Although her combat ability has always remained the same, Lin Xue is indeed a mascot that ensures fortune and avoids misfortune, both in her past life and this one—she often claims that even her sneezing equals crushing a million enemy troops in the future. Although no one believes such nonsense from her, her skill in ensuring fortune and avoiding misfortune is still recognized by everyone.

If it weren’t for her, or rather for the few important prophecies made by her past self, "Reiji", the New Empire might not have existed at all.

After assisting the then Sky Zone Emperor to achieve the great feat of dividing the Fifteen-Day Zone Capital in two, she secretly arranged a task that seemed inexplicable to Audemus: hiding the Heart of the World. At that time, no one but herself could guess the purpose of this task, but now it is clear to us that the arrangement was precisely for dealing with the current Fallen Apostles—she predicted the downfall of the Empire, foretold the sole ray of hope, foresaw that we would enter the Hall of Gathering all these years later, and even predicted the appearance of the Fallen Apostles and the value of the Heart of the World. It’s truly hard to imagine how much more she might have known and to what extent. Now I somewhat sympathize with those Fallen Apostles repeatedly struck by Lin Xue’s Prediction Ability, and I understand why they paid such a great price to develop a new type of warship, just to interfere with the Prophet for a few minutes on the battlefield: to have such an unreasonable entity as a rival is truly a hopeless affair.

Of course, there were also places where her predictions weren’t quite accurate. For instance, the reason for entrusting this secret mission to Audemus alone was likely because she foresaw that a large number of Xyrin Apostles would become rebels due to "some reason", but she couldn’t ascertain the scope of this "rebel", so she had to keep the matter as unknown to as few people as possible. In fact, she made a mistake on one point: the ones who truly rebelled against the Empire were the Fallen Apostles, who should have been annihilated at the moment of disaster, not these surviving compatriots from the Fifteen-Day Zone. But one cannot blame the Reiji of those years for her distrust of her own people, it was not distrust, but a necessary caution. After all, even the power of a Prophet is limited, she couldn’t control everything, just like the Reiji of those years foresaw the downfall of the Empire, but was still powerless to stop it all, she sacrificed herself to the Void just to gain this last glimmer of hope, at the cost of her own demise—such is the fickleness of the world.

"Mo, you’re lamenting so much that it’s making me embarrassed," Miss said playfully, twisting my ear because I hadn’t hidden my laments from her. "Audemus, now I know less than you about the events of those years. Elaborate on what happened, and about the seal status of the Heart of the World, speak only of the part that you know we are aware of."

"Yes," Audemus’ indistinct half-body projection flickered slightly. "Regarding my mission, it basically involves what was mentioned before, hiding the Heart of the World and for this, a secret sealing system was constructed.

Regarding this matter, Lady Reiji and His Majesty the Emperor had directly ordered it to be carried out in secret, even classified as top secret in any Imperial information network. I did not understand at the time why there was such a command, but fulfilling orders is a duty so after the entire Mother Star fell into planned slumber, I alone awakened, reconstructed, and established the present Northern Icefield, hiding the Heart of the World here."

"What does such hiding mean? Concealed in Other Space? Or simply cloaked its aura?" Orelia asked a detailed question, taking a deep interest in this secret plan unknown even to her.

"Both, the Heart of the World is placed in a well-arranged Space Fold, and the identification characteristics of this Space Fold were disguised. Its level of secrecy is such that it can even evade the Empire’s most advanced scanning technology," Audemus patiently explained, "I designed this system to rely on any form of Secondary Energy to keep it running and created a batch of Elemental Beings to maintain the seal. Their mission is to ensure the system operates normally until Doomsday, or the Empire’s revival. They can gather primordial minerals from the Northern Border to sustain the Magic Array, and in times of energy scarcity, they use themselves as fuel. If conditions worsen, these Elemental Beings will forcibly awaken me, restarting everything. This is the best design I could achieve. The options were indeed limited. Lady Reiji pointed out several ’safe’ areas, all on this small planet, and she emphasized that the current vessel of the Heart of the World must not be damaged, otherwise, if the Heart of the World were transferred, the risk would increase exponentially. Therefore, I could only protect the Heart of the World and its vessel within this icefield. In hindsight, Lady Reiji’s foresight was correct, as only this planet remained unscathed after the disaster erupted, while most other planets, including the Mother Star, have been severely fragmented, or even if they survived by luck, bear the marks of severe devastation from Subspace storms."

