The forest loomed ahead like a living entity, its canopy a tangled web of blackened branches that choked the sky. The air hummed with a dissonant melody, a chorus of whispers that seemed to slither into the mind. Li Tian tightened his grip on the Primal Compass, its needle spinning wildly as if recoiling from the forest's aura. Behind him, Su Lin, Zhang Wei, and Elder Qiang stood wary, their faces etched with the fatigue of relentless pursuit.
"This place reeks of the emperor's touch," Elder Qiang muttered, his staff glowing faintly with suppression sigils. "The trees are not trees—they're memories given form."
Li Tian glanced at the compass. Its starsteel gauntlet had fused deeper into his arm, amber veins now creeping toward his shoulder. "Stay close. The illusions here will attack more than just the eyes."
They stepped into the forest.
---
**First Reflection: The Ghosts of Flesh**
The path twisted immediately, the trees rearranging themselves into a corridor of gnarled, humanoid figures frozen in silent screams. Su Lin stiffened, her sword trembling. "These are no illusions. These are *people*."
Elder Qiang pressed a hand to one of the petrified forms. "The emperor's experiments. He fused dissenters with the forest. Their suffering sustains the illusions."
A low moan echoed. The figures began to tremble, their stone skin cracking to reveal pulsating amber cores. Zhang Wei raised his broadsword. "Get ready!"
The forest erupted. The petrified figures lurched forward, limbs snapping into jagged weapons. Li Tian's gauntlet flared, severing a core with a precise beam. The figure crumbled, but two more took its place.
"Aim for the cores!" Li Tian shouted, but his voice fractured. The forest warped, separating him from the others.
---
**Second Reflection: The Prison of Regret**
Li Tian stood alone in a clearing. Before him stood his master, Lǜ Zhì, alive and whole.
"You've grown reckless, Tian," the vision said, voice dripping with disappointment. "The Cores have made you weak."
Li Tian's gauntlet trembled. "You're not real."
Lǜ Zhì smiled, a crack splitting his face. "Aren't I?" He lunged, his form dissolving into a swarm of razor-edged leaves.
Li Tian dodged, the leaves slicing his cheek. The compass shrieked in his mind. ***ILLUSION. STRIKE THE ANCHOR.***
He channeled primal energy into a ground-shattering punch. The clearing fractured like glass, revealing a pulsating tree draped in chains. Li Tian obliterated it with a beam, the vision dissolving.
He found Su Lin next, ensnared by vines that whispered in her sister's voice.
"Lian is gone," Su Lin snarled, severing the vines. "You won't manipulate me again!"
Together, they fought toward Zhang Wei, who stood frozen before a spectral image of his father.
"Pathetic," the phantom sneered. "You'll never be more than a blunt instrument."
Zhang Wei roared, shattering the illusion with a single strike. "Shut up!"
Elder Qiang reappeared, his robes singed. "The forest's heart lies ahead. It will not release us lightly."
---
**Third Reflection: The Mirror of Ambition**
The trees parted, revealing a lake of liquid mercury. At its center floated an island dominated by a colossal mirror framed in bones. The reflection showed not the group, but the Magic Emperor in his prime, surrounded by swirling Cores.
***You seek to destroy what I built***, the reflection said. ***But you carry my legacy in your veins.***
Li Tian stepped onto the mercury, the surface solidifying underfoot. "Your legacy is ash. I'll end it."
The emperor's reflection laughed. ***You cannot. You are me.***
The mirror shattered. Shards morphed into replicas of the group—amber-eyed doppelgängers wielding their own abilities.
"Kill them," Li Tian ordered.
The battle was chaos. Li Tian dueled his double, each strike mirrored perfectly. Su Lin's clone exploited her lingering guilt, while Zhang Wei's brute-forced with primal-enhanced strength.
Elder Qiang alone stood apart, his double silent. "You see the truth, don't you?" the clone murmured. "The Cores are corrupting him."
The real Qiang hesitated, then shattered the clone with a sigil. "Not yet."
Li Tian, battered and bleeding, seized his double's core and crushed it. The replicas dissolved.
The lake drained, revealing a staircase leading into the earth.
---
**Fourth Reflection: The Heart of the Labyrinth**
The chamber below was a cathedral of roots, its walls pulsing with imprisoned amber light. At its center hung a massive, beating heart—crystalline and veined with black energy.
***The forest's anchor***, the compass intoned. ***Destroy it.***
The heart convulsed, birthing a guardian—a titan of thorns and petrified flesh, its eyes voids of static.
"Together!" Li Tian commanded.
Su Lin and Zhang Wei flanked the guardian, their strikes diverting its attention. Elder Qiang wove suppression sigils, slowing its regeneration. Li Tian channeled the compass's full power, the gauntlet burning his flesh.
***Energy critical***, the compass warned.
"I don't care!" Li Tian plunged his gauntlet into the guardian's chest.
The explosion of light consumed the chamber.
---
**Emergence**
The forest lay dead around them, its trees reduced to ash. Li Tian collapsed, the gauntlet's starsteel now fused to his collarbone.
Su Lin knelt beside him. "The compass?"
He held it up. The needle pointed unerringly skyward. Above the ash clouds, a shadow loomed—a temple suspended among the stars.
Zhang Wei grinned. "Now *that's* a ruin."
Elder Qiang frowned. "The Nexus's reach is greater than we feared. That temple is a beacon."
Li Tian rose, his amber veins glowing. "Then we extinguish it."
As they trudged onward, the forest's ashes stirred. Behind them, Talon and Shadowleaf scouts emerged, their eyes fixed on the temple.
The real trial had just begun.
---