Chapter 471: Chapter 407: Message from Myself

Jeming sat cross-legged on a collapsed rune cannon tower base, his eyes slightly closed, while his consciousness fully immersed in his inner grotto heaven.

Time is running out.

The next battle could break out at any moment, and with the intelligence gap between us and the enemy being so vast, it will be another hard fight.

The metal tag marked with a "2" quietly lay on the ground.

It was evident that during the first round, he wasn’t sure if his grotto heaven would be affected, so he simply hung a tag in case.

In the second round, he realized this, hence consciously gathering intelligence.

Jeming’s attention was drawn to the pile of record crystals nearby.

He needs to quickly review these pieces of information.

Because the enemy’s next wave of attack... could arrive at any time.

This time, he must be ahead.

"So, these pieces of information are key."

Jeming looked toward the pile of crystals behind the number 2 tag.

A rough count showed there were at least thirty crystals, each emitting faint spiritual fluctuation—a soul imprint he left as identity verification and reading key.

He picked up the nearest one and explored it with his divine sense.

The images began to flow.

It wasn’t a visual scene, but a direct infusion into consciousness as a "memory playback":

Underground.

Dark, damp, and intricately winding nest passages.

Jeming (or the previous round self) was leading a twenty-man wizard squad rapidly advancing.

Low-level Reaper Race members crawled all over the surrounding walls; they surged like tides, but the squad easily cleared them.

Suddenly, the ground trembled.

The tremors were not from above but deep underground.

The nest floor cracked open, and hot energy streams spewed from the fissures.

Immediately following, figures "rose" from the cracks—not climbing out, but appearing directly in three-dimensional space as if emerging from water.

Those figures were distinctly different from ordinary Reaper Race: their shells were dark golden, more complexly veined, larger in size, and their aura... all above Fourth Level.

"Forbidden Insects." His remembered self spoke in a low tone, "Damn, this is a trap; their main force is not on the front line at all..."

He switched to another crystal.

Another segment of memory: on the edge of some battlefield, using a certain detection witchcraft he scanned the earth vein.

On the instrument screen, light spots representing Reaper Race numbers were densely packed like stars.

"These guys’ movement patterns are weird, currently seem to keep attempting guerrilla tactics," came another wizard’s voice from the side.

Jeming "himself" nodded: "Weird. If the departure condition could be turned back in time, if the swarm number drops to a threshold, or if the death count exceeds a proportion, they should be fighting hard with us—at least gathering some more intelligence."

"...Unless, the cycle has a cost for them too." 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

"Or... they fear something else."

Jeming opened his eyes swiftly, placing this crystal aside and picked the next one.

This crystal recorded content regarding the discovery of a suspected "cycle device."

In memory, he locked onto an underground energy anomaly point based on previous rounds’ intelligence.

Detection results showed a high concentration of Law of Time fluctuations in that location, clearly manmade constructions.

The squad decided to raid.

Then... fell into a trap.

It was not a device, but an elaborately designed "bait node."

When the squad went deep, the node exploded, not releasing a blast but a certain temporal chaos.

Three wizards were torn to pieces by the chaotic time flow on the spot—their "existence time" was randomly disrupted, with part of the body aging to ashes while another part regressed into embryonic cells.

He barely withstood using the Body Refining Technique’s adaptive evolution, but the time flow of his right arm has not fully returned to normal.

Within memory, he could feel that arm was sometimes fast and sometimes slow, like an unstable pendulum.

"So the cycle device’s location remains unknown," Jeming muttered.

He continued browsing.

The following crystals mostly concerned tactical details: various Reaper Race variant unit traits, specific area terrain information, our wizard battle processes, and enemy responses...

Until he picked up the third-to-last crystal.

The moment of reading, Jeming’s breath halted.

This memory... was a near-death experience.

In the scene, his squad was exploring an abandoned Reaper Race structure.

The architecture style was peculiar, like a kind of temple, with walls inscribed with indecipherable symbols.

Suddenly, without any omen, an Eighth Level Reaper Race creature descended.

It did not fly in from afar but "appeared" directly inside the structure, as if hiding there all along.

The terrifying pressure instantly incapacitated all Fourth Level and below wizards, while Fifth Level wizards barely supported.

The squad’s only Sixth Level wizard "Iron Fortress" roared and stood at the forefront; heavy law patterns lit up across his body as he stretched his hands, forming a shell-shaped energy shield.

Then the Eighth Level Reaper Race merely raised one forelimb, gently pointed.

The shield shattered.

Iron Fortress wizard’s chest bore a transparent cavity, through which he could see the scene behind him.

But he did not die immediately; using his last strength, he detonated his entire energy reserve.

The self-destructive impact briefly interfered with the Eighth Level being’s lock, affording others less than a second escape window.

In memory, he activated the "Five Elements Rainbow Transformation Mirror" without hesitation.

Light transformation.

Body decomposed into countless light particles, escaping at light speed.

But right at the moment of light transformation activation, dozens of energy force fields suddenly illuminated the building’s periphery.

These energy fields precisely sealed off Jeming’s light-transformed escape routes.

Those force fields had diverse properties; some disrupted energy flows, others twisted space structures, some targeted high-speed moving targets specifically...

His light stream barely passed through the force fields’ encirclement, but he felt those ambushing Reaper Race creatures clearly "stunned" for a moment.

The last thought in memory was transmitted clearly:

"Seems like in the previous round, I used the light transformation here too; they saw it before... but didn’t understand."

Jeming abruptly opened his eyes, his back soaked in cold sweat.

He looked down at his right hand.

Now intact, but in that memory, this arm nearly collapsed during forced interference through the force field while in light transformation state, leaving permanent law damage.

Then he saw the "text note" attached to the last crystal.

"...Reaper Race’s underground nests are traps. They use large numbers of low-level individuals to draw fire; the real main force is ’Forbidden Insects’ directly teleported from the earth vein, generally at Fourth Level and above..."

"...The time reversal trigger likely correlates to the Reaper Race’s group size, but strangely, the Reaper Race seems also avoiding exceeding this threshold..."

"...High concentration Law of Time fluctuation detected in regional underground energy source, suspected man-made structure. Previously suspected to be swarm civilization’s ’cycle device,’ but later found it’s a trap..."

"Don’t use the Five Elements Rainbow Transformation Mirror’s light transformation ability to escape; although I escaped using this ability in the last moments of this round, the opponent clearly reacted but didn’t understand the specific nature of light transformation, so they failed. If used in the next round, it’s very likely to fall into the trap..."

"I’ve already exposed the feature of strong physical robustness, but the opponent seems unsure about the specific strength; find a way to inform the cycle after next that person about this fact."

Looking at this information, Jeming remained silent for a long time.