[Vol. 8] Chapter 324: The Upside-Down World, Myth Returns
“Of course not, that’s impossible.”
The dragon girl answered without thinking, then added simply.
“Even I don’t fully know my master’s true limits. If she went all out seriously, I think she could probably wipe them all out in one move. That’s the absolute difference in strength. No trick or method could ever make up for it.”
Leonis’ expression shifted slightly.
“You keep calling her ‘master,’ yet you reveal her information without hesitation. It seems your betrayal is very thorough. I’m curious, what method did [White] use to secretly make you switch sides? After all, your mind looks perfectly clear, not like someone influenced by those things.”
“Ha, you just think you’re smart…”
She muttered under her breath, in a voice only she could hear, and suddenly seemed to lose all interest in continuing the talk. Leonis noticed this, so he stopped speaking as well. Instead, he silently took out an old-looking ring carved with a lion emblem and slid it onto his hand.
That was Leonis Frederick’s [Lion Ring], his life-bound treasure, tied to all his luck and bloodline power. It wasn’t something absolutely required for this ritual, but its blessing could greatly increase his chances of success.
There was only one chance. He would not waste any tool he could use.
“Then… let’s begin.”
The instant the ring touched his finger, a fierce, storm-like aura burst outward!
In a moment, he became like the eye of a raging typhoon, and countless objects on the Star-Gazing Tower were swept away by the violent winds. This was the emperor’s kingly aura, cultivated over decades as a human ruler, pushed to its absolute peak, mixed with a terrifying power still in its early form.
That power had been building inside him for so long, and now it erupted all at once, shaking heaven and earth!
“Vmmmmm!!!”
At the same time, far away, yet aligned with the Star-Gazing Tower by the shape of the palace and even the entire capital, Frederick, a tall tower also began to change dramatically.
The black chains wrapped around its surface snapped apart, its defensive shell scattered into nothing, and countless beams of shimmering multicolored light shot into the sky from its peak. These beams formed a bridge, stretching toward the Star-Gazing Tower and linking both places high in the clouds.
With the barrier gone, the sea-like Power of Origin surged out without concealment, rolling forward like waves. The first to be hit were the imperial guards and elite warriors stationed at the tower.
The explosion of divine power came too fast, too sudden. None of the tower’s defenders even had time to react before the flood-like force crushed their bodies and souls together, breaking them down into the most basic energy particles. That energy was instantly drawn into the shining tower, feeding its inner light.
In just a few breaths, that distant light connected like guided navigation, locking precisely onto Leonis’ position on the platform, ready to descend.
Feeling the violent strength of that power, the emperor’s expression tightened. From his storage tool, he took out a paper doll no larger than a palm and tossed it upward without hesitation.
“BOOM!!!”
Though it looked ordinary, the unleashed Power of Origin didn’t instantly destroy it. Instead, the energy passed through the doll, transforming into a gentler glow that wrapped Leonis himself. Magic patterns lit up across the top floor of the Star-Gazing Tower, forming a vast formation centered on the emperor, a perfect connection of release and absorption.
“RUMBLE… RUMBLE RUMBLE!!!”
The moment this massive formation, covering nearly the entire palace and capital, was activated, the clear sky above suddenly turned dark. Clouds gathered, lightning roared, and the cracks in the heavens remained deep and empty. Yet from within, strange waves spread out, as if some ancient existence had been summoned, ready to descend into this world!
“……”
Standing almost right next to the emperor, the little dragon girl quietly watched everything happening before her. None of this could possibly affect her, since she was the Dragon God. She only fixed her burning golden eyes on the man now completely covered by colorful glowing mist, his human form no longer visible, as if thinking about something.
The heart she had given him earlier was now releasing thin streams of blood energy. These streams quietly merged with the small paper doll floating in the air. Though the paper doll was crude, once it was stained with blood it began to change, slowly forming the rough shape of a young girl.
It was easy to guess, this had to be an extremely rare treasure. The Power of Origin is the foundation of becoming a god, the very essence of divinity. Collecting it was already hard enough, but for a mortal to actually absorb it was even harder. Otherwise the path to godhood wouldn’t be so impossible, with millions of years passing without a single success.
As time went on, and as the paper doll continued blocking the flow of Origin Power, it was clearly breaking apart. It wasn’t hard to see this was some kind of life-substitution technique. Since mortals couldn’t withstand the direct infusion of Origin Power, Leonis had to rely on such a method, even if the cost was the life of his own blood kin.
The path to ascend was harder than reaching the heavens. He had thrown away family bonds, thrown away humanity, and cast aside all hesitation. He used every possible method, no matter how cruel, for only one purpose…
To succeed.
To become the Victor.
But such a path was never going to be smooth.
Suddenly, the dragon girl’s expression changed slightly, as if she had sensed something. She lifted her head toward the sky.
“...It’s coming.”
With Leonis’ summons, a new world gradually reflected within the deep void cracks above.
That world had mountains, rivers, lakes and seas, plains and valleys. Dragons soared through the skies, and strange beasts ran across the land. Xiao Guang saw in the center of that world a massive stone stele, reaching from earth to sky, crumbling apart. The barrier was fading, and the two worlds seemed to be reconnecting in some mysterious way. And at the very front of that connection…
“ROAR!!!!!”
At last, the first snow-white dragon of breathtaking beauty crossed through the void crack, releasing a mighty dragon roar over the capital, a sound not heard for three hundred years!
The black rift in the sky began filling with color and light, and the void reshaped itself into the outline of a real world. At that moment, countless residents of the imperial capital lifted their heads in shock. They saw a sight that would stay in their memories forever, something so far beyond human knowledge and reality that it shook their very souls.
Inside the rift, a vast and inverted landscape appeared out of nowhere. It was no illusion, no phantom, it was real.
