The white tunnel swallowed Shan Wei.
The Court's floor disappeared under his feet. The air changed. It felt thick and cold, like he was walking inside a deep bell made of ice. The light was not bright. It was soft and pale, like moonlight trapped in glass.
The time chain on his wrist tightened.
The High-Rank Judge's voice came from behind him, far away now, as if the words were traveling through water.
"Transfer begins."
Then the bell door behind Shan Wei closed.
It did not slam.
It simply… decided.
A quiet sound echoed once.
Dong.
Shan Wei's mind stayed calm. He did not panic. He did not shout. His prismatic Overdrive stayed tight inside him like a compressed furnace. His golden eyes watched the tunnel ahead.
The tunnel was not a straight path. It was a road made of moments.
On the left side, Shan Wei saw a scene like a window.
A boy with silver hair and tired eyes stood in the rain. He was barefoot. He was holding a broken bowl. Men in rough clothes laughed at him and pushed him down.
Shan Wei recognized it.
His early life.
On the right side, another window appeared.
A mountain split open. A crimson comet burned across the sky. A baby cried. A woman's hands shook as she covered the child with cloth.
His birth omen.
The tunnel was showing him his own history.
But it was not showing it kindly.
Every scene was sharper, darker, more painful.
The Silent Bell Monastery did not want him to remember strength.
It wanted him to remember weakness.
A monk's voice echoed through the tunnel, calm and cold, like a teacher reading a rule.
"Returning One," the voice said. "Your thread is unstable."
Shan Wei's sealed Heart slammed once inside him.
The hatred flared, but Shan Wei held it down.
He spoke in a steady voice, not to the monk, but to himself.
"I am stable," he said.
The tunnel answered with another window.
A scene of fire and blood.
A man in a sect robe fell to his knees and begged for mercy. Then the scene changed, showing Shan Wei's hand reaching out.
The scene tried to twist it.
It tried to make it look like Shan Wei killed someone innocent.
The monk's voice spoke again.
"You pretend you are righteous," it said. "But you are a calamity."
The tunnel's light turned a little darker.
Shan Wei's eyes narrowed slightly.
This was not a test of strength.
This was a test of identity.
They wanted to poison his story.
They wanted to make him doubt who he was.
The time chain on his wrist pulled him forward again, deeper into the tunnel.
New rings of white time appeared around his body. They did not crush him yet. They hovered like silent guards, ready to lock.
The monk's voice became clearer now, as if the speaker was closer.
"You will be chained to the Bell," the monk said. "You will be carried through time until your thread breaks. Then you will be quiet."
Shan Wei's prismatic edge appeared at his fingers.
He tried to cut the chain again.
The edge touched it.
Sparks flew.
The chain did not break.
Shan Wei's face did not change.
"Then I cut the anchor," he said softly.
He did not attack the chain itself.
He searched for the "why."
He focused his mind, like he was reading a formation.
Where was the chain tied?
Where did its strength come from?
A faint line appeared in his sight—thin, nearly invisible.
A line leading forward into the tunnel.
That line was the anchor link.
The link that connected this chain to the Silent Bell.
Shan Wei lifted his hand.
His Fate Severance edge grew sharper.
He crossed his fingers once and cut at the anchor link.
The link trembled.
A crack formed.
Then the tunnel itself reacted like a living beast.
A huge bell echo burst out from the walls.
Dong!
The sound was not loud to the ear.
It was loud to the soul.
Shan Wei's head felt like it was hit by a hammer made of time.
His vision blurred for one breath.
The monk's voice turned harsh.
"Do not cut the Bell," it said.
The white time rings around Shan Wei tightened suddenly. Pain pressed into his bones again.
Shan Wei's breathing stayed steady.
He did not stumble.
He used Heavenstep Flash.
Seven micro-steps.
His body shifted between tiny gaps inside the rings.
The rings missed locking his spine again by a hair.
Shan Wei cut the anchor link again.
