novelraw Chapter 250 : I Don’t Want to Shoot Her a Second Time
Chapter 250 : I Don’t Want to Shoot Her a Second Time
Chapter 250: I Don’t Want to Shoot Her a Second Time
The night was like a thin veil, gradually dissipating before Rast’s eyes.
Given his current status, he no longer experienced the overwhelming dizziness and disorientation that had plagued him during his early days as a Night Traveler each time he entered a Historical Echo.
In fact, it was quite the opposite. With his spiritual power, Rast could even briefly trace the process of his transition from the Present World into the Nightworld—down to the underlying mechanism behind the Historical Echo itself.
That was a temporal divergence solidified by the power of the “Eternal Night Stele”, hidden within the River of Time... To true history, the Nightworld existed like a reflection in a mirror.
Just as the name “Nightworld” implied—day and night rotated endlessly, yet they would never truly meet.
…
When the dim veil of night finally vanished completely, what appeared before Rast was a clean and spacious urban landscape.
Crowds bustled along the wide avenues, skyscrapers towered on both sides of the road, giant LED screens on the buildings flashed with neon glows, and in the clear blue sky, the faint trails of flying vehicles could be seen overhead...
A trace of daze flashed across Rast’s eyes.
The view before him made it seem as though he were not within a Historical Echo of the Nightworld—but had instead returned to the modern metropolis from before his transmigration.
However, Rast quickly noticed something strange about this cityscape—a towering structure of steel had risen at the city’s distant center.
It resembled an elevator, but it was tens of thousands of times larger than any civilian one... Steel tracks soared into the sky, piercing the firmament, as massive platforms carried cargo along the track between the earth and heavens.
Rast recognized this sci-fi megastructure—
A “Space Elevator”, also known as an orbital elevator. It was a technological construct intended to transport goods—or even people—from a planet’s surface into outer space at a low cost.
Whether in Rast’s former world before transmigration or the current Present World of the Western Continent, the “Space Elevator” had always been a purely theoretical sci-fi concept... Even Dean Agatha and the Mechanists of Starfall University had discussed its feasibility many times, but by the time Rast entered hibernation, the project had never moved beyond blueprints. It was still far from construction, let alone completion.
So, the place where Xiao Ai sealed herself and entered slumber—was actually a near-future sci-fi world? Just like the Historical Echo of the Sixth Era he’d entered previously?
Rast waited for a moment, yet the usual Nightworld mission prompt did not appear in his mind.
This didn’t surprise him. After all, his current entry into the Nightworld had circumvented the rules of the Historical Echo—it wasn’t a task assigned by the Nightworld, but rather a destination he had chosen of his own will.
Just like that illusion called Canaan he always arrived at during the interlude after clearing the Nightworld—Not all areas in the Nightworld were standard Historical Echoes. Some special places existed, and it was highly likely that the realm where Xiao Ai had sealed herself belonged to such a special category.
Then, he heard the soft exclamation of a young girl.
The voice was clear and melodious... yet its direction was indiscernible, as though coming from a faraway place.
Immediately after, the scenery around Rast shifted dramatically.
When his vision refocused, he found himself standing inside a sci-fi style high tower.
Through a massive quartz window, he could see the outside. Below was a sea of drifting clouds, while above shimmered the starry deep cosmos. Beside him was the steel track connecting heaven and earth.
“Rast!”
A familiar call came from behind, followed by the faint fragrance of sandalwood.
A slender figure with long pale golden hair rushed forward and hugged Rast from behind like a fledgling bird returning to the nest, wrapping him in a soft embrace.
Only after a long while did she gently loosen her arms, gazing at Rast.
Those sky-blue eyes sparkled with unconcealed joy and excitement.
“I don’t know how many years I’ve slept… an entire era has passed, Rast… and I’ve finally waited for you to come get me.”
Rast quietly stared at the girl before him.
That delicate, pale face was filled with the joy of reunion. Her crystal-clear blue eyes brimmed with affection and longing... Her voice, figure, and appearance were no different from the golden-haired girl in Rast’s memory.
After a moment, Rast slowly shifted his gaze away from the girl.
He turned toward the sea of clouds outside the quartz window, and the platforms moving between the cloud layers and the starry sky.
“What is this?”
“It’s just as you guessed… It’s a ‘Space Elevator’.”
The golden-haired girl’s voice was bright and vibrant.
“Rast, you once explained the concept of a ‘Space Elevator’ to me. You said that because known materials couldn’t meet the tensile strength required for the tether, it remained a scientific fantasy—not something that could actually be implemented.”
“But after I successfully completed the ‘Artificial Angel Project’ and became a Mechanical Angel of the ‘Judgment’ Sequence… those material science problems that had troubled human scientists for so long were no longer such major obstacles for me.”
“Sealing myself within the Nightworld and sleeping all this time—well, I had nothing better to do. So I spent that long period of self-imposed hibernation building this sci-fi structure that once existed only in fiction. It’s no longer a vague fantasy, but actual, feasible science.”
With light steps, she walked to the quartz window and stood shoulder to shoulder with Rast, gazing at the cloudy sea beyond.
“As long as we have a space elevator, humans will no longer need to rely on costly rockets to go between the surface and space. The cost of reaching low-Earth orbit would be drastically reduced.”
“At that point, traveling to space stations in orbit would no longer be a privilege reserved for a handful of astronauts… Even ordinary civilians would be able to use the space elevator to leave the surface and live in the stars.”
“By then, the barriers to space exploration would fall. We could collect energy from stars, and even mine rare minerals from nearby planets… All those things once described only in sci-fi could slowly become reality.”
Her clear and melodious voice was filled with longing and dreams, like something out of a fantasy.
