The Collapsing Secret Realm

The conversation with Red-Eyed Gu Ding made Sea Emperor give up his idea of telling Gu Ding what he had seen.

In fact, it was only now that the Sea Emperor had seen the true secret hidden within Gu Ding for the first time, but he had no way of knowing what it was. He only knew that it was not Gu Ding's split personality.

Dissociative identity disorder typically occurs in individuals with weak psychological resilience. When faced with problems that the primary personality cannot resolve, the split personality emerges and assumes the corresponding role. However, Gu Ding did not have this problem; he was always an optimist, fearless and undaunted, and had no conditions that would lead to a dissociative identity disorder.

Moreover, if it is a split personality, the strength will also be limited by Gu Ding's cultivation level. Even if it is stronger than Gu Ding, it is impossible to directly crush Deadpool.

For various reasons, the Sea Emperor ultimately decided to follow Red-Eyed Gu Ding's instructions and keep the secret from Gu Ding for the time being.

The entire secret realm was already teetering on the brink of collapse. The sky seemed to have been torn open with a huge hole, and the ground was constantly trembling, cracking and stretching into the distance like a spider web.

"What happened?" Gu Ding slowly awoke, the first thing he saw upon waking was the shattered sky, his face filled with confusion. "Did I perish?"

"You haven't perished. We're still in that secret realm, but for some reason, it has already fallen apart and will completely collapse in a few minutes," the Sea Emperor explained.

"Where's Deadpool?" Gu Ding finally got up from the ground. He remembered being petrified earlier.

"He has already fallen." The Sea Emperor was still pondering how to tell Gu Ding about this.

"Fallen? Who did it? Was it the Palace Master of the Heavenly God Palace?" Gu Ding asked several questions in a row, his mind now filled with doubts.

Sea Emperor remained silent for a moment before giving a false answer. "I don't know either. After you were petrified, I fell into a deep sleep just like you. I don't know what happened."

"It looks like someone had a big fight with that Deadpool, because even the secret realm is so badly damaged." Gu Ding didn't doubt anything, because he knew that the Sea Emperor's condition was sometimes indeed affected by him.

"That's possible." Sea Emperor had actually witnessed Deadpool being crushed by Red-Eyed Gu Ding without leaving even the slightest trace.

Gu Ding surveyed his surroundings; the ground was littered with corpses—all victims previously controlled by Deadpool. After Deadpool's death, his control was automatically released.

As the roaring sounds continued, countless fragments disintegrated in the sky, and the ground collapsed completely. The entire secret realm was on the verge of collapse.

"This secret realm is already collapsing. I estimate that everyone will be swept into the Space Turbulence, and no one will be able to survive..." Gu Ding said with a wry smile as he looked at the surrounding situation.

"The collapse of the secret realm will cause the space where the secret realm is located to be crushed by the space of the Real World. The spatial teleportation channel will collapse, and no one will be able to escape. However, this situation is not a dead end, because every secret realm has some Stabilization Point in its construction. These Stabilization Point are special locations that support the rules of the entire secret realm space. As long as you stand within the coverage area of these Stabilization Point, you are safe."

"The area where you are standing now is a safe and Stabilization Point. The ground will not crack, and even if the entire secret realm collapses completely, you will not be affected. You just need to stand here and wait for the secret realm to completely collapse, and you will return to your original Gravel World."

The Sea Emperor's words were undoubtedly good news.

This was the first time Gu Ding had heard of the theory of Stabilization Point. He was somewhat surprised, and hadn't expected to be so lucky as to be standing in a Stabilization Point area. But watching the entire secret realm gradually collapse, and the surrounding corpses being swept into the Space Turbulence and torn to dust, he knew that probably not many people would survive this test.

Time passed second by second, and Gu Ding saw the entire world around him turn into tiny, grain-like fragments, floating and dissipating into the sky as if weightless. Only the patch of ground beneath his feet, about ten square meters in size, remained completely undamaged.

"With such a commotion, it seems that Celestine, the master of the Heavenly God Palace, has not appeared..." Gu Ding frowned slightly, feeling somewhat puzzled.

If Celestine had appeared, he should have intervened to save them after killing the Deadpool. But strangely, aside from learning from Sea Emperor that the Deadpool had fallen, he hadn't seen the Lord of the Heavenly God Palace. Therefore, there are only two possibilities: either Celestine wasn't the one who killed the Deadpool, and Celestine was never even there in the first place; or Celestine killed the Deadpool but didn't care about the lives of his people at all.

