CHAPTER 118: MEMORIES BEYOND TIME

But just as everyone assumed the young man would stop, something astonishing happened next.

"What’s he doing? Why isn’t he stopping?" a Sect Elder muttered, eyes wide.

Igaris wasn’t stopping. He still felt he had not reached his limit.

His body was stained with blood, his robes tattered, yet his will remained unshaken like an immovable mountain.

Step by step, he advanced.

7,500.

8,100.

9,000.

The world itself seemed to slow as he climbed. Day turned to night, then night back into day, but he did not falter. The observers, usually prideful and composed, stood in frozen silence, eyes wide, unable to look away.

This was no longer a trial.

It was a miracle.

It was a dragon ascending, defying every rule written by men and gods alike.

"Rumble... Rumble!"

Suddenly, the sky darkened. Clouds churned with ancient pressure. A spiral of chaotic lightning began to gather above Igaris, crackling and snarling with divine fury.

"Heavenly Tribulation?" someone gasped.

"But how...? He hasn’t even formed a Martial Core!" cried another elder in disbelief.

This was a phenomenon meant for ascended Martial Lords and Kings, yet it descended now upon a youth not yet recognized as a true cultivator.

The heavens trembled. Winds howled like beasts. Thunder coiled and snapped across the sky like silver serpents.

"This... This isn’t normal," whispered Supreme Elder Jin, stepping forward. His voice was calm, but his clenched fists betrayed his shock.

Sect Master Fang narrowed his eyes. "What kind of monster did Elder Hao bring back?"

Kai Quibing couldn’t even speak. He just stared at Igaris, who had now reached the 9,800th step, his body barely standing, but his gaze still fixed ahead.

"This isn’t just a trial anymore," muttered Elder Hao with reverence. "This is destiny unfolding."

The tribulation above continued to rage, but Igaris didn’t stop.

He lifted one leg.

Then set it down.

9,900.

Only 100 steps remained.

"Rumble!"

Just then, without warning, a terrifying arc of crimson lightning descended from the sky, roaring like a furious dragon.

"Bang!"

"Argh!"

The bolt struck Igaris squarely on his back and his body was flung forward, stumbling several steps before catching himself.

"Sizzle!"

Sizzling smoke rose from his scorched clothes. Underneath, his skin was burnt and blackened in many places, his eyes bloodshot from the pain.

It was agony.

A pain that went beyond flesh. It seared through muscle, bone, and soul.

Every nerve screamed pain. His breathing turned ragged. For a brief moment, his knees buckled.

He had experienced battle, had nearly died many times before. But this... this was different.

It was as if the heavens themselves were branding his existence.

His vision flickered. His hearing dulled.

But deep inside, something stirred.

A voice without words. A call without sound.

An instinct buried deep in his soul screamed that this tribulation was no accident. It was meant for him. A crucial threshold he must cross. A trial not just of strength, but of recognition. A forbidden revelation.

He felt like If he gave up now, something precious would slip away forever.

Gritting his teeth, he raised his eyes once more. The final steps loomed above, blurred through blood and sweat.

He planted one foot forward.

Then another.

Rumble!

The lightning above spiralled again, gathering more wrath.

But he did not stop.

He would climb.

Even if the heavens shattered his bones, even if his flesh burned away, even if the sky itself tried to erase him—

He would not stop.

Because to get revenge, to create a better world, to protect what he held dear, and to break the chains of fate placed upon him—

He needed to rise.

"CRACK!"

Another bolt of lightning, even more violent than the last, tore through the sky and crashed onto Igaris.

It was a strike meant to kill.

A deafening roar followed, and his body was nearly split in two. Smoke and blood burst from his skin as bones shattered, organs crushed.

Anyone else would have died instantly.

But—

[Undead Recovery Activated]

A pulse of eerie blacl light surged through his veins. His wounds stitched themselves together, bones snapped back into place, and burnt flesh began to regrow at an inhuman rate.

Yet the pain remained. Worse than before.

It wasn’t just physical anymore.

Inside his mind... something opened.

A crack. A window. A gate.

And through it, images surged forth.

A colossal figure, cloaked in light, speaking with a tiny golden human standing on what looked like a broken Cosmos.

It was not a dream. It was not a vision.

It felt like a memory.

’What is this? Why am I seeing this?’ he thought, panting, half on his knees.

Before he could answer himself, another image came.

This time, the image was even more vivid.

A regal man, impossibly handsome, stood in a celestial hall. Planets orbited beneath his feet as he held the hand of a woman so breathtakingly beautiful that even time seemed to pause around her.

She had shimmering black hair, porcelain skin, and a smile that could turn galaxies silent.

But Igaris felt pain radiated from them.

A deep, searing pain, as if something precious had been snatched away from him.

Then it hit him.

’She... she looks like Evernight... but her horns and wings are missing...’

His heart trembled.

These were no illusions. They were memories. Ancient. Fragmented. Distant—yet terrifyingly personal.

He staggered up another step.

And another.

Each step brought more lightning. And with each strike, more memories.

More visions.

Shirley, older, beautiful beyond compare, wielding a golden halberd and facing down an army of shadowy beasts.

A white-haired girl, weeping as she held his dying body in a garden of stars.

A dragon, massive and divine, bowing its head to the powerful and domineering Overlord.

And that Overlord...

His posture. His eyes. His smirk.

Why did he look like Igaris?

No, not the current him.

A past life?

Or... a future self?

He wasn’t sure.

But as soon as he took the 10,000 th step everything fell into place.