iron Throne, raised the longstaff in his hand, and gently tapped the ground once.

*Thud.*

A transparent ripple spread out from the base of the staff.

Wherever the ripple swept, all abnormal statuses were forcibly cleared.

Lin Jie felt the heavy shackles clinging to his nerves shatter instantly.

His muscles regained their strength, his sluggish thoughts became sharp once more, and the impact injuries from the previous battle were greatly alleviated.

It wasn't just him.

Beside him, William sharply inhaled a cold breath, his pale complexion rapidly regaining its color.

Julian and Evelyn also broke free from the paralysis one after another, sitting up in astonishment.

Marcus even sprang up directly from the ground, instinctively grabbing the battle axe beside him.

It was simply a miracle.

The old man slowly raised his head. His gaze passed through everyone and landed on Lin Jie.

This gaze reminded Lin Jie of the description of that "Mysterious Mentor" in Karl's journal, of the voice he heard in the reverberation of the Round Table insignia.

Merlin.

The Oak Sage.

This legend now stood less than ten meters away from him.

"You are late."

The old man's voice was hoarse and low, spoken in pure ancient English pronunciation.

"Visitor from half a century later."

Lin Jie was just about to speak, to ask the question that had been weighing on his mind for so long.

But he found he couldn't do it.

The entire world in his perception suddenly underwent an extremely bizarre dislocation.

Shortly after Merlin's words fell, Lin Jie felt his spirit being violently ripped from his flesh by an irresistible pulling force.

This sensation was profoundly strange.

It was like surfacing from underwater, or waking from a heavy, oppressive dream.

When Lin Jie could see his surroundings clearly again, he found himself still standing in the temple hall.

But the world had changed.

The underground hall was now filled with an eerie silver-gray light.

This light had no fixed source. It flowed through the air like liquid, clinging to every rock, every pillar.

The surfaces of those objects were now covered with a substance resembling mercury, slowly writhing and refracting a disorienting halo.

All sound had vanished.

Lin Jie turned his head to look at his teammates beside him.

They still stood in place, frozen in their postures from the previous second.

William was about to raise his gun in alert, the muscles on his face tense, his gaze sharp; Julian's mouth was open as if about to exclaim in surprise; Evelyn's hand was still pressed against the frame of her glasses.

But they didn't move.

Not just still.

Around their bodies appeared a layer of blurred double images, the effect of countless different postures superimposed together.

Lin Jie reached out, attempting to touch William's shoulder.

His hand passed right through the figure.

No tactile sensation.

"Don't waste your effort."

Merlin's voice sounded behind Lin Jie.

Lin Jie whirled around.

Merlin still stood beside the iron Throne, but in Lin Jie's current field of vision, this old man's appearance had undergone a dramatic transformation.

The gray cloak had become a flowing robe woven from countless intricate runes. The oak longstaff in his hand was no longer dead wood, but a living sapling with lush branches and leaves, its roots anchored in the void, its apex coalescing a dazzling white light.

What shocked Lin Jie the most was that Merlin's body was "solid."

In this world where everything except himself was a phantom, only Merlin possessed an undeniably tangible presence.

"Where is this place?"

Lin Jie looked at his own hands.

His hands were also covered with that faint mercury-like sheen, but he could feel his own existence, feel the pulse of his thoughts.

"The Interstice."

Merlin walked up to Lin Jie, the staff in his hand gently tapping the ground, stirring a circle of silver ripples.

"Or, using a term you might understand more easily—Limbo."

"This is the seam between reality and illusion, the buffer zone between the material world and the ocean of spiritual nature."

Merlin reached out and grabbed a handful of the silver light-mist flowing in the air.

That light-mist gathered at his fingertips, transforming into a butterfly about to take flight, before dissipating into scattered points of starlight.

"This is the Aether."

"What you call spiritual nature, the source of magic, the fuel for all supernatural powers."

"All UMAs are, in essence, deformed children born from this ocean. When they die in the real world, their residual spiritual nature also returns here, awaiting the next meaningless recombination."

Lin Jie looked around.

This sensation of being filled with a mercury-like quality, of time standing still, of abundant spiritual nature, gave him a powerful sense of déjà vu.

"The Swamp Tree Fiend..."

Lin Jie murmured.

"Back in the Black Forest, that Digestive Space that consumed us..."

"Correct."

Merlin nodded, a trace of approval flashing in his eyes.

"That Swamp Tree Fiend used its own powerful spiritual nature to forcibly prop open a small bubble within Limbo."

"Only its bubble was filled with decay and obsession, whereas here..."

Merlin spread his arms, displaying this vast, tranquil silver space.

"...here is the pure Source Flow."

"But, how can a living person enter here?"

Lin Jie looked at his semi-transparent body.

If this was the final destination of spiritual nature, didn't that mean only the dead could enter?

"Under normal circumstances, they cannot."

Merlin tightened his grip on the staff.

"Unless your soul itself is sufficiently special, or someone has opened a Backdoor for you."

"I used this staff as an anchor point to temporarily pull your consciousness in."

"Why do this?" Lin Jie asked. "Those people outside are my teammates. They are trustworthy."

"I trust your judgment."

Merlin's expression turned serious.

"But I cannot trust this world."

