Inside the main hall of the Chaos First Palace, the Return to the Abyss Main Disc hangs beneath the dome, with myriad chaotic patterns resembling a slowly rotating galaxy. Yun Qiusheng stands with his hands behind his back in the center of the array plate, his eyes closed, his mind already focused on the Fate Soul connection with Ling Liangyan.
That wisp of Fate Soul light, originally as faint as a star, was still flickering with difficulty. One breath. Two breaths.
During the third breath, the spark flickered, as if it were being tightly gripped by an invisible giant hand.
Yun Qiusheng's brow suddenly tightened.
The air inside the hall seemed to freeze instantly, and the chaotic Dao energy surged around him in layers of swirling patterns, as if the entire main hall was fighting for the last glimmer of life for that Fate Soul.
Suddenly, the light trembled violently. Then, it dimmed inch by inch, like a candle flame being swallowed by darkness.
Until it was completely extinguished, the Chaos Main Plate inside the hall emitted a very low mournful cry, and the light patterns suddenly broke.
"Liangyan--!"
Vice Hall Master Yun Yanxi cried out, her voice echoing through the hall, carrying an undisguised tremor. Yun Qiusheng slowly opened his eyes.
Those eyes, once as calm as an abyss, now blazed with fury. "Thought Severance Devouring Emperor..."
His voice was deep, yet it felt like the sky was pressing down.
The next moment, he turned to look at Yun Yanxi, his gaze as cold as a blade.
"Yanxi, I have transmitted the information that the Thought Severance Devouring Emperor is hiding above the Black Sea to the entire Void Obliteration Domain."
The major temples and sects have already set off. Qin Yu and his group must have arrived first.
He raised his hand. The array patterns around the Chaos Main Hall suddenly lit up, and layers of light curtains rose up, as if a giant beast that had been sleeping for thousands of years had opened its eyes.
"Immediately activate the palace protection formation and seal all dimensional gates. From this moment on, Chaos First Palace enters a state of combat readiness." "Yes!" Yun Yanxi replied in a deep voice.
Meanwhile, above the Black Sea in the Void Obliteration Domain.
The sea was as black as Endless Abyss, its surging waves seemingly swallowing stars. The sky hung low, thunderclouds pressed down, and a barely perceptible rift appeared above the Black Sea —the forcibly isolated barrier of the Transcendent Five-Dimensional Space.
The army of the Chaos First Palace has arrived. Countless figures hover above the Black Sea, their formation as solid as a mountain, their auras intertwined, causing the waves to collapse.
At the very front of the group, two figures stood side by side. One was dressed in white, his aura calm yet Qin Yu sharp edge concealed.
The other person had a solemn expression, and his chaotic aura was steady and heavy— Yun Yanwan, the Chaos First Palace.
Qin Yu's gaze locked onto the hidden boundary wall above the void, his voice low yet clear, echoing throughout the array in front of him.
"Palace Master, let's join forces and shatter this barrier to the Transcendent Five-Dimensional Space." Yun Yanwan nodded. "Yes, alright."
Their auras surged simultaneously, the clouds above the Black Sea began to churn wildly, and a deep, abyss-like echo faintly emanated from beneath the surface.
However, at this very moment
Boom! The sky behind them suddenly exploded.
Beams of light pierced through the distant sky, tearing the clouds to shreds and causing the vast sky to tremble.
The massive army surged forward like a torrent.
Qin Yu and Yun Yanwan turned around at the same time.
The arriving force Silent Nothingness Divine Hall army.
At the forefront, a man with an aura as steady as the cold currents of an abyss stepped through the air, his black robe billowing.
With eyes as sharp as knives, Li Cangming, an elder of the Silent Nothingness Divine Hall, Chaos Realm · Middle Stage.
To his right, a woman with flowing robes and an aura that was restrained yet oppressive to heaven and earth stood tall— Li Yanzi, the deputy temple master of the Silent Nothingness Divine Hall, at the Stainless Realm · Ultimate.
Jin Hanyan.
