The chaotic void trembled without end.
Centered on the Nine-Colored World Gate of the Heavens, layer upon layer of spatial ripples spread outward, sweeping across millions of miles of boundless space. The Primordial Dao Qi, normally frozen in eternal stillness, erupted into chaos, surging like a raging sea. Countless tiny spatial rifts crisscrossed the void, constantly appearing, vanishing, and spreading.
Since the realms had been sealed off in the distant past, the Primal Chaos Domain that guarded the source of the Heavens had never experienced such a violent disturbance.
Standing on a lofty platform in the void, Lin Chen held his hands behind his back. His robes fluttered gently in the raging Dao winds, yet he stood like a pillar supporting the heavens, rooted in primordial chaos. No matter how the world turned upside down around him, he remained utterly unmoved.
His gaze was as calm as still water, fixed firmly on the trembling Nine-Colored World Gate.
That brief clash of auras just now had not been his imagination.
Beyond the realms, in the void, not only had the turbid Qi of evil demons dormant for ages begun to stir, but it also carried a trace of the Dao aura of the Ancient God-Demon Remnants, long since vanished from the river of time. These two utterly opposing forces, which should have been locked in a struggle to the death, had fused together and were battering the Supreme Seal he had personally laid down. The scheme behind this was far more terrifying than a mere invasion from the Outer Realm.
Rumble—
The World Gate continued to shudder.
Nine-colored divine light flickered on and off. The once orderly, tightly woven patterns of the Heavenly Dao had dimmed and fallen into disarray over a vast area. Countless ancient runes flashed frantically, emitting a hum that sounded on the verge of shattering. Black cracks spread across the seal barrier, slowly widening before his eyes.
Threads of ink-black turbid Qi seeped through the cracks. They landed without a sound, yet possessed an exceptionally strange corrosive power.
Wherever the turbid Qi passed, pure Primordial Dao Qi instantly rotted and turned foul, growing murky and violent. The Dao patterns of order in the void rapidly disintegrated and vanished, while the once-stable laws of space and time collapsed layer by layer. The order of the Heavenly Dao throughout the entire region was quietly thrown into disarray.
Lin Chen's gaze darkened slightly. He raised a hand and pressed down gently.
His formless, intangible Chaos Supreme power of the Dao spread quietly. It carried no earth-shaking might, yet bore the original authority that ruled over all Daos.
The raging Dao winds around him instantly subsided. The spreading spatial rifts all closed, and the chaotic currents of primordial energy settled once more. In just a few short breaths, the turbulent Primal Chaos Domain had returned to its age-old tranquility.
It seemed that everything had settled, but the tremor deep within the Nine-Colored World Gate had not ceased in the slightest.
Lin Chen's Supreme power had merely suppressed it by force, preventing its turbulent aura from leaking out and hiding it from every probing divine sense across the Heavens.
"Just closing your eyes and pretending it's not there."
Lin Chen murmured to himself, a cold glint passing through his eyes.
He knew that the surface disturbances could be easily quelled, but the hidden danger deep within the seal had already taken root. The barrier across the Heavens, built by an ancient seal, had long ago developed a breach after being secretly corroded over unknown ages.
The strands of ink-black turbid Qi that had seeped in seemed weak and scattered, but each one had taken root in the foundations of the various planes throughout the Heavens. They were difficult to eradicate.
He stopped watching and a point of golden light suddenly blazed between his brows.
His exceptionally pure chaotic divine sense surged forth like a tide, becoming a boundless net of the Heavenly Dao. It instantly enveloped the entire Primal Chaos Domain, then pierced through the cracks in the Nine-Colored World Gate's seal. Following the wisps of black turbid Qi, it traced them back to their source to find their ultimate origin.
His divine sense traveled through rifts in space and time, crossed layer upon layer of planar barriers, and swept over countless star domains and territories.
The myriad lower realms appeared peaceful, their lands stable and their many races thriving.
But under Lin Chen's incredibly penetrating divine sense, no hidden darkness could escape notice.
In every great world, every middle plane, and even the smallest remote realm, fine strands of black turbid Qi coiled around the depths of nearly every world's origin. They were extremely well concealed, blending perfectly with the fortune of the Heavenly Dao. They had evaded the scrutiny of every Heavenly Dao Saint and planar Supreme in existence, silently gnawing away at the foundations of the planes.
In some planes, fortune had shifted and the balance between good and evil had fallen apart, causing the numbers of demonic beasts and vicious creatures to inexplicably swell. In others, space and time had grown chaotic, with remnants of the past and future frequently appearing. And across many ancient forbidden grounds and dark abysses, the aura of death grew ever denser as ancient vicious creatures stirred from their slumber.
In the end, every one of these countless abnormalities could be traced back to this strange turbid Qi.
Tracing its source, digging deeper with every layer.
Lin Chen's divine sense finally pierced through the layers of sealed barriers and reached the untraveled void beyond the World Gate.
