Ryker felt that he had reacted fast enough, he had been on alert from the very beginning. But in the end, the gap in strength was so large that he couldn’t even see what happened, let alone react to it properly.

‘No… I did react fast enough… my chain just… went right through her?’

That was when Ryker realized that the piercing pain he was supposed to feel didn’t come. At first he thought that it was because she had pierced through his chest, right into his spine, severing any neural network he might have had in the region and rendering his pain receptors moot… But soon, he realized this wasn’t actually the case.

Gathering up his courage and looking down, Ryker found that the woman’s arm was, indeed, in his chest. But there was no broken bone, no blood, no ghastly, lethal wound…

She was incorporeal.

Suddenly, the woman took a step back and pulled her arm back out. And to Ryker’s shock, out with her hand came a long line of chains.

“Divined Chains… You are a Valorian… What a joke…”

The kitten turned woman released her hold on the chains and they suddenly snapped back into Ryker’s body with a ferocious speed. Even she seemed to be taken aback by its fervor.

“Suppressed? No… Time Spirit Energy…”

The woman shook her head again. Ryker could have sworn she saw something akin to a mix between disdain and incredulousness.

However, his thoughts couldn’t linger on that at all.

Had she just pulled out his Spiritual Resonance from him? What kind of concept was that? He couldn’t even fathom a mechanism through which a person could do such a thing…

First she’d have to be able to read his soul like an open book. And then, not only would she have to find the location of the Divined Chains, something that even Ryker was completely incapable of doing, but she would have to also give it tangible form to pull it out.

Something analogous would be like something reaching into your body then pulling out a particular phenotype from your genome, almost like plucking your eye color or your skin tone out from within your body on a casual whim.

It was ridiculous.

The most shocking part to Ryker was that he was fairly certain that if the woman just kept pulling, she could eventually strip him of his Spiritual Resonance entirely.

Judging by how hard the Divined Chains were pulled back into his body, it was likely that even she would struggle with doing so. But after what he had just seen, he didn’t dare to underestimate this woman.

Ryker frowned, looking at this woman deeply.

Not only had she done this, but she had deduced his Time Type Spirit Energy with a single glance as well. Just what level was this woman on?

Even with all the questions in his mind, his thoughts went toward a single one.

“Miss, you know of my Valorian Clan? In that case, do you know how I can return home?”

“Miss? Home?” The cat lady shook her head. She had a feeling that Ryker’s definition of the Valorian Clan and her own were on vastly different spectrums.

“Where is Auberon?”

‘Auberon?’ Ryker frowned before it clicked. Was that the Crimson Supreme’s name? Honestly, he had never really bothered to learn it.

But what did it mean that this woman was asking about him? Could it be that her relationship with Patience’s father was a positive one? In that case, how would she react to Ryker effectively crippling him?

The loss of four contracted beasts was devastating. Unless Auberon found some extremely high class Spirit Herbs, healing was nigh impossible. And even then, his best chance would be hiring a Spiritual Cook to help out as well, but the trouble was that any such existence would be on an entirely different level. Even the Valorian Clan couldn’t easily invite such a person.

Most would have to suffer from an injured soul for the rest of their lives.

Of course, those so-called Divine Daggers seemed to actually be capable of healing them…

But why would Ryker help that man after he tried to kill him? So that he could try and kill him again? How asinine.

“You know him,” the woman said lightly.

Ryker’s expression had been the same from start to finish. He was extremely adept at controlling his soul fluctuations so it was impossible that this woman used that anyway. Even when she said “you know him”, he didn’t react.

And yet, she returned to her throne as though she had already gotten her answer and didn’t need him anymore.

She took a seat almost lazily, crossing her legs and leaning an elbow on an arm rest and her cheek on a palm. She looked completely uninterested.

‘I don’t know if she’s really confirmed it or not, but either way, she doesn’t seem to give a damn, and that’s fine by me.’

“You said—” Ryker stopped as the woman raised up a hand.

He felt an annoyance well up inside him. He didn’t give a damn how beautiful this woman was, he still had his own pride. Who did she think she was to stop him with a hand wave like she was commanding a servant?

