Li Ban and Zhu Yao flew back down to the ground.
"Hey, what did you guys find?" Tail asked nervously, hurrying over.
Guo Kao and Ming Kai didn't speak, but their expressions showed they were just as curious as Tail.
"We found a little secret about Heaven Beyond Heaven," Li Ban said with a smile, leading everyone back to the giant dragon, Dila, to rest. "But I need to organize the information before I tell you."
Naturally, there were some things he couldn't share with everyone.
Although the other three were curious, they sensibly didn't press the issue, waiting for Li Ban to share what they were allowed to know.
"Please set up camp. We might be staying here for a few days," Li Ban said.
"Alright." Ming Kai immediately sprang into action, dragging along a somewhat reluctant Guo Kao.
Tail took a step, then turned back. "You aren't going to run away from Heaven Beyond Heaven by yourselves, are you?"
He knew exactly what she was worried about and didn't want that fear to turn into regret over joining his team.
"We still have to fight our way out through the Sea of Monsters, and we'll do it together!"
Tail pursed her lips, flashing a slightly embarrassed smile. "That was petty of me."
She rarely trusted others. Her past experiences at the previous camp had made her even more closed off; she seemed easygoing, but in truth, she remained fiercely independent, too afraid to rely on anyone else.
Li Ban's solemn response had calmed her unease.
Tail bounded away. The cat ears atop her head twitched, seemingly just as elated as their owner.
When Li Ban turned around, he saw Zhu Yao staring at Tail's retreating back.
"I'm a little curious about how you interact with the Tail on the outside," she said.
Thinking of Little Cat, a smile subconsciously touched Li Ban's lips. "The one on the outside is called Cat Girl. Because her life experiences are different, she's actually vastly different from Tail now."
"Vastly different?" Zhu Yao's gaze swept over the smile on Li Ban's face, and she lowered her eyes. "The Zhu Yao on the outside must be different from me too, right?"
Just as Li Ban wondered why Zhu Yao had suddenly become so sentimental, she steered the conversation straight to business. When she looked up again, her eyes were serious and intent.
"What did you encounter in Heaven Beyond Heaven? Why did you suddenly swim upward?"
After following Li Ban up to the edge of the sky, Zhu Yao had stood guard there the entire time. That was how she had managed to pull him out of the water the instant he returned.
"Sorry, plans changed. I figured out how to move my body within the water pillar pretty quickly, so I stayed a bit longer. But as for swimming upward—that was because I heard someone calling my name."
Zhu Yao opened her mouth in shock. "Who?"
"I'm not sure yet, but I can almost guarantee the voice came from the Unreturning Place."
Zhu Yao drew a sharp breath, her heart pounding.
Since entering the Recycling Station, no one had ever received a signal from the outside.
To think that Li Ban had not only heard a voice from the Wizard World, but that it was specifically calling his name.
"They are looking for you," Zhu Yao said with certainty. "And they're trying to find a way to save you."
Li Ban smiled. "That's my guess, too. I suddenly swam up because I wanted to communicate with that voice. However, when I reached the very end, I abruptly left the water and entered an empty space—"
"You successfully got out?" Zhu Yao interrupted in surprise.
"No, that still wasn't outside the Recycling Station. Furthermore, that space was extremely dangerous. The spiritual rhinoceros felt as heavy as a solid object and was completely unusable. On top of that, a tyrannical rage bred in the depths of your heart, constantly urging you to go mad. One wrong step, and you would lose your sanity forever."
"Heavy spiritual rhinoceros and losing your sanity... Isn't that the Nihility State?"
"So that's what the Nihility State looks like. But the moment I entered that space, I transformed from a human into a bug.
"Does the Nihility State also turn people into bugs?"
Zhu Yao's face paled, and she raised a hand to cover her lips. "No, the Nihility State doesn't turn people into bugs; it only drives them into chaotic madness. But bugs—"
In a flash, Zhu Yao had grasped the crux of the matter.
"Yes, bugs. Bugs that might be connected to the Unreturning Place." Li Ban knew Zhu Yao had arrived at a terrifying hypothesis, and he could only confirm it.
Zhu Yao swayed on her feet. "Could it be... could the bugs the Unreturning Place has been killing all these years actually be... the people who escaped from the Recycling Station?!"
Li Ban could only try to comfort her. "People who had already lost their minds. To those of us in the Recycling Station, they were already monsters."
Zhu Yao felt a bone-deep chill.
She knew that quite a few people were also trying to brave Heaven Beyond Heaven, attempting to leave the Recycling Station.
She and Priest Qian Que had given up on breaking through Heaven Beyond Heaven out of fear that it would allow the bugs from the Unreturning Place to ravage the Wizard World, pivoting instead to attack the Sea of Monsters. However, Zhu Yao had never intended to blame those who still planned to escape through Heaven Beyond Heaven.
Yet the thought that those people had endured unimaginable hardships and risked their lives to escape, only to mutate into bugs and be slaughtered by the people of the Wizard World... it made her blood run cold.
"Zhu Yao, are you alright?" Li Ban looked down at her with concern.
Zhu Yao slowly raised her head. "I was just wondering... what exactly is waiting for us outside the rift?"
There were only a handful of ways to leave the Recycling Station.
