Chapter 200: Through the Tear

The pull ended as suddenly as it began.

Lian hit solid ground hard enough to force a sharp breath from his lungs. Pain flared through his damaged ribs, but he stayed on his feet. The tearing sensation in the air vanished. Behind him, he heard Elara land and recover, followed by the heavier impact of Ryzek’s boots.

The tear sealed shut with a low, final sound.

Lian raised his head and scanned the new space at once.

The chamber was larger than the one they had left. Black stone formed the floor, polished to a dull sheen that reflected almost no light. Pale blue veins ran through the walls like frozen lightning, giving off a cold, steady glow. The ceiling rose higher than before, and deep vertical grooves marked the stone on every side. The air was colder here, dry and still.

In the center of the room stood a second platform.

This one was empty.

No body. No blade. Only a smooth, slightly raised surface of the same black stone. Around its edge ran a ring of readable text.

Lian moved closer, stopping a short distance from the platform. His eyes tracked the carved words once, then a second time to be sure.

“What is taken must be balanced by what is given. What is kept must be paid for in full.”

The meaning was no clearer than the previous carving, but the pattern was consistent. The tomb kept placing conditions in front of them. First the measure. Then the demand to leave something that could not be returned. Now balance and payment.

He glanced down at his hand.

The small gray rock was still there, dull and ordinary against his blood-stained fingers. Touching it had opened the path to this place. It was not a random object. It was a trigger. Lian closed his fist around it and stored it away. Leaving it on the floor again felt like a mistake.

Behind him, Elara and Ryzek were already checking the chamber. Lian did not need to look to know it. He kept his attention on the platform and the residual energy in the room. The power here was denser than in the previous chamber — controlled, but stronger. It sat in the walls and the floor without pressing against him the way a living aura would.

No immediate threat showed itself.

No secondary exits revealed themselves either. The place they had entered from was gone, sealed as if the tear had never existed. Forward was the only direction left.

Lian stepped back from the platform without touching it.

“We check the rest of the chamber first,” he said. “No one steps onto that platform until we know what else is here.”

He turned and began his own sweep of the room, eyes moving across the black stone, the blue veins, and every groove in the walls, while the empty platform waited in the center with its single line of text.

Power Scale / Cultivation Realms (Quick Reminder)

Foundation Realm (Layers 1–9): Body forging, no external Qi.

Circuit Awakening Realm (Early–Peak): First Qi loop, internal bursts.

Core Condensation Realm (Early–Peak): External Qi release, short flight.

Stellar Circuit Realm (1–9 Stars): True flight, Qi armor, energy projection.

Nebula Dominion Realm and higher: Domain control, galaxy-level power, etc

Power Scale Reminder

Lian Yu: Stellar Circuit Star 1.

Elara Voss: Core Condensation Peak

Keep it as reminders