With those words, all of eternity fell silent.
The heavens and earth, which had just been convulsing and crumbling amid a raging tide of baleful energy, abruptly sank into utter stillness beneath that ancient whisper from the void beyond the Outer Realm.
The howling wind died. The cracks froze in place. The Heavenly Dao's divine radiance and the aura of Destiny Return to Void, surging across the sky, ground to a halt. Every scene of slaughter, confrontation, and destruction seemed to have been paused by an invisible hand.
Lin Chen stood at the center of the void. The Ancestral Seal's power, surging through him, abruptly stopped, and an unprecedented tempest stirred in his heart.
The Dual Seals returned to their places. The endgame began.
The one being judged was not the Heavenly Dao of all creation, but the Chess Game Player who had slumbered for countless ages.
Those two sentences shattered every belief that had endured since time immemorial.
He had thought the False Heaven Chess Players had laid out the game, and that the Heavenly Dao was the ultimate power in this world. Breaking free of Myriad Chess Reincarnation and opposing True Heaven's selfish designs should have marked the end of the path to defying fate.
But only now did he finally understand: from beginning to end, everyone had been trapped within layer upon layer of nested Double-Layer Chess Games.
The Out-of-Domain Chess Player had been the one moving the pieces in the outer game.
The supreme True Heaven had controlled the inner world.
Yet whether Chess Players or True Heaven, in the end, they were all pieces on someone else's board!
The true mastermind, the one who had slumbered for countless ages while arranging everything, was the Original Chess Player!
"No wonder... No wonder True Heaven calculated everything, yet still couldn't escape fate's backlash."
Lin Chen's mind trembled. The Ancient Remnant Soul in his sea of consciousness shook violently, its hoarse voice carrying bone-deep realization and sorrow.
"Back then, I sent a wisp of my origin into the Ancestral Seal. I knew only that the Heavenly Dao concealed its selfishness and the chess game harmed people, so I always thought True Heaven was the ultimate culprit. I never imagined it, too, was merely a puppet pushed onto the stage!"
True Heaven seemed to rule over all eternity, arrange the world, scheme against all living beings, dilute fate, and enjoy boundless glory. In truth, from beginning to end, it had merely worked for the Original Chess Player, bearing the game's karmic burden and shielding its master from the backlash of the ages!
At the highest reaches of the void, the Eye of True Heaven had lost all its detachment and authority.
In that moment, it was no longer enraged, no longer bent on killing. It was left only with utter shock, bewilderment, and terror that reached down to its very origin.
It had lived through countless ages and arranged billions of cycles. It had considered itself the rightful ruler of the world, the one true immortal across all realms, and had done everything in its power to transcend and attain immortality. It had schemed over the game, exploited all living beings, and resisted fate, convinced that each step brought it closer to the peak of the Great Dao.
But the cold truth shattered all its arrogance.
It was not the one controlling the game. It was merely a top-tier piece on the board, meant to keep the game in balance and bear the backlash.
Its work through the ages, its schemes, its selfish ambitions—all along, it had merely been toiling for someone else!
"Impossible... Absolutely impossible!"
For the first time, True Heaven's vast will wavered in panic. Its disbelieving, obsessive roar echoed through heaven and earth. "This sovereign gave rise to the world's origin and commands the rules of all realms. I transcend the cycles of life and death! Who could scheme against me? Who could imprison an Innate True Heaven?!"
It couldn't accept such an absurd truth.
The lofty Heavenly Dao had become someone else's puppet, and the grand design of the ages had become someone else's plaything.
Below, Kallen, Frieza, and the Golden Super Saiyan stood frozen in the void, their blood and energy stilled, their minds utterly blank.
They had come so far—from fighting cosmic enemies to breaking free of the Saiyan destiny, then opposing the Supremes of the Heavens and tearing apart the Myriad Chess Game. They had thought each breakthrough had freed them from another shackle and brought them one step closer to the truth.
Now they had discovered that beyond every shackle lay another, and beyond every chess game, another game.
Defying Heaven and changing fate, following the Anti-Dao Heart—before the Double-Layer Chess Game, it all seemed as insignificant as a joke.
High above the Ninth Heaven, the Seven Supremes looked ashen. The Dao hearts they had cultivated for countless ages were fractured beyond repair.
They had followed the Heavenly Dao, revered it, and spent their lives comprehending it. Only today did they learn that the very Heaven they had revered and followed was itself a helpless pawn. The order that had governed the Heavens for countless ages was, from its very roots, a deception.