There was no Primordial Dao Qi, no order of space and time, and no sun, moon, or stars. There was only endless stillness and darkness.
Cold, desolate, and void—these were the only qualities of this realm.
Yet in the deepest part of this silent darkness, Lin Chen's divine sense caught sight of something utterly different.
The endless darkness had gathered into a boundless sea of turbid Qi. Its black waters churned and surged, giving off a terrifying aura that corroded the Heavenly Dao and annihilated the laws of nature. All the turbid Qi seeping into the myriad worlds of the Heavens originated from this Outer-Realm Turbid Sea.
At its very center floated a gigantic, dilapidated ancient hall.
The entire hall was a murky, blood-dark red, its bricks and stones mottled and its surface covered with cracks. Countless ancient, savage patterns of gods and demons were carved across it. Even after enduring the corrosive darkness of ages, it still retained an overwhelming, tyrannical power.
More than half of its doors had been shattered. Streams of ink-black turbid Qi poured from inside, merging into the Outer-Realm Turbid Sea before quietly seeping through the cracks in the seal and into the Heavens.
The instant Lin Chen's divine sense passed over the plaque above the hall, a line of blurred, incomplete ancient seal script slowly appeared before his eyes.
[Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin]
The moment he saw those four characters, countless sealed memories came rushing back to life in Lin Chen's mind.
In the distant past, when Heaven and Earth had first taken shape, gods and demons had risen together, and chaos had reigned.
It was a dark age when humanity had fallen into decline and gods and demons ruled supreme. The ancient races of gods and demons dominated the universe, waging endless wars, tearing the world apart, and trampling the lives of countless races beneath their feet. Countless planes shattered, the order of the Heavenly Dao collapsed, and the newly formed Heavens teetered on the brink of annihilation.
The Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin had been the central sanctuary of the ancient alliance of gods and demons, a symbol of the dark order of the bygone age.
Back then, he had ascended to the peak of chaos, swept through the evil demons beyond the realms, suppressed the turmoil of the ancient gods and demons, and razed countless demonic lairs. He had personally brought that dark and chaotic age to an end. He clearly remembered crushing the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin with a single palm, annihilating it along with countless leading figures among the gods and demons, leaving nothing but dust in the river of time.
The ancient demonic hall, which should have been utterly destroyed and ceased to exist, had reappeared deep in the void beyond the realms.
"The echoes of the bygone age have returned at last."
Lin Chen's eyes narrowed, and the deductions in his mind suddenly became clear.
This was not an invasion by some new dark force from beyond the realms.
These were the remnants of the chaos of ages past—the surviving power of gods and demons that had never been fully eradicated. After lying dormant for ages, they had quietly revived in the darkness beyond the realms and amassed their strength.
When the great war had ended, the Heavens had been left in ruins, with everything needing to be rebuilt. To stabilize the newborn Heavenly Dao and protect the myriad races, he had chosen to seal off the passages beyond the realms and fix the order of the Heavens in place, allowing all life to recover.
He had believed that every leading figure among the gods and demons had been wiped out and that the scattered remnants were nothing to fear. He had never imagined that the source of the demonic hall itself had survived, lying dormant beyond the realms for ages as it silently corroded the seal and secretly plotted against the Heavens.
They had endured for ten thousand years without making a sound. Now that they had struck, their first move was an upheaval that threatened to overturn the Heavens.
The instant Lin Chen's divine sense locked onto the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin—
Buzz!
The Outer-Realm Turbid Sea suddenly surged into a frenzy. From within the dilapidated ancient hall, an icy, ancient divine sense—hoarse with age—abruptly awoke and hurtled toward him!
"Chaos Supreme... You remain undying after all these ages. Just as I thought, you're still guarding this place."
The ancient voice crossed the dark void, filled with boundless venom, hatred, and resentment, and echoed throughout the entire space beyond the realms.
This divine sense was broken and feeble, yet it contained the overwhelming malice of the ancient age of gods and demons, steeped in the stillness and madness of countless ages.
It was the will of the surviving God-Demon Hall Master!
In the distant past, Lin Chen had grievously wounded him and left him on the brink of death. He had clung to life and lain dormant until now.
Lin Chen's divine sense did not waver as he faced the sinister, ancient remnant. His cool voice echoed through space and time. "A wretch clinging to life dares stir up trouble and disturb the peace of the Heavens?"
"Peace?"
The ancient remnant suddenly let out a low, eerie laugh. Its voice was hoarse and broken, filled with grief and madness.
"The peace you speak of is the agony of my people's destruction! The order you established is a prison cage that suppresses all things and shackles life! For countless ages, we've been trapped in darkness, corroded by the void and tormented day after day! Now that the seal has decayed and the Heavenly Dao is flawed, the order of the bygone age must return to the Heavens!"
As the words fell, the Outer-Realm Turbid Sea erupted!
