The Era of Gods

Jovis quickly surveyed the surroundings and loudly commanded:

“Turn off all the searchlights, abandon the original plan, everyone get on the ship.”

His eyes shone brightly as he scanned the area, then suddenly, he violently looked up towards the depths of the island. A hint of shock appeared in his calm eyes, and the next second, he whipped around and bellowed:

“Everyone heard me, leave the island immediately!”

“Prepare the main guns, aim at the island, wait for my command!”

At the same time, he spoke to Elton and Hall who were still on the island in the private channel for the Children of Nightmare:

“Forget about your men, come back quickly.”

Hall asked in the channel:

“What did you see?”

Jovis didn’t hide anything and replied:

“I saw the mountains inside the island moving.”

The Children of Nightmare were terrified, and without another thought, Hall and Elton abandoned their subordinates and rushed towards the already-ignited Ironclad Warship.

“Isn’t this a mining island? How could it be?”

Jovis stared intently at the behemoth in the distance that had moved again, this time with even greater amplitude than before. Based on his experience…

“I suspect a god might have inadvertently arrived on this island, which is what caused Bernie and the others’ deaths.”

“A god?”

This name sent a shock through the hearts of the Children of Nightmare. They looked towards the island in horror, just in time to see the mountain range shrouded in black fog on the island move slightly, causing their hearts to skip a beat.

The two Children of Nightmare boarded the ship at breakneck speed while the many-tentacled monster pulled its body from the ground, turning into a small building-sized spherical mass rolling towards the sea, passing by the Ironclad Ship. Many crew members on the ship felt nauseous and dizzy, and several of them who were near the gunwale instinctively climbed up, wanting to jump overboard.

Fortunately, a Child of Nightmare pointed a finger, and with a crisp ‘pop’, everyone came to their senses.

The tentacled mass plunged into the sea and disappeared from sight, while the Ironclad Ship had started but was temporarily still at the shore to pick up the remaining subordinates.

But just then, a deep, unconscious growl came from the center of the island, like that of a giant beast. A gust of wind pushed the gray fog toward them, and the crew members close to the ship preparing to board fell to the ground all at once, enveloped by the gray fog. Everyone on the deck fell over, except for six Children of Nightmare and a few powerful warriors of bloodline origin who could still stand.

At the same time, in the distance, the towering peaks began… rising higher, and a faint but frightening will was slowly awakening.

“Forget about them, evacuate immediately!”

Steam billowed from the smokestack of the Ironclad Ship as the massive warship slowly moved away from the shore, leaving behind dozens of exploration team members who had fallen less than fifty meters from the shore.

But at that moment, no one cared to accuse them of being heartless for abandoning the fallen because the mountain range in the center of the island had already risen hundreds of meters. The oppressive and fearful will had already awoken, its unconscious sweep visible as numerous strange creatures in the waters around the island began to leave the region.

The six Children of Nightmare stood on the deck, gazing towards the horizon. Another Child of Nightmare, Max, said with a shocked voice:

“Is that a god of this world?”

Jovis nodded:

“If I’m not mistaken, it should be.”

After saying this, he turned around, clapped his hands to attract everyone’s attention, and said:

“Don’t look anymore, lest we draw Its attention. Prepare the warship to speed up and leave this sea area, and report the message to Lord Gainey Lun. Let Lord Gainey Lun take action himself; this is no longer within our reach.”

“But Lord Gainey Lun is currently hunting a human prodigy, he might be too busy.”

“Then let’s wait until Lord Gainey Lun is available. Anyway, this has nothing to do with us anymore.”

The Children of Nightmare fell silent.

“Boom!”

Another ear-splitting explosion drew their attention, and they instinctively looked towards the distant sea surface. To their utter shock, a colossal arching swell, several kilometers in diameter, rose from the endless ocean. The next second, an ominous chill swept over them, and they vaguely…

“Don’t look anymore.”

Jovis quickly slapped several of his companions awake. The Children of Nightmare were shocked to find themselves at the edge of the deck without knowing how they got there, and before they could do anything, they heard the stern rebuke of a companion:

“Don’t think, don’t speak, leave the deck immediately.”

“Roar!”

An earth-shattering roar sounded, followed by a massive wave that lifted the hundred-meter long Ironclad Ship into the air and then threw it down forcefully, the bone-chilling cold accompanied by a hint of a mentally swaying suggestion.

But such a mental suggestion still couldn’t affect the Children of Nightmare, who reacted instantly and ran swiftly towards the cabin.

Only after rushing into the cabin did everyone breathe a sigh of relief. The Children of Nightmare looked at each other, and one of them asked:

“What was that just now?”

Jovis said with a grave expression:

“It’s another god!”

“Another god?”

“It seems to be heading towards that island.”

“What does It want to do?”

No one answered, but they all had an answer in their hearts.

Elton looked at the others, including Captain Jovis, who seemed a bit excited and ready to jump into action, yet no one spoke first.

Until….

A huge roar came from afar, followed by an even more horrifying growl. The eyes of the six Children of Nightmare lit up simultaneously, Jovis suddenly stood up and roared:

“Do it!”

The other five Children of Nightmare also stood up and said in a low voice simultaneously:

“Then let’s do it.”

