The ruin‑towers of the Shattered Star Plains gleamed with a sickly violet light under the moon. As Chen Yuan set foot on the broken terrace, his mechanical arm's gears scraped in protest—this space felt like crumpled parchment, its star‑trails fracturing into infinite overlays on his vision, each shade reflecting a different possible fate: tentacle‑sprouting limbs, a face encrusted in bone‑scales, or final dissolution as his father had in the Blood Pool.
"Pendant, this isn't your family's asylum, is it?" Chen Yuan shook his head and forced his sight to steady, the Astral Core at his chest burning with stabilizing warmth. "Next time you guide a legacy, could you at least send a co‑pilot? I'd rather hear Old Mo's nagging than witness a hundred ways to die."
The pendant pulsed almost dismissively, as if to sigh, "You chose this key—you'll finish its course."
Selene's Star‑Shard Mask shattered again into seven fragments, astral energy surging wildly:
"The star‑trail… it's gone! Time here is chaos—we may exist in past, present, and future all at once…"
Blood dripped from her fingertips, sketching a star‑map in midair that twisted into tentacle shapes.
Lilith's shadow‑cloak wrapped around Selene just in time, her silver gaze reflecting the warped void:
"Chen Yuan—your pendant is resonating!"
He noticed the pendant throbbing in step with the churning chaos‑vortex at the ruin's core, its thirteen storm‑runes lighting one by one to project the Patriarch's phantom in the mist. Azure Bone's voice, no longer metallic, crackled with a millennium of loneliness:
"Key‑bearer, the No‑Return Domain is the womb of chaos‑primal—and the grave of magic‑path spirit‑qi. Only through mastery of the Nine Reverse‑Entropy Transformations can one rewrite the world's entropy…"
Before the echo faded, the vortex spat forth inky sludge that solidified into Chen Yuan's own worst nightmares—Barû's tentacles, Albert's blood‑hand monstrosity, and his father's chaos‑corrupted form in the Pool. He raised his bone‑cannon, but froze—for in each monster's eye gleamed the fears he'd buried: the dread that he too might become the very creatures he'd slain.
"So the fiercest Cthulhu creature is the tentacled beast within." Chen Yuan ripped off his gear‑wrist, letting golden ichor drip. "Pendant—did you not tell me the final trial was a psychological Gauntlet?"
The pendant's warmth spiked, as though scolding him for the joke.
Old Mo's caravan screeched to a halt at the ruin's edge. Mechanical tendrils reached beneath the chassis to anchor the broken towers:
"These 'Entropy Demons' born of fear can only be banished by pure primal energies!" he called, hurling the Starborn Prism from the Grey‑Robes. "Use your blood to activate it—your master did the same to conquer his own inner demons!"
Chen Yuan caught the prism; storm‑runes and astral core flared in harmony. On its facets glowed silhouettes of every chaos‑core he'd refined. Inspiration struck: he drove his bone‑blade into his palm, staining the prism jade with astral‑blood. The phantasmal cores coalesced into tangible storm‑rune blade—his long‑dead quarry become his arsenal.
"Every monster I refined was my armory," he realized. Wielding the prism‑blade, he cleaved incoming tentacles, each strike purifying surrounding chaos‑qi. "Pendant, you hid this deep—I've been working for you all along?"
In reply came an even more voracious tide of Entropy Demons—shapes of Iron Fortress denizens, Starborn Seers, even Lilith's shadow‑self—once saved souls now corrupted, bearing down upon him.
Lilith's shadow‑sword cut through the counterfeit of herself, her silver eyes fierce:
"They're devouring your memories! Chen Yuan—don't look with your eyes; feel the pendant's resonance!"
He shut his eyes, letting Bone‑Vein Resonance flood the ruins. In the darkness, the storm‑runes from the pendant were the only light. The twisted memory fragments of corrupted dreams—Iron Fortress citizens smiling by gears, Seers praying at altars, Lilith's first fragile expression in the mortuary—revealed their true forms in the pendant's glow.