Her figure was like a still pool reflecting the moon, her aura clear yet unfathomable. Thousands upon thousands of disciples of the Silent Nothingness Divine Hall followed closely behind, their ranks orderly and their momentum overwhelming.
Before the two armies had even fully clashed, Jin Hanyan's figure had already vanished from the spot.
The next instant, she appeared before Qin Yu. A slight breeze stirred, and she softly spoke, "Yu."
That one sound spoke volumes.
The coldness in Qin Yu's eyes softened in that instant. He raised his hand, his fingertips gently touching her cheek, the warmth of his palm spreading through her.
"You're here, Yan'er." The two looked at each other, but said nothing more.
Yet it seemed as if heaven and earth had frozen in that moment. And on the other side...
Yun Yanwan had already taken a step forward and stood opposite Li Yanzi.
The two hall masters' auras intertwined, yet there was not a trace of hostility between them.
Li Yanzi nodded slightly. "The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor will surely perish today, and the Silent Nothingness Divine Hall will show no mercy."
Yun Yanwan's gaze was as firm as iron. "The same applies to the Chaos First Palace."
The two simultaneously unleashed their auras, causing a sudden storm to rise above the Black Sea. At this moment, they had only one goal: to completely Annihilation the Thought Severance Devouring Emperor.
Within the Transcendent Five-Dimensional Space, countless restrictions, like an inverted obsidian curtain, pressed down on the blood-red altar. The array patterns intertwined into "Daoist veins" that did not belong to the mortal world, each breathing out dark red and gray-black mist, like the tides of the ancient Dead Sea breathing here.
The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor stood atop the highest point of the altar, his black robes seemingly twisted from the void of night. His long, silvery-white hair cascaded down like a waterfall of frost, and a halo of light, thin as a crescent moon forgotten by the world, hung above his forehead. Fine stardust and shards of ice danced around the halo, making his almost pale face appear even more indifferent, while his eyes were like two empty cavities in the deep sea.
Its weight was so profound it could drag all thoughts into the abyss. It looked down at Ling Liangyan, whose breath was already fading in the center of the altar, its lips expressionless, yet its voice was like a cold wind blowing from the ends of the world. "Alright, Silent Profundity Self-Proving Cause Seed. Now, you will lead the various Demon Race out to meet those ant-like humans."
Upon hearing the sound, the ten celestial demons simultaneously raised their heads, their auras converging as if ten crimson Heavenly Abyss had instantly closed in. Their figures didn't flee, but were instead swallowed whole by the extraterrestrial laws carried by their own Fate Soul. Black mist and scarlet patterns intertwined to form ten rifting shadows.
In a flash, they disappeared into the depths of space, leaving only the echoing array patterns reverberating gently in the void like the tolling of a bell, as if foreshadowing the impending slaughter.
The altar suddenly Space Silence, leaving only the Thought Severance Devouring Emperor. It slowly raised its hand, and as its five fingers spread, what dripped from between them was not light, but rather thin, almost invisible, grayish-white threads. These threads did not entangle.
Yet, it was shrouded in the chilling aura of "causality failing." With a gentle nudge, the altar base hummed and groaned, as if a door that had been suppressed for countless eons was turning over underground.
The next instant, the restrictions beneath the altar were peeled away layer by layer, like peeling back a cocoon Blood Immersion: first, the dark gold patterns went out, then the gray-black chains coiled on them broke silently, and when the last seal dissipated, even the space seemed to gasp, emitting a very soft "hiss--" sound.
A bead slowly rose from the depths of the barrier.
It was crystal clear, yet it had long lost the meaning of "completeness." The surface of the bead was covered with spiderweb-like gray-black cracks, each crack resembling a wound left by something gnawing from within; the void within the bead was no longer deep or boundless, but rather presented a morbid dark gray.
It was as if the abyss, once capable of bearing the Annihilation of all realms, had been hollowed out, leaving only weary and broken remnants. Fine, gray wisps of wind occasionally escaped from the cracks. These wisps had no direction, no form, and vanished as soon as they appeared, not even qualifying as power, like abandoned "remnants of failure."
