Chapter 1487: The Climb

It’s well known that Amber is a creature of contradictions—reckless yet timid, impulsive yet cautious, swinging unpredictably between boldness and hesitation.

The moment any real danger appears nearby, even the slightest rustle of wind or movement, this shadow assault goose will open a shadow gate and bolt away in a fraction of a second. Her speed is astonishing—so fast that sometimes it feels like her body is running ahead while her soul struggles to keep up.

But if no immediate threat is detected, her mindset shifts instantly—her horizons expand. She might even convince herself that climbing an ancient god’s throne is worth a try.

Amber stood beneath the towering throne, craning her neck to gaze up at its sheer, cliff-like facade. Her eyes gradually hardened with determination.

Without hesitation, she began to climb. Using the uneven reliefs and weathered cracks etched into the stone, she scrambled upward, hands and feet working in tandem.

The chaotic winds of the Shadow Desert stirred gently, ruffling her long hair and the scarf around her neck. Yet the breeze didn’t slow her down one bit. Here, where shadow power saturated the air, her limbs felt stronger, her body lighter—as if the entire world conspired to lend her strength. Everything around her seemed to aid her ascent—except for the blinding dust that had clouded her vision at first.

At first, her pace was slow, but gradually she picked up speed. It was as if gravity’s pull had loosened its grip, and she moved like a shadow—light and swift. Clutching the intricate, arcane carvings, she darted nimbly between protrusions and recesses. Trails of shadowy dust streamed behind her like a comet’s tail. From afar, it looked as if a drifting cloud was spiraling along the throne’s edge—graceful and agile.

She climbed for an unknown length of time before pausing halfway up. Taking a moment to rest, she glanced back at the path she’d scaled. The shadowy mists behind her were dissipating, revealing ancient pillars and broken bricks buried beneath gray-white sand. At the horizon, the boundary of the desert stretched out, marked by the silhouette of a vast city.

Amber rubbed her eyes and stared intently at the distant cityscape for several seconds—it looked different from what she remembered.

After a long gaze, she finally pinpointed the source of the dissonance.

In her memory, that city at the desert’s edge was a ruined wasteland. Whether from Modir’s earlier descriptions or her own accidental visit to the Shadow Divine Realm, the city had always appeared as a jagged silhouette of crumbling towers, broken walls, and skeletal frameworks reaching skyward. Despite the distance, the ruins were unmistakable.

But now, the city’s silhouette showed towering spires and imposing walls, buildings packed tightly like a stark black-and-white painting stretching across the horizon. Under the pale, chaotic daylight, the city was silent yet radiated a faint, majestic aura.

What should have been a ruin now looked perfectly intact.

“What the hell… Did Lady Night finish off the Reverse Tide and then get bored, so she started some landscaping?” Amber muttered to herself. “Finally got around to redecorating the Divine Realm, huh…”

Her aimless chatter helped ease her shock, but her thoughts remained clear. Seeing the inexplicably restored city silhouette, her mind immediately jumped to recent intelligence from the north—she thought of the vanished Violet Kingdom, the dense fog of Prandel, and Gawain’s theory that the Violet Kingdom might have been a massive “illusion” born under Lady Night’s influence from the start.

Everything changing in this Shadow Divine Realm must be connected to Lady Night. The changes in the Violet Kingdom must be connected to her as well. So could the disappearance of the Violet Kingdom be linked to the transformation of that city silhouette?

“If only Old Zongzi were here—he’s great at spinning these kinds of wild theories…” Amber mumbled, glancing down below. She hesitated, wondering if she should give up climbing and try to find a way to reach that city and investigate. Though it looked far away, she could use shadow power to move quickly in this world. If the city truly existed, crossing the vast desert to explore might be worth a shot…

After a few seconds of indecision, she withdrew her gaze from the distance and looked back up at the throne.

She’d already climbed more than halfway. Changing her goal now wouldn’t be wise. More importantly, this throne was clearly the core of the entire Shadow Divine Realm.

Investigating the throne might be more meaningful than chasing after that distant city.

Putting the newly restored city silhouette temporarily out of mind, she refocused on the task at hand and continued climbing, hands and feet working in unison.

After an unknown stretch of time, she finally reached the top of this “cliff.”

Gripping the last protruding carving along the seat’s edge, she hauled herself up. The repetitive strain had numbed her nerves; it felt like she’d been climbing this cliff her entire life. When her back finally hit the flat surface of the seat, she exhaled sharply and collapsed, utterly drained, unwilling to move.

Though the omnipresent shadow power had helped immensely, and she’d felt light and agile during the first half of the climb, this was still a sheer, cliff-like ascent to the heavens. Fatigue set in during the latter half, and by the final fifth, her strength was nearly spent. She’d pushed herself through the last few meters on sheer willpower. Now, she felt completely hollowed out.

“I’m never climbing walls again for the rest of my life…” After lying on the throne’s surface for a full five minutes, Amber finally rolled over and got up, rubbing her sore joints and muscles as she muttered, “Climbing this thing is way harder than I thought…”

She looked around, taking in her surroundings.

Now atop the massive Shadow Throne—crafted for Lady Night herself—the sheer scale was dizzying. Amber felt as if she were standing in a vast plaza, gazing out at distant city walls. She glanced back at the route she’d climbed, then instinctively stepped back a few paces—not out of fear of heights, but to avoid being blown off by the wind. That would have made all her effort pointless.

