Chapter 1 At the End of the Long Slope

At the end of the long slope was a smooth, mirror-like crystal wall, almost vertical.

This was already halfway up the crystal spire. The slope was like a long river suspended in the air, connecting the mountain body and the great plains. When Hao Ren looked at the end of the slope from the great plains earlier, he thought this road would lead directly into the interior of the crystal spire, but he didn't expect it to end in a cliff face, with no entrance in sight.

So that meant... the so-called verification was on this cliff?

"Is this it?" Vivian frowned, curiously examining the place.

Since the end of the slope was directly connected to the mountainside, with nothing to rely on on either side and thousands of meters of empty space below, the view from here was extremely broad. Not only could one see the great plains spreading out below, but one could even see thick white lightning raging in the sky, striking—or rather, providing energy to—the crystal clusters on the great plains. Looking up, one could clearly see the peak of the crystal mountain surrounded by a dazzling corona of light. The powerful sparks of energy formed a ring-like structure, with large and small bolts of lightning constantly splitting from the corona and striking the summit, creating a continuous roar.

Salaman didn't speak, but silently walked to the mirror-like cliff and knocked on it three times.

Ripples of light spread across the cliff, and then several crisp voices came from within the crystal:

"Who's disturbing the sleeping fairies?" "But the fairies aren't sleeping..." "It sounds cooler that way!" "Why does everything have to sound cool?" "Because fairies are the guardians here, and guardians have to sound awesome and majestic!" "Like Salaman?" "Salaman isn't majestic. His beard covers his whole face. How can you see any majesty?" "Ugh, you're all so dumb! I'm not talking to you anymore!" "Speaking of which, shouldn't we go out and greet people... Salaman's knocking." "Oh? Is that so?"

Salaman: "..."

"Ahem, occasionally... occasionally things like this happen," the usually serious old giant couldn't help but show a look of embarrassment. He coughed twice and knocked on the cliff three more times, raising his voice in a very majestic (mostly forced) tone, "Guardians of the Holy Throne, the commander of the Guardian Legion brings special guests to visit this sacred place. Please come out and meet us."

The ripples on the crystal wall trembled again, and then Hao Ren saw a small, glowing head pop out of it.

Then more little heads.

One fairy after another emerged from the crystal wall. Some only showed their heads, curiously looking around. Others had most of their bodies out, waving their arms and greeting Salaman. Still others simply flew to the giant's head, excitedly flitting up and down. Once again, Hao Ren heard the same noisy din he experienced when he was in a fairy settlement: chattering, bustling, illogical, chaotic...

Even Salaman couldn't stand the noise. He coughed loudly twice, forcibly silencing the overexcited fairies, and then said with a serious face, "Please be quiet. I have something extremely important to discuss today..."

"Did you finally defeat those corrupted monsters?" "Or did they finally break in?" "Or are you going to the Holy Sanctuary?" "That won't do!" "The Queen isn't here. The Holy Sanctuary must never be opened!"

"I'm bringing her to undergo the Holy Sanctuary's verification process," it was unrealistic to have a serious conversation with the fairies, so Salaman simply ignored their chattering and pointed at Vivian, getting straight to the point, "The verification is for the highest authority holder."

At that one sentence, all the little fairies were stunned. For once, they were all quiet.

But after less than three seconds of silence, they exploded, their clamorous voices almost pushing Hao Ren off the slope: "The fairies can hardly believe their ears!" "Salaman's bringing someone to perform the verification process?" "The highest authority is the Queen! The fairies' Queen!" "The goddess set the highest level of security restrictions on this authority..." "If someone of unknown origin connects to the system, that'd be a big problem!"

"She has already passed the Nakdal Crystal's verification process," Salaman said loudly, raising his voice, "Your compatriots in Nakdal judged her to be the master of the Holy Throne, the Queen of all resonance nodes."

The fairies quieted down again, then erupted with a roar: "Nakdal! You found Nakdal?" "No wonder we've been feeling a much stronger resonance signal lately!" "Wait, are you saying this person passed the Nakdal Crystal's identity verification?" "If she can pass the identity verification of one of the three crystals, should we try connecting her to the main system?" "We can connect, we can connect!" "But how could the Queen not know she's the Queen? If she really is the Queen, then she'd know how to open the Holy Sanctuary herself..."

"Due to some special circumstances, your Queen may have lost some of her memory," Salaman explained. Although Vivian's identity had not yet been verified, he directly referred to Vivian as "your Queen" to facilitate communication with these not-so-clever fairies. "She's currently unable to execute the scheduled Holy Sanctuary activation procedure on her own, and doesn't know how to prove her identity, so I'm bringing her to execute the second plan."

"Okay, okay, since Salaman said so..." "Then the fairies agree!" "The verification can be done here." "First, let the Queen connect to the main system!"

