“Join Mount Luo...”

Zhu Shi was stunned for a moment before letting out a sigh.

“So, it’s still not allowed?” I asked, somewhat concerned.

“It’s not that it’s impossible. If you truly have such extraordinary power, whether you want to join Mount Luo or do something else, I have neither the reason nor the authority to stop you.”

“Then, do you think I’m exaggerating or fabricating my abilities?” I found her reaction entirely understandable.

But she shook her head. “I don’t doubt your account of the battle.”

At least show some doubt!

I was already prepared to demonstrate on the spot.

“Before, I thought you had weaknesses in combat, which is why I opposed your joining Mount Luo. But now, it’s the complete opposite—being too powerful has its own set of problems.” Zhu Shi seemed to be weighing certain concerns. She glanced at the fragmented remains on the ground again, her expression tinged with sorrow. “I’ll explain the reasons to you in detail later. For now, let’s deal with the aftermath of the fallen demon hunter.”

Agent Kong seemed to be someone Zhu Shi was familiar with. Seeing a former acquaintance become corrupted and die, her emotions must have been extraordinarily complex.

“Sorry, I didn’t intend to kill him earlier,” I said.

“There’s no need to apologize to me. I know it wasn’t you who killed him but some other unknown cause. Even if it truly was you, the fault lies with Agent Kong, not you.” As she spoke, a look of guilt appeared on her face. “Besides... I’m the demon hunter responsible for this area. This burden should have been mine to bear.”

Initially, I had felt a faint and somewhat irrational sense of guilt for causing the death of someone Zhu Shi knew. But now, it was her who felt guilty toward me. That’s when I remembered what Agent Kong had said while still disguised—that one of the reasons Zhu Shi didn’t want me to join Mount Luo was because she didn’t want me to kill.

That wasn’t something Agent Kong had said casually; Zhu Shi truly did have a remarkably naive side to her.

Although I didn’t directly kill Agent Kong, his death was undoubtedly linked to me. Yet, unlike the previous fallen demon hunter, Agent Kong had left me with the impression of being human. Perhaps I should have felt some guilt for his death, but I felt nothing at all.

Instead, I found myself regretting that, with Agent Kong’s death, many truths I didn’t yet understand were buried in darkness along with him.

The fallen demon hunter incident clearly has many unanswered mysteries. Where did Agent Kong acquire this power? Why did he suddenly self-destruct at the end? Why did the previous fallen demon hunter seem to recognize me? What was the deal with the ritual array and the basement in the fifteenth-floor room?

It feels as if I’ve speedrun through a game only to discover I missed a lot of collectibles. But reality doesn’t allow for a restart. All I can do now is throw myself into the next adventure.

The fact that I could no longer access the Shadow World through Agent Kong also left me feeling deeply regretful.

The internal state of the Shadow World is indescribable using human language—so much so that even I couldn’t fully grasp what it felt like to be there. If I had to compare it to something, it would be like forcing a text editor to open a video file, with the result being that I was nearly reduced to a meaningless string of garbled data.

I had to muster all my strength to endure it, barely maintaining my existence and ability to think while I was there.

When I explained this part to Zhu Shi before, her expression grew even more baffled, as if she couldn’t make any sense of what I was saying. Honestly, I didn’t understand it either. I was just going with my instincts.

Originally, I had intended to spend more time observing the Shadow World, but I worried that Agent Kong might take the opportunity to escape while I was preoccupied. Since capturing him would allow me to make him reopen the portal, I hurriedly returned. I hadn’t expected, however...

After parting ways with Zhu Shi, I searched the area again and managed to find more scattered remains of Agent Kong’s body. Of course, these weren’t large pieces—just a finger that had been blown apart during the explosion and charred to ash by the flames.

Driven by a sense of regret, I picked it up and took it with me. Perhaps because it had been scorched into charcoal just before his death, the finger retained its Fallen Demon Hunter form, making it somewhat of a keepsake.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Calling it a “memento” might make me seem a bit twisted, especially considering I’ll likely encounter far more bizarre events in the future. Compared to what’s to come, this charred finger is probably nothing significant.

But at least for now, this strange object holds some meaning to me.

---

The next day, this morning to be exact, I met Zhu Shi at a park near the university.

Maybe she had done something behind the scenes—despite the huge commotion I caused by splitting the abandoned building in half, no official personnel had come to talk to me. Or maybe she was the official personnel sent to speak with me.

As usual, she wore a white blouse and a black skirt, with a large black guitar case slung over her back, dressed like a member of a band.

Compared to yesterday, her expression had become much calmer. Perhaps she had come to terms with the emotions stirred by seeing an acquaintance turn into a villain and then die, or maybe she had simply buried it all deep within herself.

