Chapter357-Copy and Projection
So this was what the sixth stage of the Human Emperor Trial truly was!
Daniel narrowed his eyes slightly and raised his hand, summoning several of his own clones. They stood around him, identical in every detail, but Daniel still felt uncertain about how this battle was supposed to be fought.
Because his opponent was none other than himself.
And Daniel was immortal.
Even for him, this created a headache. The more he thought about it, the more he realized how absurdly broken his own abilities were. In fact, Daniel himself, for once, felt that his own existence was something close to unsolvable.
What was even more terrifying was that the replica he faced in the sixth stage could also use Time Stream.
If not for Daniel's sharp perception of the changes in the flow of time, he might not have realized that his double had also inherited Time Stream.
That meant the other side might also wield the God of Thieves' dagger.
So this trial wasn't merely a rough copy. It had replicated him entirely?
At this thought, a rare tremor of fear rose in Daniel's heart.
What was the Human Emperor Trial, truly?
Why did it have the power to reproduce even his God Rank Skills? If that were the case, then the permissions governing this trial space were far too high. Perhaps they even touched upon the level of the Supreme Will itself.
But as soon as the thought came, Daniel realized something was wrong.
No matter how mysterious the trial, it was still only the Human Emperor Trial. It should not have such inconceivable authority.
He frowned, deep in thought. Then, suddenly, his eyes flashed.
Perhaps there was another way to think about it.
What if the opponent in the sixth stage wasn't a copy at all?
What if it was merely a projection?
When Daniel recalled the earlier stages, the answer became clearer. The figures of the former Human Emperors he had faced were not truly recreated beings. They had been projections.
If he thought of it this way, everything made sense.
This space was not the real world. It had its own rules, its own boundaries.
It was much like the virtual worlds Daniel remembered from online games.
In those games, the weapons and treasures you carried had nothing to do with the real world. The two realms might influence each other, but they were never directly interchangeable. Bringing an in-game artifact into reality was impossible.
Likewise, the Human Emperor Trial was a self-contained domain. It could generate projections of him or of past emperors, but it could not truly create them.
Creating a virtual projection was easy. To make a true physical duplicate in reality was on a completely different level.
And Daniel sensed instinctively that even the Supreme Will would never allow such perfect copies to exist. A system that could duplicate one's storage space and everything inside it—that would simply be too broken.
He exhaled, closed his eyes for a moment, and accepted the truth. He was facing his own projection. The question now was—how to defeat it?
His thoughts raced at lightning speed.
In only a few seconds, Daniel reached a plan.
Since the projection's storage space was identical to his, all of their items matched. So the only way to break through was to use something special.
His mind fell on a very rare scroll—a Sealing Scroll—that he had discovered long ago in some forgotten Divine Temple. This relic had the power to seal away all of his God Rank Skills.
After a brief moment of hesitation, Daniel decided to use it.
But he was not foolish enough to seal everything. He kept Time Stream and Fog of Concealment unbound, leaving himself the tools he needed to maneuver.
Once his preparations were complete, he stepped into the trial space again.
This time, at the very first instant, he unleashed Infinite Plunder upon his projection.
Since ascending to demigod rank, his Talent Specialization had evolved. Infinite Plunder no longer merely stripped fragments or word-effects of skills—it now directly stole entire skills.
In the blink of an eye, the projection was stripped bare. The only two God Rank Skills it had left were immediately plundered and added to Daniel's arsenal.
It was only thanks to his earlier sealing of Divine Unshackling that this gambit succeeded. Without it, the plunder might never have taken effect.
Daniel's lips curled into a faint smile as he gazed upon his diminished double.
"So in the end, projections can never match the original."
He snapped his fingers.
In the next moment, the skies split open. Meteor Arrow Rain descended in torrents. The sealing scroll's effect lifted, his powers restored in full.
In an instant, the sixth stage was cleared.
Yet Daniel felt no joy.
Because in the end, he had killed himself.
And that sensation was far from pleasant.
What troubled him more was the weakness the trial had revealed. Without his God Rank Skills, he was pitifully fragile. A single God Rank Skill aimed at him would be enough to finish him off.
The only fortunate thing was that he had passed the stage—and quickly at that.
From beginning to end, it had lasted no more than a single second. For this battle, only striking first had secured his victory.
Daniel steadied himself, exhaled, and with clear eyes stepped forward into the seventh stage of the Human Emperor Trial.
On the communication networks, Daniel's feats once again flooded every channel.
And this time, the news updates came at a dizzying pace. Within barely ten minutes, several announcements had already been posted.
Across the myriad races, awakeners everywhere were left reeling. Many felt as if they were living in a dream.
So this was the Human Emperor Trial? To them, it no longer seemed so daunting. At least in front of Daniel, it looked almost trivial, as if the challenges did not even exist.
A strange mood swept the network. Some younger awakeners even felt emboldened, thinking, If he can do it, maybe I could too.
But the older awakeners and the resurrected veterans knew better.
They understood the true difficulty of the trial.
Odin, for instance—once considered a prodigy of his generation—had failed in the third stage. He had never advanced further.
The comments on the networks grew fervent.
"His Majesty Daniel's power is terrifying beyond measure!"
"I feel it in my bones—the future of humanity will grow brighter and more prosperous under his reign!"
"Yes! With Daniel leading us, perhaps humanity will walk a brand new path, one that no one has ever tread before!"
"This time, the so-called millennial Apocalypse is nothing to fear. For the first time in thousands of years, humanity might pass through such a calamity with ease!"
"Daniel, Your Majesty… your deeds will be eternal."