'The pitch-black cave, the silent call, the writhing black vines, the golden-haired woman suspended.'

'Huu~~'

In the dead of night, Rosen awoke in the frigid rocky cave, calmed his mind, then softly exhaled.

"The dream was even clearer this time. The dark energy is the writhing blood vines."

In addition, the Sun Rune on his back also had a faint reaction, indicating an extremely powerful Withered envoy or even the Withered King himself was nearby.

Compared to the previous dream, Aurelia's aura of light had dimmed slightly, and the anguished expression on her face was more pronounced.

Another obvious difference was that Aurelia seemed to be speaking to him, but her voice was very soft, almost only her lips were moving, and he couldn't quite make out what she was saying at first.

Clearly, Aurelia had truly been captured, most likely trapped in the moonlight stone mine cave below the mountain.

He couldn't help but think: "Aurelia, was this an accident, or is the Withered King just too powerful?"

"Come to think of it, Aurelia seemed to be saying something to me. What exactly does she want to tell me?"

Rosen opened his adventure log to check, and found the dream had also been recorded and could be reviewed anytime.

He zoomed in to observe carefully, focusing on the shape of Aurelia's lips. Watching intently, he finally understood.

"Ligh...t? What does that mean?"

Just then, soft footsteps approached and someone sat down beside him, and a voice spoke:

"Rosen, you're the only mage in our party. I don't want you to lose your combat effectiveness due to lack of sleep."

It was Shalina the exorcist knight, her voice tinged with slight reproach.

Rosen's mind was full of puzzles, so he immediately asked this person who took the initiative to approach:

"Lady Shalina, you're a servant of the God. Can you tell me something about the Golden God?"

"Interested in the gods? That's wonderful, I'm delighted to introduce the glorious history of my Lord to you."

Rosen asked directly: "Is the Golden God omnipotent?"

"No, the gods do possess power beyond mortal imagination, but they have pains and helplessness unique to gods."

"For example?"

"For instance, my Lord simply cannot completely prevent the corruption of the human heart, nor save all the suffering people. This pains my Lord deeply, yet he is also utterly helpless."

She actually started preaching to Rosen.

Rosen did not like being preached to, so he immediately changed the subject.

Lowering his voice, he asked: "You've already confirmed the existence of the Withered King, right?"

Shalina was slightly startled, glanced around, and seeing no one was paying attention to them, gave a slight nod.

"That's right."

"How can we possibly stand against the evil god with just us few?"

Shalina smiled lightly: "The Withered King was once a god, but is no longer one now, because his transcendent heart has been shattered."

Rosen's heart stirred: "Transcendent heart?"

Shalina nodded slightly: "It is the core of the transcendent soul. The current Withered King is truly just a wisp of a broken divine soul."

"Of course, the divine soul is still very powerful, and there are signs that it is re-coalescing the transcendent heart. If left unchecked, it is likely to rise again after this war."

Rosen understood completely, but still had a shred of doubt.

"Are your sources reliable?"

"This is the divine revelation of the Golden God, who always values the lives of the faithful."

Seemingly worried that Rosen was too anxious, Shalina smiled gently.

"Don't worry, for this mission, the gods have granted exceptionally powerful miracles. As the core to accomplishing the mission, we will do our utmost to protect your safety."

"Besides, we're not fighting alone. There is a fallen transcendent who is our comrade in arms, isn't there?"

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Rosen's gaze focused: "You're right."

After a pause, he asked again: "Why choose me? There are countless mages in Silvermoon City more powerful than me."

"This isn't just my choice, but the gods' choice as well."

"The Golden God chose me?"

Rosen felt a little uneasy, as if being watched by some indescribable entity.

Shalina did not notice his abnormality.

"I have faith in the wisdom of the gods. Moving forward with conviction and doing my best to accomplish the mission entrusted by the gods is the only way we mortals can repay the grace of the gods."

Having heard this much, Rosen's mind was settled.

But a thought surfaced: "Just what kind of existence are the Golden Gods?"

One thing was beyond doubt: the Golden Gods who controlled the most fertile and vast lands in the world must be among the strongest powers of the age.

But just how strong they were, Rosen had no concept.

Suddenly he recalled the Words of Awakening by Archmage Blazesky - it said that gods were nothing more than a bunch of fraudulent transcendent archmages.

His mind stirred. He scolded himself for foolishness: "With that book around, why do I need to seek answers like the devout Shalina?"

Thinking thus, he said: "Lady Shalina, thank you for resolving my confusion. I'm tired, going to sleep."

Shalina nodded: "That's a good boy. Rest well, we need your power."

Rosen closed his eyes, opened his adventure log, and rewound back to the riverbank of the Chillwater River, starting to read the Words of Awakening carefully.

"Mortals believe gods are omnipotent, eternal and immortal, able to see all. These are nothing more than distorted delusions born of fear!"

"Gods are merely people of greater longevity, strength and wisdom. They transcend mortals but still cannot change the laws of the world."