This world wind of thoughts almost made him snap, but he forced them down with a quiet clench of his jaw.

This woman was far too powerful and beyond his understanding. He couldn’t truly afford to offend her.

These thoughts, though, only made him feel more suffocated. He felt like he was right back in the Valorian Clan, but the irony was that he could actually cultivate now…

And yet it was meaningless.

What good was cultivating now when he was still so weak? A mere Federation head of a small backwater country had almost killed him, and now he was being suppressed by a damn kitten.

If only he could have started cultivating at three years old like he should have. Would he already be a Mythical Ascended Master? Would he have already taken that final step and become a God? Would he even still have to fear this woman?

Ryker closed his eyes, wrestling for control over his beating heart.

The woman didn’t seem to notice or didn’t care to.

And then, to Ryker’s surprise, she began a spiel tinged with boredom.

“This prison is known as Iteration 002. It’s the second of its kind and carries some special properties, but ultimately that’s all it is. It exists as a separate entity from the real world and is designed to evolve and improve on its own for the sake of providing novel insights of cultivation to those who oversee it.

“The Daos—well, you probably don’t know what that is considering the path of this iteration. The laws that govern this world are incomplete and don’t allow progression beyond a certain point. From time to time, the laws will be shifted and changed in order to test various new theories depending on the whims of the current arbitrator.

“This world began 370 years ago and will be allowed to prosper for another…” the woman’s voice trailed off as though she was calculating something before she nodded, “another 1732 years before it is reset again based on your calendar.

“As for why I’m here, it is because my Clan has a bleeding heart and doesn’t like to see fellow humans become experimental lab rats. You’re the fourth to appear here within the last 370 years, so I’ll tell you what I’ve told all the others.

“If you can break free of this prison within the allotted time frame, you may have a chance to survive. Fail and you will perish.”

By the time she finished her words, the woman’s eyes were half closed and waves were storming in Ryker’s heart.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

None of this made any sense.

Could he believe that there was some mighty Clan or power out there playing God? Not just a moniker for a cultivation realm, but truly God?

Yes, he could. That wasn’t all that difficult to accept. In fact, the fact they would genocide their experimental world for a fresh start and tweak the variables of their little experiment only made even more sense to him.

Wouldn’t that explain the odd suppression of women in this world? Why did their talent seem oddly disproportionate?

It was an oddity he had noticed immediately during the Quota Check, especially when the talent of some of the women reacted oddly to during the check portion of the event.

It explained how this world was so young and yet had advanced so far. It explained how their world was so close to the Valorian Clan’s, and yet their overall strength was so much weaker…

This seemed to explain every single one of the questions that Ryker had had about this world, and yet…

Why did his Valorian Clan exist? What about the Mystery Master Alliance? His mother’s Clan? Jaana’s Clan?

All of these Clans were powers with histories of tens of thousand of—

Ryker froze.

‘This is Iteration 002… did I come from another Iteration, accidentally crossing over into this one? Then how many more years does my Iteration have before its own reset?’

Ryker suddenly didn’t know what to do. His thoughts were moving so fast that he was at a loss. He couldn’t seem to even reach any depth down one avenue before he immediately jumped to the next.

“What… is the longest an Iteration will be allowed to go on for?” Ryker asked.

The woman shrugged. “Depends. At the lower end a few decades, at the higher probably a few ten thousand years.”

Ryker’s heart skipped another beat.

“And why not any longer than that?”

“If you allow it to go for too long, it’s only a matter of time before those on the inside figure out what’s going on. Once they reach the limit of the Daos they’ve been given, they’ll become desperate to break free of those limits.”

“And your Clan is powerful enough to not worry about telling us directly?”

The woman’s eyes opened slightly wider as she looked at Ryker.

“There are certain rules that we must abide by as well.”

“So you don’t really have bleeding hearts after all,” Ryker said before he could stop himself.

“No, not really,” the woman said casually, yawning. “At the end of the day, it’s really just all an attempt at balancing Karma—ah, that’s probably another thing you don’t understand. Whatever.”