A sprawling, Upside-Down World.
And it was not empty. After the white dragon, more and more massive dragons emerged from that world, their bodies covering the sky. They flew over the capital, five, ten, a hundred, until thousands roared together, shaking the heavens and earth!
The ancient ruins, the battlefield of myth where the remains of the Serpent were buried. This mysterious world, after three hundred years, had finally returned to its original place in such an overwhelming way!
And the changes did not stop there.
Soon after the thousand dragons appeared, several streaks of colorful light burst out of the inverted world. They formed into vague, glowing figures that stood upon the endless sky itself, facing the dragons from afar.
Even at such a distance, Xiao Guang immediately recognized them.
They were none other than the Twilight Council members, the very ones who had once ambushed her and Violet in the buffer zone, trying to exile them outside time and space!
Of course, these were only the avatars of those gods.
Three hundred years ago, during the war of the Mythical beings, the two major camps had fought bitterly over the Serpent’s remains. Just as victory was about to be decided, the Twilight Council had intervened with overwhelming force, forcing both sides to join together against the outsiders. In the end, the council’s avatars were sealed away at a terrible cost.
This was something many strong figures already knew, an open secret.
But not long ago, Xiao Guang had heard a very different story from [White], another version, the real truth behind it all.
A plot, deeply hidden, had been manipulated behind the scenes by the Twilight Council and the World Sustainers. In the end, both sides were wounded, or perhaps both were scheming with their own secret plans. They each had to step back halfway, leaving the final outcome to be decided three hundred years later.
Just then, a sharp and crazy laugh suddenly rang out across the sky.
[Yo! Yo yo yo? Puhahahahaha! Isn’t this just too funny? In only three hundred years, my true body was smashed to pieces and is now waiting to be revived? Fun, fun, so much fun ahahahahahahahaha!!!!!]
The laugh was sharp and loud, like the noise of broken gongs clashing, so harsh that just hearing it made people feel irritated. The Dragon God frowned slightly and looked upward. Her blazing fiery eyes easily pierced through the glow surrounding the speaker, revealing its true form.
It was a short figure wearing a tall, pointed triangular hat. Most of its body was wrapped in a cloak, but from behind stretched an absurdly long, spear-shaped, furry tail. Its presence was extremely bizarre.
On its face was a mask of black and white, material unknown. At this moment, the mask’s expression shifted with its laughter, mouth stretching unnaturally wide, showing crazed excitement, filled with strange madness.
It was Musk, the [God of False Faces and Ecstasy]!
This one was among the few Council members Xiao Guang still remembered by name. After all, it had been a certain priestess who personally struck his true body from across worlds with the [Ultimate Art: Radiance]. Naturally, the dragon girl still remembered.
Gods cannot be killed. At least, not by normal means. Even a terrifying technique like the [Ultimate Art], one that even Xiao Guang feared, still counted as a “normal” method. She knew the god could not withstand it, but neither could it be destroyed completely. The fact that this mad god’s avatar now appeared perfectly intact in the world was proof enough.
Freed from their seal, these godly avatars that had been trapped for over three hundred years quickly reconnected with their true bodies outside the world. Except for the mad God of False Faces, who kept ranting nonsense, the other Twilight Council members’ avatars quickly learned everything that had happened in the last three hundred years.
Soon, their gaze shifted downward, landing on the human emperor sitting on the Star-Gazing Tower. He ignored everything around him, silently absorbing the vast flow of Origin Power from the ritual, his aura swelling visibly with each moment.
One of the gods stepped forward: a mighty being wielding a huge warhammer. Its body was covered in heavy silver armor, and instead of a human head, it had an upside-down triangular metal shape, fused as if one with the armor. It let out a cold snort, like thunder, full of disdain and angry contempt.
[A mere ant-like mortal dares to meddle in this game and covet the [Wheel of Heaven and Earth]? Die!!!]
Boom!!!!!!!!
Without another word, the god swung its massive hammer in a wide arc. The weapon grew larger in the air, becoming like a falling mountain, crashing down toward the Star-Gazing Tower!
Clang!!!!!
But before the hammer could strike, it slammed against a glowing multicolored shield that suddenly appeared. This shield seemed to be formed by the mysterious high tower in the palace and the Star-Gazing Tower working together. At this moment, it expanded, wrapping the entire capital city inside.
The divine hammer and the shield collided midair with an earth-shaking crash. Countless citizens collapsed to the ground in terror. Yet despite its deafening power, the hammer did not break the shield. It only made faint ripples on its surface, the barrier remained firm and unmoving.
[Hm?]
The hammer-wielding god coughed lightly, surprised that mortals had built such a powerful formation. It seemed to notice something in the clash, and its tone grew curious.
[I see. You crudely imitated the two-dimensional laws, then sacrificed countless living beings to fuel it, temporarily turning this city into your own “divine realm” to resist gods. Ruthless, daring… no wonder you had the audacity to attempt this. …Fine then, what’s the harm in letting you live a little longer?]
Although the god still spoke with disdain at mortal trickery, realizing the attack had failed made it stop for now. It simply held its ground with the other Twilight Council members, facing off against the distant dragons, before turning its gaze back up toward the Upside-Down World.
Even though they had just been freed from their seals, the moment they saw the scene before them, and linked with their true bodies, they understood very clearly what the human emperor was trying to do, after abandoning cooperation with the Twilight Council and siding with the World Sustainers.
Right now, he truly did have the qualification to fight for the [Wheel of Heaven and Earth].
But it was only a qualification.
Even with all his careful preparations, as long as they, the Twilight Council members, were here, they would never allow the World Sustainers to claim that power.
Three hundred years ago it was the same.
And now, it would be no different.