"Gods too will have their life worn away by time, gods too will age and weaken, the power of gods is indeed far beyond mortals, but the wisdom of gods can also be washed away by the rolling tides of time!"

"Gods can be injured and bleed too! As long as the injury is great enough, even gods can be killed!"

"Ah~~mortals~~open your eyes wide and see the truth of the world! What happened in the past and what is happening now, they are actually the same thing after all."

"A minority of heartless, cold-blooded intelligent creatures controlling the fate of the majority - who see themselves as compassionate, hot-blooded and moralistic fools!"

Reading it sentence by sentence, Rosen noticed that every line seemed highly inflammatory, easily stirring one's blood with purported profound insight upon first hearing.

But on deeper reflection, there was a whiff of demagoguery.

A thought surfaced: "This Archmage is somewhat like a certain orator on Earth. Spewing such raving words, his ending is unlikely to be good."

He asked directly: "Lady Shalina, are you still there?"

"Why aren't you sleeping yet?"

"Can't sleep, puzzled by a question."

"Then ask away, perhaps I can enlighten you a little."

"I once heard someone mention a person, nicknamed Blazesky the Archmage."

Before he finished speaking, he heard Shalina's low laughter: "Rosen, you're really bold, asking an exorcist knight of the Pure World Order about a blasphemer?"

Rosen sensed Shalina was not angry, and continued asking: "Then can you tell me about his past?"

"He lived 100 years ago. It can't be denied, he was also an extremely rare talent in the arcane arts, becoming an archmage at just 35, only a step away from transcendent archmage."

"Unfortunately, he went mad! Harboring delusions of challenging the majesty of the Golden God!"

"What happened to him then?"

"What could happen? He incurred divine wrath, struck by 9 consecutive bolts of golden lightning that reduced his body and soul alike to ashes."

Rosen sighed: "What a pity."

"It was deserved retribution!"

"You're right, it was deserved retribution! Alright, my confusion is resolved, going to sleep."

"Hurry and sleep! No more random thoughts."

This time, the confusion in Rosen's heart largely dissipated, his mind much calmer. Soon after closing his eyes, drowsiness washed over him and he fell soundly asleep.

The moment he fell asleep, that bizarre dream emerged again, even clearer than before.

Aurelia's voice. No, not a voice, but a notion, directly entered Rosen's mind.

It was a very strange notion that Rosen could not comprehend, but oddly, as this notion kept streaming in, he found his connection with Aurelia growing increasingly distinct.

"What's going on here?"

Even as he wondered, the incoming notions turned into clear words.

"Rosen~ Feel the power I'm transmitting to you, then come save me~"

The last two words echoed in Rosen's mind like a valley's echoes, repeating over and over.

"Save me~~ Save me~~~ Save me~~~"

Rosen awoke abruptly, but did not open his eyes.

After a few deep breaths to calm his mind, he sank into his sea of consciousness and observed the imagined imagery within.

Upon looking, he discovered the membrane representing the Godhood archetype in his sea of consciousness had much brighter golden specks.

Sensing carefully, he found that compared to before, the specks contained an exotic spell structure.

Looking closely, he was amazed to find it was not difficult at all, he could actually understand it.

After thinking for a bit, he imprinted this spell structure and loaded it into the spell simulator to try running it.

After about half an hour, he had fully figured out this spell.

"So that's how it works. But Aurelia, can I really save you?"

Rosen felt utterly uncertain, without the slightest confidence. But on second thought:

'Aurelia would never act groundlessly. Since she feels I can save her, and even the Golden God made a similar judgement, it means I should have the ability to save her.'

"Most likely, the Withered King has already been heavily injured by her."

"Moreover, I'm accompanied by the temple's exorcist knights, who are specialized in banishing evil entities and devoted followers of the Golden God. They should have ways to specially purify such weakened divine souls."

Thinking thus, his heart relaxed significantly: "Anyway, I'll just do my best."

As for now, have another meditation session to channel some more power to Aurelia.

He started meditating.

This meditation, he could feel the power link between him and Aurelia strengthen considerably. Nearly 99% of the meditation power escaped through the golden speck into the unfathomable void.

This resulted in the pressure endured by Rosen's body decreasing tremendously, and the total meditation time instantly increased a hundredfold.

When the meditation finished, he went back to sleep.

This time, the dream did not reappear.

The 24th recommendation list is around 1550.

Not a great ranking across Qidian, but it has reached and slightly exceeded Old Mochi's psychological expectation.

After several previous filler books, to still earn the trust of readers, Old Mochi is deeply grateful.

Now, time for the good stuff.

No more conditional rapid updates. In short, updates will be at my capacity limit.

Starting today, minimum 3 updates daily, 4 updates on good days.

Half and half frequency for both.

Could be even faster, but need to pace it to ensure quality. Otherwise it's easy to lose control and ruin the story - that would be quite embarrassing.

Of course, will still have small outbreaks of rapid updates when writing flows smoothly.

Update times: Goal is completion before 12 noon. If not done, will complete before 5pm.

(End of Chapter)