This time, the crack spread farther.
The chain on his wrist loosened slightly.
Only slightly.
But it proved something important.
It can be cut.
The monk's voice went quiet for one cold heartbeat.
Then it spoke again, closer, like a whisper right behind Shan Wei's ear.
"You have done this before," the voice said. "You always resist. You always return."
A window appeared ahead.
This one was different.
It did not show his youth.
It did not show his birth.
It showed a grand hall of white stone and silent bells hanging from the ceiling.
A throne of pale metal sat at the center.
On that throne sat a shadow with no face.
And in front of the throne, a man with silver hair and golden eyes was on his knees.
Shan Wei's eyes narrowed.
It looked like him.
But older.
More tired.
More broken.
The older Shan Wei lifted his head slowly.
His mouth moved.
The tunnel tried to let the words out.
The monk's voice spoke over it, cutting it off.
"Do not listen to echoes," the monk said. "Echoes are lies."
Shan Wei's heart turned cold.
The Silent Bell was hiding something.
That older version of him was not an enemy.
It was a warning.
Shan Wei lifted his hand and pressed a prismatic seal onto the window.
The window shook.
The monk's voice snapped.
"Stop."
Shan Wei spoke calmly.
"I decide what I see," he said.
He pushed.
The window cracked open wider.
For one breath, Shan Wei saw the older him speak clearly.
"Do not trust the Bell," the older him said. "They nail love into time."
Then the tunnel screamed with bell echoes.
Dong! Dong! Dong!
The window shattered into white mist.
The time rings tightened again.
Shan Wei's body stopped moving.
The rings locked at his ankles.
Then at his knees.
Then at his waist.
The monk's voice became calm again, like a teacher who has punished a student.
"Now you will listen," it said.
The tunnel's walls turned into a long hall.
Bells hung above.
Each bell was small, white, and silent.
Each bell had a name etched into it.
Shan Wei's eyes sharpened.
He understood what this was.
A name hall.
A hall where names are recorded and controlled.
The monk's voice whispered.
"If we erase your name here," it said, "the world will forget you."
The time chain on Shan Wei's wrist pulled forward again, dragging him down the hall.
Shan Wei's eyes stayed calm, but inside him, his focus sharpened into a blade.
He looked at the bells above.
He searched.
Not for his own name.
For the weakness.
For the formation pattern.
The bells were not random.
They were placed in a grid.
A grid that carried time law.
A grid that could be broken if he found the key point.
Shan Wei watched the flow.
The bells' positions made a circle pattern.
The circle's center was not in the middle of the hall.
It was slightly to the right.
A hidden core point.
A control nail.
Shan Wei's Fate Severance edge appeared again.
He could not move his legs.
But his fingers could still draw.
He drew one prismatic glyph in the air.
Tiny.
Sharp.
He sent it forward like a needle.
It flew toward the hidden core point.
The monk's voice grew cold.
"No."
A bell echo burst out.
Dong!
The needle glyph shook.
But it did not stop.
It struck the core point.
A faint crack spread through the hall's grid.
The bells above trembled.
Some bells rang silently, like their names were shaking.
The monk's voice tightened.
"You are stubborn," it said.
Shan Wei's voice was calm.
"I am Emperor," he said.
The hall's white light dimmed for one breath.
Then a door appeared ahead.
A door made of bell metal.
On the door was a symbol like a nail piercing a thread.
The monk's voice whispered, almost pleased.
"Good," it said. "Now we show you the truth."
Shan Wei's eyes narrowed.
Truth in the Bell's mouth meant poison.
The door opened.
Inside was a small room with one bell in the center.
This bell was larger than the rest.
This bell was cracked.
On the bell was one carved title.
"RETURNING PRISMATIC ONE."
The monk's voice was right beside Shan Wei now, so close it felt like breath.
"Welcome back," it said. "Returning One."
The bell door behind Shan Wei locked.
Dong.
To be Continued
© Kishtika., 2025
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