As the fairies chattered, one after another they flew back to the crystal wall. Most of them merged back into the crystal, leaving only one little fairy outside. This little one flew in front of Vivian, stared at her for a while, and said in a crisp voice, "Suspicious Queen person, step forward and put your hand on the wall~~"

Vivian stepped forward in confusion and pressed her hand against the crystal wall: "Is that all?"

"Of course not. That's just the first step!" the little fairy flew around, "Then it's our turn!"

As this little bean happily spoke, she flew up and down around Vivian, and then she seemed to suddenly notice that there was a stranger on the scene, and flew to Hao Ren with a whoosh: "Oh! There's someone I don't recognize! Who are you?"

"Uh... I've been standing here for ages, didn't you see me?" Hao Ren was a little embarrassed. "I came with your Queen—I'm an ally of the Guardian Legion now. You can call me Hao Ren."

The little fairy perked up: "An ally! Allies are a good thing. We haven't gotten support in a long time."

Hao Ren frowned, looking at Vivian, who still had her hand pressed against the crystal wall and had a somewhat bewildered expression on her face: "I want to confirm, is this verification process dangerous?"

"Not dangerous, not dangerous. Even if you fail the test, you'll just be teleported back to the starting point. But you'll never be able to get close to the Holy Sanctuary again," the little fairy flitted up and down. "Of course, if you show hostility to the Holy Sanctuary or carry dangerous energy reactions at the same time as failing the verification—then you'll get a beating!"

Hearing the little fairy's explanation, Hao Ren felt a little relieved. And at that moment, as if Vivian's contact with the crystal wall had finally produced a reaction, the smooth, mirror-like cliff suddenly lit up with twinkling lights. Then these lights quickly moved around, and actually intertwined to form words and symbols!

Strings of characters scrolled across the crystal wall, and below the characters, a luminous bar began to slowly extend...

Hao Ren: "..."

Was he going to hear the Windows startup sound next?

"Why does this thing left by the goddess of creation feel so familiar... Don't tell me this verification process is just a fingerprint unlock," Hao Ren turned to Vivian, laughing and crying. "Speaking of which... Vivian, what's wrong with you?!"

He was shocked to see that Vivian was surrounded by a layer of thin light, and a large number of mysterious ancient characters faintly appeared on the surface of this light. Between the flashing of the light and the characters, Vivian's whole body gradually became illusory, and quickly became translucent!

This form... was like those fairies.

Vivian didn't seem to hear Hao Ren's voice. She just stood there quietly, maintaining the posture of pressing her hand on the crystal wall. Even the expression on her face seemed to be frozen in time. Seeing this scene, Hao Ren couldn't help it and stepped forward to take action, but Salaman suddenly stopped him: "Don't worry. She's just establishing a connection with the main system. This connection process won't cause her any damage."

Hao Ren didn't dare to completely trust these explanations. He took out the data terminal and had it immediately check Vivian's current state.

"Partner, what the giant says should be true," the terminal quickly completed the check. "Vivian's life signs haven't changed at all, and there are no signs of mental intrusion or consciousness distortion detected—there's just an energy field temporarily isolating her from the outside world. This energy field seems to be protective."

Hao Ren breathed a sigh of relief.

At the same time, Vivian found herself standing in an unfamiliar place.

She was standing in a "forest."

A crystallized world. Everywhere she looked, everything was as crystal clear as ice crystals. She saw countless crystal trees growing wildly around her. Between the trees were lush shrubs and flowers. A winding stream ran through the center of the forest, and the water reflected colorful light like flowing crystals. And between these crystal things, she could even see butterflies fluttering and rabbits running...

They were also crystals.

Light refracted on the surface of the crystals, and the crystals established connections with each other through light. Countless colorful light particles jumped in this forest, forming an incredibly busy... three-dimensional network.

"Hao Ren?" Vivian looked around blankly. She remembered that she was standing in front of the crystal wall, undergoing the fairies' "test," but she didn't know why she had come to this place. "Salaman? The fairies?"

The nearby bushes suddenly made a crackling sound. Vivian immediately looked in the direction of the sound. She tried to summon her familiar lightning ball or corrosive blood arrow, but found that only a vague ball of light lingered in her hand.

The light also dissipated immediately, and then constantly refracted and jumped in this crystal world.

A crystal stag walked out from behind the bushes. For some reason, when she saw this elegant creature, the vigilance and hostility in Vivian's heart gradually subsided.

The crystal stag walked straight to Vivian, then lowered its neck, as if waiting quietly.

Vivian hesitated, but still gently placed her hand on the stag's forehead, and said softly, "Feels... harder than G滚's forehead."

"Main system activated, administrator establishing connection...

"Connection successful, 'Throne of the End' ports 12 through 86 opened.

"Executing unit detection... Throne node integrity sixty-five percent, executable, external network integrity eighty-six percent, executable.

"Playing reserved message..."