Jovis took a deep breath to calm his excited heart and said in a low voice:

“Don’t get excited just yet, let’s look at the situation first, then find the right opportunity, we….”

In the depths of the island, where the Children of Nightmare saw deep within the mountain peaks, was in fact a gigantic flesh ball occupying over three kilometers at the center of the island.

This gigantic flesh ball’s surface was full of wrinkles, covered with a hard keratin layer, making it look like stone mountains.

There were no living creatures on the flesh mountain, only the breathing movements of the flesh mountain every few days.

The frequency of these breathing movements had been increasing lately, which usually meant the Sleeper was about to awaken.

In the eyes of outsiders, it was this flesh mountain that was about to awaken, but within the core of this flesh mountain, within a space enclosed by tough flesh walls, a gray Chaotic Vortex filled with evil and destructive energy was slowly turning. In the center of the vortex, a Magic Cube that hovered between reality and illusion was slowly twisting, and with each turn, a wisp of gray mist sprayed out from the crevices of the cube into the vortex.

The Creation Rubik’s Cube!

Lin Xiao’s Creation Rubik’s Cube.

If someone could see inside this Creation Rubik’s Cube at this moment, they would see a space without the concept of boundaries at its core, where a shimmering sphere hung suspended, outside of which was a… Chaos Vortex that had already become very thin.

Upon closer inspection, one would find that the thin Chaotic Vortex was actually made up of bizarre, mud-like remnant souls.

The Crystalline Spherical turned slowly, emanating an invisible force of attraction. This intangible attraction spread out into the surrounding Chaotic Vortex, continuously drawing remnant souls into the sphere.

With each indescribable mystic surge that emerged, a slight wisp of gray mist was expelled, and the inner part of the sphere brightened a bit, with its invisible attraction growing stronger.

Within the Crystalline Spherical was a sea of dazzling light formed by countless rays, in the center of which Lin Xiao’s transparent figure was enshrined, with a halo unfolding behind him.

This was his Soul of God, and the pure sea of light surrounding him was the remnant souls that had been thoroughly Purified by the Creation Rubik’s Cube.

With the aggregate of the Nightmare’s Will and the Soul trying to swallow his Soul of God and seize his divine body being devoured by the Creation Rubik’s Cube, and the fall of all the Children of Nightmare, the War naturally ended.

What happened after the War, no one knew, because ever since his Soul had entered the Creation Rubik’s Cube to save his life, Lin Xiao had been oblivious to everything outside, only aware of the long process of Refining that had begun. Using the power of the Creation Rubik’s Cube, he was Refining the incarnate of Nightmare’s Will and that Soul Agglomerate.

The Nightmare’s Will Incarnate was early on refined by him, nearly depleting all the remaining Creation Energy in the process. Therefore, there wasn’t enough Creation Energy left to refine the Soul Agglomerate efficiently, and he could only grind away slowly. Now, over ninety percent of the several million souls in this Soul Agglomerate had been refined, and it wouldn’t be much longer before they were completely refined.

As for the shimmering sphere he resided in, it was not an anomaly produced from the refining of the Nightmare’s Will Incarnate and several million Soul Agglomerates, but the Core of the Crystal Wall System’s Origin.

Yes, the Crystal Wall System’s Core.

During the refining of the Nightmare’s Will Incarnate and the millions of souls, especially after refining the Nightmare’s Will Incarnate, he discovered that his Soul of God simply could not withstand the power of this Nightmare’s Will.

Neither in quality nor in quantity could he bear it.

After all, it was Nightmare’s Will, a force with many Great Dominators, a vast Crystal Wall Universe filled with powerful monarchs numbering in the hundreds, and Lords of Nightmare numbering in the tens of millions or even billions, comparable to True Gods. Even a fraction of their strength and level was unimaginable, and at his current level, how could he possibly bear it.

In fact, it was fortunate that his location at that time was the battle in the Divine Realm, which restricted the power of those three Children of Nightmare to a maximum of Rank 8, otherwise, he would undoubtedly be facing a God-level Existence in this world.

Such a powerful being, even with just a fraction of its strength, he used almost all the Creation Energy in the Creation Rubik’s Cube, and it took who knows how long to erode its will, leaving only the Origin.

Yet this unmanageable Origin almost assimilated his Soul of God.

So, Lin Xiao had a sudden inspiration, taking out the Core of the Crystal Wall System’s Origin to bear this excess Origin. Then, his Soul of God went inside the outer shell of the Crystal Wall System’s Origin Core to slowly digest it.

But then a new problem arose: the Origin of Nightmare’s Will was indeed resolved and digested, yet a new issue emerged.

As his Soul of God entered the Crystal Wall System’s Origin Core to digest the Origin of Nightmare’s Will, he discovered something…. both strange and shocking.

He found that the Origin of Nightmare’s Will, upon entering the shell of the Crystal Wall System’s Origin Core, surprisingly fit this thing perfectly, merging into it as if it had arrived home.

Then, as the Origin of Nightmare’s Will was injected, the shell of the Crystal Wall System’s Origin Core began to spontaneously generate a consciousness. Changing and transcending.

Yes, it was consciousness, not will.