Is the ‘Chrysalis’ and ‘partner exchange’ meant to give Trial Takers a chance to understand each other?

Yolan really wanted to scoff at this conclusion, but seeing Ashe’s serious expression, she found herself unable to laugh.

After a moment of silence, she sat down on a chair farther away from Ashe and said, “What do you want to talk about?”

“Can you take off your Mask?”

“No,” Yolan shook her head. “My name, appearance, and any key information that could point to me will not be revealed. Not just to avoid Miracles like the Prophecy Sect, but also for…”

“For what?”

“When Silver Lantern is willing to tell you her real name, she will also tell you the answer.”

“Alright,” Ashe didn’t expect to extract key Intelligence through conversation tactics, after all, he wasn’t Igor. “What outcome will this trial lead to?”

Yolan smiled, “You already have your own judgment, why are you asking me?”

Ashe was taken aback, staring suspiciously at Yolan, who pretended to be shy and lowered her head, “Don’t stare at me like that, I’m still wearing a Mask…”

“No, I just think your tone sounds a lot like the Observer,” Ashe said. “Whenever I ask a question, he always shuts me up with that line.”

Yolan blinked, “But we’re not wrong, are we? If our answers differ from your judgment, would you change your mind? If not, then what’s the point of our answers?”

“Indeed, there’s no point,” Ashe nodded readily. “But I’m used to starting with simpler topics and gradually delving deeper, so you might inadvertently reveal some important information…”

“Mental sorcerer conversation tactics?”

“Maybe, after all, proximity to Lala Fatty makes one fat, I’ve unconsciously picked up a lot of his bad habits,” Ashe said. “But it could also be that I enjoy chatting with friends.”

“Without any meaning or purpose, just aimless chatting, isn’t that already a meaningful thing?”

Yolan suddenly laughed, “You sound like a sorcerer who has never experienced loneliness.”

Ashe immediately became nervous, feeling as if the Mirror Master had seen through him.

But Yolan didn’t continue the topic, instead she said straightforwardly, “This is the Divine Fire Trial left over from the Gray Fox Divine Era, a subsystem of the divine fire system. Although it can’t directly determine the Demi-God who will rule the next Divine Era, it still has a crucial influence.”

“So it really is related to the divine fire…” Ashe wasn’t particularly surprised, nodding as he spoke. “So, your ultimate goal is to become a Demi-God?”

“Not exactly the ultimate goal, but becoming a Demi-God is indeed a phase in our plan.”

“Can you tell me what it is you’re really pursuing?”

“Silver Lantern has already hinted at it before, hasn’t she?” Yolan said. “We believe this world is just a Dream of the Divine Sovereign, a delusion of all living beings. What we seek is to pierce through this Dream, allowing everyone to return to an eternal future.”

“That’s actually what I find most puzzling,” Ashe said. “Assuming you’re right, and the world is indeed a Dream, this view only explains why you act so recklessly, destroying lives as easily as breathing, creating disasters as effortlessly as eating a meal, since in a Dream, consequences don’t matter.”

“But I can’t understand why you want to pierce the Dream. What’s wrong with letting people live, grow old, and die in the Dream before returning to the Virtual Realm? If you’re in a hurry to escape the Dream, why not just return to eternity directly?”

Yolan slowly shook her head.

“Have you met any heroic soul commanders on the Time Continent?”

Ashe was taken aback, then nodded. “I’ve met a few.”

“Then you should understand that death is not the end, and eternity is also enslavement,” Yolan said. “Only by piercing the reality of the Dream can we completely sever the shackles between the Divine Sovereign and us, to see freedom in eternity.”

“So, what you’re pursuing isn’t power, fame, status, or achievements in reality, but eternal freedom after death?”

“You could say that.”

Ashe realized that there was indeed an irreconcilable conflict between him and Silver Lantern. He cared about reality, while Silver Lantern had completely lost hope in reality, yet she also understood that the Virtual Realm wasn’t a peaceful utopia, so she sought to create a better future by destroying reality.

