Chapter 1,348 – Whitfall

Zac—or rather Everit—had been crippled.

Lawkeepers lived lives full of danger, at least the greedy or ambitious ones. The [Peregrine Gondola] had brought Zac to a timeline where one of Everit’s missions had gone sideways. Instead of catching the fugitive, he’d been lured into an ambush. Everit managed to kill the offender and his companions, but it cost him everything.

A crippled Lawkeeper could still live a life of comfort, relying on a pension and the wealth they’d accumulated as a cultivator. That wasn’t the case with Everit Draom. He’d made too many enemies among criminals and Lawkeepers alike. He’d also spent centuries brazenly embezzling everything he came across, and his net worth was thought to rival Monarchs. That even attracted the attention of people Everit had no relation to.

Everit’s fortune was ripped from his hands so quickly it made his head spin. His residences were seized under the guise of rooting out corruption, and his hidden haunts were exposed through torture and soul-damaging memory scans. It still wasn’t enough. The vultures were convinced he had more stashed away, and they’d stop at nothing to get it.

Originally of humble birth, Everit had no backing within the Magistrate. The Judges looked the other way, siding with their own over a toxic has-been. Only one of Everit’s old instructors took pity on him. He arranged for Everit to be brought away and sent to a remote corner of the Left Imperial Expanse to live out his final days. Five years had passed since then, and Everit was still traveling the shallows.

It took Zac nearly two hours to digest the new set of memories. They were far more complete than what he’d gathered from the memory lantern. The alternate timeline’s Everit Draom already felt more real to Zac. It wasn’t the only difference from the times Zac had stepped inside the bodies of others inside the memory lanterns.

The transformation was nearly complete and impossible to influence. Inside the memory lanterns, Zac could still access his cultivation if he focused. That wasn’t an option inside the Peregrine Ocean’s illusion. His Soul Cores and Cosmic Core had been replaced by Everit’s broken remnants, which couldn’t even generate enough energy to sustain an F-grade cultivator.

Calling on the Abyss in his bloodline was fruitless, and what little energy remained in his body was Cosmic Energy rather than Miasma. Perhaps the latter was for the best, given the circumstances. The Hidden Nodes, quantum spaces, the Remnants, and the Shrine of Kanba—all gone. Zac had no way of telling how Esmeralda fared. Hopefully, she was safely sealed inside the shrine while he overcame this test.

Zac could vaguely feel the Void, but it was blocked by something that felt like immutable Law. It was a first for Zac, and it left him feeling incredibly exposed. Even while trapped inside the Orom, Zac always had the Void as an ace in the hole. Its ability to make the impossible possible had been an important reason Zac never gave in to despair. It was just a matter of finding the right solution. Not this time.

The only apparent things remaining were his Daos. The intangible Dao Apparitions of his Trinity Path had appeared in his destroyed Soul Aperture the moment Zac took over Everit’s body. Maybe the alternative was impossible. Was the trial supposed to impart him with a true understanding of the Dao of Order to match Everit’s cultivation? Was it supposed to alter his mind to forget about his insights? Zac sensed that would go against the purpose of this test.

His body had stabilized by the time Zac had sorted through the memories and taken stock of his situation. He only felt slightly nauseated, though that was partly from the red plants lining the country road. Naturally, the soul-crushing weakness remained. Understanding the Dao meant little when you had no Mental Energy or abilities to infuse them into.

From an attribute standpoint, Zac estimated his current strength to be even lower than when he woke up on the day of the integration. That still left him slightly better off than the commoners in this particular region.

Lacking any talent or heritage, most had to settle for being passively nourished by the ambient spirituality, becoming slightly more healthy than people of medieval earth. Those better off could attend cultivation schools in the cities. But even there, they mostly practiced inefficient manuals that provided little in terms of strength.

For instance, the young guardsman Tam Brooks instructed only reached the equivalent of a level 20 cultivator after more than a decade of diligent practice. Exceeding such people only put Zac above the lowest strata in society. The wandering cultivators who’d made some inroads could threaten his life, and there were E-grade Clans in the larger cities.

Despite understanding the situation, Zac spent another hour silently sitting on a stone by the side of the road. He occasionally gazed across the huge field, occasionally turning toward the sprawling forest on the other side of the road. He looked down the horizon, sometimes turning around in the direction Everit Came from.

A few travelers had passed by during this time, giving Zac curious looks before walking off. One kindhearted stranger reminded him not to stay too long. Apparently, the herbs were called Blood-Boiling Reeds, and their harmful aroma would grow much stronger during the night. Zac nodded in thanks before continuing his ruminating vigil.

What was he supposed to do?

There were no clear indicators and no helpful quest prompt to throw him a bone. In fact, Zac couldn’t access his Status Screen at all, and he had no one to bounce ideas off of. Was there a mission to finish or a thread of fate to resolve? Was he supposed to do the same thing as Janos in the nightmare city, find a weakness and break out? Was he supposed to survive until the clock ran out without having his identity replaced? After all, Everit’s memories continuously pushed against his.

A scream of danger forced Zac out of his confused state. He tilted to the side and saw a streak of black flash by. A burning flash of pain on his cheek followed. The arrow had only grazed him as it passed, but a second one had slammed into his left shoulder with enough force to make Zac see stars.

Everit had outfitted himself with a decent chainmail last year, and it was still mostly intact. It protected Zac from suffering a puncture wound, but the force was still enough to dislocate his arm. This kind of injury should barely register, yet it cut deeper than some of the worst wounds of Zac’s life.

He had no energy or war-tempered body to mitigate the pain. It was raw and unadulterated, and Zac had to face it head-on. However, the illusion couldn’t take away the resilience hammered into his very essence. Zac’s mind was still sharp as a razor, and he responded on instinct. Using the arrow’s force to speed up his pivot, he lunged into the fields of shoulder-high herbs.

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A surprised curse came from deeper into the woods—one of the archers who’d ambushed him. The other one should be hiding somewhere in the fields. They still posed a threat, but Zac first had to deal with the two bandits who’d approached to finish the job. The burly duo had displayed surprising stealth, almost managing to sneak up on Zac through the fields.

The scimitar-wielding bandit to the left was either a mortal blessed with extraordinary strength or exceedingly shallow cultivation, but the leader was a proper practitioner. Zac also got a vague sense of familiarity from him, or rather the distinct tattoo on his throat. The bandit had relied on a washed-out and barely functioning talisman to hide their presence, but it was useless now that Zac had noticed them.