Beside them, the Chaos King's massive body shuddered violently as endless torrents of chaos surged, carrying the fury and resentment of primordial disorder.
Chaos had existed since the world's beginning. It was the oldest and most primordial force. Yet even the birth of chaos and the existence of disorder had long ago been written into the rules of someone's game.
Beyond the void of the Outer Realm, the Myriad Chess Player—whose origin had been steadily fading as he struggled to survive—fell completely silent.
He had commanded countless chess games, toyed with living beings throughout the ages, and prided himself on transcending the Heavens and looking down upon all. Yet he was nothing more than a lower-ranking piece than the Heavenly Dao, expendable at any moment.
The Double-Layer Chess Game had locked everything in place, layer upon layer.
The upper layer bound the Heavenly Dao; the lower trapped all living beings.
Not a single soul across the ages had escaped.
Amid the deathly silence, the Out-of-Domain Destiny Shadow slowly stirred and unfurled.
Two glimmers from the Ancestral Seals—utterly different, yet sharing the same origin—peeled away from the depths of the void and slowly rose.
One was dark and restrained, ancient and vast: the Cage-Inside Ancestral Seal, nurtured in Lin Chen's chest, freed from its cage, and steadfast in its heart.
The other was clear and translucent, suspended beyond the Outer Realm: the Cage-Outside Ancestral Seal, bearing fate and lying dormant in the void.
The Dual Seals faced each other across the boundary, answering one another from afar.
Hum—!
Two deep, weighty notes of the Dao rang out at once, crossing the ages and piercing the barriers of the Double-Layer Chess Game.
The two glimmers instantly burst into ten thousand zhang of radiance, one dark and one bright, one within and one without. They intertwined into a path of absolute light that spanned heaven and earth, linking the real and the illusory.
The baleful aura of Destiny Return to Void, which had ravaged the world and dissolved all things, shed its violence and destructive force the instant the Dual Seals resonated. It became the purest primordial origin power and surged along the path of light into this world.
The origins of the living beings True Heaven had forcibly stolen, now on the verge of dissipating, and the vitality of the Great Dao suppressed by the Heavenly Dao were drawn by the Dual Seals' power. One by one, they returned to their rightful places and were reborn.
The torn barriers between heaven and earth, the shattered laws of the myriad realms, and the depleted spiritual energy of the mountains and rivers began to mend and revive at a visible pace.
The Dual Seals' power transcended the Heavenly Dao, the chess game, and fate.
Within this Double-Layer Chess Game, it was the sole force beyond anyone's control—the only primordial power from outside the game!
The Ancestral Seal on Lin Chen's chest burned fiercely. An endless flood of information welled up from the depths of its origin, and countless truths sealed away for ages rushed into his sea of consciousness.
In ancient times, there had never been any so-called birth of the Heavenly Dao or natural creation of the world.
The Original Chess Player had opened up chaos, divided the myriad realms, and personally constructed the first layer: the Myriad Chess Reincarnation game.
To stabilize the game, restrain chaotic disorder, and dilute the backlash of reincarnation, it had personally brought forth True Heaven, laid down the rules of the Heavenly Dao, and built a second cage of order for the world.
One game, one Heaven—two layers binding all realms.
The Chess Player had hidden deep within the void and slept through the ages, letting the game run on its own and the Heavenly Dao evolve by itself. It had coldly watched billions of living beings pass through death and reincarnation, harvesting the fruits of the Great Dao that had accumulated through layer upon layer of chess games.
The two Ancestral Seals were the only opposing origins the Chess Player had overlooked when it first created the game. They were the sole variables capable of transcending the entire system.
One had fallen inside the cage, hidden within the origins of all living beings, awaiting the awakening of the one who would defy fate.
The other had sunk beyond the cage, merged with Destiny Return to Void, and awaited the day of the endgame.
Throughout the ages, the Chess Player had remained asleep, letting True Heaven and the Chess Players keep each other in check, letting the Heavens and Chaos wage war against each other, and letting all living beings endure endless cycles of suffering.
It never fought, never grasped, never showed itself, never revealed its presence. It had only waited for the ultimate moment, when the Dual Seals returned to their places and the variable reached completion.
"So that's how it is... All the suffering, all the struggles, all the defiance of fate—every bit of it was a variable it had deliberately awaited."
Lin Chen slowly opened his eyes. They were clear and lucid; he saw through every fog that had shrouded the ages.
His defiance of the Dao had not been a coincidence. The Ancestral Seal's awakening had not been luck. The game's collapse had not been an accident, and fate's arrival had not been a calamity.