To use a game analogy, Silver Lantern was like a player who knew a special cheat code, believing that by completely destroying the first level, she could obtain a better identity or profession in the second level.

More importantly, she had no attachment to the first level.

Upon reflection, many people from Senlo had somewhat nihilistic traits, after all, ‘burning faith’ is another way of saying ‘die early, transcend early.’

Silver Lantern grew up in the Tribulation Fire Temple, and when she opened her eyes, she saw a Doomsday wasteland, sects waging constant wars against each other, the night strangling the green and mutilating the weak, as if the world had always been this bad.

However, everyone knows that many years ago, this world was once a peaceful and prosperous Gray Fox Divine Era, and even now, people can reminisce about that beautiful past through the gray fox heritage… Compared to living in perpetual darkness, these Senlo people, who occasionally catch glimpses of past glories, naturally despise the wasteland era even more.

For the Senlo people, reality is indeed a trash game.

Unless Ashe can make Silver Lantern immerse herself in delusion again, this world is doomed to be destroyed by Silver Lantern!

Seeing Ashe deep in thought, Yolan smiled and said, “See? It’s not so easy for people to understand each other, is it?”

“No, you’ve been a great help,” Ashe replied. “At least you’ve made me realize that Silver Lantern isn’t some indescribable monster, but an ordinary person with vulnerabilities.”

“Feels like I might have just doomed Silver Lantern,” Yolan said. “As compensation, could you answer a question for me?”

“My dream is to grow old with the one I love!” Ashe answered immediately.

Yolan blinked. “So my question is, who is the one you love?”

Ashe’s eyes flickered, and he shrugged. “Even if I told you, you wouldn’t know them.”

“But you hesitated,” Yolan stood up. “Let me guess, you hesitated because you’re not sure who the one you love is…”

“Or is it because there’s more than one person on your mind?”

Ashe grabbed a nearby cushion and threw it at her. Yolan nimbly dodged to the side, drifting into her bedroom like a breeze, leaving behind a bell-like laugh. “Goodnight, Ashe.”

“Goodnight, Mirror Master.”

Ashe returned to his bedroom, locked the door, and after washing up, realized he was already late for the scheduled login time. He quickly lay down on the bed and opened Aurora’s Sorcerer Handbook, selecting “Virtual Realm Exploration!”

Soon, Ashe opened his eyes in the dream phantom, seeing his three teammates nearby.

“Observer-!”

Deya instantly rushed over and hugged him, her eyes brimming with tears. “I didn’t mean to hit you yesterday!”

“It’s fine, I almost hit you too, didn’t I?” Ashe said. “It was all the fault of ‘Love and Hate Reversal.’ Ultimately, the reason we suddenly encountered this curse affix is because of my Half Tactile Sense identity. This time, I’ve dragged you all into it.”

“If we keep running into curse affixes, I might have to consider temporarily leaving the team, letting you three form a team until I resolve the curse of Half Tactile Sense and then come back…”

“No!” Deya hugged him tightly, shaking her head firmly. “You’ve helped us so much, now it’s our turn to help you! Right, everyone?”

“Right,” Vesser quickly chimed in. “Without the captain’s help, my exploration progress would’ve been crawling. If the price to pay is just helping out during curse affixes, it’s totally worth it.”

Two of the three operators had already voiced their support. When they turned their heads, they noticed the Red-Haired Sword Princess had quietly walked away. When they caught up to her, they heard her calm voice. “Stop slacking off, let’s start looking for affixes.”

The Witch walked beside her and said, “But we were talking about last night…”

“No talking about last night!” Sonya karate-chopped Deya’s forehead.

But when she looked up and saw Ashe’s expression-trying not to laugh-her face turned as red as fire, steam practically rising from her head. Then her right hand instinctively reached for her sword hilt-

“I hate small talk the most,” Ashe declared solemnly. “Let’s focus on exploring affixes. Today, we’re making up for yesterday’s missed quota. Target: ten phantoms!”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by Aunomay