117: Chapter 117 The Truth of Betrayal

Ying's laughter, like cold, rusted iron, slowly dissipated above the deathly silent Light Sphere Mother Star. Those Emotion Devourers lurking on the edge of the darkness momentarily retracted their fangs, transforming into clumps of viscous black shadows prostrate on the ground like the most loyal servants, quietly awaiting their master's next command to slaughter. The darkness did not recede; instead, it felt like a heavy coffin, firmly sealing the entire desolate land. The air was permeated with a lingering chill and decay; every breath felt like swallowing shards of cold glass, scraping against the throat and heart.

Kate remained in a half-kneeling position, holding Lin Fan tightly in her arms. Her back was ramrod straight, yet she couldn't suppress a slight trembling, as if she might collapse at any moment. She didn't dare use force, fearing that the slightest tightening would tear open the bone-deep wound on Lin Fan's chest. She could only use the gentlest strength to cradle him loosely in her arms, letting his head rest on her shoulder as she felt his weak but real breathing.

Pure white energy from the Light Sphere Race slowly seeped from her palms like the gentlest moonlight, carefully enveloping Lin Fan's body in an attempt to soothe his damaged meridians and stop the continuous flow of blood. But whenever the healing light approached that hideous wound, it would be violently repelled by wisps of pitch-black mist. Those mists carried Ying's unique cold malice, writhing frantically like living things, desperately resisting all luminous salvation.

That was the darkness rooted deep within Lin Fan's soul, a mark firmly bound to his life, something ordinary healing power couldn't even touch.

Kate's fingertips were ice-cold, and her strength seemed drained by these endless attempts. She lowered her head, her gaze fixed intently on Lin Fan's wound. Fresh red blood intertwined with black poisonous blood, slowly sliding down his pale chest and soaking his already tattered clothing, spreading into a jarring stain on the cold, charred rock.

From the moment that Light Sphere Race student spontaneously combusted into a shadow and vanished during the opening ceremony; from the moments of Lin Fan's repeated unusual silences, evasions, and even his counter-intuitive suggestion to "hand her over in exchange for the academy's safety," a seed of doubt had been planted in her heart. She forced herself not to think or guess, deceiving herself with countless reasons like "he must have a hardship." She was willing to believe that the man who had protected her and fought alongside her through countless life-and-death moments would never betray her, would never hide things.

But now, that wound seeping black blood served as the cruelest testimony, ruthlessly shattering all her persistence and trust.

"Why..."

Kate's voice was hoarse beyond recognition, each word forced out of a dry throat with broken sobs. Her eyes were bloodshot, and tears swirled frantically within them, but she stubbornly forced them back, refusing to let them fall easily. She gently raised her hand, using her thumb to brush away the sweat-soaked hair from Lin Fan's forehead, the trembling of her fingertips nearly impossible to hide.

"Lin Fan, tell me, why is this happening?"

"Why is Ying's power inside your body?"

"Why did you know the Light Sphere Mother Star was a trap all along, yet you didn't tell me from the beginning?"

"Why did you have to shoulder all the secrets and face all the darkness alone?"

The string of questions was as light as a sigh, yet heavy enough to crush this deathly silent world.

Lin Fan's body jerked in her arms. Beneath his closed eyelids, his lashes fluttered violently, and his pale lips quivered as if he were engaged in a most difficult struggle. He didn't dare open his eyes, didn't dare meet Kate's gaze. He knew all too well what was in those eyes right now—pain, confusion, disappointment, and the breakdown of being deceived by the person she trusted most. Those were the emotions he never wanted her to have, the haze that should never have appeared in the light he fought so hard to protect.

He could face Ying's overwhelming power, endure the lethal attacks of the Emotion Devourers, and hover on the brink of death countless times, but he alone could not bear Kate's gaze.

"Speak!"

Kate could finally no longer suppress the emotions in her heart. Her voice suddenly rose, carrying a breakdown suppressed to the extreme. She gently cupped Lin Fan's face, forcing him to lift his head and look her in the eye.

When those eyes, once clear and bright and always full of gentle smiles, came into view, Kate's heart was instantly seized with a tight grip.

At this moment, there wasn't a trace of light in Lin Fan's eyes, only turbid inkiness and surging pain, like a starry sky swallowed by darkness, leaving only endless desolation and despair. His gaze flickered and avoided hers, like a child caught doing something wrong, filled with helplessness and guilt.

Not far away, Ying still stood quietly at the edge of the darkness, his face hidden in the shadows of his black robe, showing no expression. He didn't strike or interrupt; he merely watched like a cold bystander, enjoying with great interest this drama of collapsing trust he had personally directed. He was waiting—waiting for Lin Fan to tear away the last layer of disguise himself, waiting for him to personally lay bare the cruelest, most lethal truth before Kate.

