The Darkin threat had clearly been dealt with, so why did Ahri still feel so uneasy?
There seemed to be something strange permeating all of Mistfall.
"Strange?"
Akali looked around and sniffed the air. Other than the lingering scent of blood, she could not sense anything unusual.
"I feel it too."
Master Yi observed the area through the Seven Lenses of Insight and discovered that the air itself was inexplicably restless. Whatever was causing it, Xolaani was definitely not the source.
There was another problem here besides the Darkin.
"Do any of you from the Ancient Sword School know anything else?"
Luke looked at Linju's lifeless body and confirmed that Xolaani had been sealed back inside her weapons.
Darkin could not be permanently killed, at least not with any known method.
The way to deal with them was to sever the weapon linking them to their vessel. Once that connection was broken, even someone as powerful as Xolaani would be unable to recover.
The disciples of the Ancient Sword School looked confused by his question.
One of them stepped forward. "This is also our first time entering the heart of Mistfall. We only know that the headmaster spent a long time preparing to find that weapon. We don't know anything else."
Judging by their expressions, they really were telling the truth.
"Now that I think about it, this place has felt ominous ever since we entered Mistfall," Master Yi said after recalling their arrival. "I assumed it was because of Xolaani's presence, but it seems she was not the only reason."
Ahri closed her eyes and focused all her senses while activating her innate abilities.
At last, she seemed to see and sense something.
"I can feel everything here. It is filled with pain and despair."
She opened her eyes, concern appearing in her beautiful gaze.
"Something terrifying exists here."
"Everything here..."
Luke and the others fell into thought before suddenly reaching the same realization.
Everything naturally included the flowers, grass, and trees. Ionia was a land filled with spiritual life.
Now that they examined their surroundings carefully, they finally noticed many details they had previously overlooked.
Many flowers and patches of grass had withered. Some trees looked as though an invisible force had bent their trunks, and an oppressive atmosphere hung over the entire area.
"The spirit realm in this region must be experiencing some kind of problem," Master Yi finally concluded.
If nothing was visibly wrong with the material realm, then the issue was most likely within the spirit realm, which was closely intertwined with it.
Without another word, he took a deep breath and slowly exhaled.
Then he closed his eyes and pressed his palms together, gradually calming his mind until no stray thoughts or desires remained.
The others saw spiritual energy ripple from his body as he rose from the ground and began floating in midair.
When Master Yi opened his eyes, he found himself in another world.
He had entered the section of the spirit realm corresponding to Mistfall.
The first thing he felt was an overwhelming desolation. Death and decay were everywhere, with almost no sign of life.
A powerful sense of dissonance struck him. Two different worlds seemed to overlap within his vision, crudely stitched together as one steadily devoured the other.
Purple magical energy lingered in the air, and everything carried an aura of emptiness. Black, vine-like growths wrapped around every part of the spirit realm. Some grew upward like jagged rocks, creating a bizarre and horrifying landscape.
The native spirits were being crushed beneath the infestation. Like helpless animals caught in snares, they were entangled by the vines while their essence steadily weakened.
Sorrow, grief, and agony filled the realm.
They were being devoured by creatures Master Yi had never seen before. Some resembled strangely shaped insects, while others were utterly alien beasts. Many were covered in blackened carapaces. Some of those shells were still developing, while other creatures had none at all.
Tentacle-like organisms writhed through the air. The constant sound of gnawing echoed everywhere, as though the creatures possessed a hunger that could never be satisfied.
The corruption was spreading at an astonishing rate.
In Master Yi's eyes, the original spirit realm surrounding Mistfall had nearly been consumed completely. Never before had the spirit realm seemed so unfamiliar or so horrifying.
The sight sent a chill through him. He could clearly sense the endless hunger and ambition within these unknown creatures.
He closed his eyes again. When he reopened them, he had returned to the material realm.
"What did you see?" Luke asked. "Your breathing became very unsteady."
