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"How could it vanish…?" Aiolos frowned deeply.
Alex responded with a bitter smile: "I don't know either. This Ophiuchus Palace exists outside the Twelve Zodiac Temples. It belongs to a Gold Saint beyond the Twelve… even I don't fully understand it."
His knowledge came from his older brother's words, passed down in secret and in this case, even that wasn't enough to explain what had occurred.
The four Gold Saints exchanged glances, all of them visibly shaken.
"Pope… did you say this is a Gold Saint independent of the Twelve Zodiac Saints?" Mu asked, unable to hold back.
Alex nodded: "Yes. He is the Thirteenth Gold Saint, said to have existed since the Mythological Age. But his history has long since vanished into legend. What little we know… is that the Ophiuchus Saint sought to become a god, angering the divine powers, and was erased. Even the Sanctuary has no records of it left, almost as if the truth was deliberately wiped out."
As they listened to Alex's words, all four Saints fell silent—
None of them had imagined there would be such a hidden story in the Sanctuary's past.
And now, Jiang Chen had vanished along with the Ophiuchus Palace.
Even they could no longer make sense of what was going on.
But while they were completely in the dark…
Jiang Chen's situation was entirely different.
The moment he stepped into the Ophiuchus Palace—
He felt a misty, ethereal force envelop his entire being.
…
The Ophiuchus Palace had vanished from the Sanctuary.
Alex and the others searched as much as they could, but the Ophiuchus Palace seemed to have completely disappeared, leaving not a single trace.
In the end, they had no choice but to give up.
Only Aiolos, Shaka, and Sage continued occasionally probing the area where the Ophiuchus Palace had once been, hoping to discover something, anything.
But a whole year passed—
Still, there was no sign of the palace.
It was as if the Ophiuchus Palace had never existed.
One year later—
The Capricorn and Scorpio Gold Palaces lit up with dazzling brilliance.
A month after that—
The Aquarius Palace also radiated light.
By this time, the Sanctuary had assembled seven of the Twelve Gold Saints:
Aries, Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Aquarius.
The remaining ones were: Leo, Pisces, Taurus, Cancer, and the Libra Saint, who remained atop Mount Lushan.
And it wasn't just the Gold Saints—
The number of Silver and Bronze Saints had also steadily grown over the past year.
Now, the Sanctuary had:
24 Silver Saints,
48 Bronze Saints
Roughly a third of the full order.
This time, the total number of Saints in the Sanctuary had reached an unprecedented level. In terms of sheer numbers, they were already on par with the Sanctuary at the start of the Holy War two centuries ago.
Yet the next Holy War was still over a decade away. But even as the Sanctuary developed—
A hidden darkness beneath it was quietly beginning to stir…
Faint strands of dark aura slowly spread outward, and mainly toward the Gemini Temple.
Pitch-black shadows crept in silence. They spread across the Gemini Temple.
"Hahaha... Who would have thought that the most loyal warriors of Athena would harbor such darkness in their hearts?" A mocking, unrestrained laughter echoed from the void, as black aura engulfed the Gemini Palace.
Inside, Sage and Kanon were in the middle of their training, completely unaware that the black aura had already begun to seep into their bodies.
Their Cosmos inevitably began to shift…
And in the depths of Sage's soul, a tiny seed took root.
But at that moment—
No one noticed this silent change. Sage and Kanon continued their training inside the Gemini Palace, unaware. The temple itself and the Gemini Gold Cloth were visibly enhancing their Cosmos.
A year earlier, Sage had sent his younger brother Kanon to the Gemini Palace to train.
Alex hadn't opposed the idea—
Though Sage had officially inherited the Gemini Gold Cloth, Kanon's raw talent was undeniable.
Even if Kanon couldn't become a Gold Saint, his power was more than enough to place him among the top Silver Saints.
So no one interfered.
But even Alex didn't realize: That dark aura had already begun to infiltrate the Gemini Temple, creeping deeper by the day.
As the darkness spread, Sage's expression during training gradually began to change.
Half of his hair slowly turned white, while a dark and violent aura began rising from his body.
But just as quickly—
A powerful burst of Cosmos erupted from within him, restoring his aura to normal.
"What's going on? This aura…?" Sage frowned. He could feel that something was off.
He extended his Cosmos to investigate but couldn't detect anything out of place.
His doubt lingered. He glanced at Kanon briefly, but in the end, he just shook his head and closed his eyes to resume meditating.
Strangely enough—
This time, his training felt smoother than ever before. Previously, he had felt a clear gap before he could break into the Seventh Sense. But now, as he resumed his training—
Within moments, Sage suddenly opened his eyes.
At the same time, Kanon did too.
"Bro… my Cosmos?" Kanon spoke reflexively but as soon as the words left his lips, he saw the same shocked expression on Sage's face.
The two brothers exchanged a look. Their eyes filled with disbelief. But no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't perceive the changes in their bodies.
Eventually, they just accepted it. After that, both their Cosmos began to soar at an astonishing pace.
In just a few short months—
Their Cosmos reached the limit of the Sixth Sense, and they were now only a single step away from the Seventh Sense.
"Boom!"
An overwhelming aura surged outward.
That day, the Gemini Palace burst into radiant light. High above the sky, the Gemini constellation shone more brightly than ever. But amidst that light—
No one noticed that darkness was also quietly spreading within the Gemini stars.
The seed of darkness that had been planted was now silently beginning to sprout.
A new personality was also quietly being born.
"Hurry up! Increase your Cosmos as quickly as possible! Those damned traitors… I'll make them pay the price!"
Black mist swept in. Thick and oppressive, a voice tinged with excitement and arrogance echoed from within.
The silent night sky remained resplendent. The stars gently shimmered.
…
At the Ophiuchus Palace—
Illusion and reality intertwined. The power of time seemed to be etched into the fabric of space here or perhaps it was etched into the past, into the mythological era itself.
"Whoosh—!"
A tide of illusion swept through the air. At that moment, Jiang Chen's consciousness seemed to transcend countless layers of time and space.
When his mind gradually recovered from its dazed state—
An urgent voice rang in his ears:
"Asclepius! Something's wrong! Melchabah is gravely injured, you need to come, quick!"
The voice was anxious and pressing.
Jiang Chen awoke from his confusion.
"Who… are you?"
Still in a daze, he turned instinctively to the speaker: a burly teenage boy.
"Thank goodness! You're finally awake, Asclepius! Come with me!" Before Jiang Chen could fully gather his senses, the youth grabbed him by the hand and dragged him outside.
Outside, blinding sunlight poured down on him, and the last of Jiang Chen's disorientation faded. Suddenly, a flood of memories surged into his mind—
Memories of a young boy. Memories that didn't belong to him and yet, at that moment, they merged perfectly with his own mind, becoming a part of him.
This boy's name was: Asclepius.
(To Be Continued…)
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