(P.S. I made a small change to the previous chapter: the Nine-Colored Goddess died too.)
In the past, beneath the sky screen, there was deathly silence.
When the God of Food's final words, "Asura God! Poseidon! May neither of you die a good death!" rang out from the sky screen, the entire Douluo Continent seemed to freeze.
The wind stopped, the birds fell silent, and even the rivers seemed to stop flowing.
Then all hell broke loose.
"The God of Food... is dead?" Flender stood on the Shrek Academy's training grounds, his lips trembling. It took him a long moment to squeeze out the words. "That was the God of Food... a deity of the Divine Realm... and he was beaten to death by a bunch of mortals just like that?"
"And the Nine-Colored Goddess... she smashed her head against a rock..." Dai Mubai's face was pale, his voice hoarse. "She was a goddess... even with her cultivation reset to zero, she was still a goddess... and just like that..."
He couldn't go on.
Ma Hongjun hugged his arms and shuddered. "I've got goosebumps all over... those were two deities, caught by a bunch of mortals. The man was beaten to death, and the woman smashed her head to death... that's just too..."
"Too tragic," Oscar finished, his expression troubled as well. "Even though they were deities too, how should I put it... seeing that made me feel a little uncomfortable."
"So what if they were gods?" Yu Xiaogang's voice was perfectly calm. "The sky screen has already proven that deities can die, and that mortals can beat them to death. The Divine Punishment of Equality for All Beings, equality for all beings... those four words are no joke."
"Every living being's cultivation was reset to zero, and every Soul Master lost their Soul Power. They all hate the deities who caused it. That hatred needs an outlet, and the deities are that outlet."
"In those people's eyes, the deities are the culprits."
Beneath the sky screen, similar discussions rose and fell across the Douluo Continent.
"The God of Food is dead... and so is the Nine-Colored Goddess..."
"This is too unbelievable. Two deities, killed just like that..."
"Yeah... they were deities, and they were beaten to death just like that..."
"It seems those two were wrongly blamed! They weren't the culprits!"
"That's right! At the end, the God of Food seemed to curse Asura God and the Sea God, and he said it was all their fault..."
"I heard it too. Asura God and the Sea God... were they the ones who brought down the divine punishment?"
"The God of Food said it just before he died. Surely it can't be false?"
"It must be true! So it was Asura God and the Sea God who caused the divine punishment to descend!"
"The Sea God? Isn't Tang San the Sea God? Then it must be the original Sea God..."
Sea God Island.
Bo Saixi stood atop Sea God Mountain, as if her bones had been pulled from her body.
She had heard the God of Food's final words.
"Asura God! Poseidon! May neither of you die a good death!"
Poseidon. Lord Sea God.
Was Lord Sea God, whom she had worshipped all her life, one of the culprits who had brought down the divine punishment?
"Lord Sea God... you... how could you..."
She murmured under her breath, her voice so hoarse it was barely audible.
She truly hadn't expected Lord Sea God to have interfered in the lower realm.
Lord Sea God was the one who had brought down the divine punishment.
For the first time, Bo Saixi's faith in the Sea God began to crumble.
Divine Realm Core.
Qian Yuhan, the Angel God, and Ye Si, the Rakshasa God, were also watching the sky screen.
After they saw what had happened to the God of Food and the Nine-Colored Goddess, both their expressions changed subtly.
Qian Yuhan pressed her lips together, an emotion she herself was unwilling to acknowledge flickering in her golden eyes.
Relief.
She thought of what had happened to her future self: Wu Wei had pinned her to the ground, demanded that she become his maid, and taken her to an inn to rent a room. At the time, she had considered it a disgrace beyond measure and wanted nothing more than to tear Wu Wei to pieces.
But now, seeing the fate of the God of Food and the Nine-Colored Goddess, she suddenly felt...
Perhaps my future self didn't have it so bad after all?
At least she was still alive.
At least she only had to face Wu Wei.
"Asura God, Sea God!"
"So you were the culprits!"