Master Yi realized that his entire body was covered in cold sweat. Even he had never witnessed anything like what he had just seen.
"The native spirit realm is being invaded," he told the others. "It has already reached the brink of collapse."
"Invaded?"
Akali looked completely confused. It was the first time she had ever heard of such a thing.
She had only seen the spirit realm once and knew merely that it was another world. How could another force invade it?
"This is an extremely serious problem," Master Yi said. "We must find a way to deal with it."
He had an ominous intuition that the strange lifeforms invading the spirit realm were searching for a way to break through the barrier and enter the material realm.
Akali sighed. "But we can't even enter the spirit realm."
There were three known methods of reaching it.
The first was possessing a special ability that allowed someone to enter the spirit realm.
The second was using a unique object. Through Master Yi's meditation and the Seven Lenses of Insight, for example, it was possible to witness scenes from within the spirit realm.
The third method was death.
Ionian tradition held that after death, a person's soul entered the spirit realm. Guided by a spirit of death, it would cross the final threshold and begin a new cycle of reincarnation.
"Let me try," Ahri said.
She remembered what she had witnessed during her previous meditation. Entering the spirit realm did not seem particularly difficult for her.
The real problem was figuring out how to bring Luke and the others with her.
For some reason, she felt certain that she could do it, almost as though this was an innate duty she had been born to fulfill.
After so many days of meditation, her control over her abilities had grown increasingly refined.
She had discovered that as her spiritual strength increased, her craving for soul essence gradually diminished.
At first, she had barely been able to control herself. Now, aside from occasionally struggling to restrain her urges around Luke, she could freely command the ability.
She had also discovered why she had lost control in the past. She had simply been too weak to control such a powerful gift.
Ahri slowly closed her eyes, and her spiritual energy began spreading outward. It extended like strands of silk and attached itself to the souls of everyone present.
Luke and the others immediately felt a faint stirring within their souls, as though something new had been added to them.
At Ahri's command, an enormous amount of magic erupted from her body. The energy was extraordinarily pure, and in the next instant it spread outward like a shock wave.
A barrier from another realm seemed to descend from the sky, enveloping everyone before settling completely around them.
The spirit realm appeared before their eyes.
The last time Akali had seen the spirit realm, Shen had guided her through it using the unique power of the Eye of Twilight.
This time, her eyes widened, and she took a disbelieving step backward.
"How could it look like this...?"
The scene before her was completely different from the spirit realm she remembered. It resembled a desolate valley filled with corrosion and death.
The once-lively spirits of the realm now looked weak and miserable.
Everyone else froze as well, having never expected to witness such a sight.
Countless drifting organisms floated through the air, each one radiating an unnatural presence.
Ahri had also brought the swordsman in the conical hat into the spirit realm. He immediately placed a hand on the hilt of his sword and prepared for battle.
Everyone present could tell that these bizarre creatures were not native to the spirit realm.
Luke stared at the scene, momentarily stunned.
"The Void..."
"The Void? What is the Void?"
Akali immediately caught his quiet words and questioned him.
The others also turned toward Luke, realizing that he seemed to know something.
Luke was certain he had not mistaken it. The scene before him unquestionably belonged to the Void.
Those unnatural entities were clearly Voidborn.
According to Luke's understanding, the Void had originated in an age so distant that its beginnings were nearly unknowable. It represented an incomprehensible emptiness beyond the boundaries of existence.
For reasons no one fully understood, the Void had discovered Runeterra and invaded it thousands of years ago.
It had then waged war against the Ascended, who had not yet become Darkin. In the end, the Ascended emerged victorious and halted the Void's invasion.
The Void was a world outside Runeterra, and for thousands of years, its desire to consume Runeterra had never diminished.
It was also one of the disasters Luke had feared for a long time. The Void was always searching for opportunities to tear open a breach into Runeterra. If it ever completely shattered the barrier between the two worlds, the result would undoubtedly be an apocalyptic catastrophe.
Luke had simply never expected to see traces of the Void and its creatures in Ionia.
