The piercing sound waves penetrated his eardrums, shaking his brain until it felt scrambled... Roy struggled to get up from the ground. When he saw the sand worm, his pupils contracted as he remembered something...
This was clearly the monster that Netero, Linne, and Grandpa Zigg had encountered when they first set foot on the Dark Continent!
'No wonder it looks familiar.' Roy subconsciously turned his head. Beside him stood three figures... they were none other than Netero, Linne, and Zigg!
'So, have I traveled back in time, or have I been forcibly pulled into Grandpa Zigg's memories?'
Roy had no time to ponder. The sand worm, so immense its end couldn't be seen, blotted out the sky and sun. Its tail swept towards them... and then he heard a loud shout from beside him: "Get down!"
He quickly dropped to the ground... but while he could dodge the tail, the fierce wind, carrying an incomparably powerful Ren, ripped up the surface of the land, uprooting people and trees alike. There was no way to dodge that.
He could only fight fire with fire, countering Ren with Ren!
'Think fast... think against the clock... imagine all the aura nodes in my body opening in an instant, forcibly expelling my manifested aura.' Roy had just started to get the hang of it, releasing a Nen shroud to cover himself, when... he was struck by an uprooted tree and sent flying.
It felt as if all his internal organs had been shattered...
Two seconds... Had he only just arrived in this world to be sent back so soon?
A sweet taste filled Roy's throat, and he couldn't stop himself from spitting out a large mouthful of blood. Then, his head tilted to the side, and he lost consciousness...
[Warning: Detecting connection to "Unknown Consciousness"...]
[Alert mechanism activated... "Gate of Cognition" opening...]
The familiar sensation of falling washed over him... He seemed to faintly hear a familiar voice again.
Roy groggily opened his eyes. Before him was the familiar Sea of Cognition, and the many wooden doors floating on its surface...
To his surprise, he hadn't returned to reality immediately. Instead, he had come to the world of cognition!
He struggled up from the sandy beach...
The first thing he did was check his body.
Good, no injuries. His organs were all in place and functioning well. Everything indicated that—
The world with the tentacle was nothing but a phantom dream.
As he thought this, he habitually rolled up his pant legs, letting the seawater wash away the fatigue from his consciousness. He casually glanced over and froze...
Right next to the Gate of Demon Slayer, a pitch-black door had appeared out of thin air. The door was ajar, revealing a narrow slit... From within, he could faintly hear the roars of strange beasts and the tragic screams of humans.
"re: Dead Man's Game"... "Unknown Consciousness connection"... Zigg, Linne, Netero... Various terms intertwined and flooded his mind, forming an incredible speculation—
Roy gradually realized,
Whether it was passive or accidental, somehow... through his own Nen ability, "Gate of Cognition," he had connected to Grandpa Zigg's consciousness, or rather, his memories of the expedition to the Dark Continent!
So, this extra door led to the Dark Continent within Zigg's memories!
His thoughts gradually cleared. Roy finally understood what his great-grandfather had meant when he said, "Your Grandpa Zigg loves sausage"... It turned out that even when some people died, their consciousness could remain, not yet forgotten by the world...
The question now was, should he continue?
The young man came back to his senses, hesitating on the spot. Gritting his teeth, he waded through the shallows, pushed the door open, and stepped back in!
"Get down!" The memory reset... Roy heard the loud shout again. Without thinking, he quickly dropped to the ground and unleashed his Ren. It was the same feeling as before; he forced himself to push all his manifested aura out of his nodes to form a Nen shroud, protecting himself as he braced for wave after wave of impact...
"BAM!" This time, Roy was hit by a flying rock and sent flying, lasting for two and a half seconds...
"Splash~" The seawater crashed against the reef. The familiar sensation of falling came again. As expected, Roy woke up once more, completely intact, back in the familiar world of cognition.
This time, he slapped his own face.
Without hesitation, he pushed open the black door and charged straight in. Again, it was the same shout, "Get down!"
He forced his manifested aura to form a Nen shroud to protect himself. This time, he lasted for three seconds before being hit by a piece of a wooden board and losing consciousness.
Next, it became a continuous cycle: enter the Dark Continent, return to the world of cognition, re-enter the Dark Continent, return to the world of cognition again...
Finally, after going back and forth seven or eight times, a deep exhaustion washed over him. The tenth time Roy returned to the Sea of Cognition, he struggled to roll over and collapsed on the beach. He knew in his heart—this was his limit!
Fifteen seconds... This time, he had lasted a full fifteen seconds...
...
In the old castle's basement.
Tsubone watched as Roy pushed the serving cart into the passage.
As Scarface and One-Eye closed the security door, she unhurriedly took a pocket watch from her pocket. Seeing it, memories seemed to return to her... This was her third time here. The previous times were for Zeno and Silva, respectively.
She was born into service for the Zoldycks. Raised by Maha, she grew up alongside Zeno and even held Silva while he peed. She clearly remembered how long each of them had stayed inside.
She had also met Zigg, and had even served him for a few years. She was present when he died, so she knew what was inside.
Three seconds was the result Zeno had delivered. Three and a half seconds was Silva's limit. Now... the old butler stared intently at the passage, releasing her En. The moment she sensed a fluctuation in Nen, she pressed the stopwatch.
Scarface and One-Eye stood like two door gods on either side, protecting her, allowing nothing and no one to distract her.
Tsubone counted silently, "One... one point five... two..."
Her eyebrows rose. "Two point five... three..."
Her pupils dilated in surprise as she continued, "Three point five... four... five... six!"
This... impossible... Her two pink pigtails blew messily in the wind... Tsubone's brow furrowed tightly as she continued to count, "Eight... nine... ten... eleven... fifteen!"
She abruptly pressed the stopwatch, noticing... that the unique Nen fluctuation had disappeared... She froze!
"It seems the old master really likes him," Scarface said in a deep voice.
"Because he stayed the longest," One-Eye added honestly.
They were all children adopted by Zigg, playmates who had grown up with Zeno. Among them... Scarface was also Tsubone's husband, Hall's father, and Canary's grandfather.
Seeing Tsubone in a daze, he reminded her, "You should report this truthfully."
Tsubone snapped back to reality. Still holding the stopwatch in one hand, she freed the other to take out her phone and call Silva, not wasting a single second, saving even the time it would take to walk.
"Creek... creek..." On the second floor, in the master bedroom.
The soft, large bed was shaking, as if it couldn't bear the impact, protesting and wailing...
"Ring ring ring..." A phone rang, and the bed fell silent...
The man frowned, picked up the phone, and pressed the answer key, saying displeasedly, "What is it?"
"We have the time the master wanted."
"How many seconds?"
"Fifteen seconds."
"What?!"
Silva leaped out of bed, revealing a body of muscle as if forged from steel!
"You know this is no joke."
On the other end of the line, Tsubone faintly heard footsteps. She looked up towards the passage. Roy was pushing the serving cart out, walking at a steady pace. The bouquet of chrysanthemums had been left in front of the airtight door, blooming quietly.
"You know I don't joke."
Silva: "..."
He put down the phone and fell into a long silence...
T/n:
If you like the novel so far, please leave me a 5-star review
I'd really appreciate it if you could leave a Review—Power Stones
patreon.com/Hard_Worker +50 chapters