That was the most delicious delicacy of this feast.

Lin Fan took a deep breath. The wound on his chest flared with heart-wrenching pain, and the black-red energy belonging to Ying inside him surged frantically with his fluctuating emotions, like countless venomous snakes gnawing at his meridians. Ying's whispers echoed continuously in his mind—Give up, admit it, you were originally me, hiding it is meaningless.

He knew he couldn't hide it any longer.

He couldn't hold on anymore.

"Ying... is not an outsider."

Lin Fan's voice was so faint it was almost inaudible, yet it struck Kate's mind like a thunderclap.

"He is not an external invader, not a dark creature from the depths of the universe, not the enemy we have been fighting..."

His voice grew lower, carrying a fatigue that seemed to sink into an abyss. Every word was like a slow execution of his own heart.

"He was split off from me."

"He is me."

"He is all my negative emotions, all my desire to kill, all the fear I didn't dare face, all the pain buried deep in my heart, all the darkness I suppressed... condensed into another me."

Boom—!

The world seemed to completely overturn at this moment.

The arms Kate used to hold Lin Fan instantly lost all strength. She froze in place, her mind going blank, all her thoughts completely crushed by this single sentence.

Ying was a dark personality split from Lin Fan?

Ying was Lin Fan, and Lin Fan was Ying?

Then everything they had experienced during this time—the student who died tragically at the opening ceremony, the children collectively hypnotized to draw Destruction Equation, the 72-hour death countdown for the Interstellar Academy, the narrow escape through the emotion black hole, the terrifying journey to the Mother Star, the brutal ambush just now, the lethal blow Lin Fan blocked with his body...

All of it came from the man in front of her whom she had fought so hard to protect?

Then were they fighting the darkness, or were they fighting Lin Fan?

Were they protecting each other, or a stranger who had been hiding a lethal secret from the very beginning?

All the trust, all the determination, and all the faith that had supported her along the way shattered completely in this moment, leaving not even a single whole fragment behind.

Kate looked at Lin Fan in her arms, looking at this man who had just recklessly protected her with his life, and suddenly felt he was incredibly foreign. She couldn't even distinguish whether the person lying in her arms was the gentle and reliable Lin Fan, or the cold and cruel Ying.

"What... did you say?"

Kate's voice was airy, carrying an extreme emptiness, as if her soul had already left her body, leaving only an empty shell mechanically repeating the words.

"Ying is a... dark personality you split off?"

Lin Fan slowly opened his eyes, his inky gaze filled with despair. He nodded heavily, each word carrying the weight of blood and tears.

"Yes."

"A long time ago, when I first came into contact with power beyond common sense, when I was forced into life-and-death situations again and again, when I watched the people around me die one by one while I was powerless to help, he began to be born."

"I thought I could suppress him, lock him in the darkest corner of my heart, and never let him appear. I practiced desperately, held onto the light desperately, and told myself desperately to be a Guardian, but I was wrong."

"He absorbed my pain, my fear, and my resentment, growing stronger day by day until I could no longer suppress him—strong enough that he could leave my body, possess an independent consciousness, and have his own dark domain."

Lin Fan's voice began to tremble. Tears finally fell from the corners of his eyes, mixing with beads of blood and landing on the back of Kate's hand, shockingly hot.

"We are one, souls bound, bloodlines connected."

"If he lives, I live."

"If he dies... I will also die."

The last five words were as light as a wisp of smoke, yet they carried the cruelest fate, striking hard against Kate's heart.

She finally understood.

She understood all of Lin Fan's abnormalities, all his silences, and all his evasions.

Why he had dived into Ying's domain alone to negotiate, why he brought back the condition to "hand over Kate in exchange for the academy's safety," why he still brought them here despite knowing the Mother Star was a trap, why he remained silent when she questioned him, and why he always carried a faint, cold aura.

It wasn't betrayal, cowardice, or joining the darkness.

He didn't dare to resist.

He couldn't resist.

Because once Ying was eliminated, he himself would also disappear.

He was afraid that if he died, no one would protect her anymore; afraid that if he died, she would be harmed by Ying; afraid that if he died, the Interstellar Academy would be destroyed; afraid that if he died, she would cry for him.

So he chose to hide it, chose to shoulder all the infamy alone, chose to struggle bitterly in the gap between light and darkness, and chose to weave a protective shell with lies to keep her safe inside—even if he was misunderstood, hated, and abandoned by the whole world.

How ridiculous.

And how cruel.

Kate looked at Lin Fan, looking at this man she had loved, trusted, and relied on for countless days and nights, and suddenly laughed.

It wasn't a gentle laugh or a happy laugh; it was a laugh of extreme anger and ultimate despair. The laughter was soft, yet it carried a desolation that made one's heart tighten, slowly echoing in the deathly silent world.