"Out there, ears are everywhere."

"And what I need to tell you, if those managers were to hear it, they would spare no effort, even if it meant blowing half of England to smithereens, to stop the truth from spreading."

A chill ran through Lin Jie's heart.

He instinctively covered the Round Table insignia in his pocket.

"Is it because of this?"

He took out the insignia.

In this silver world, that ancient metal disc was now emitting a piercing golden light.

It was no longer an inanimate object, but pulsed like a beating heart, resonating intensely with the staff in Merlin's hand.

Merlin extended a finger, gently touching the surface of the insignia.

"Gawain..."

The old man's voice held a touch of vicissitude and nostalgia.

"That stubborn fool."

"Until his death, he never gave up searching for the way home."

As Merlin's finger made contact, the golden light on the insignia erupted violently.

The surrounding silver mist began to churn fiercely. The stationary afterimages vanished, replaced by grand yet fragmented scenes, like holographic projections.

Lin Jie felt as if he had been thrown ten thousand meters into the air.

He looked down upon the land beneath his feet.

It was London.

The Thames meandered, the Houses of Parliament stood majestic, countless factory chimneys belched black smoke, carriages streamed through the streets, gentlemen and ladies strolled beneath the gas lamps.

It was a picture of prosperity, reality, brimming with the power of the Industrial Revolution.

But then, Merlin gently waved the staff in his hand.

"Look closely, child."

"This is the world you live in."

The scene changed.

At the very edge of that bustling city, at the extreme limit of vision, bizarre mosaic patterns began to appear.

The boundaries of the world.

At those boundaries, the sky was a heart-palpitating gray-white.

The earth abruptly broke off, revealing a dark, void-like abyss below.

And within the city itself, on buildings, streets, on the bodies of pedestrians, were densely covered fine cracks.

Filling those cracks was precisely this silver-gray substance from Limbo.

"The Overlay."

Merlin's voice echoed in Lin Jie's ears.

"The prosperity you see is but a thin layer of paint, daubed upon a canvas that has long since shattered."

"This world is pieced together."

"The boundary between the real world and Limbo is becoming blurred."

"This is why UMA sightings have increased exponentially in recent years."

"They are not invaders."

"They are 'leaking' in through these cracks."

Lin Jie watched those scenes.

He saw the void behind the wall of the Chelsea Hotel in New York.

He saw the coastlines on the South Seas charts that didn't match his memories.

He saw the misaligned constellations in the starry sky.

All the clues connected at this moment.

"What on earth is going on?"

Lin Jie turned to look at Merlin, his voice somewhat dry.

"Is this world... truly false?"

Merlin was silent for a moment.

He dispersed the scenes before them, letting the surroundings return to silver-gray tranquility.

"The word 'false' is not accurate."

The old man sighed.

"It exists. We can feel pain, we can think, we can love and hate."

"For those living within it, it is the only reality."

"But on the scale of time..."

Merlin used his staff to draw a straight line on the ground.

"True history, that river that should have flowed normally, was still normal two thousand years ago."

"Back then, the Aether was depleted, mystery receded. Humanity should have walked a purely material path."

"But."

Merlin drew a huge X on the line.

"At a certain node."

"The world deviated from its proper course."

"A disaster, or some kind of high-dimensional interference beyond our comprehension, destroyed 'reality'."

"To preserve the spark of civilization, to prevent humanity from going completely extinct."

"The rulers of that time, the earliest Round Table Knights, using the holy relics in their possession, did something insane."

Merlin raised his head, his gaze burning as it fixed on Lin Jie.

"They intercepted a segment of history."

"A segment of human civilization at its most glorious, most promising for development."

"They 'projected' this segment of history."

"Like building a massive stage upon the ruins."

"All of us, myself included, are actors upon this stage."

Lin Jie felt his worldview crumbling.

This sounded like the most insane fantasy novel.

"So..."

Lin Jie spoke with difficulty.

"The existence of I.A.R.C. is to maintain this stage?"

"Correct."

Merlin let out a cold laugh.

"The earliest Round Table Knights, the organization from King Arthur's time, was indeed established to combat those UMAs leaking in through the cracks in spacetime."

"We passed down through generations, always upholding the oath to protect humanity."

"Until my generation."

"That period known as the 'Silent Decade'."

"A schism occurred within the Knights."

Merlin pointed at the iron Throne.

"At that time, we discovered the truth of the Projection."

"Discovered that this world was becoming unstable, the cracks growing more numerous."

"The faction led by Gawain advocated finding a way to repair the Projection, attempting to use Time Anchor Points to return to the true timeline, to prevent that disaster from happening."

"We wanted to break this false cycle."

"But..."

A flash of pain crossed Merlin's eyes.

"The other faction, led by Lancelot of that time."

"They refused."

"Because within this Projection world, they held the rules."

"They wanted to exploit the Projection. They didn't want to wake up."

"They only wanted to be eternal emperors within this collapsing dream."

Lin Jie understood.

"And you?"

Lin Jie looked at Merlin.

"Why are you hiding here?"

"I am waiting."

Merlin looked at Lin Jie, his eyes holding a light unlike any before.

"I am waiting for a variable."

"Lin Jie."

Merlin spoke the name.