From the moment he was born, awakened his heart, and began to struggle against the current, he had already fallen into the Original Chess Player's ultimate scheme.
He was the one and only Fate Defier of the ages—and the ultimate variable the Chess Player had awaited for all those ages.
At the highest reaches of the void, True Heaven watched the Dual Seals resonate, the world mend, and its rules rewritten. At last, it fully understood the reality before it.
Its vaunted Heavenly Dao power, authority over the rules, and immortal Dao fruits were nothing before the Dual Seals' primordial origin.
Every selfish scheme and every plot it had laid over countless ages had merely paved the way for the Chess Player's endgame.
Its overwhelming resentment and fury finally shattered its Dao heart.
"This sovereign will not accept this!!"
A roar of Heavenly Dao fury, echoing across the ages, exploded as every remnant of its origin went berserk.
True Heaven abandoned its attempt to seize the foundations of all living beings and gave up resisting fate's backlash. It no longer sought immortality or transcendence. Now it had only one obsession—
To tear apart the game and break free of its control. Even if it meant mutual destruction, it would sever its fate as a chess piece!
Golden divine light from the Heavenly Dao gathered wildly across the sky, forming the ultimate Heavenly Dao Sword, which pierced through billions of dimensions. Its point was aimed not at the fate beyond the Outer Realm, nor at the people of the world, but at the Chess Player's origin, sleeping in the depths of the void!
"You imprisoned me for ages, toyed with me for ages, used me for ages! Today, I will overturn your game and destroy its foundations!"
True Heaven had gone completely mad. It poured out the power it had accumulated over the ages and launched a desperate counterattack against the ultimate being behind the scenes.
The Heavenly Dao Sword tore through the void, bearing all the resentment and fury of an Innate Heavenly Dao.
But just as the Heavenly Dao Sword was about to rush into the void beyond the Outer Realm and touch the Chess Player's origin—
The path of light between the Dual Seals suddenly blazed a hundred times brighter.
The two forces of the Ancestral Seals, one light and one dark, intertwined and converged. They became an absolute barrier stretching across the Heavens, suppressing Chaos and freezing fate in place.
Bang—!
The supreme Heavenly Sword slammed into the barrier. Countless cracks in the Heavenly Dao burst open, and the sword's violent force immediately rebounded upon True Heaven itself.
Its supreme Heavenly Dao body trembled violently. Divine light shattered inch by inch, and for the first time, True Heaven's origin suffered irreversible damage!
With a single strike, the maddened Heavenly Dao was completely suppressed by the Dual Seals!
The Eye of True Heaven dimmed and trembled in the void. Its ancient majesty had vanished completely.
The Double-Layer Chess Game held it in check. The primordial origin crushed it. A chess piece could never rise against the Chess Player, and the Heavenly Dao could never break through the Dual Seals' restraints.
The outcome was settled. Nothing could be reversed.
Between heaven and earth, every living being stared blankly at the two Ancestral Seals slowly drawing together in the center of the void, their hearts filled with conflicting emotions.
The deception had been exposed, and layer upon layer of shackles had been revealed. But freedom was not what awaited them—only a deeper despair.
The old Heavenly Dao had collapsed, and the old chess game had been destroyed, but the true Chess Player had awakened.
Lin Chen floated quietly in the void, feeling the burning connection between the two seals of the same origin and the primordial power surging rapidly within him.
He could clearly sense himself stepping further away from the realm of ordinary living beings, the constraints of the game, and the Heavenly Dao's jurisdiction—becoming a new existence that stood above the Double-Layer Chess Game.
But this transcendence was not freedom. It was another, deeper form of entanglement.
Deep within the void beyond the Outer Realm, the ancient, indifferent whisper sounded once more. It was no longer concealed or indistinct; its calm, icy words heralded the opening of the endgame.
"The Double-Layer Chess Game is over. The preparations of the ages are complete."
"The Dual Seals are united. The variable is complete."
"My slumber ends. The Third Ultimate Chess Game officially begins anew."
As the words fell, the two Ancestral Seals, separated by the boundary for countless ages, shot toward each other.
And in the final instant before the seals touched and united, Lin Chen suddenly realized in horror—
His soul, his heart, his obsession with defying the Dao—all were rising beyond his control, forcibly drawn by the seals' origin.
He was not the one who had broken the game.
He was the new, sole Chess Core that would restart the Third Ultimate Chess Game!
The true endgame had never been the destruction of the Heavenly Dao or the shattering of the chess game.
It was him—replacing True Heaven and the old Chess Players, becoming the new, inescapable core of the game that governed all creation!
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