"You cannot fool me." Chen Yuan's mechanical arm disassembled under the rune‑light, exposing a fully skeletal forearm streaming with astral energy. "I did not refine fear—I refined you," he declared. "I have resonated with every mote of chaos and every shard of order in this world."
As the Entropy Demons dissolved, the chaos‑vortex at the ruin's center coalesced into an altar of interwoven light and shadow. Hovering above it was the Prime Core of the Cthulhu World—a translucent orb swirling with black chaos and jade magic‑path qi. His father's remnant was trapped at its rim, using dwindling will to prevent its collapse.
"Yuán… stay away…" his father's voice flickered like a candle in wind. "Should the core shatter… all will…"
"All will return to chaos, or be reborn into new order?" Chen Yuan cut down the final demon. His bone‑arm resonated with the altar—storm‑runes and phantom gears merging. "Matilda said the final Rite of Reverse‑Entropy is to let chaos and order coexist. And I…" He surveyed his half‑machine, half‑skeleton body. "…am the perfect vessel of that union."
Selene's mask chimed as it synced the Astral Core with the Prime Core. In midair it sketched out a renewed star‑map:
"The star‑trail reignites—you are the new astral‑anchor!"
Lilith's shadow swept the altar—her eyes widened:
"It's not a chaos‑core at all, but Azure Bone's broken Dao‑Soul! The true primal of this world is the one that fragmented in his struggle against the Old Ruler. And you, as bearer of the pendant, are reassembling that Dao‑Soul."
Chen Yuan's skeletal arm trembled. He realized the pendant's resonance with every key site—chaos‑primal was but the warped magic‑path qi broken by the Patriarch. As the token's runes flared thirteenfold, he pressed it to the altar. Memories flooded his mind—Azure Bone battling the Old Ruler, his father's crossing into this realm, even his own touch in the museum. In his mechanist‑bone form, these shards recombined into a new energy circuit: Mechanist prowess powered by astral qi, stabilized by Blood‑Death essence, with chaos‑factors converted into balanced lubricant.
As the Prime Core surrendered to the pendant's light, the shattered world‑void began to mend. The Rifted Star‑trail Plain straightened itself. Chen Yuan watched his father's remnant escape the core, dissolving into the pendant's space—and Azure Bone's full specter finally bowed to him.
"Legacy fulfilled?" Lilith whispered, supporting the swaying Chen Yuan. His arm was already forming crystalline bone‑cog structures, internal energies swirling in three colors.
"Don't worry—this is only the ultimate 'skin.'" He flexed gem‑like finger‑joints, each pulsing with a tri‑energy flow. "Now I wield Astral Prophecy, magic‑path Corpse‑Refinement, and mechanist Gear‑craft—three built‑in finger‑prompts. Each with side‑effects, sure—but better than Albert's tentacle cosmetic surgery."
Old Mo's caravan rolled up once more; its wheels crushed fresh star‑dust into new growth:
"Congratulations. You are now both the Key and the Heart of the Cthulhu World. But…" He tapped the pendant now melding with Chen Yuan's body. "Its light feeds you, and soon it will fully fuse—no more system prompts to complain about."
"Perfect—I'm tired of mechanical voices," Chen Yuan grinned. He touched his chest; the pendant's pulse matched his heart. "From now on, I'll write my own walkthrough—like this: first, install an astral shield on my arm, then coat my bone‑scales with chaos‑resistance, and finally…" He pointed to the distant ethereal visages of Old Rulers awakening. "…serve all tentacled horrors their death notices."
The chaos‑vortex quieted, replaced by gentle jade light. As he boarded Old Mo's caravan, the sound of gears and bones clicking became a triumphant march. Ahead lay the No‑Return Land and the final frontier of his own legacy: freeing his father's soul, reweaving Azure Bone's Dao, and remaking a world once ruled by madness into one of balanced renewal.