I thought for a moment, feeling that something seemed off, I hesitated and asked: "So, there should also be a Heart of the World on the Technology Side, right? After all, the Mother Star was conceptually split into two parts, and there can’t be only one Heart of the World, correct? Since the Heart of the World of this world has been properly hidden, then where is the other one?"

"Although I am not very clear about the situation over there, the two worlds should correspond with each other, Lady Reiji certainly also arranged for matters in the other universe. I believe that the other side’s world must also have a place preserving the Heart of the World."

"But I have never heard Gaia mention this!" I retorted immediately, and at this, everyone fell silent, we realized once again that everyone had overlooked a rather important matter.

I quickly contacted Gaia, moments later I shook my head at those around me: "Gaia’s memory bank does not contain information about the Heart of the World. She indicates that the Technology Side Mother Star’s universe has never been aware of the Heart of the World, she also inquired among all currently online Xyrin Apostles, none recall any secret mission like this back then."

Lin Xue covered her forehead, slightly closed her eyes, then looked worriedly at me after a moment, saying: "This is not good, the Heart of the World is likely already in the hands of certain individuals, and the method of theft is quite sophisticated, even blocking the memories of Xyrin Apostles who might have participated in the corresponding mission back then."

"Why go to such great lengths to protect the Heart of the World in the Fifteen Day Zone Capital Universe?" Qianqian pondered for a while before seizing another key point, "Aren’t there many universes? Is the Heart of the World in the Fifteen Day Zone Capital special?"

"Specialness, specialness, it must be special," Lin Xue quickly tapped her temple with her index finger, as if it could speed up her thinking, "I remember the Fallen Apostles had a goal for collecting the Heart of the World; they can’t just take any universe’s Heart of the World. The Heart of the World in the Fifteen Day Zone Capital must be a key item. I definitely saw something back then, but now... damn, if only I were as amazing as I used to be... Wood, can I borrow your divine talent?"

"Are you going to sacrifice yourself to the Void again?" I slapped the back of Lin Xue’s head, "What are you thinking? The situation isn’t too bad. Even if the Fallen Apostles got the Heart of the World, it’s been tens of thousands of years, and their great project is still in the preparation stage. It’s certain they’re missing a lot of things, and we’ll always have a chance to defeat them as long as we achieve results every time they act."

"Wise decision," Orelia "looked" at me, "I’ve already gained a rough understanding of the current state of the Fallen. Their plan cannot be completed in a day. Perhaps the Heart of the World in the Fifteen Day Zone Capital is crucial, but it’s definitely not the only factor. We should plan for the long term. Audemus, the Heart of the World you kept is still intact, correct?"

"Yes, I checked its condition first thing after awakening."

"Very good, hand it over to us for protection. You just happen to get rid of this frail state. We now need you for a more important task: to unlock the core of the Sky Tower."

"Speaking of which, what does that Heart of the World look like?" Qianqian’s face was full of curiosity. She knew that the true form of the Heart of the World is actually formless and intangible, merely a point of information entanglement. However, the Heart of the World would randomly attach itself to anything in the current world, and only when the current reliance is destroyed will it jump to the next object—this is also why Audemus wants to seal the Heart of the World along with its reliance in an Other Space: to prevent that thing from suddenly jumping to another object and unnecessarily complicating his task. Now Qianqian became interested in that heavily protected Heart of the World, eagerly wanting to see what it looks like. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

To be honest, I’m a bit curious too because I’m usually busy with... supposedly busy affairs, and I rarely come into contact with that thing. The most memorable Heart of the World I can recall was with the Milia in Mobra World (often, the essence of the Heart of the World and the host can actually be interchangeable). The Heart of the World didn’t seem to have any special features—it couldn’t be destroyed before the world itself ended, and the change in hosts merely made that point of information entanglement jump around. For the Heart of the World, the current host is almost just a container; it could be a cat or dog. The host for the Heart of the World in the Fifteen Day Zone Capital Universe must have been deliberately chosen, and I’m very curious what Big Sister of yesteryears picked as the host.

