A few more days passed.
Lạc Trần had grown fully accustomed to the weight of the iron heart.
While the mad doctor remained lucid, he made a habit of dropping by his house.
The doctor looked to be a youth of sixteen or seventeen - visibly younger than Lạc Trần. But of course, that likely wasn't his real age.
He was rather short, only reaching up to Lạc Trần's chest. Wisps of silver streaked through his unkempt hair. An old, cracked golden circlet sat atop his head, and he wore a plain tunic adorned with chicken feathers. Were it not for the medicine basket he always carried on his back, no one would associate the man with anything even close to "healer" - not even a quack.
The man was mad.
But his skill in medicine remained intact.
Had it not been for the restorative decoctions he prescribed, Lạc Trần would never have recovered so quickly. His injuries had been far too severe - beyond the help of even immortals.
Naturally, the doctor's medicine could only restore his physical strength to that of an ordinary man. After the celestial meridians were torn from his body, his internal channels were ruined. The divine surge released when the heart of Saint was ripped out shattered his inner furnace.
Thus, Lạc Trần would never again walk the path of cultivation.
This morning, the doctor's usually chaotic home had been cleaned meticulously - completely unlike its usual disarray.
Gone was the ragged, careless look. He wore pressed robes, freshly combed hair, and his medicine basket on his back.
"Don't steal my chickens," he said. "But if they lay any eggs, you're welcome to them. Just remember to shut the coop, or the vegetable patches will start acting up again."
"I won't be around for the next few days. The medicine's already prepared- left beside the gourd trellis. If you run out, help yourself."
Lạc Trần walked the doctor all the way to the village gate.
The village chief, lounging in a wheelchair, snored with his head tilted back, drool soaking his beard. Suddenly, as if sensing something, the old man stirred and snapped awake.
"Oi, doc. You usually just stomp once and vanish across thousands of miles. What's with this leisurely stroll today?"
"Ch-Chief... Hehe... Good morning…"
The doctor stammered. His giggle had a dazed, dreamy edge. His madness was clearly flaring again.
The chief sighed.
"Go on, then. Just don't abduct the wrong person again. You're looking for a man."
The doctor took a step forward. Space twisted around him—the distance of hundreds of miles compressed into a span no longer than a hand. He stepped again, this time with the other foot, and space snapped back. The doctor and his medicine basket vanished beyond the horizon.
The chief stroked his beard and asked,
"So... Sick Boy, how long's it been since you arrived in the village?"
"Just over a month now."
"Good. Tomorrow's the market gathering. The deaf guy wants to sell tools to nearby villages. You should tag along, get a sense of how things work here in the Dry Sea."
The chief gave a few nods, then closed his eyes. Moments later, he was snoring again.
---separator line-kun rolls into view---
Early the next morning, Lạc Trần found the Cripple, the Deaf, the butcher, and Madame Mute already waiting at the village gate.
Their village possessed a truly bizarre palanquin.
From the outside, it resembled a wedding litter - barely large enough for one person. But within, the space stretched impossibly wide. All four of them could sit inside, sipping tea and playing chess, with room to spare. It was clearly a spatial treasure.
There were no bearers to carry it, no animals to pull it. Instead, eight cow legs protruded from the sides. When it moved, the legs skittered like spider limbs, lending the entire contraption an unsettling, horror-tale quality.
Despite its grotesque gait, the cow-legged palanquin moved quickly. Before long, the village of Sickos had vanished behind them.
"Things in the Dry Sea are... odd," said the Cripple. "Every first and fifteenth of the lunar month, all roads converge at a single point. A thousand paths collapse into a fingertip's width. All the villages gather then, to trade at the market. It's quite the sight."
"You're losing me with all this mysticism, Brother Cripple," said Lạc Trần.
"Then look!"
The butcher grabbed his head and shoved it toward the window.
At some point, the road beneath them had risen off the ground, curling and twisting in mid-air like a dancer's silk ribbon. The palanquin's legs trod over empty sky, rushing toward a vast black hole.
"The darkness?"
Lạc Trần's eyes widened. He remembered the Dry Sea's cardinal rule.
"Yes and no. The darkness we fear is sentient. It devours, ever hungry. But what we're heading into now... is something else."
"Watch again. But don't stick your neck out. We don't want to haul your headless corpse back for the doctor to patch up."
