Chapter 212: Seventy-Two Deaths

The gate sealed behind Ryzek with a heavy final sound.

Lian stood on the pale stone platform under the dead man’s broken aura and listened.

At first there was nothing. The same thick silence that had covered the ocean before the gate appeared. Then the sounds began. Distant impacts. The grind of heavy bodies moving. A sharp crack of energy discharge. Then a sound that was unmistakably a roar of effort — Ryzek’s — cut short by something heavier.

After that the noise became constant.

Screams of exertion. The wet, solid noise of bodies colliding. Energy bursts that flared and died. The unmistakable impact of silver bone plating striking flesh and ground. Lian could not see beyond the sealed gate, but the sounds painted enough of the fight for his mind to work through the rest. Ryzek was not moving through a controlled sequence of enemies. He was being pressed without pause.

Time stretched.

The dead man did not speak. He stood in the same place, aura still heavy over the platform, and watched the gate without expression. Elara remained still beside Lian, eyes fixed on the dark metal surface. Neither of them asked questions. The rules had already been made clear. No observation. No assistance. Individual measure only.

The fighting continued.

Hours passed by the feel of it. Then longer. The sounds never fully stopped — only shifted in intensity. Sometimes the energy discharges came faster and sharper. Sometimes there were long stretches of heavy impacts and nothing else. Once, near what Lian judged to be the end of the first day, there was a prolonged sequence of overlapping crashes so dense it sounded as if the entire space beyond the gate had turned into a single continuous collision.

Lian’s mind kept returning to the same points.

One hundred thousand. Real death. No second attempt.

Yet the fight went on.

By the second day the sounds had grown more ragged. The energy bursts were less frequent. The gaps between major exchanges lengthened, then collapsed again into sudden violence. Lian found himself tracking the changes without meaning to, trying to read survival from noise alone. It was incomplete information, but it was all he had.

Near the end of the third day, the sounds stopped.

The silence returned as suddenly as it had broken. No final crash. No trailing noise. Just the sealed gate and the quiet of the platform.

The dead man spoke.

“He passed. Barely.”

Lian turned his head toward him. Elara did the same.

“He died seventy-two times,” the man continued, voice flat and absolute. “His soul is linked to a recovery device held by his clan. Each time his body was destroyed, the link pulled him back and restored him enough to continue. That device is the only reason he is still alive. Most who enter this test die once and remain dead. He was lucky enough to carry a second chance into the gate — and stubborn enough to use it seventy-two times.”

The words settled over the platform.

Died seventy-two times. Brought back by a clan device.

Lian’s thoughts locked on the statement. The deaths had been real. The pain and failure had been real. Only the link to something far outside the test had given Ryzek the chance to stand up again and again. Without it, the first true death would have ended everything.

The dead man turned his head slightly toward Lian and Elara.

“He came prepared for that cost. I do not think either of you did.”

Neither of them answered. Lian kept his expression controlled, but the implication was clear. Whatever preparation Ryzek had carried into the gate, the man did not see the same thing in the two of them.

The dead man’s gaze moved between them once more.

“Who is next?”

Elara stepped forward without hesitation.

She did not look at Lian. She did not speak. She simply walked toward the towering gate. The vertical line of force split open at her approach, revealing the same darkness Ryzek had entered days before. Cold air spilled out across the platform.

Elara crossed the threshold without slowing.

The gate sealed behind her with the same heavy, final sound.

Silence returned to the platform. Lian stood under the broken aura, eyes on the sealed metal, and waited for the sounds of the next fight to begin.

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