Ryker wasn’t surprised by this at all. What “bleeding heart” of a Clan would prepare three thrones for themselves? Clearly, they didn’t care very much about what was happening here either.

“Then the Valorian Clan…?” Ryker asked.

“They’re the reason all of this is possible. Without their Divined Chain Dao, these Iterations couldn’t have been created in the first place.”

That was not the answer Ryker was expecting, but it confused him even more.

If this Valorian Clan, different from his own, was the force powering all of this, then why would…

Ryker shook his head. It was a stupid train of thought.

What were these experiments for? Obviously, it was for the sake of finding a novel method of breaking free of whatever shackles were holding them back. If they just put random people in this prison, then how would they benefit from it?

In every Clan, there were the haves and have nots.

Ryker was the son of one of the three potential Heirs of his own Valorian Clan, but there were those that were the sons and daughters of mere periphery elders, or the bastards of forgotten children with maids, or some who barely had the right to use the Valorian name at all.

There would always be the lessers in a Clan, and if this Main Valorian Clan was as powerful as this woman said, they would certainly be large and have more than enough “fat” to trim from their edges. They wouldn’t even consider these people family, just useful pawns.

Ryker didn’t feel rage at the injustice of it all. He could hardly give a damn about the morality.

But the fact these people dared to imprison him truly filled him with fury.

The woman, once again, didn’t seem to care much about Ryker’s fury. She had already made some guesses about him, but even if she was correct, it didn’t have much to do with her. She was just here for the points.

Ryker found his mind trying to balance a fine line.

On the one hand, he didn’t trust this woman at all. Her demeanor told him everything he needed to know. He couldn’t just bare his soul and expect it to not come and bite him in the ass later.

But at the same time, if he didn’t ask certain things, he might never have any other opportunity to learn about them.

“In that case, what opportunity are you providing here?”

“You can use the facilities of this place and depending on your performance, you can access certain libraries of information and certain opportunities.”

Ryker frowned. A trial? Why the hell should he trust these people to evaluate him?

If he went all out, and revealed everything he had to offer, wouldn’t he end up on the losing end?

Suddenly, an amused smile curled the woman’s lip. At that moment, she truly looked like a kitten playing with a shiny new toy. She seemed to be able to see through Ryker’s thoughts, and yet had no intention of stopping or changing them at all.

“And I assume I can come and go as I please?” Ryker asked.

He tossed everything else to the back of his mind, standing as tall and straight as a javelin.

Since these people wanted to play games, he would play games. That was what he was best at.

When he decided that he would be an Emperor as a child, he meant for the whole world. And now that the scope of his definition of “world” had changed, his original dream hadn’t shifted in the slightest.

These people were entirely unable to shake his resolve.

“No,” she replied. “The resources are finite and I’m not even here with my real body. As you can see, I’m practically a ghost. You can only take the trials themselves once every ten years. However, whatever grade you receive will give you continuous access to certain tiers of rewards.

“You can only enter this world itself once a year.”

Ryker’s eyes narrowed. “Is this a test for myself? Or myself and my Spirit Beasts?”

The woman seemed even more amused, and Ryker felt that he had inadvertently given something else away.

“That would depend.”

Her reply left Ryker confused, but she clearly had no intention of elaborating.

Rather than asking another question, Ryker began to look around.

Behind him, there was the very same enormous door. To the sides, there were several pathways, and up ahead, there were the three thrones.

Ryker’s gaze flashed as he took in several runes he had simply never seen before. But he quickly found them to be very similar to the language used on the Divine Dagger.

His steps shifted and he ignored the beautiful cat lady. He stepped before a pillar, running his hands over them.

At first, the woman thought that he was just throwing a tantrum. But as a few minutes became an hour, and an hour became half a day, she was rendered speechless.

Someone could probably pretend for a few minutes, maybe even an hour, but Ryker clearly wasn’t pretending at all.

Suddenly, he took out four Divine Daggers and the woman’s eyes narrowed.