"So..."

Kate spoke slowly, her voice terrifyingly calm, without a single ripple, as if all emotions had been drained away.

"You would rather lie to me."

"You would rather keep it from me."

"You would rather let me misunderstand you, let me hate you, let me think you betrayed me and the entire Interstellar Academy."

"You would rather struggle in the darkness alone, enduring all the pain and torture by yourself."

"Than tell me the truth, think of a way together with me, or let me face it by your side, right?"

Her gaze locked onto Lin Fan, the tears in her eyes finally unable to be held back any longer, surging out and blurring her vision.

"Lin Fan, tell me, what exactly am I to you?"

"Am I a burden who needs your protection but isn't worthy of knowing the truth?"

"Or have you never believed that I could fight alongside you and bear all the suffering together?"

"What right do you have to make decisions for me? What right do you have to shoulder everything alone? What right do you have to think that your lies are the best protection for me?"

"Do you have any idea? Being deceived by the person I trust most, being kept in the dark and running around like a fool, is ten thousand times more painful than facing Shadow directly, or even dying right now!"

Every word was like the sharpest icicle, stabbing ruthlessly into Lin Fan's heart, leaving him battered and breathless.

He wanted to shake his head, to explain, to tell her he didn't mean it, to tell her he was just afraid she would be scared, afraid she would be sad, afraid she couldn't bear such a cruel truth. But when the words reached his lips, only dryness remained. All explanations seemed pale and self-deceiving in the face of the word "concealment."

He was truly afraid.

Afraid that once she knew the truth, she would look at him like a monster; afraid she would utterly collapse after learning the enemy she had been fighting was her most trusted partner; afraid she would choose to distance herself from him after knowing his fate of symbiosis with Shadow; afraid his darkness would defile her light.

He feared nothing else—not death, not destruction, not being consumed by Shadow, not being misunderstood by the whole world.

The only thing he feared was her crying.

"I didn't..." Lin Fan spoke with difficulty, his voice hoarse and broken, every word carrying a hint of blood. "I didn't distrust you, I just... I was just afraid you couldn't bear it, afraid you'd be scared, afraid you..."

"Afraid of what? Afraid I'd leave you?" Kate pressed closer, tears streaming down. "Lin Fan, you're so selfish! With your self-righteous protection, you've pushed me further and further away. With your silence, you've completely crushed the trust between us!"

"I don't need you to shoulder everything alone. I don't need you to protect me with lies. I just want to face it with you! Even if the road ahead is hell, even if the end is destruction, I want to be with you!"

Pain, like a monstrous wave, instantly submerged them both.

Lin Fan looked at Kate's tear-streaked face, her bloodshot eyes, and her desperate, broken state. At that moment, the defense he had struggled to maintain for countless days and nights completely collapsed.

This man, who had never frowned or shed a single tear no matter how powerful the enemy or how fatal the injury; this man, who had always remained calm and stood tall through countless life-and-death crises; this man, who hid all his pain in his heart and saved all his tenderness for those around him.

For the first time.

His emotions completely broke down.

"Do you think I wanted this!"

Lin Fan suddenly roared, his voice heart-wrenching and echoing across the silent land. Even the Emotion Devourers lurking in the darkness were startled into a slight agitation by the roar.

The wound on his chest split open again, and black-red blood gushed out, staining Kate's clothes. Yet he seemed unable to feel any physical pain, left only with extreme agony and repression.

"Do you think I wanted to be a hero!"

"Do you think I wanted to shoulder all of this alone!"

"Do you think I wanted to become a half-human, half-ghost monster? To become an existence that even I am afraid of!"

"I didn't! I didn't want any of it!"

His voice grew louder, hoarser, and more broken, like a dying beast wailing in despair.

"I'm afraid! I'm scared to death!"

"Afraid that once you knew the truth, you'd think I'm a disaster, the source of destruction!"

"Afraid you'd be afraid of me, stay away from me, and never look at me again!"

"Afraid you'd look at me with eyes full of strangeness, fear, or even disgust!"

"Afraid the darkness within me would completely pollute your purest light!"

He stared fixedly at Kate, the pain in his eyes almost overflowing. Tears mixed with blood slid down, hitting the cold rock and shattering into despair.

"I'm not afraid of anything! I'm really not afraid of anything!"

"I'm not afraid of death, not afraid of being consumed by Shadow, not afraid of being misunderstood by everyone, not afraid of falling into endless darkness!"

"I'm only afraid of seeing you cry!"

"I'm only afraid of you being sad, afraid of you being heartbroken, afraid of you suffering even a little bit of harm because of me!"

"I just... I just wanted to protect you!"

The last sentence was completely hoarse, completely broken, completely exhausting all his strength.

