LotM: Surviving as a Marionette

This was a world that swept across the horizon, twisted and spiraling endlessly.

The sun hung suspended in mid-air, while the distant places that should have been impossible to see twisted upward. The ground wrapped around the sky, and countless buildings of Tingen either hung vertically or upside down. Above the sun were the shadows of countless inverted buildings, with lifelike beings embedded within them like little figures, indistinct and shadowy.

He looked around once more.

The Theater With Curtains That Never Draw had also undergone a bizarre folding. The originally three-dimensional theater seemed to have become flat layers.

"[Host, you have entered the 'Observer' module.]"

'Don' spoke aloud. Without the connection to the host, the system could only communicate with him in this manner.

"All internal components are now fully displayed." Don could see his mother in the surface campus area, see Olsen and the other Abrahams in the inner campus area, and the countless terrifying monsters in the Crimson Campus area were all exposed without concealment. In his eyes, none of these held any secrets.

Without doubt, this space was exactly the same space he had found himself in after being ejected by the Knowledge Moor!

"As expected, this place isn't restricted to only spirit-like beings."

Don examined his body once more—it hadn't changed.

He didn't reconnect the system to himself. The system was currently in its optimal state to display the divine power of a Sequence 4. Higher sequences could always suppress contamination forces below their level. Don could possess the body of a Sequence 4 demigod in a wraith-like state for two reasons: first, because the system held no hostility, and second, because the vast gap in sequence levels meant it couldn't transmit contamination in reverse.

However, calling it wraith possession wasn't entirely accurate. Don's anchor wasn't the body, but the isolated Seer Beyonder characteristics within it that belonged to him. His ability to control this demigod body was simply because the system's commands caused the body to mimic the movements of his spirit body.

If he were to rebind with the system or truly possess his own body, then after establishing a more stable connection, the divine contamination from the Alchemist Sequence 4 demigod power would spread through the system as a conduit, or through this possession state, and reversely contaminate his spirit body.

Even though there was no connection between body and spirit body, it was enough to deceive the 'Observer' module that lacked system verification.

Although the body was controlled by the system, the body possessed divinity and the spirit body had sufficient sequence level. One was his original body, the other was his liberated spirit body—both were correct, so naturally they could fool the foolish 'Observer' module.

"Sequence 4 is clearly a qualitative change. With divine power, I can exert the strength of my own sequence level to a much greater degree."

Confirming this method was effective, Don prepared to begin exploring the rules of this space. He had to figure out certain safe rules before he could confidently use this space as one of his contingency plans.

"System, bring out the item."

Don waved his hand, and a three-meter-long Sun Scepter appeared in his grasp.

The system storage and the system were one entity. After embedding itself in the host's body, the items in the system storage were also considered part of him. Demigod-level Beyonder items could also provide him with a certain degree of divine support.

However, such things not under the system's complete control weren't as useful or safe as the system's own Alchemist Beyonder characteristics that had been fully assimilated by it.

The system used the Alchemist's divine power to shield against the countless streams of indecipherable information flowing from all directions. Don waved the Sun Scepter in his hand, confirmed the sun's rises, then continued observing his surroundings.

At the same time, Don released the War Bishop Marionette.

After the War Bishop appeared, it fell silent. Although the theater had given this War Bishop Marionette a Spirit Worm, clearly the distance between them now far exceeded the range that the theater's core could manipulate.

Yet the place they were in was still inside the theater.

"It's not a distance problem, it's a spatial problem."

As Don had suspected, the War Bishop marionette was now useless. The theater's core couldn't use the Spirit Worm to infiltrate this space. Although it appeared they were still within the theater, they had been completely severed from the theater spatially.

"It's somewhat similar to the Spirit World—completely overlapping yet mutually isolated. But the connection between the Spirit World and the real world is very tight. Ordinary people, as long as their inspiration reaches a sufficient level, can also receive feedback from the Spirit World. But here, that's completely impossible."

A space that completely overlapped with the real world, yet was far higher than both the real world and the Spirit World.

Although he didn't know if there was any life here, or if anyone had ever discovered this mysterious space, Don decided to give it a codename first.

"Let's call it... Euclid's Four-Dimensional Space."

Lower-dimensional beings cannot observe the existence of higher-dimensional life. This codename was fitting enough.

After determining the codename, Don looked around once more.

He could feel the consumption of his spirituality. With divine support, after isolating most of the meaningless information streams that consumed his spirituality, Don quickly found what he was looking for in this world of constant twisting and rotating.

'Astronomical Telescope for Stargazing'—you can always immediately find the star you most want to see!

Both pieces of Astrologer equipment provided Don with tremendous assistance.

He found the person he was looking for.

It was the young man he had seen earlier with the telescope, the one on his territory bearing the Parasite.

This Parasite was highly likely to be Amon's target. Whether for cooperation or opposition, Don needed to uncover this person's background.

Otherwise, he couldn't rest easy with a demigod wandering his land.

"A Parasite, likely from the Jacob or Zoroast family, inherently opposed to Amon. The possibility of cooperation with him isn't high."

Unless one was a fool, anyone would know how foolish it would be to cooperate with this 'God of Deceit.'

However, before observing, Don decided to borrow spirituality from his past self once more.

He let his spirit body partially emerge from his body, then reached inside the body and pulled out a charm.

It was a charm composed of mystical symbols including the Eyeless Eye and Secret Threads.

A 'Yesterday Once More' charm crafted personally by the theater's core, which could borrow spirituality from his past self, allowing him to maintain peak condition at all times.

"History."

Using the ancient Hermes language as the activation incantation, Don saw the shadows of countless historical fog.

He breathed a sigh of relief.

The Yesterday Once More charm could be used, which meant the power of historical fog could take effect in this world.

This also confirmed certain things from the side.

"After meeting certain conditions, there should be a way to establish channels between this world and the physical world."

Otherwise, given the scenes he had previously witnessed, where everything was in an 'observed' state, historical fog should also be in this state and unable to truly affect this world.

Don relaxed and prepared to borrow power from his past self.

He had originally intended to borrow spirituality from his past self who was making preparations in the theater, but when the images from the historical fog appeared, what Don saw was a dark and cold mausoleum.

Don: ?

(End of Chapter)