Becoming a Great Wizard inside the Recycling Station was impossible.
And past Heaven Beyond Heaven lay an even deeper despair: losing one's sanity and mutating into a bug.
So what about outside the rift?
Would it truly be freedom?
Would they survive Nine Deaths, One Life and struggle their way out of the rift, only to discover an even more profound despair waiting for them on the other side?
"Don't worry. We can escape the Recycling Station. A Great Wizard told me so."
Before Shaman Ming sent Li Ban into the Recycling Station, he had said that as long as Li Ban could leave this place, his cultivation of the heart would undergo a massive breakthrough.
Therefore, the Recycling Station was absolutely not a one-way path to death.
Under Li Ban's encouragement, Zhu Yao gradually regained her composure.
She offered a bitter smile. "I've despaired once before. Now, it seems I'm much easier to shake."
She had clearly already made up her mind that she would either escape or die trying, yet she still found herself shivering in the face of this horrifying reality.
Surely, Priest Zhu Yao on the outside would never be as weak as her, right?
"Sorry, I'm fine now. Please, go on."
Li Ban handed Zhu Yao a wheat flatbread. "Eat. We have plenty in stock right now, so it's not a waste."
Although the wheat flatbread's taste was mediocre, it provided the satisfying feeling of a full stomach.
Being able to eat one's fill was also a kind of happiness.
And happiness could dispel a portion of one's fear.
Zhu Yao didn't refuse. Taking the finger-length wheat flatbread, she began to nibble on it.
Li Ban then continued, "In that space similar to the Nihility State, I heard the voice calling me again. But because the environment was so harsh, I only managed a brief exchange with them. They gave me a spell—the Spatial Guidance Art. Do you know of it?"
Zhu Yao stopped chewing. "The Spatial Guidance Art. I know of it, but I don't know how to cast it. It's a very unique spell."
So unique that only Priests at the Dark Moon level or higher were permitted to learn it.
But not everyone was qualified to study it, and even among those who were, not everyone could master it.
"I heard that it requires three hundred and sixty-five shifts in mental intent. But to successfully cast the spell, you can't just cycle through the shifts in a simple sequence; you have to adjust them in real-time based on the space you're casting from and the space you're trying to connect to."
It sounded incredibly difficult.
Li Ban, who still hadn't fully mastered many of his current spells, scratched his chin.
"What is the specific effect of this spell?"
"It connects two spaces together, allowing people and objects from both sides to cross directly through."
"Long-distance spatial teleportation?"
"No. Spatial teleportation is actually rather simple. It only requires controlling a person or an object and transferring them to another location. We've even set up corresponding spatial teleportation formations in a few places across the Nine Provinces. It's just that... for various reasons, we generally still opt for flying or more primitive modes of transport."
Zhu Yao paused, not elaborating on what those 'various reasons' were.
"The Spatial Guidance Art, on the other hand, targets two entire spaces rather than a specific individual, so the area of control it requires is vastly larger. Thus, while Priests at the Dark Moon level or higher know of this mighty spell, very few have ever successfully cast it."
"Then why do you think they gave me this spell? Could they want me to link the Recycling Station's space with the outside world so we can get out?"
Zhu Yao shook her head. She understood the affairs of Priests far better than Li Ban did. "Whoever gave you this spell must be a Priest at the Dark Moon level or higher. They would definitely know that casting the Spatial Guidance Art within a single world is already exceedingly difficult. To try and connect two completely separate worlds—"
She shook her head again, feeling both bewildered and daunted by the very idea.
"I've never seen any Dark Moon or Solar Priest succeed with it in practice. Perhaps a Divine Offspring Priest could, but... but this is the Recycling Station. It's a place sealed away by the Great Wizards. Even if a Divine Offspring Priest had the ability to link the spaces of the Recycling Station and the Wizard World, they might not necessarily be willing to do it."
Divine Offspring Priests were incredibly close to the Great Wizards, but because of that, their freedom was also severely limited.
There were many things they couldn't just do on a whim, unlike those with a lower identity.
Li Ban finally understood. "Then their purpose in giving me this spell definitely wasn't to link the two worlds. After all, you mentioned before that Divine Offspring Priests wouldn't fall into the Recycling Station."
"Does the person who gave you this spell even know the Recycling Station exists?" Zhu Yao shook her head uncertainly. "Before we fell into the Recycling Station, we only knew of the one-way trip to the Dark Side of the World. Perhaps they assume you've fallen into the perilous Dark Side of the World, and they think that only a powerful spatial spell can help you escape?"
Li Ban paced back and forth. At first, he thought the one who gave him the spell might be a Priest from the Unreturning Place.
They had used some unknown method to allow Shi Ming to contact him.
But now, he felt that the person who gave him the spell might actually be Shaman Ming.
He was the only one who might understand the existence of the Unreturning Place.
"So he must be trying to hint that I should link two spaces within the Recycling Station together."
Li Ban stopped pacing and looked up at the mountain peak, gazing at Heaven Beyond Heaven shrouded in mist.
"Could it be linking Heaven Beyond Heaven and the Sea of Monsters?"
"Hmm?" Zhu Yao was startled by Li Ban's idea.
However, she followed Li Ban's gaze upward and suddenly felt that this seemed to be a viable train of thought as well.