Madame Mute traced characters into the air to echo the warning.
Lạc Trần cracked open a window, peering out.
Countless "paths" converged toward the black hole. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people walked toward the void.
And among them...
He saw himself.
Their appearances varied, ages different, but deep within, he knew they were all versions of him.
One "him" was fifteen, starving by the roadside, giving up his food to a mother and child. He died a pauper, a mortal, forgotten.
Another "him" had turned away, let the pair die. That version became a thug, ruthless and driven. Before long, he ruled over a gang of thugs. A wealthy family took him in as their enforcer. A court official even used him as his secret hand. The official eliminated his rivals; he took one of their daughters as his wife. At thirty, she hanged herself while he was away. When scandal reached the capital, the official didn't hesitate to throw him under the bus. He died on the execution platform.
A different version betrayed his sect, joined the demonic path, and slew Vân Thiên Sước with his own hand. Later, he stole the talents of his own disciple. In the end, the Cloudspike Sect hunted him down. He died at 270.
One more "him" wandered into the Dry Sea and collapsed at the gates of the village of Sickos.
Lạc Trần's head spun. He collapsed inside the palanquin, gasping.
"How do you feel?"
The Cripple smirked, a blade of grass between his teeth. He knew, but asked anyway.
Lạc Trần's throat was parched. Madame Mute handed him a cup of tea. He drained most of it in one gulp before asking:
"Out there... I saw versions of myself, each living a life I never knew, with memories I never had. But they felt so real. What was that?"
"You could think of it as possibility," the Cripple said. "Or perhaps reality."
"Sick Boy," said the butcher, unusually somber. He grabbed Lạc Trần's shoulder, voice low. "The Dry Sea is not simple. We can't protect you forever. The sooner you start to understand... the longer you might survive."
"If it's so important, why not just tell me?"
"We can't," the Cripple replied, all levity gone. "This is the Dry Sea. Speak of taboos, and the taboos come. Some things, you must uncover on your own. We dare not say more."
Madame Mute made the final remark with a flick of her finger in the air:
"Remember this: You are in the Dry Sea."
---the separator line is also at the Dry Sea, apparently---
The cow-legged palanquin plunged into the black hole, descending into an ancient ruin.
The stone tiles beneath them bore strange symbols. Dried blood had crusted black across the ground.
To the left and right stood dome-like structures—low and squat.
Beside the road were half-stone, half-glass statues: people, demi-humans, even beasts that had shapeshifted and took on a humanoid form. All were on both knees, hands pressed in reverence, eyes trained in the same direction. Time had eroded their faces, leaving their expressions unreadable.
Parts of the yellowed walls had turned to glass, each pane a different color.
The deaf man hefted his iron hammer and strode toward a small dome nearby, a few hundred meters from their landing site. A wooden post stood outside the door, with a piece of animal hide dangling from it. A slanted characters spelled "Sickos," scrawled with obvious abandon.
The Cripple slung a wine pouch over his shoulder and grinned.
"Sick Boy. This is your last chance. Come with your Brother Cripple - I'll help you graduate from boy to man."
"Don't corrupt the kid," the butcher barked. "Girls come and go. Power is the only truth. Come with me to the arena - we'll find you a real brawl."
He bumped shoulders with the Cripple and grabbed Lạc Trần's wrist.
Madame Mute poked him in the side with her needle.
"Don't listen to these two," she wrote. "The chief wants you to broaden your view. Come with this old woman to the cloth market."
She rarely wrote so much. Afterward, she shot a glare at the others.
The Cripple raised his hands in surrender. "Fine, you win. I'm off."
"Cheater. Dragging the chief into this," the butcher muttered, waving a fist. He turned and stomped toward the arena.
Madame Mute shook her head, tossed a leather pouch of liquor into the nearby room. The deaf man muttered inside - whether thanks or complaints, no one could say.
And so...
An old woman and a young man wandered the ruins, carrying a bundle of clothes.
Madame Mute led the way. Lạc Trần hawked their wares - though awkwardly. After years as a Cloudspike Sect disciple, mundane tasks felt foreign on his tongue. Everything he said felt off.
To be fair...
The clothes were terrible. Every time he tried to praise them, his conscience quivered.
No wonder the Cripple and butcher vanished the moment they arrived at market.