The bead no longer feels cold or ethereal, but rather has a strange, sticky feel. It is not the stickiness of matter, but a silent yearning for "filling," "devouring," and "completing." It floats in the air and sways slightly, as if it might fall at any moment. The surrounding space is constantly distorted as a result, and tiny cracks appear repeatedly and are forcibly stitched up, revealing an extremely unstable and precarious state.
The Annihilation Realm-Breaking Pearl.
The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor stared at it for a long time, as if gazing at a broken shell that could still rewrite the life and death of countless worlds. Then, it raised its other hand, its palm slowly opening—there was no physical object there, only a tiny speck of "rift-colored" dust, somewhere between reality and illusion, dancing within it. It was so transparent that it was almost invisible, yet it rendered all cause and effect within a three-foot radius ineffective, as if time and space were being held still. That was the Silent Profundity Self-Proving Cause Seed.
It does not emit light, yet it keeps all light away; it has no weight, yet it can press down on the void to create fine wrinkles; it hangs in the palm of your hand like a lotus embryo, its outer edge sometimes cracking and sometimes closing, as if "the end" and "the Unborn" are interlocking and proving each other within it.
"Come on." The voice of the Thought Severance Devouring Emperor was extremely soft, like a drop of ice falling into the deep sea, yet it caused the array patterns of the entire altar to light up at the same time. Dark red and gray-black intertwined to form a huge ring array. As the ring array rotated, it brought up countless shattered runes, like a reversed rain of blood spreading in the air.
Its palm tilted slightly, and the Cause Seed did not fall. Instead, it resonated with the cracks around the bead. The cracks, like hungry mouths, opened all at once, their gray-black edges trembling, emitting a faint but sharp hiss.
Cause Seed if hearing the "possibility" of a summons, Yin Zhong trembled slightly, and the transparent crack instantly stretched into an extremely thin line. One end of the line was still in the Devouring Emperor's palm, while the other end had silently pierced into the deepest crack in the bead.
The first change occurs when "cause and effect return to zero".
The area around the rift should have been a desolate dead zone, but under the pull of the Cause Seed, a very shallow "blank" suddenly emerged from the rift. The blank was neither light nor black, but rather "nothingness" that seemed to have erased all traces of what had ever happened. The gray-black wounds at the edge of the rift seemed to have had their rotten flesh suddenly pulled out, first contracting violently, and then gradually fading away their morbid dark gray.
The weary, lingering void inside the bead was forced to halt its collapse the instant the blank space appeared, like something on the verge of death suddenly gaining a moment to breathe.
The spatial distortion around the crack also eased, and the recurring tiny cracks were gradually "smoothed out" by the blank space, as if an invisible hand was rebuilding the causal framework. It was not about repairing old wounds, but about first reducing all the causes and effects of the old wounds to zero, and then rebuilding from zero.
With a gentle flick of his fingertips, Thought Severance Devouring Emperor's blankness instantly spread into a spiderweb shape, extending along the cracks in the bead. Wherever it passed, the gray-black cracks gradually became shallower, as if the bloodstains had been washed away. The "residual breath of failure" within the cracks also stopped dissipating under the suppression of the blankness, as if it had been forcibly pressed back into the depths of the bead.
At that moment, the entire bead seemed to emit a silent groan, and the speed at which the surrounding space was stitched together suddenly accelerated. The distorted interface, like melting wax, was straightened again, and the array patterns above the altar became clearer, like a celestial net being woven back together.
The second change occurs in the "grafting of existence".
The Cause Seed did not remain in a particular crack; it was like a walking "proof," slowly moving along the core fissures and veins inside the bead. With each step it took, a "broken" blank space was erased.
The original continuity of the broken bead was forcibly stitched together during this shifting process, as if a torn timeline was being stitched back together, old and new cracks no longer separated from each other, but connected by a line of the same crack color, forming a chilling "seamless connection".
