He who sleeps alone in the swamp

Lumen took​‌​‌⁠⁠⁠‌​​​‍‌‍​‍‌‍‍‍‍‍⁠​ a deep breath and closed his eyes.

The narrow solitary confinement cell was surrounded by mechanical walls and floors. Even the bed, table, and chair were cold metal. The boxed meal on the table had long since solidified.

He said softly, “The people of the Bait Cities didn’t capture the sheer scale of that thing. Those writhing black clouds of flesh reached all the way to the sky above, and below, they were like the roots of an ancient tree. Countless tentacles were buried in the earth; the ground trembled, and the crust cracked and closed with every breath it took. Every time the ground split, those things devoured deep within the swamp were exposed…”

His Adam’s apple bobbed rapidly. He unconsciously hugged his drawn-up knees and whispered, “Houses, plants, hummingbirds with eyes stuffed with silt looking upward, human body parts… and some people who had been swallowed by the silt until they were no longer human, their remaining flesh still struggling upward due to nerve impulses. But the flesh that had already been assimilated turned into sludge, turning back to devour what was left of itself…”

He finished and didn’t speak again for a long time. An Yu sat on the floor beside him, watching his tightly closed eyes tremble.

An Yu sighed. “A Chaotic Reaction.”

Lumen remained motionless, as if he were already dead.

After an unknown amount of time, a single tear escaped from beneath his tightly closed eyelids, followed by a steady stream that traced paths down his deathly pale cheeks.

“It wanted to swallow me. There were too many tentacles, too many—it was absolute numbers and absolute power. I couldn’t escape. I was already halfway submerged; the ground was freezing and viscous, like countless iron hands dragging me down. He used the mental interference of the Black Rose to clash head-on with the Black Goat. He actually managed to interfere with that thing’s will. When the silt beneath me let go, I was still thinking that his mental control was terrifyingly powerful, but I soon realized something was wrong—”

He couldn’t go on.

An Yu gazed at him, his golden eyes as serene as ever. He let out a soft sigh. “Commander Flame… he was likely just communicating with that thing. They made a deal, didn’t they?”

Lumen snapped his eyes open, his beautiful gaze filled with alarm. “How did you know?”

An Yu lowered his gaze and remained silent. It was only during this long two-month slumber that he had suddenly understood why he had been trapped in the safe house back in District 99 before the time reset.

Kaos had a thousand ways to kill him without devouring him—to kill a god through simple means. Kaos had arranged everything long ago.

Yet, in the end, he chose to trap An Yu in the safe house, isolating him from the battlefield.

Perhaps that was the unspoken deal he and Qin Zhilu had understood between them.

The High-levels Officers were the Protectors at the pinnacle of the evolutionary chain, and only those capable of leading a Chaotic Reaction were the top-tier Super-Aberrants.

They were always able to look each other in the eye and hold a dialogue.

Lumen didn’t wait for a reply. He took a deep breath and said softly, “He fed himself to it. I don’t know why he did it. At the very end, all I saw within the mass of the Black Goat was a Black Rose growing from the depths of the earth toward the sky. The thorns of the rose kept spreading, but the rose was also covered in filth. Beneath every thorn, a muddy sac throbbed. The branches it grew became harder and harder to distinguish from those mud whips. It was… completely assimilated.”

“How did you get out?” An Yu asked quietly.

Lumen was silent for a long while before slowly unzipping his jacket.

A shocking, bloody welt ran from the side of his neck down to his lower abdomen, looking as if it had been delivered by a lash.

“There were two branches that hadn’t been covered by the sludge yet. One whipped me away with such force I nearly lost consciousness for a while. When I came to, there was no trace of the Black Goat in sight—only the other branch remained, coiled around my wrist. It grew and spread frantically, carrying me all the way out of the mist.”

His voice grew softer as he spoke, as if returning to that night of heartbreak and despair.

He recognized the branch that brought him out; it was the one from Jin Xuyan’s injured arm.

It wasn’t supposed to be able to grow that long. In his vision, the proximal end of that branch was constantly turning into mud, while endless offshoots branched out, diving deep into the swamp to snatch “food” back from the Black Goat. It was likely through that gradually acquired energy that it could extend far enough to deliver him out of the swamp.

He remembered that when he finally hit the ground, the branch was almost entirely covered in sludge the moment it let go of him.

Read at Mizushi Novels

Visit Mizushi Novels

In the end, Jin Xuyan had only said those two words to him.

Support the original translation

Read on Mizushi Novels

An Yu shook his head and murmured, “Perhaps I’m not that heartless anymore.”

Don't scrape

Don't copy

An Yu finished and said softly, “I’m sorry.”

Read at Mizushi Novels

Visit Mizushi Novels

He felt a sudden sense of helplessness; he was only one person.

Support the original translation

Read on Mizushi Novels

The world would already be shredded.

Don't scrape

Don't copy

A sharp, steady voice rang out from the door as Qin Zhilu strode in.

Read at Mizushi Novels

Visit Mizushi Novels

Sleep was mature and capable, always out on solo missions and rarely appearing at the Spire. Lumen had only accompanied her once, during his first mission in the Spire trials.

Support the original translation

Read on Mizushi Novels

Lumen asked immediately, “What happened in the swamp?”

Don't scrape

Don't copy

Qin Zhilu admired the fighting spirit radiating from him. “So I believe that Flame’s will has not completely perished.”

“Let’s go save him,” Lumen said instantly.

“No. I must be honest with you. Those churned into a Chaotic Reaction do not come back. But his will is still fighting and needs our help.” Qin Zhilu paused, staring at him with a heavy gaze. “Only a martyr with a resolute will can receive the reward of self-sacrifice.”

Lumen curled his lip mockingly. “That’s your way of thinking. It doesn’t fit his values…”

“Do you really know him?” Qin Zhilu said. “Flame once chatted with me, saying that when you were forced to come to the Spire, you questioned him on the difference between a Protector and a Super-aberrant. I think he answered you then, you just didn’t take it to heart.”

Lumen froze.

He remembered then. That man had been silent for a moment before giving a light, dismissive laugh.

He took several drags from his cigar before saying, word by word:

“A Super-Aberrant is everlasting disorder; a Protector proves the Way through their own body.”

The man he had always thought disdained combat—the man who treated his status as an Order-Keeper as a lofty position from which to admire his own abilities—had actually been fighting all along.

Fighting this massive calamity, staking his life.

“Today is the Winter Solstice. The worldwide snow that has fallen for two months finally shows signs of stopping.”

Qin Zhilu turned to leave. “When the snow stops, we depart.”

Author’s Note:

[Snowflake Fragment] Jin Xuyan (6/6) Wishing You Safety

Go… Zhao Ran, go quickly…

Leave this place, tell An Yu and Qin Zhilu—

The trajectory of this world’s entropy has changed; it is no longer a simple fusion of biology and matter.

The atmosphere, the land, the ocean, the swamp…

The world is a giant sandbox. But that thing doesn’t want to play with sand; on the contrary, what He wants to do is flip the sandbox over.

Go, Zhao Ran.

Even if I cannot find a path to life, you must leave.

I hope you can understand: what I saw you as was not because of what you resembled, but because of what I hoped you would become.

Compared to a leopard bathed in the blood of the battlefield, I would rather you be a free finch, flying upward, out of the calamity.

I’m sorry I forced you to become a Protector.

Though freedom may ultimately be unattainable, you must go. Don’t look back.

I wish you safety.

I love this CP ;w;