Currently in blocky mode, Audemus readily agreed, "When Orelia contacted me, this task was already complete. If you’d like to see it, I can open the passage to the storage of the Heart of the World right now. It’s just outside."

As he spoke, the two-foot-square crystal block housing Audemus shattered with a bang and quickly reassembled in midair. After a crisp clatter, it became a translucent sculpture similar to the Gudel person outside. He flexed his body and apologized to us, "I’m sorry. This form of mine can only be maintained for less than ten minutes and can’t leave the icefield range. But it will be over soon."

We left this small ice house and found that the snowstorm outside had ceased, while in the extreme distance, a massive snow tornado, towering between sky and earth, eerily hung in the sky and was gradually approaching us. The tornado was mingled with a lot of broken ice and rocks, clearly marking its boundary and form. That shape didn’t seem naturally formed and was constantly changing. As it drew closer, it gradually took on the face of a middle-aged man with a furious beard and hair—a face only—appearing in an odd state at the upper end of the tornado, with the lower half being nothing but a pair of giant arms resembling a swirling, bending cloud mist, making it look akin to a fast-frozen Aladdin Lamp God.

After getting relatively close, the tornado transformed into a giant nearly a hundred meters tall—but only the upper body. The lower half of the giant was still a coiling storm that emitted a deafening roar.

"Ah, so that’s the Storm Giant from the continent’s legend," Lin Xue pointed at the tornado, "It does look spectacular."

"Unlike other kin who manifest Ancient Spirits and natural phenomena, the Storm Giant was created consciously by me, and its mission is to guard the sealing of the Heart of the World, hence it can never leave the icefield. The wind and snow that hover over the icefield are the Storm Giant’s incarnation, allowing it to sense every move in the icefield at all times. After I return to slumber, it remains the planet’s strongest Guardian, despite only possessing a tiny Soul Fragment of mine. It still performs its task very well."

"I might know how those Gudel Elemental Beings were created," I said, watching the distant Storm Giant. Around its inverted cone-shaped lower half, small whirlwinds constantly split off. Once separated, these small whirlwinds seemed to acquire consciousness, roaming around to gather nearby ice and rock to build their bodies, quickly transforming into translucent ’Shattered Ice People,’ some of whom flew in the air without lower bodies, appearing like small-scale Storm Giants, while those on the ground looked exactly like our guide."

"Yes, the Storm Giant and Gudel Elemental Beings were created simultaneously, the latter being the split lifeforms of the former," Audemus said, "The sealing hub is inside the Storm Giant, and now my subordinate and this avatar are sharing one consciousness. Look, that is where the Heart of the World is stored, and it’s already opened."

As Audemus spoke, he pointed with his transparent arm made of shattered crystals at the Storm Giant hundreds of meters away, deep inside whose body a red core was rapidly brightening and gradually escaping the confines of the Giant’s body. I saw many bright lines and rune marks covering this red core and connecting to the surrounding hurricane. As the core drifted away from the Giant’s body, these lines and runes began to break one by one. Judging by my limited knowledge in mysticism, this meant the entire sealing was a one-time thing; once activated, it would be completely destroyed, and only by breaking these runes in the correct order could stability be ensured, or something particularly discordant would definitely happen — for example, the Northern Ice Plain turning into the Northern Hemisphere Icefield, or the Mother Continent transforming into an Ice Continent, or the Heart of the World being flung off to some unknown place at the ends of heaven and earth.