If the first level is about rebuilding the skeleton from scratch, then the second level is about reconnecting the broken "progress of existence," so that the bead no longer resembles a broken vessel, but rather a "nucleus of Annihilation" that can still function.
At this moment, the spiderweb-like cracks on the surface of the bead suddenly vibrated in unison, and extremely faint silver-gray lines emerged from the depths of the cracks, like veins drawn from countless broken Fate Soul, intertwining with each other and finally converging into a tiny vortex in the center of the bead.
As the vortex appeared, the distortion of the surrounding space abruptly stopped, and even the void within the sickly dark gray bead slightly contracted, as if searching for a new location of "depth." The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor's gaze darkened, and his palm clenched suddenly, causing the rift line to tighten abruptly.
This entanglement, which forcibly binds the fates of the old and new holders to the same invisible string, is not out of emotion or attachment, but to erase the "interruption" to the point that even existence cannot be remembered as having ever been interrupted.
The third change occurs during "Annihilation and rebirth".
The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor slowly bent down, the halo around his forehead swirling gently. From the deepest part of the altar, ripples of gray-black light suddenly rose, and within the ripples, it seemed as if countless fragments of "the true meaning of Annihilation" were churning. He placed his palm close to the bead, not as a touch, but to allow the "seed" of the Cause Seed to completely fall into the core crack of the bead.
In an instant, the entire bead seemed to be pierced by some indescribable coldness. The sickly dark gray inside the bead was suddenly torn open by an extremely thin "colorless crack." The crack did not belong to any light or darkness, but it was as if the bead had been pulled out of time and space.
The spatial cracks around the bead no longer reappeared, but were replaced by a higher-level "drifting state": the bead did not truly disappear, but seemed to become a speck of dust "Does Not Exist in any space or time", suspended outside of cause and effect, stuck in an eternal moment that was both about to collapse and about to be repaired, remaining on the threshold of "about to be repaired" without falling or advancing.
At that very moment, the spiderweb-like gray-black cracks on the surface of the bead suddenly froze, as if frozen in time and space; then, those cracks began to converge little by little from the very edges, the gray-black color being swallowed back into the depths of the fissures, replaced by an extremely faint, extremely clear crystalline pattern—a pattern that was not dazzling.
It was as if "Annihilation" had been purified from its destroyed form, returning to a purer, sharper, and more complete state. The dark gray of the void within the bead gradually faded, and a profound black reappeared, but it was no longer a morbid, powerless black; rather, it was like an "Annihilation Abyss" capable of swallowing all worlds and containing their ultimate end.
The once-dissipating gray wisps of wind have disappeared, the silent yearning within the cracks has been quelled, the "viscous" feel of the bead has vanished, replaced by an Ultimate coldness and clarity, as if it no longer begs for completion, but has regained the right to dominate completion and Annihilation.
Finally, the Cause Seed -colored dust slowly sank to the core of the bead, like a transparent lotus bud closing in an abyss. The instant the lotus closed, a very thin halo of gray-silver light rose from the outer edge of the bead. The halo had no temperature, yet it caused all the array patterns on the entire altar to simultaneously submit and bow down, as if even the laws of nature acknowledged its "re-formation."
The brand-new Annihilation Realm-Breaking Pearl hung there, crystal clear and cold. Its surface was no longer covered with spiderweb-like cracks, but instead replaced by extremely fine "crack crystal patterns." These were not wounds, but rather natural textures, as if the end had been etched into the breath of the artifact.
The deep Black Abyss within the pearl slowly spun, and as it spun, invisible ripples of Annihilation spread and receded. The distortion of the surrounding space was no longer out of control, but rose and fell slightly with its breath as if in submission, as if it could shatter the boundaries of all worlds into dust with the slightest movement.
The Thought Severance Devouring Emperor silently watched all this, its fingertips slowly retracting, like retracting a needle that had just pierced the heavens and earth. Its eyes held no joy, only a deeper coldness, like the silence before a great calamity truly descends.