The Road Ahead

The sky was crimson, as though eternal flames burned within it; the earth was scorched black, as though it had endured the most terrifying extinction.

This was a world that had already died, a corpse.

The heavens were shattered, the earth cracked apart. There was no life, and it belonged to none of the pillar gods.

It matched Li Wen's description perfectly.

Li Wen walked alone through this dead world. The quarter-hour had long since passed, and the illusory clock tower had vanished, yet she was in no hurry to begin.

She was considering a question: What exactly had this world experienced?

Perhaps Twilight of the Apocalypse?

No. As someone who had experienced Twilight firsthand, Li Wen had witnessed what worlds destroyed by Twilight of the Apocalypse were—or would become.

It was absolutely not shattered skies and earth, not unquenchable fire, not Blazing Flame Storms connecting heaven and earth, nor anything comparable to any destruction one could imagine.

No matter where she went, Li Wen could see nothing but scorched earth and blazing flames. She gave up on moving forward and took out The Final Codex hidden within her cloak.

The amber encasing it showed no change. Even amid this crimson apocalypse, it remained cold and clear.

Li Wen took a deep breath, knelt upon the scorching ground, and placed The Final Codex before her.

She drew the Bone-Gnawing Short Sword and first slashed at the Emerald Star Cloak several times. When it left no marks, she took off the cloak and used the Bone-Gnawing Short Sword to cut open her palm.

"I swear in the name of Twilight!"

Bright red droplets of blood scattered like raindrops, boiling away the instant they touched the ground.

"Eternity begins at dawn!"

Li Wen cut a second wound, this one on her shoulder. Blood slowly flowed from it without pause.

"The end comes at twilight!"

The Bone-Gnawing Short Sword rose again. The third wound was at her ankle. By then, blood streamed all over her body, staining her entirely red.

"Life is destined to walk toward death!"

The fourth wound was in her abdomen. Li Wen did not even blink as she stabbed the blade directly in.

"All things are destined to return to their end!"

The fifth wound was on her back.

"Other than me, no other endbringer shall endure forever!"

The sixth wound was on her forehead, and the world before Li Wen's eyes immediately blurred.

"Other than me, no other eternal being shall walk the End Path!"

The seventh wound was at her heart. The Bone-Gnawing Short Sword stabbed into it without hesitation. Amid agony at one hundred percent, Li Wen recited the final line:

"All destruction begins with me and ends with me!"

Her life remained at 1%, no longer changing in the slightest. Blood slowly flowed across the dark brown scorched earth, tracing twisted lines.

The lines ended at The Final Codex. Now, the amber encasing the codex was soaked through by blood, gradually changing from translucent reddish yellow to pure blood-red.

Once the entire piece of amber had been dyed red, it shattered with a crack like falling glass. An ancient book with a black cover slowly rose into the air.

It opened on its own without anyone touching it. The blood on the ground was drawn upward, and profound crimson characters began appearing across page after page of blank paper. When the final page had been filled, the book closed again. A lush ancient tree appeared upon its formerly featureless black cover, and beneath the tree was a girl leaning against its trunk, hidden within a cloak, her gaze staring straight outward.

With a thought from Li Wen, The Final Codex immediately opened to a page. The abstract and profound text upon it now felt more familiar to her than her native tongue.

She knew she had succeeded halfway.

The ritual Li Wen used had also come from the Strategy Group. They called it Seven Deaths and Seven Commandments. Legend said that in Canaan, someone had exchanged seven deaths for seven vows. Once the seventh vow was made, that person ascended to sainthood.

The seven wounds corresponded to that saint's seven deaths: death by nails driven through the palms, death by having the shoulder split open, death by bleeding from the ankle, death by a spear piercing the abdomen, death by being slashed across the back, death by having the forehead smashed open by a massive stone, and finally, death by having the heart cut open.

The Strategy Group had devised the entire ritual based on this account. It could only be used to bind The Final Codex. There were two purposes to the binding: one was to use The Final Codex, while the other was to prevent the codex from being taken away.

The reason she had performed the ritual in a dying world like this was also because of the latter. When The Final Codex broke free from its restraints, its power would inevitably leak out. The pillar gods might not care, but their Subordinate Gods, apostles, those nameless Outer Gods, forgotten Old Gods, even Demigods, Crowned Ones, legendary mages, and all manner of terrifying beings from the Outer Realms... There were far too many beings coveting the Original Text of Lineage. Li Wen could not afford to be careless.

The Final Codex

Supreme Artifact—Mephisto (Li Wen)

An Original Text of Lineage recording the Twilight Pillar, depicting The Twilight Witch's Path to Godhood. It is said that obtaining the codex grants one the chance to glimpse the position of a pillar god.

Turn the pages to view Twilight's complete lineage.

The true power of this Supreme Artifact might only be revealed once Li Wen rose to a higher level, but even though she had only completed its preliminary binding, it was enough for her to browse the complete Twilight Lineage.

Since the Golden Age ended and the Twilight Pillar collapsed, no Twilight Lineage had remained in the world. Aside from the Elders still existing in Amber City, no one could walk its path, including the path once taken by the Twilight Witch—the End Path.

Li Wen held the codex and turned its pages carefully, one by one, until she saw the words "End" and stopped.

She first skimmed it quickly, then read it again word by word with particular care.

In truth, she had already completed the binding. As long as she thought of it, the contents of The Final Codex would automatically surface in her mind.

But Li Wen immensely enjoyed reading at this moment. Though flames and storms howled together here, the shattered Sky Dome roared in fury, and her life hung by a thread at a pitiful 1%, it still reminded her of her previous life. Back then, there was no World Tree: Origins, no Great Transmigration, no Twilight of the Apocalypse. There was only the warm early-spring sunlight, her gentle mother reading a storybook in a calm voice, and the young siblings immersed in the tale. That beauty had been impossible to resist.

"The complete End Path has twelve stages... Every stage advancement requires... Original Texts of Lineage from other pillar lineages?"

Li Wen pulled herself free from those fond memories and closed the book. She reread it in her mind, yet what was recorded within was absolute truth. No matter how she read it, truth would never change.

"Every advancement of the End Path requires an Original Text of Lineage from another pillar."

The Strategy Group had spent decades before Li Wen used Urd's Thorn to give her the strategy for obtaining The Final Codex. Now, she had to repeat that same effort eleven more times.

Li Wen fell into a long silence.