Were they trying to create an entrance through the spirit realm?
Luke suddenly thought of Xolaani. She must have fought against the Void long ago, because before the Darkin became known as Darkin, they had been called the Ascended.
They were the ones who had stopped the Void's first invasion.
At the same time, they also seemed to have suffered some degree of influence from that conflict.
At least, that was what Luke had learned. Because of that, he wondered whether Xolaani's presence had somehow caused the Void to appear here.
He did not voice the question. There was no longer any point in speculating when the Void was already present before them.
After listening to Luke's explanation, everyone gained a general understanding of what the Void was.
In simple terms, it was extraordinarily dangerous.
"I can't believe something like this exists," Akali said.
She suddenly felt like someone who had never looked beyond her own backyard. She had once believed Ionia was unimaginably vast, yet the world contained far more disasters than she had ever imagined.
First came the Shadow Isles, then the Darkin, and now the Void.
"Why does Runeterra have to endure one disaster after another?"
"Drop the question," Luke said.
He stared at the endlessly ravenous Void insects and drew Snowglance.
"We can't allow them to keep feeding. We have to wipe them out here."
They were currently standing within the section of the spirit realm connected to Mistfall. The spirits lingering throughout the land continually released cries of sorrow and pain.
If the Void completely occupied this region and then continued expanding outward, the consequences would be unimaginable.
Everyone nodded.
Luke examined the surroundings.
"Judging by the current situation, the Void has not been here for very long. It is still in the process of taking over this area, which means we still have a chance to stop it."
"First, we need to determine the full extent of the infestation and whether it has spread into more distant parts of the spirit realm. Second, we need to find the source of the corruption. From what I understand, destroying the source should halt the Void's expansion."
The Void could not directly enter Runeterra, so it would try every possible method to create a breach and slip through it like smugglers crossing a border.
Once the Void occupied this part of the spirit realm, opening such a breach would no longer be difficult.
More accurately, every step of its occupation was equivalent to widening the breach.
They had to find the source of the Void infestation as quickly as possible.
No one objected to Luke's plan.
After a brief discussion, they decided to split up.
Akali, Ahri, and Wukong formed one group. Luke, Master Yi, and the swordsman in the conical hat each traveled alone.
The four groups departed in different directions.
"What a pain. I never should've come over to see what all the commotion was about."
The swordsman looked around at the empty, absurd landscape and sighed once again. Despite his complaints, he quickened his pace and slashed his unsheathed blade toward the nearby Voidborn. His sword strikes were exceptionally fierce.
Because of Ahri's power, they had temporarily gained the ability to enter the spirit realm.
As long as Ahri continued supplying magic to the connection, they would not be forced out.
Master Yi shot forward like a streak of light, leaving only an afterimage in the air as he swept through one area after another.
Every Voidborn in his path was eliminated instantly. He moved so quickly that the naked eye could not follow him.
Akali's group also fought without difficulty. They had been unable to interfere in the battle against the Darkin, but the Voidborn here were nowhere near as powerful as Xolaani.
Some were even extremely weak, perhaps because they had only recently arrived.
Working together, the three faced little pressure.
"The Void's influence has already spread as far as Ionia. Is the situation really as serious as I fear?"
Luke raced alone through the spirit realm, unleashing one sword strike after another. Countless Voidborn disintegrated beneath his blade.
The creatures seemed to possess astonishing reproductive abilities. Despite having arrived only recently, they had already formed enormous swarms.
None of them were particularly powerful, but their sheer numbers made them troublesome.
Luke continued thinking as he fought.
To him, the Void was an unstable bomb that could invade Runeterra again at any moment.
In his memories, Void rifts frequently appeared across the Shuriman continent because that was where the Void had first entered the world.
Now, traces of the Void had appeared even in Ionia. This was completely beyond his expectations.
Xolaani might have been responsible, but the situation still could not be underestimated.
It seemed Luke would need to visit Shurima when he had the opportunity.
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