Lin Fan's vision went dark, and he could no longer support himself. He slumped heavily into Kate's arms and fainted, with only the faint rise and fall of his chest proving he hadn't completely left this world.

Kate held the unconscious Lin Fan, frozen in place, tears streaming down and blurring her vision.

The anger, confusion, grievance, and pain in her heart instantly softened under Lin Fan's heart-wrenching roar, turning into a deeper, heavier, and more suffocating heartache.

She hated his concealment, hated his solitary endurance, and hated his self-righteousness.

But she felt even more heartache for his struggle, his forbearance, and for how long he had suffered alone in the gap between light and darkness. She felt for how he desperately tried to protect her even when he was already covered in wounds.

How could she be afraid of him?

How could she loathe him?

How could she leave him?

He was her light, her faith, and the person she wanted to protect for a lifetime.

Even if he was stained with darkness, even if he fought against fate, even if his very existence was a disaster, she would not let go, would not retreat, and would not leave.

The cold wind blew with black mist, stinging their faces.

Not far away, Little Kate had been standing silently in the corner, seeing and hearing everything.

Her small body trembled slightly, her eyes filled with tears, but she bit her lip hard, refusing to make a sound for fear of breaking the suffocating atmosphere.

She finally understood.

She understood why Teacher Lin Fan was always silent, why he always looked at Teacher Kate with such complex eyes, and why he always carried a trace of unshakeable fatigue despite having great power.

He wasn't a traitor or an enemy; he was just a poor soul ensnared by darkness who desperately wanted to protect the light.

Little Kate sniffled, her gaze involuntarily falling to the side.

AKai was leaning against a massive black rock, his face as pale as paper, his breath so weak it was almost undetectable. He had exhausted nearly all his energy to fend off the siege of the Emotion Devourers just now, and currently lacked even the strength to lift a hand. The elegy anchor that had accompanied him for decades lay quietly at his feet. Its metal shaft, carved with the ancient and mysterious patterns of the Light Sphere Race, was emitting a faint golden glow that was out of place in this darkness.

That was a divine artifact left by the ancestors of the Light Sphere Race, a legendary treasure capable of purifying all darkness and severing all evil bonds.

Little Kate's heart skipped a beat, and a vague thought emerged uncontrollably from the depths of her mind.

She slowly shifted her steps, carefully walked to the side of the elegy anchor, knelt down, and lightly touched the cold metal shaft with her small fingers.

The moment her fingertips touched the patterns, a vast tide of ancient information flooded into her mind.

It was the secret tome left by the ancestors of the Light Sphere Race, the true method of using the elegy anchor, and the ultimate secret hidden deep within the divine artifact.

Little Kate's pupils suddenly contracted, and her small body stiffened.

She understood.

She understood everything.

The elegy anchor did indeed possess the power to separate symbiotic entities. It could forcibly strip away the dark persona belonging to Shadow within Lin Fan's body and completely purify it, allowing Lin Fan to return to being that pure Guardian untainted by darkness.

However.

There is no such thing as free power in this world, and certainly no salvation without a price.

The price of separation was the need for a willing vessel.

Using the vessel's entire life, all their energy, and their whole soul as a substitute to bear all of Shadow's dark power, to endure all the pain and destruction during the stripping process, and finally dissipate along with the darkness, vanishing completely from this world.

Simply put.

To save Lin Fan, someone must die.

And among everyone present, only two people possessed the purest Light Orb bloodline, were capable of bearing the power of the elegy anchor, and were qualified to be the vessel.

One was AKai, who had been bound to the elegy anchor for decades and had long since linked his soul to the artifact.

The other was her—the one who was born in resonance with the artifact and carried the future of the Light Sphere Race.

Little Kate looked down at the shimmering golden patterns on the elegy anchor, then up at the pale, unconscious Lin Fan in Kate's arms, at the tearful and heartbroken Kate, and then at Shadow, who was waiting quietly nearby with cold eyes.

Her small hands clenched into fists, nails digging deep into her palms. The sharp sting made her even more lucid.

She didn't speak or make a sound; she simply hid this cruel secret in the deepest part of her heart.

A terrifying yet destined-to-be-executed thought slowly took shape in her small heart.

She looked up at the pitch-black sky. Her gaze was no longer filled with the previous fear and helplessness, but with an extreme determination completely unbefitting of her age.

Shadow's feast was still ongoing.

The 72-hour countdown was still ticking away.

The entanglement of fate between Lin Fan and Shadow was still pulling.

And she was ready.

Ready to become that sacrificial vessel, ready to trade her life so Lin Fan could live, so Kate wouldn't cry, and so the Interstellar Academy could return to peace.

Darkness still shrouded this desolate land, but a glimmer of light called sacrifice was quietly ignited within that small body.

This war of light and darkness, trust and betrayal, sacrifice and salvation, had only just entered its most cruel stage.