The God of Food's accusations broke the silence. He stepped forward and glared at Asura God and the Sea God. "If it weren't for you, my wife and I wouldn't have died in the future!"
"You're the ones who got us killed!"
The God of Food accused them, furious beyond measure.
Although he and his wife, the Nine-Colored Goddess, were still perfectly fine now, watching everything that had happened on the sky screen made his heart pound with fear. He was afraid the same thing would still happen in the future.
So the God of Food couldn't tolerate the culprits who had caused it all.
"Asura God, you should admit it now, shouldn't you?"
"You were one of the culprits who caused the divine punishment to descend in the future!"
Seeing the God of Food step forward, the Rakshasa God was even less inclined to hold back. She stepped forward as well and began questioning Asura God.
"And you, Sea God!"
"You were one of the culprits too!"
The Angel God also stepped forward and angrily rebuked the Sea God.
The Rakshasa God was at odds with Asura God, and the Angel God was at odds with the Sea God. Now that they had seized the chance, of course they wouldn't pass up the opportunity to curse them out.
Besides, they really were furious.
In the future shown on the sky screen, after the divine punishment reset their levels to zero, the two of them were humiliatingly captured by a mortal and made to serve as maids, and were even taken to warm his bed.
Faced with the accusations and questioning from the God of Food, the Angel God, and the Rakshasa God, Asura God and the Sea God's expressions were unsightly indeed.
The Sea God Poseidon's hands trembled slightly, and cold sweat beaded on his temples.
Asura God remained expressionless, standing there like a silent mountain.
Accused in public, both of them truly felt they had lost all face.
The other gods looked at one another.
The God of War wanted to put in a good word for Asura God, but he opened his mouth and found he didn't know what to say.
Everyone in the Divine Realm Core had heard the God of Food's final words on the sky screen loud and clear.
"Very well, what they said is right!"
"Asura God, Sea God!"
"The evidence is conclusive now. What do you two have to say for yourselves?"
The God of Destruction stepped forward next, intending to make Asura God and the Sea God admit their mistakes and then punish them.
"Destruction." The Goddess of Life suddenly spoke. Her voice was quiet, but it stopped the God of Destruction in his tracks. "The sky screen hasn't finished showing everything yet. What the God of Food said is only one side of the story. We'll have to keep watching to learn the truth."
The God of Destruction glanced at her and couldn't help clenching his fists. Why did his wife refuse to stand on his side every single time?
"Wisdom, tell us: does what the sky screen just showed count as evidence?"
For the moment, the God of Destruction didn't want to speak to his wife, so he turned to the God of Wisdom instead.
The God of Wisdom pushed up his glasses. He really didn't want to get involved in the affairs of the god kings.
But then he thought of the Divine Punishment of Equality for All Beings on the sky screen...
So the God of Wisdom spoke. "Everyone saw what the sky screen just showed, didn't they?"
"What the God of Food said is quite credible!"
"Didn't the sky screen show earlier that Tang San had died once and his body was resurrected?"
"Mortals couldn't possibly possess that ability. The ones who possess the Resurrection Divine Light are the God of Food and his wife, so the God of Food and his wife weren't wrongly blamed at all. They must have had a hand in interfering with the lower realm too."
"But they weren't related to Tang San, so why would they secretly help resurrect him?"
"Tang San is the future Sea God."
"Then it isn't hard to guess. The Sea God must have asked them for help..."
"So the Sea God is certainly one of those responsible in the future."
"Since the God of Food cursed the Sea God and Asura God, presumably he wouldn't have wrongly blamed Asura God either..."
"Everyone also saw that Xiao Wu inherit Asura God's divine position earlier."
"Judging by the situation on the future battlefield, Tang San had lost and had already been killed!"
"So it isn't hard to deduce that Asura God and the Sea God probably didn't want to see their inheritors lose, which is why they secretly stepped in to help them."
"Asura God and the Sea God were the ones who caused the divine punishment to descend in the future!"
"The God of Food and the Nine-Colored Goddess were accomplices too."