Ryker’s gaze looked blank and empty for a moment, as though he couldn’t see the daggers in his hands at all.

He had been wondering why there were several of these daggers, and some of the woman’s words had helped him to piece it together. In fact, he was more certain than ever that he shouldn’t use these daggers on himself or on his beast companions.

These daggers were clearly just another experiment.

If this woman’s words were true, then even the so-called “God Realm” of his Valorian Clan was probably just a joke. In that case, playing around and giving boosts at these levels was a simple matter for these people.

Of course, Ryker was referring specifically to the talent altering aspects. From what he could tell, the cultivation aspects of the dagger were just fine, it was just a faster way of accumulating energy.

By the same token, using that accumulated energy to attack was fine as well.

“I noticed something,” Ryker spoke for the first time in almost a day. “You say that it’s very difficult for you to come here. You say that I can only come here once a year and only take your trials once every ten years…

“You’re also quite prideful. Maybe even more so than me, if you can believe that. You sat there for almost a day, watching me do what probably looks like sheer nonsense to you. And yet, you never asked a single question. I wonder, are you truly not curious?”

The cat lady’s eyes narrowed, and her mouth parted to speak, but Ryker had already turned away. Honestly, he was entirely uninterested in her answer.

“That door had hundreds of key entrances, but there was only one key to open them all. Rather than separating the doorway into several pieces, one for each one of your Iterations, there’s just one? Why is that?

“This isn’t even Iteration 001 according to you, it’s 002. Were you just being too honest? Were you lying on purpose and trying to obfuscate the truth?

“You’re not very intelligent, do you know that, cat lady?”

The woman’s gaze suddenly sharpened. “Who do you—”

“If I were to make a guess at what’s happening here, there’s just one Iteration, there’s always only been one Iteration. Some time ago, you lost control of what’s been going on here, and even you all can’t enter freely any longer.

“Who would have thought? Trying to experiment on your fellow humans, hoping they’ll show you something you couldn’t think of on your own, would come with its own share of surprises,” Ryker spoke, his voice dripping in sarcasm.

“Realizing things weren’t going as planned any longer, you chose to separate the singular Iteration into many more. Unfortunately, your patchwork wasn’t perfect, or else I wouldn’t be here, now would I?”

There was no way Ryker could just “accidentally” slip through restrictions placed by these people. The only explanation was that those restrictions weren’t perfect to begin with. And there was no way they’d do something so dangerous without making sure all their ducks were in the row. So ultimately, that pointed to a slip up at some point in time.

“I have to say, your earlier display of power almost had me. When people think they’re talking to a God with their lives in your hands, they’ll eat up whatever you say without question.

“You thought you were very subtle, but you actually weren’t very subtle at all. I noticed you activating your little runes in order to pull my Spiritual Resonance out of me. I should have realized it earlier, but if your daggers can suck my talent out of me and even sap at my soul strength, why wouldn’t it be able to move and transfer Spiritual Resonances too?

“It was a cute parlor trick, but now that I have a full understanding of the runes in this room, you tell me. Between a little ghost kitten like yourself and a fleshly human like me…

“Who has more control here?”

“… You’re playing with fire.”

“Am I?” Ryker sneered. “I asked you a simple question earlier. Are these trials for me or me and my Spirit Beasts? You seemed to get a hoot out of that, because there was never really a real answer, now was it?

“Your little trials would be as hard as they needed to be to keep me humble and under your thumb.

“Unfortunately, I’m not a fan.”

Ryker tapped a foot and his Pure Soul rippled.

The woman’s pupils constricted. “Pure Soul! That’s impossible, you can’t possibly be born—”

“Didn’t I say it already? I would say your brains went to your chest, but…” Ryker looked down. The woman was a beauty indeed, the best he had ever seen. Even his bias didn’t allow him to put his Jaana on the same level. But beauty was one thing, curves were another.

Rage flashed in the woman’s eyes.

“These worlds already spiraled out of your control.”

Ryker’s gaze landed on the two empty thrones, a sneer tugging at his lips.

It was the fault of these people for giving him too much information.