After a long time.

The sky had completely darkened.

A slender figure walked heavily through the gates of the Evernight Guild.

The person who came was none other than Zhou Huai.

In fact, the "Zhou Huai" who faced Mr. Duan in the other courtyard earlier was merely a substitute vessel perfectly replicated one-to-one using the S-rank Necromancer class he had just drawn!

That earth-shattering self-detonation had fooled Mr. Duan's arrogant eyes and blocked a fatal death trap for the real Zhou Huai.

However, living was even more suffocating than dying.

Zhou Huai walked up the stairs from the first floor to the third like a wandering soul, inspecting the empty rooms.

Finally, he sat dejectedly on the sofa in the third-floor living room.

His expression turned completely cold, and his hollow gaze stared blankly at the ceiling.

"Lost... Truly lost so thoroughly..." Zhou Huai muttered to himself, his voice exuding a deep sense of powerlessness.

Although he had managed to escape by a hair's breadth through the substitute's self-detonation and fooled the god-like Mr. Duan, in this confrontation, he had truly lost completely and utterly.

Not only were all the top SS-rank and SSS-rank Avatars completely wiped out, save for Insect Emperor Caesar far away in Sakura Country! Even the Pendulum of Life and Heaven-Suppressing Seal, which were sufficient to subvert the rules of the world, all fell into his hands.

What made Zhou Huai's heart pierce with pain and unable to breathe was—he actually took Ye Xi away as well!

That girl who had always silently guarded his side, who had never given up on him even when he was paralyzed for five years, was thus taken away by his mother's killer right under his nose.

This battle not only shattered all of Zhou Huai's proud Avatar trump cards, but also ruthlessly crushed the absolute self-confidence Zhou Huai had accumulated through the System over a long period.

"That level of power... wiping out SS-rank with a wave of a hand, even Divine Artifacts are helpless against him..."

Zhou Huai thrust his hands into his hair, painfully tugging at his scalp.

"Facing such a powerful opponent, what can I use to contend with him?"

"How am I supposed to save Ye Xi?"

"To defeat someone who transcends the rules of the world, I'm afraid I must also reach this degree of 'transcendence'. However, exactly how should I do it? Madly grinding monsters to level up? Even if I level up to one hundred, in front of that kind of monster who jumps out of the framework, I'm afraid I'm just a slightly larger ant..."

Zhou Huai sat numbly on the dark sofa for a whole night, his brain spinning at high speed, yet he never figured out the slightest clue.

Despair flooded over his entire being like a tide.

Just as he was about to be completely swallowed by this deep sense of powerlessness.

The cold and mechanical System prompt tone exploded without warning deep within his mind!

【Ding! Detected that the host is facing a major choice, triggering a hidden challenge quest!】

【Quest Name: Seeking the Source: The Lost Goddess!】

【Quest Objective: Save the host's mother. (Deadline: 100 days!)】

【Quest Reward: Top-grade class orb draw chance X2 (Guaranteed SSS-rank)!】

Listening to the electronic sound echoing in his mind, Zhou Huai abruptly sat straight up from the sofa, inevitably widening his eyes as his pupils contracted violently.

"Save... mother?!"

Zhou Huai was stunned, his face full of incomprehension and shock.

He could not understand why the System would suddenly issue such a seemingly irrelevant challenge quest to him at this time.

The content of the quest turned out to be saving his mother, who had been missing for a full five years and whose life or death was unknown!

"Wait..."

Zhou Huai took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down as his brain began frantically analyzing things step by step.

"Could it be that... mother is the key to solving all problems?!"

If one were to say that besides that unfathomable Mr. Duan in this world, what else existed that transcended the rules of the world.

That would only be this 【God-level Clone System】 existing in his own mind!

The System was not a dead object; every challenge quest it issued was not without a target. Every time it appeared, it seemed like some kind of guidance in the dark, leading him step by step toward the truth.

Thinking about it carefully now, there really was such a terrifying possibility!

That Mr. Duan was an ancient monster who had lived for who knows how many eras and spanned countless "version iterations"! The years he had lived in this world were probably far more ancient than he had imagined.

Such a transcendent person who regarded all living beings as ants, why would he have a younger sister living in the mundane Zhou Family?

Since she was Mr. Duan's own younger sister, how could she possibly just be an ordinary woman with no power to truss a chicken?

During that sudden attack back then, Mr. Duan could have easily wiped out the entire Zhou Family, but he only crippled him and went to great lengths to forcibly take his mother away. If his mother were merely a mortal, she would have died long ago in that storm. Why would Mr. Duan keep her alive until today?

Thinking of this, the fog in Zhou Huai's mind seemed to be split open by a flash of lightning in an instant, and he suddenly figured it out!

"My mother... is definitely a very important figure! Furthermore, she harbors a secret that even Mr. Duan is wary of or must crave!"

"Otherwise, five years ago, Mr. Duan would never have tried every possible means to take her away!"

Zhou Huai's hands gripped tightly, his knuckles turning white.

"Perhaps only by finding her can we figure out the truth of all this, and only then will there be a way to deal with Mr. Duan!"

At this point, in this suffocating and long dark night, Zhou Huai finally saw a glimmer of hope in the desperate situation.

However, behind this hope was a bottomless abyss.

The hidden challenge quest issued by the System was definitely unprecedented in difficulty.

After all, that was a whole two "guaranteed SSS-rank" class orbs as rewards! The System had always followed the principle of equivalent exchange; the more bountiful the reward, the more it meant the process of the quest was a narrow escape with nine deaths and one life.

Most crucially, this quest also had an extremely harsh time limit of 100 days!

"100 days..."

Zhou Huai stood up, walked to the window, and watched the faint whitish light gradually emerging on the horizon.

This 100-day countdown was like a Sword of Damocles hanging over his neck, forcing him to seize every minute and every second to improve his strength and look for clues.

Because after 100 days, if he still failed to rescue his mother, what awaited him might not be as simple as just failing the quest.

Even the entire world would usher in complete destruction and cleansing within Mr. Duan's "grand plan".

"Mr. Duan, the score between us hasn't been settled yet..."

Zhou Huai gazed at the morning light in the distance, his eyes long devoid of depression, replaced by a cold and resolute killing intent like a solitary wolf.