There was no one else around, so we could talk freely. Today, she came as a Demon Hunter of Mount Luo, officially here to discuss my future.

She first asked me to demonstrate the ability to transform my body into flames. After I obliged, she circled me as she observed, her expression looking as if she’d just seen a ghost.

"…Even though I never doubted what you said and had mentally prepared myself, still… are my eyes playing tricks on me? Am I dreaming right now?"

"Is this ability really that amazing?" I asked curiously.

"It's no longer a matter of being impressive or not—this is divine-level power," she evaluated. "The ability to freely transform your body into a natural element is considered a manifestation of 'divine' power in the world of demon hunters, commonly referred to as 'elementalization.' This skill is seen as a characteristic of gods or immortals. While there are other methods to forcibly mimic such a divine ability, they almost always come with certain conditions, costs, or limitations. There's no way they could use it as effortlessly as you."

With a sense of unreality, I responded, "So, does that make me a god or an immortal?"

"…That depends on how you came to possess the ability to elementalize," she replied, seemingly finding the idea just as absurd.

Hearing this, I reflected on my past experiences and gave her an explanation.

The process of learning to elementalize—or what could be called my 'second form'—was not particularly complicated.

Zhu Shi and Agent Kong both seemed to think that a flame user like me resembled more of a "mortal wielding a powerful weapon" than a true "transcendent." Honestly, in my normal state, I had to admit I often felt the same.

I had always felt there was an invisible gap between myself and the flames. When I manipulated fire, it felt like issuing orders to a subordinate—there was always a delay between "me giving the command" and "the flames executing it." No matter how much I practiced, it felt like I was trying to build rapport with the flames, rather than achieving seamless, instinctive control.

Logically speaking, the flames should be an extension of my mind, so this inexplicable delay shouldn't exist. Thus, I formed a hypothesis: there was a difference between "my own spirit" and "my spirit transformed into flames."

From this, a thought occurred to me—what if I couldn't control the flames seamlessly because I was still human, and not the flames themselves? So why not become the flames?

To put this idea into action, I chose an incredibly simple and brutal method.

I set myself on fire.

Unless I willed it otherwise, flames couldn’t harm my body. I could fill every crevice of my being with fire, feeling myself merge entirely with it.

And one day, I found that the boundary between myself and the flames had vanished completely.

I became the flames.

The whole process was so muddled that even I didn’t fully understand it.

After hearing my explanation, Zhu Shi was utterly dumbfounded.

“That method of yours…” she managed to say after a long pause, “all I can say is, for true gods and immortals, even if they can’t articulate the process of achieving elementalization to others, they themselves are always completely aware of how they did it.

“For the former, it’s an innate state of being; for the latter, it’s the result of profound enlightenment.

“But as for your approach—grabbing onto some nonsensical idea, training aimlessly, and then suddenly succeeding…” She hesitated before concluding, “based on everything I’ve seen, there are no other examples of this method.”

"I see..."

It seemed I truly had no connection to gods or immortals. However, as a superpowered individual, I was clearly quite unique.

I wasn’t sure whether I should feel happy about being “different.” This uniqueness appeared to mean there were few, if any, examples I could draw upon for reference, making it even harder for me to uncover the reasons behind my superpower awakening.

“I think I now understand why you never encountered anomalies in the past,” Zhu Shi said with a sense of clarity. “Anomalies attract each other, but extreme power has the opposite effect. Your power is so immense that anomalies actively avoid you. Not only do intelligent and instinct-driven anomalies retreat, but even anomalies that exist as phenomena seem unable to interact with you for some inexplicable reason.

“This is a phenomenon usually observed only with the Great Wu Chang or with a handful of hunters whose powers are extraordinarily immense.”

Hearing this new term, my curiosity was piqued. “What’s a Great Wu Chang?”

“The so-called Great Wu Chang are the strongest hunters at the pinnacle of Mount Luo,” she explained. “They are immensely powerful and extremely few in number. Currently, there are fewer than ten Great Wu Chang in all of Mount Luo.”

“You say they’re immensely powerful... How powerful are we talking?”

As I asked, I began speculating to myself. Considering that an organization like Mount Luo hadn’t taken over the country or left a distinct mark on history, the Great Wu Chang’s power likely didn’t surpass that of ancient armies, and at most, wouldn’t exceed that of modern ones.

Still... I was confident I could defeat an ancient army. Couldn’t the strongest hunters manage that?

Or was I underestimating armies? Did ancient forces have hidden means to suppress superpowered individuals like me?

What Zhu Shi said next, however, was utterly absurd:

“Barring certain exceptional historical cases, as far as I know, the Great Wu Chang generally possess the power to single-handedly destroy entire nations.”