“All this time, conflict, strife, and war among humans… at their core, they were just battles over limited resources and territory.”
“But if space elevators are realized, and the threshold to outer space exploration is lowered—then, in the face of a vast, boundless cosmos filled with seemingly infinite resources and land, human warfare would naturally cease to exist.”
“Rast, don’t you think… that would be like a dream come true?”
“Mm.” Rast nodded calmly. “If all that really happens, then I think Shiltina would be pretty happy—no more wasting her energy each day dealing with foreign envoys and putting on a diplomatic face.”
He turned his head to look at the distant sea of clouds and, beneath them, the earth’s vast continents laid out like a map from their high-altitude vantage point.
Across the endless land, modern cities and prosperous nations stood side by side, forming a scene of peace and prosperity.
“This place, this continent… it’s not a real world, is it?”
Rast suddenly asked with a blank expression.
“That’s right.”
The golden-haired girl nodded slightly.
“This place is actually a manifestation of my spiritual power—a landscape projected from the mind.”
“In other words, it’s what people call the ‘Spiritual Sea’ or the ‘Mental Image World.’”
She gazed out the quartz window at the flourishing continent below the cloud sea.
“Rast, by now you must already understand—”
“Once an Extraordinary being reaches the Legendary Realm, or even breaks through to become an Angel, their soul undergoes a transformation… their once intangible spiritual power ascends into a tangible ‘Spiritual Sea’, and a materialized ‘Mental Image World.’”
“And this place is my inner world as a Judgement Angel.”
“Throughout the long years of self-sealing and slumber, it took me many, many years to gradually perfect the landscape of my inner world into its current form.”
Rast nodded in agreement.
Ordinary Extraordinary beings also possessed spiritual power and souls, but those were generally formless and intangible, unable to exist independently from the body.
But things were different for the Legendary and the Angels. Their soul and spirit were so strong that they surpassed the limits of the flesh, forming a Spiritual Sea of their own—a kind of independent micro-world, a Sub-Dimension.
Because Rast’s spirit had been tempered through the countless cycles of time in Deep Blue Port, his mental strength had long surpassed that of others… even before he achieved the Legendary Realm, he already possessed a Spiritual Sea—
That crimson wasteland beneath a dim sky where gears spun was Rast’s Mental Image World. It was also the foundation that had allowed him to resist the corruption of the Evil God, and even once hunt the resurrected Death God within the Nether Abyss.
As for the girl before him, she was an Angel. After a long slumber, she had perfected her inner world to the point it resembled a truly prosperous civilization. That wasn’t surprising at all.
The so-called “Divine Realms of Eternal Bliss” promised by the gods who now hid within the Threshold of Seraphim to their believers after death—were, in essence, just Mental Image Worlds evolved over endless time by those gods themselves.
“However, although this world is just a projection of my mental landscape, the things I’ve researched within it—be it the technology to build the ‘Space Elevator’ or other scientific creations—are all real.”
In the girl’s sky-blue eyes shimmered a light full of sincerity and passion, like a knightess of justice with grand aspirations.
“Even if this is only an ideal world imagined by me, once we return to reality together, with the power of science I possess as a Judgement Angel… we can reshape that broken, ravaged world into something that matches our vision.”
“It’ll be a true utopia—flawless and perfect. No oppression, no deceit, no war, where all people are equal, free of racial and national divides.”
“Human probes will reach the deepest trenches of the ocean, and soar to the edges of the star systems… the entire civilization exploring the starry sea together, creating solar sails, harnessing infinite energy from the stars.”
With a bright smile like the sun, she warmly took Rast’s hand.
“Rast, I want to change this world. I want to save those who are trapped in famine, war, and disaster.”
“This beautiful sight… I want to witness it together with you.”
As she spoke, the golden-haired girl lightly tapped her pale finger into the void.
In the next instant, a radiant doorway slowly manifested before her.
The glowing, illusory door was brilliant and dazzling, as though leading to the far reaches of nothingness.
Rast understood—this radiant door was the path from here back to the real world. As long as he stepped through, he would escape the Nightworld and return to reality.
How could the rules of the Nightworld possibly restrain a true Angel in her prime?
Yet as he listened to the girl before him, her eyes sparkling, her voice filled with dreams and ideals for the world...
Rast merely remained silent, letting her hold his hand and lead him toward the brilliant doorway, as if she meant to guide him out of the Nightworld’s prison.
It wasn’t until they were just a few steps away from the radiant doorway that Rast let out a quiet sigh.
“No matter how hard you try to imitate… a counterfeit is still just a counterfeit.”
He slowly raised his hand.
In that instant, illusory pale silver particles gathered at Rast’s fingertips, forming the outline of a revolver.
Its entire frame was silver-white, reflecting a chilling metallic sheen, like Iron Moon—the real “Iron-Marked Moon” had been destroyed by Rast two years ago, but in a Mental Image World, even delusions could be made manifest.
Rast lifted the barrel of the gun and slowly aimed it at the figure before him—her back, directly over her heart.
But at the very last moment, he didn’t pull the trigger.
A few steps away, the golden-haired girl also stopped walking, seemingly sensing Rast’s action.
“Why didn’t you shoot?”
Her voice no longer carried the cheerfulness from before. It had turned flat and cold.
“Not long ago, in the illusion of Canaan, I personally shot that girl.”
Rast said softly, “It was an extremely unpleasant experience… every time I recall it, it tears me apart.”
“So I don’t want to pull the trigger again. Even if I know that you’re just the manifested will of the ‘Holy Grail of Stars: Judgment’...”
“You’re merely a fake—one that stole Xiao Ai’s memories and her appearance.”