In a high-level martial arts game, a wife is given to you at the start.

Lin Qiye stood at the bottom of the slope, looking at the hand, at the high priest that hand was carrying, and suddenly smiled.

"Three servants," he said, "you've finally come out."

The hand paused.

The voice in the void paused for a moment, then rang out again, carrying a hint of scrutiny: "You recognize me."

"I don't recognize it," Lin Qiye said, "but I recognize the mark you left in the temple—a sun disc with a vertical pupil, missing a horn. You erased the horn of the candle, but left the vertical pupil on the emblem, worshipping it daily. You fear it, yet you covet it."

"Oh."

The voice laughed, but without a hint of amusement: "The mixed blood of the Candle speaks more eloquently than the Candle himself. Before his death, the Candle divided his mark into three, scattering his bloodline across the heavens, all to wait for a descendant capable of restarting the lock. He waited for you—and then? The lock restarted, and the Vertical Pupil will never awaken again. But did he tell you that the moment the lock restarted, the weakest crack in the seal also opened?"

Lin Qiye remained silent.

"Of course he won't tell you," the voice said. "This 'Candle' man only ever says what he wants to say. He thought he could control everything, but he couldn't even control himself. You inherited his bloodline, and you also inherited his naiveté."

The hand slowly retracted, and in the center of the light pattern, a figure gradually solidified.

It was a figure draped in a gray robe, whose age and features were indiscernible. He stood in the center of the light patterns, with surging fluorescent blue light beneath his feet and the ever-growing crack behind him.

"Let me introduce myself," he said. "I am one of the three attendants. You may call me—Yuan."

"What about the remaining two?"

"They're dead," Yuan said. "There's no nourishment outside the heavens; they couldn't endure it and scattered one after another. Only I remain, waiting a hundred years for this door to reopen."

He took a step forward, his gaze landing on Lin Qiye: "The mixed blood of the Candle, I'll give you a choice. Kneel down, submit to me as your master, and I'll spare your family's lives. Of all the heavens, I only want the primordial universe; nothing else matters."

What if I don't kneel?

"Then I'll send your entire family, along with this city, into the mutation," Yuan said. "I've said it before, the mutation trait is nourishment for us. And you—"

He raised his hand, and a point of fluorescent blue light condensed at his fingertips: "Just firewood."

Lin Qiye stood there, looking at him, and suddenly said something unrelated:

"Do you know that I just saw a skeleton in the forbidden area?"

Yuan paused for a moment.

"That skeleton had been sitting cross-legged for countless years, its hands folded on its knees," Lin Qiye said. "Embedded in its chest was a complete crystal. On the surface of the crystal was a vertical pupil-like pattern."

"Then what?"

"Then I remembered something," Lin Qiye said. "The ancestral records say—only when the three seals are united can the Candle Master's Lock be restarted, suppressing the pupil for eternity. But the lock has been restarted, yet you say that the weakest crack in the seal has also opened."

He slowly raised his right hand, a dark gold emblem glowing in his palm: "I've been wondering, what makes you dare to come back? With just a crack?"

"Now I understand."

"You didn't just appear out of nowhere."

"You did it because of me—because of the moment I placed those two crystals back into the skeleton's chest, because of the tremor when the lock restarted, because of the crack torn open by that tremor."

His voice was flat, but each word was like a hammer blow, striking Yuan's heart again and again.

"I restarted the lock to suppress the pupils."

"But what you've been waiting for is this moment when the lock restarts."

"The candle was sealed with three seals to suppress the pupils, and the door was locked. Once the lock was reset, the pupils were suppressed—but the door also opened."

Yuan was silent for a moment, then suddenly smiled.

"Smart," he said. "Smarter than Candle. Candle was on guard against me until his death, for countless years, but he miscalculated one thing—he thought the lock was safest when it restarted. Little did he know, the moment the lock restarts, with the old and new seals alternating, is the door's weakest point."

"His last words to you were: 'The flame will never be extinguished.'"

"Whether the flame has been extinguished or reignited depends on whether you can walk out of this hillside alive today."

He raised his hand, his five fingers joined together, and slashed at Lin Qiye from afar.

A fluorescent blue blade of light tore through the night and slashed down at Lin Qiye.

Lin Qiye did not dodge.

He raised his right hand, and dark golden light gathered in his palm to meet the blade of light head-on.

boom--!

The light blade collided with the dark gold light, creating a visible shockwave that snapped the withered grass on the slope and sent sand and stones flying. Lin Qiye took a half step back, his palms numb, and a bloody gash appeared on his hand.

He looked down at the blood on his hand, then looked up at Yuan.

"The mixed blood from the candle can withstand one of my strikes." A hint of interest crept into Yuan's voice. "Interesting."

"But you can only catch it with one hand."

He raised his hand again.

This time, it's no longer a light blade.

The crack behind him suddenly expanded tenfold. Fluorescent blue light poured out like a flood, covering the entire slope and surging towards Lin Qiye.

Lin Qiye stood still, watching the surging fluorescent blue light approaching.

He did not back down.

He raised his right hand, his five fingers spread out, and the dark gold emblem lit up, spreading a thin curtain of light in front of him.

The light screen was very thin and looked like it would break at the slightest touch.

But the moment the fluorescent blue light collided with the light screen, it didn't rush over—it was as if it had hit an invisible wall, surging, piling up, and roaring in front of the light screen, but it could never get past that thin light.

Yuan's gaze finally changed.

"You…" He stared at the thin curtain of light, "You are not a hybrid of candle blood. You are—"

"I am his descendant," Lin Qiye said, "but I am not him."

"He's alone; he can't control you."

"I'm different."

The moment he finished speaking, the emblem on his palm suddenly shone brightly.

It's not dark gold.

It was a dark gold color with a hint of fluorescent blue.

The fluorescent blue light merged with the light screen in front of him, transforming into a pillar of light that shot straight into the sky. The pillar of light tore through the clouds, illuminating the entire night sky.

Lin Qiye stood in the center of the pillar of light and slowly spoke.

His voice was soft, yet it carried throughout the entire night sky:

"Yuan, do you know what a mutation trait is?"

Yuan remained silent.

"You treat it as nourishment, as power, as a ladder to immortality," Lin Qiye said. "But the records of the Candle clearly state—the mutated characteristic is a disease of the original universe. It's not a monster, not an enemy; it's that this universe is sick."

"It erodes everything, devours everything, turning a healthy body into a breeding ground for decay. You three servants are the malignant tumors that grow from this lesion. You rely on it to grow strong, to maintain your peak, and to drag the original universe into decline."

"The candle chose the wrong path back then. He thought that suppressing the ailment would save this primordial universe. But without removing the ailment, suppression is merely a delaying tactic."