“This place is huge…” Amber finally admitted after surveying the area. “But for such a big chair, there’s not even a cushion. The seat’s just stone—must be uncomfortable to sit on…”

Casually critiquing an ancient deity’s throne, Amber seemed to have completely forgotten the place’s eerie atmosphere, her initial nervousness, and even her self-proclaimed role as the Shadow Chosen. She began running around the vast, chair-like platform, poking and prodding at anything that looked interesting within her line of sight.

Eventually, she reached the throne’s backrest and craned her neck to look up at the towering structure.

It was an even more daunting cliff than the one she’d just climbed. The ancient stone backrest stretched straight up, dizzyingly high.

Amber had no intention of climbing any further.

She stood at the base, straining her neck to search for the mysterious star chart rumored to be there—but found nothing. Only the sheer cliff face covered in intricate, arcane patterns.

“Still can’t see the star chart…” Amber’s neck stiffened from looking up so long. “But these patterns… they look a lot like the ones on the surface of the Anchor Generator…”

She blinked, comparing the complex carvings on the throne’s backrest with the patterns Gawain had sketched from memory on the Anchor Generator. There was at least a seventy to eighty percent similarity. But by now, this wasn’t surprising—the secret connections between Lady Night, the Celestial Stand, and the Voyagers were no longer a mystery. It made sense that the throne would bear the Anchor Generator’s motifs.

After lingering near the backrest for a few more minutes, Amber finished exploring most of the throne. Her gaze shifted to the last untouched spot, hesitation flickering in her eyes.

Even a reckless shadow assault goose has moments of caution.

Lady Night’s black-and-white scepter rested quietly beside the throne, its upper half leaning on the seat’s edge. To Amber, it looked enormous—like a pillar capable of supporting an entire fortress.

Amber pondered a question seriously—would she get in trouble if she touched it? The owner didn’t seem to be around…

Unconsciously, she took a step toward the scepter. An inexplicable, almost imperceptible pull drew her closer. Though part of her thought it was reckless, a strange intuition kept telling her it was safe.

She reached the scepter. Its gray-white shaft, made of some indiscernible material, shimmered with faint, shifting light.

After a brief hesitation, she extended a finger and lightly touched its surface.

The next moment, a voice echoed directly inside her mind: “Error. Boundary failure detected… Unauthorized action blocked… Reconstructing boundary. Safety protocols activated…”

A dizzying wave swept through her body. Amber suddenly lost control, even briefly losing all sensation. It felt as if an irresistible force enveloped her, her perceptions swirling chaotically in her mind. The whole ordeal was over almost as quickly as it began—less than a second—and she found herself firmly back on solid ground, her mind clear once more.

She blinked, looked up, and realized she was standing atop a crumbling, dilapidated altar. Before her loomed a throne as massive as a mountain, its facade rising straight up like a sheer cliff into the sky…

Amber: “… (Cecil’s swear words) (very blasphemous curse) (too obscene to even write)”

Damn it, I just wasted half a day climbing for nothing.jpg.

The more Amber thought about it, the angrier she got. If only she hadn’t been so reckless back there—maybe she could have spent more time investigating the throne, maybe even discovered something new. At the very least, she could have tried to pry something off it…

But after some careful thought, she gave up on climbing again. She didn’t know how long she could stay here, but she couldn’t afford to waste all her limited energy on endlessly climbing a chair.

Almost at the same moment, a barely perceptible shift in the air nearby made Amber’s ears twitch sharply.

Normally, with her strength, such a faint change would be undetectable. But this strange environment seemed to grant her unexpected powers. She quickly turned toward the source of the sensation and immediately spotted a peculiar stone pillar standing before the throne—and resting quietly atop it, a large black leather-bound book.

The “Wilde” who had disappeared earlier had mysteriously returned to the Shadow Throne.

Amber wasn’t sure if it was just her imagination, but the moment the black book appeared, it seemed to sense her presence. Yet it made no move, lying there as silently as a real book, almost as if it was deliberately playing dead to lower its profile.

Amber didn’t care one bit.

After all, she’d dug up plenty of things that were truly dead.

“Long time no see, Mr. Wilde,” she said, striding over to the stone pillar that looked like a reading stand, eyes fixed on the black book resting on top. “Where did you go just now?”

The book remained silent for several seconds before finally responding, as if overwhelmed by Amber’s gaze: “Who are you? You seem… familiar. Are you a visitor who stumbled in by mistake?”

“You don’t remember me?!” Amber’s eyes widened in surprise. “I’m Amber. We met here before—I accidentally fell in, you told me this was the Night Lady’s divine realm, and you said your name was Wilde, that you used to be a human adventurer but somehow turned into a book…”

“Alright, alright, I remember now, I remember,” Wilde’s voice came from the book, sounding resigned before Amber could finish. “My memory’s been pretty good lately. I recall our last meeting…”

“Old folks getting better memory is a good thing. I know someone with a crazy good memory—he’s even older than you,” Amber said casually, then eyed Wilde with curiosity. “But you still haven’t told me—where did you go just now? So you can actually move around and leave this place?”

The book was silent for a few seconds. “…I went to see an acquaintance.”

“An acquaintance?” Amber raised an eyebrow. “You can visit people here? Is there really a place to drop by in this lost divine realm?”

“Not before, but things have changed recently,” Wilde’s voice carried a hint of weariness. “The connection between this place and the real world is gradually strengthening.”

Amber stared at the black book for a long moment, her mind racing through countless thoughts and theories. Then, suddenly, she said, “That acquaintance you mentioned… is it yourself?”

(End of chapter)