However, judging from the competition arranged by Celestine, he seems to care a lot about cultivating geniuses. According to Bartholomew, he needs a large amount of resources, and geniuses with terrifying cultivation speeds are undoubtedly the ones he is most willing to cultivate.

Following this logic, the second possibility can be ruled out. Therefore, a more reasonable explanation is that Celestine is unable to appear for some specific reason. Someone else killed Deadpool, and that person doesn't care about the lives of those in the secret realm.

Gu Ding's deduction was very close to the truth, but no matter what, he never imagined that the whole thing was related to him.

About half an hour later, the drifting space fragments disappeared, replaced by the sky and ground of the Gravel World.

He also saw more than ten people standing on the other two Stabilization Point. It seemed that the location of the Stabilization Point in the space where the secret realm was located had shifted, and the distance between the Stabilization Point had become only a few hundred meters.

The two groups at the other two Stabilization Point looked around in terror, like frightened birds.

Gu Ding only stepped out of his Stabilization Point after hearing the Sea Emperor's confirmation.

Seeing that Gu Ding had come out safely, the two groups of people then made a move and followed him out.

"What on earth happened?!" a burly man couldn't help but ask, his gaze fixed on Gu Ding, the first to step out from the Stabilization Point. He asked Gu Ding because he noticed that among everyone present, only Gu Ding appeared the most composed; everyone else seemed completely bewildered.

"I don't know. All I know is that the entire secret realm collapsed for some reason." Gu Ding could only shake his head. He really didn't know what had happened, but it seemed that the others were even more confused than he was.

"Did everyone else perish?" a woman in green armor asked, covering her mouth. Even though her hand covered half her face, Gu Ding could still see the terror on her face.

"You don't need to ask that question, do you? You saw it yourself, the corpses on the ground were all shredded to pieces. If it weren't for the special area we were standing in, we would definitely be dust by now," a man next to him couldn't help but answer.

"He's right, most of them have already perished!" a voice suddenly came from afar.

Everyone, including Gu Ding, looked in that direction and saw a group of figures walking towards them.

"You guys are lucky. I thought that apart from the people we rescued, no one else would have survived." Kornahan, the leader of the group, glanced at everyone.

Gu Ding also discovered that the group, including Kornahan, numbered quite a few, as many as seventy or eighty people.

"They must have hidden in the area where the secret realm teleportation entrance is located," the Sea Emperor whispered in Gu Ding's ear. "The spatial teleportation entrance can only be supported by the spatial Stabilization Point of the secret realm. Although the teleportation channel was destroyed, that area of Stabilization Point is still safe. The people from the Heavenly God Palace also knew this, so they fled there as soon as they discovered that there was a problem with the secret realm."

"Vice Palace Lord Master, the Trial Space has been destroyed. What should we do about our competition?" A short-haired man who looked quite young suddenly asked.

Kornahan glanced at him, a hint of displeasure in his eyes, but he still spoke, "All matches are suspended. As for whether they will resume, that depends on our investigation. As for whether and when they will continue, that's up to the Palace Master to decide. We will inform you as soon as we have any news."

"What you need to do now is register. We need your cooperation in the investigation of this incident, and we will ask you questions one by one. We hope you can tell the truth, do not exaggerate the facts, and do not make things up. That will only cause trouble for our investigation. If we find anyone lying, I don't mind teaching them a lesson."

After speaking, Kornahan's cold gaze swept over the crowd, then he nodded to a Purple-Robed Man behind him, "Register them!"

Although Kornahan's gaze was intimidating, Gu Ding could clearly see that his aura was very weak, indicating that he had suffered severe injuries, though he concealed it very well. Gu Ding also noticed that it wasn't just this Vice Palace Lord who was severely injured, but also several elders. These were all people who had fought Deadpool before, which made him wonder who had killed Deadpool.

"Name?"

"Gu Lotte"

"Age?"

After completing the simple registration, the group was arranged by the Heavenly God Palace to stay in a palace within the Heavenly God Palace for receiving guests.

According to the Sea Emperor's detection results, even the True God-level participants did not receive this treatment. Clearly, these ninety-odd people were only allowed to stay because of their connection to the collapse of the secret realm, most likely simply for the purpose of facilitating questioning.

Gu Ding was fairly satisfied with the environment here, but strangely, according to the Sea Emperor's detection, the closer they got to the Heavenly God Palace, the weaker their sense of the Heavenly God Palace Master Celestine became.

Furthermore, the termination of the match made approaching Celestine impossible, prompting Gu Ding to consider how to get closer to Celestine. (To be continued~^~)