Audemus pointed at a glowing object gradually floating over and said, "That’s the Heart of the World which my subordinate was ordered to hide, intact."

As the halo finally faded away, I saw the appearance of the thing clearly, and was momentarily dumbfounded.

A huge and hefty metal ring, dark black, roughly a meter in diameter, its surface sparkled with stars of blue and purple as if unaffected by gravity, levitating in mid-air, radiating visible ripples around it: it seemed the air was being distorted by some kind of force field, or it could be the light that’s bending, or even the space itself.

Now let’s combine these two matters: Big Sister, and the ring.

A massive ring from the peak strength of Big Sister...

The moment I saw this metal ring, both Lin Xue and even the often scatterbrained Qianqian couldn’t help but step back several paces, layers of cold sweat breaking out all over us, dingdang above, in this frigid place at minus one hundred degrees, darn it, I broke out in a sweat!

On site, there were two people without much reaction: Alaya and Orelia; the former probably didn’t register it, and the latter, whatever change there might be was hard to tell, who knows what expression she has now?

"You can’t touch this thing directly with your hands, right?" I maintained a safe distance, pointing at the metal ring.

Audemus nodded, "Seems you’ve grasped the Emperor’s power, this metal ring itself is endowed with self-preservation ability, the Emperor’s power is attached to it, never dissipating over tens of thousands of years. It’s too important, so the Emperor made it as unbreakable as possible. Oh, the system shows the information entanglement point of the Heart of the World is still attached to the ring."

I continued sweating buckets, you tell me how to transport this thing back!

After thinking for a long time, I finally contacted Avalon, calling the local street office director Miss Artemis: "Little Artemis, I need support here, send over a battalion... No, deploy a regiment of gunmen here..."

Before I finished, Lin Xue directly interrupted, "Don’t mind him, we can handle it ourselves." Then she cut off the communication, and Miss puffed angrily at me, "Don’t exaggerate so much, you take it back."

"Geez, it’s going to be a fate worse than death!"

"What’s there to fear," Miss rolled her eyes, "You’re not the enemy, Sister Chen Qian’s curse won’t activate on you."

"You’re mistaken, this power was left by the Emperor of the Fifteenth Day Zone, she doesn’t even know me! Putting this thing in personal space, if it doesn’t kill me it will still peel off a layer of skin!"

Miss froze for a second, "Oh right, I forgot about that."

"Audemus, there must be some method to transfer this thing, right?" I looked expectantly at the crystal-clear Imperial Officer beside me, "Packaging box? Switch? At least provide a pair of protective gloves, how can this untouchable thing be transported to Angel City?"

Audemus shrugged, "The Emperor’s power can’t be isolated, but it can identify friend or foe. As long as there’s Imperial identification codes, in theory, one should not be affected by the curse. Of course, if you bring the Emperor here now to have her remove the curse directly, that’s possible too."

I thought bringing Big Sister over for this matter would be a bit troublesome, so I looked at the group around me. Audemus was not a consideration now; Lin Xue and Qianqian had identification codes back then, but their Imperial accounts were revoked seventy thousand years ago, and Alaya was the same, now the two parts of Mother Star haven’t finished reuniting yet; she’s a black account on the Mysterious Side Mother Star. Among the remaining people...

Finally, my gaze fell on Orelia.

"Orelia, can you handle this?"

The normally calm Angel Kite shivered for the first time, then nodded, and with a near fatalistic resolve approached the still drifting black ring in mid-air, lightly touched it in front of everyone’s watchful eyes.

Luckily, nothing happened.

"Feasible." Orelia was also quite pleased, she nodded, casually storing the ring in her personal space.

I smiled, stepping forward to commendably pat Orelia’s wings, "Well done, now quickly return to Angel Ci..."

Before finishing, I felt a sudden blackness in front of my eyes... (To be continued. If you enjoy this work, feel free to visit Qidian (qidian.com) to cast recommendations and monthly votes, your support is my greatest motivation.)