Endless black turbid Qi shot into the sky, gathering into countless savage phantoms of gods and demons that hovered densely in the dark void. They took all manner of shapes, each formed from the remnants of an ancient god or demon. Their auras were violent and vicious, steeped in the murderous malice of countless ages.
The phantoms all threw back their heads and roared. Their overwhelming ferocity surged together, crashing into the sealed barrier across the Heavens!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Three earth-shaking blasts rang out in succession!
The Supreme Seal, already riddled with cracks, warped violently and caved in. Vast swathes of golden Dao patterns shattered and vanished. The black cracks in the seal barrier widened several times over in an instant, growing as broad as mountain gorges.
More and denser black turbid Qi poured through the cracks and into the Primordial Chaos Domain of the Heavens.
This time, the turbid Qi was no longer seeping in as a thin, faint trickle. It came surging through like floodwaters bursting through a breached dam!
In an instant, the winds and clouds in the Chaos Domain rose once more!
The void that had only just settled began to tremble again. The Dao aura across the entire region fell into utter disarray, and vast swathes of the pure Primordial Dao Qi were instantly stained black.
Countless powerful beings, ancient beasts, and remnants of darkness hidden along the Chaos Domain's borders were now in an uproar.
They could clearly sense the power of the World Gate's seal rapidly weakening, the terrifying aura of darkness from beyond the realms pouring in, and the age-old order of the Heavens beginning to loosen and collapse!
"The seal's broken!"
"The age of darkness is returning!"
"The chaos is coming! Fortune lies everywhere!"
Countless hidden divine senses stirred with greed, madness, fear, and excitement, their emotions filling the entire chaotic void.
In the countless planes of the lower realms, one upheaval of Heaven and Earth followed another.
Forbidden grounds awoke, and black fog filled the skies. Vicious creatures emerged, shaking the mountains and rivers. Heavenly phenomena erupted everywhere, while earthquakes, tribulations of lightning, and spatial storms appeared one after another. The myriad races were thrown into panic.
The turmoil across the Heavens had truly begun.
Standing on the lofty platform in the void, Lin Chen watched the cracks in the seal spread wildly. He felt the ancient malice of the gods and demons rushing toward him, but his expression remained calm. Only a glint of icy light flashed in the depths of his eyes.
The old enemy that had lain dormant for ages had emerged, and the plot concealed for ten thousand years had finally come to light.
But he feared nothing.
In the distant past, he had been able to raze the chaos of gods and demons and establish order across the Heavens. Now, his Dao body was perfected and his Dao power reached the heavens; his foundations far surpassed what they had been back then. Even if his old enemies returned and darkness descended once more, he could still suppress every foe and protect the Heavens.
Lin Chen slowly raised his right hand. The divine power of his chaotic origin flowed through his palm as countless Supreme Dao patterns appeared, blazing with golden light as they suppressed the darkness.
"You remnants have lurked in secret for ten thousand years."
"Today, I'll settle the old score from ages past."
At his words, the sound of the Dao thundered across the Heavens.
Just as he was about to reinforce the seal and purge the remnants of gods and demons beyond the realms, a sudden change erupted!
Deep within the surging, turbulent Outer-Realm Turbid Sea, at the lowest level of the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin, an exceedingly strange, unfathomably deep glow of dark purple slowly lit up.
The glow was incredibly faint, concealed within the boundless black turbid Qi. Even the newly awakened remnant of the God-Demon Hall Master had failed to notice it.
Yet in Lin Chen's eyes, which could see through all Daos, that purple light contained a level of power that surpassed the ancient gods and demons, surpassed the evil demons beyond the realms, and even transcended the understanding of the Heavens as they existed today.
Ancient, mysterious, boundless, vast.
What made Lin Chen's heart tighten was that the instant the dark purple light flickered, the Chaos Supreme Dao Seed within him, dormant for countless ages, trembled slightly for the first time, beyond his control.
At the same time, an exceedingly faint, ethereal heartbeat echoed from the ultimate darkness beyond the realms—the deepest, most distant place, untouchable by all.
Thump—
The heartbeat was as light as nothingness, yet it shook the past and present and stirred the origin of chaos!
Lin Chen's figure paused for the first time. An expression of grave disbelief flashed through his eyes.
He understood in an instant.
The revival of the Hall of Ten Thousand Demons' Return to Ruin, the upheaval of the Ancient God-Demon Remnants, the spread of the Heavens' Turbid Qi, and the weakening of the World Gate's seal...
None of this had ever been the endgame of this scheme that had spanned countless ages.
It was merely a ruse to draw him in and test the limits of the Heavens!
The being truly dormant in the ultimate darkness beyond the realms—the ultimate terror powerful enough to overturn the Heavens across countless ages and shake the foundations of his Supreme Dao—had only just begun to show signs of awakening.
At the end of the darkness, an unknown game had quietly begun.
Before you continue