I've Come to Collect You

The southern continent fell into a deathly silence.

After the extreme negative emotions of madness, rage and hatred faded, only emptiness and confusion remained. The members of the three clans felt hollow inside, as though a piece were missing, as though their souls had been drawn out of them.

Eighty or ninety percent of them were caught up in life's three great philosophical questions.

Who am I? Where am I? What am I supposed to do?

The three clan leaders, Ancestral Dragon, Primordial Phoenix and Primordial Qilin, were still staring up at the sky. Their strongest feeling at that moment was: I want some peace and quiet. Don't ask me who Quiet is.

Their own wretched figures in the screen of light, their clans withered away, the Primordial World scarred from end to end by the war between the three clans—each scene was seared into their Primordial Spirits. They couldn't forget them even if they wanted to.

They fought until the very last moment, then slit their own throats and departed this world.

There were no winners among the three clans!

Not only were there no winners, they had lost utterly and completely.

The three overlords who had once held dominion over the seas, land and skies of the Primordial World, and the three clans whose members had once been spread across it, ultimately survived by their last breaths, eking out a miserable existence.

The Dragon Clan and Phoenix Clan had even become food on certain great powers' plates, served at the table as famous dishes such as dragon liver and phoenix marrow. Qilin were comparatively rare, and thus benefited somewhat from the value placed on rarity, but they were still reduced to serving as mounts or gatekeeping divine beasts.

Compared with their former status as overlords, it was the difference between being up in the heavens and being trampled into the dirt—with a couple more kicks for good measure.

It was truly a pitiful and lamentable fate.

As far as the outcome went, the Dragon Clan fared somewhat better. Having many children and descendants had its advantages. Of the three clans, only the Dragon Clan had enough members that, once the Karmic Force was divided among them, it managed to preserve a little of its foundation.

Afterward, the Dragon Clan had even taken the initiative to shoulder the duty of gathering clouds and bringing rain. It had landed civil-service positions in the Heavenly Court and secured iron rice bowls, finding a way out of its predicament.

As for Ancestral Dragon, Primordial Phoenix, and Primordial Qilin, the Heavenly Dao's Karmic Force descended upon them when they were gravely wounded and on the verge of death, becoming the last straw that broke the camel's back.

As the saying went, a dying person spoke kindly. Knowing full well that they could not escape their doom, there was only one thing they could do: give everything they had in exchange for a future for their clans and descendants.

Not a single living being doubted whether the scenes shown on the screen of light were real.

What a joke. One could claim the Twelve-Rank World-Cleansing White Lotus was fake, but even Pangu's illusory figure, bearing Pangu's Pressure, had appeared, and the Heavenly Dao itself had stepped onto the field to help as referee. Who would still question whether it was real?

If you thought it was fake, you could go up and try exposing it yourself. It was just a question of whose authority you wanted to challenge.

"We... are all chess pieces..."

Ancestral Dragon murmured in a low, hoarse, dry voice. The domineering air of Ancestral Dragon had vanished from his face, leaving only the look of one whose time had passed.

"We thought the three clans were fighting for supremacy, but it never occurred to us that we weren't even qualified to compete. Heh heh heh."

Primordial Qilin shook their head again and again with a bitter smile, lying weakly on the ground, looking rather like a stray dog driven from home.

"At this point, it's too late to say any of that, and there's no point to it either."

Primordial Phoenix was a practical sort, and she herself had never cared all that much about fighting for supremacy. But her clanspeople had insisted on competing, and on top of that, Ancestral Dragon's domineering-CEO-style marriage proposal had thoroughly enraged her.

"Forget it, forget it!"

They understood it completely now. From the moment friction between the three clans began to intensify, an invisible hand had been pushing from behind the scenes, driving them step by step toward the abyss of destruction.

No, that wasn't right. More than one great hand had been plotting against them.

Yet they had been completely oblivious, willingly leaping into the trap.

Had the screen of light not appeared, had the great god Pangu not let them learn the outcome in advance...

Then, once the war ended and the Heavenly Dao came out to tally the losses and settle accounts with them...

Not only would the three of them have fallen, but that terrifying Karmic Force would also have sent the three clans into utter decline, leaving them unable to rise again for all eternity.

It was true that they had been plotted against, but their present miserable state was also a fact. They had to pay for the mistakes they had made and atone for their sins.

Though they were deeply unwilling to accept it and wanted to settle accounts with the beings who had plotted against them, they lacked the strength to act on those wishes now. Their priority still had to be preserving their clans and what remained of their foundations.

There might still be a chance to settle accounts in the future. After all, none of them had yet reached the end of the road, with their bodies dead and their Daos extinguished.

As long as they remained alive, there was still a chance.

Xiang Dong nodded repeatedly as he listened. Right, right. As he saw it, this so-called Kalpa was essentially no different from a pig-butchering scam.

It was a trap tailor-made and meticulously designed for you. Once you were tempted, you were bound to fall into it.

Even Queen Mother of the West and Zhen Yuanzi, who had stayed shut in like homebodies and hidden away all their lives, had ultimately failed to escape being plotted against. They simply hadn't lost quite so badly.

Xiang Dong had already burned through everything he had. His consciousness sank into slumber once more, and he could no longer maintain the screen of light.

The screen of light flickered before going black, and the illusory image of Pangu's illusory figure appeared once more. He made no movement and spoke no words; he merely turned his back on the living beings of the Primordial World and let out a deep sigh.

That single sigh made the countless living beings, as well as Ancestral Dragon, Primordial Phoenix and Primordial Qilin, feel a crushing pressure.

It was much like the feeling of a naughty child who had wrecked the house while their parents were away, only to turn around and see them standing in the doorway, with no time at all to clean up.

After all, if Pangu were still alive, never mind Ancestral Dragon, Primordial Phoenix and Primordial Qilin—

Even Chaos Demon Gods like Hongjun, Luohou and Yangmei would have had to behave themselves.

Who would dare cause destruction? Wouldn't that just be asking for a beating?

It was at this moment that the Heavenly Dao also carried out its postwar reckoning.

Still standing there in a daze? I've come to collect you.

The Heavenly Dao brought Karmic Force down upon the three clans as punishment for plunging living beings into misery and leaving the Primordial Land scarred from end to end.

As the leaders of the three clans and the ones who fought the fiercest, they naturally had to bear the chief responsibility. Most of the Karmic Force fell upon Primordial Phoenix, Ancestral Dragon, and Primordial Qilin.

The remaining Karmic Force was divided among the members of the three clans.

Not one of them could hope to escape; not a single one was left out.

Because of Xiang Dong's intervention, the three clans had not yet reached the point of mutual destruction. They still retained sufficient foundations, at least half their members were alive, and the three patriarchs had not perished with their Daos extinguished.

So, after subtracting the portion of Karmic Force borne by Ancestral Dragon, Primordial Phoenix, and Primordial Qilin, the remainder, divided among every member of the three clans, was not too heavy a burden.

If the original outcome had been the bankruptcy and indebtedness of the three clans, with every member owing at least a hundred million,

Then the result now, divided evenly, was a few million per member. This was when the benefit of having numerous descendants became apparent.

More importantly, the three clans had not yet reached the point of total bankruptcy, where their assets would need to be restructured. Their foundations and strength remained, giving them sufficient means to repay what they owed.

Once they had paid it all off and cleared their debts, it was not impossible that they might rise again.