The Lord of Hell stood in the Void, his broken wings drooping behind him. Dark red blood of original sin dripped down his broken bone spurs, turning into blood flowers burning with sinful flames in the Void. His gaze pierced through layers of barriers of laws and landed on the figure clad in a rock armor and with hair as long as a galaxy.
Both involve Second-Step Eternity, but the difference is so vast it's despair-inducing.
The Lord of Hell could clearly perceive that the Mother of the Stars ' "second step" and his own "second step" were fundamentally different concepts. His own second step was a threshold he had barely crossed under the infusion of the Abyss Will, his foundation unstable, his laws incomplete, and he hadn't even fully grasped the authority that the Second-Step Eternity should possess. The Mother of the Stars ' second step, on the other hand, was a state of perfection achieved through countless epochs of immersion in this realm, a peak state where every step was precisely placed on the nodes of the laws, and every authority was honed to its ultimate limit.
That's not all.
The Lord of Hell closed his eyes and used his own Law of Original Sin to perceive the structure of the other's laws—and then he saw a breathtaking scene: the laws of the Mother of the Stars were not a path, but a net. This net covered every corner of the Material Dimension, from the arrangement of microscopic particles to the movement of macroscopic stars, from the birth and death of life to the rise and fall of civilizations, all of which were under the coverage of His laws.
Time? The timeline of the material universe is firmly nailed to His net of laws. Any attack based on time will be dissolved, assimilated, or reduced to zero by this net before it even touches Him.
Fate? The authority of the Goddess of Fate is itself a branch derived from the threads of Fate. The Mother of the Stars has a deeper understanding of Fate than the Goddess of Fate. However, she does not need to act personally, so she entrusts this authority to her followers.
Cause and effect? The essence of cause and effect is the interaction between matter, and matter is the absolute domain of the Mother of the Stars.
Reversing Space-Time, manipulating Fate, altering cause and effect—these incredible powers, which seem unbelievable to outsiders, are merely routine functions of the Mother of the Stars ' network of laws.
The Lord of Hell opened his eyes, a bitter smile appearing on his lips.
Ignorance breeds fearlessness. A mayfly gazing at the blue sky sees only a vast expanse, perhaps harboring the dream that "one day I will be able to fly to that cloud." But a lamb encountering a tiger feels the chilling bite of sharp teeth into its throat, the despair of blood gushing from its carotid artery. The former remains unmoved, unaware of its own limitations; the latter trembles, having already felt the chill of death.
The Lord of Hell naturally wouldn't tremble. As the ruler of Hell, a powerful being who has stepped into the Second-Step Eternity, He wouldn't experience emotions like fear. But that bitterness, that clear-headed understanding that was so intense it was despairing, gnawed at His heart like a bone-deep sore.
"Is this... His true power...?"
The Lord of Hell muttered to himself, his voice hoarse as an echo from the Abyss.
Golden sap still seeped from the crack in the trunk of the Ancestral Tree of Life. Its crown trembled violently, not from anger, but because it too was experiencing the same sensations as the Lord of Hell. As a newly Eternal, the Ancestral Tree of Life felt the terror of the Mother of the Stars more directly—if the Lord of Hell faced a tiger, then the Ancestral Tree of Life faced a collapsing mountain. Not being attacked, but being "suppressed," crushed by an irresistible force from the deepest recesses of the material world, making even breathing difficult.
The World Tree's projected body had become much more transparent. As a projection, it originally lacked the full power of its original form, and the attack it had just withstood from the Chaos Stele had consumed most of its energy. At this moment, the two golden suns in its eyes had dimmed considerably, but its gaze remained sharp, still frantically deducing possible ways to break the deadlock.
The Ruler of the Abyss's body was still trembling, not from fear, but from the intense backlash of power emanating from within Him after the Abyss Will had been severely damaged. The Earth Titan raged within the Abyss, each punch tearing at its Abyss essence, each strike weakening the Ruler of the Abyss's power. He gritted his teeth, trying to stabilize the laws within his body, but the contingency plan planted by the Mother of the Stars was far too deep and ruthless to be resolved in a short time.
The Abyss Warden stood at a distance, the Black Book slowly closing in His hand. His black eyes held no fighting fervor, only a calm born of countless eons of suppressed hope. He didn't need to act, for the Mother of the Stars had already done what He most desired—to destroy the Abyss from within.
The God of War of the Astral Realm supported himself with his battle blade, the "eternal wound" piercing his chest still bleeding, but golden flames of war burned in his single eye, showing no sign of retreat. He had fought through countless eras, facing battlefields far more desperate than today, and he believed that as long as he had a breath left, there was always a chance to turn the tide.
Dale, clutching the hole in his chest, channeled pure white magical light through his fingertips, attempting to heal the wounds left by the Flame of Fate. But the Flame of Fate was no ordinary attack; it wounded not only his body but also "Fate" itself— Dale needed to reconstruct his denied Fate before he could repair his body.
These Eternal are all searching for a way to break the deadlock in their own way. Their thought processes far exceed the speed of light, and they perform billions of deductions every second, frantically searching for the Mother of the Stars ' weaknesses from different angles, dimensions, and levels of laws.
Then, to their despair, they discovered—they couldn't find it.
It's not that there are no flaws, but rather that the network of laws of the Mother of the Stars is too tight. So tight that any seemingly flawed position, upon closer examination, will turn out to be a trap, a deliberately exposed opening to lure attackers. Once you attack that position, it will trigger a deeper countermeasure, putting you in an even more passive situation.
Overpower skill with force, and suppress others with overwhelming momentum, like a celestial river pouring down, unstoppable.
This is the way the Mother of the Stars operates. She doesn't need sophisticated strategies or complex plans; she only needs to spread her power outwards like a flood, crushing, submerging, and sweeping away everything that stands in her way.
Once He gains real power and starts to exert pressure, it will be extremely difficult to turn the tide.
In the eyes of Angley, the God of Wisdom, silvery-white numerical symbols flowed like a waterfall.
As the God of Wisdom of the Adrian Federation and a key figure who participated in the entire process of reshaping the Weave, Angley had a clearer understanding of the course of this war than anyone else— the Federation could not win. Not "possibly could not win," but "absolutely could not win."