Chapter 1665: Recalled
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
As the goddess of creation recalled the initial function of the Dream of L’Haronne, a terrifying presence appeared.
Of course, it was not the Mad Lord. The Mad Lord’s real body was still sealed within the deepest parts of the Plane of Dreams, trying to escape captivity. But the presence that appeared was no less a foe than the Mad Lord.
Hao Ren felt the entire Umbral Realm shake. The basis of all life and forms was being shaken by a powerful interference. Hao Ren, however, knew that his senses were not accurate: the quaking was only within the ruins of the Star of Creation because the energy was entrenched within the area. However, the shock of its appearance was so great that everyone’s senses were muddled for a moment.
Numerous massive blasts rang from all over as the continents and islands floating peacefully in space for the past 10,000 years suddenly spun maniacally like a malfunctioning gyroscope. Debris, big and small, collided against each other in the spin, creating a massive crash. The ancient ruins on the continents were also consumed by the chaos. While they were crushed and grounded between the floating continents, the remaining energies blew out from within and formed a massive web of arching lightning.
Only the continent Hao Ren and the rest were standing on maintained its stability. As the chaos ensued, the goddess of creation swiftly reacted. With a stomp, she stabilized the entire continent and created a small realm of order around the continent. Yet, this small realm of order was insignificant in comparison to the ruins and debris of the Star of Creation. Just like a solitary island in the middle of a storm, the danger of being overwhelmed was real.
Nangong Wuyue’s tail quickly coiled around Nangong Sanba who was closest to her as she let out a pitiful shriek. “Aaaaahhhh!! What’s going on?! What’s going on?!”
“Something is being released!” Hao Ren swiftly armed himself as he commanded Nolan to overload every weapon system onboard. “Didn’t we discussed this before. The heavenly kingdom was destroyed because of the clash of the goddess and Mad Lord’s powers. Since the goddess is still alive—”
“The other half is too!” The second part was continued by the goddess herself. She seemed to have fully recovered from the deep slumber. Not only she was awake, but her memories of the matter had also recovered too. “Damn it, I remembered why I created that dream in the first place. There’s another me here, and I dragged her along to annihilation that time, but like me, she was not totally destroyed, so to keep that monster from escaping. I created a real dream to bind her… The dream becoming L’Haronne actually happened somewhat later…”
“Seems like that dark version of you, is about to appear.” Hao Ren gave the nervous goddess a pained look. “If I’m not wrong, you had tried to strengthen the seal by cutting off your memory of her right? The dream plus the memory separation, it may seem like a good idea but aren’t you a little overconfident?! My god, this was not the first time your schemes turned out the other way!”
The silver-haired goddess had wanted to say something but an intimidating aura soon came crashing against everyone and that put a stop to the conversation.
Within the dark, chaotic void, the energy seeping out of the ruins seemed to now have a focal point as started converging towards that direction. Nolan by reflex fired the main cannon towards that direction but the powerful psionic cannon shot was blocked by a giant lightning bolt arcing out from the convergence before both attacks petered out. It was very clear that the converging energies and the psionic cannon were of the same level.
After the temporary disruption, the converged energy current had finally being compressed and reformed. A blinding flash later, a black cocoon-like object lined with blood-red lines appeared in its place.
“Attacking it is pointless!” The goddess of creation hurriedly cautioned. “The energy around it will nullify all attacks. Her main body is not even out yet. We need to wait for the cocoon to break…”
Hao Ren muttered to himself that damage nullification was a joke when an appropriate force was applied, but after some thought, he realized that he probably did not have that sort of firepower to totally kill a god. He then turned around to ask, “Can we take her down after the cocoon breaks?”
The goddess of creation looked up. “No, she’ll probably wipe the floor with us.”
Hao Ren almost had a heart attack. “Huh? Weren’t you her equal? Plus, a few of us won’t…”
The goddess of creation furrowed her brows as she monitored the enemy. “We were equal when we were asleep, but I’ve just noticed that her sleep quality has probably been better than mine…”
Hao Ren finally confirmed that this goddess’ image shattering was not him seeing things. But he did not have the luxury to comment on that anymore, as cracks appeared all over the “cocoon”, which was floating mid-air.
The breaking of the cocoon was rapid, nothing like in the movies or games where CGI effects were blasting for at least thirty minutes. If Hao Ren had the confidence to blow it up, he would have deployed at least four digits worth of cannon platforms and space mines, but it only used two seconds to break open, and as he dark shell fell apart, a petite silhouette appeared in midair.
It was a female that looked identical to the Goddess of Creation, the only difference was, she had no color to her.
Just like an uncolored painting, the lady from the cocoon was horrifyingly pale from top to bottom, no matter her hair or her clothing, her skin or her eyes, it was all pale white. If not for the contours of her eyes were still visible Hao Ren would have thought he was looking at a white silhouette.
“Heh, I thought the dark version of you would have been black, never thought she would be so white.”
Hao Ren tried to crack a joke but clearly, no one was in the mood to laugh.
The biggest insurance against the goddess of annihilation was the goddess of creation, but now she said that she did not have a restful sleep, and the boss cannot be beaten. What the actual f*ck?
Regardless, now that the enemy is here they had to fight, Hao Ren felt that he had least had to try before totally giving up, or at least buy everyone the time to escape. He immediately pulled out the two long swords and gave Nolan the command to deploy the navigational signal in his mind.
Now that the dream had ended, the transmission should have been fine, right?
The goddess of annihilation had seen his movements, and the pale evil goddess looked down. Her eyes were emotionless as a dry croak came out of her mouth, “I know the swords in your hand.”
“Oh? You can actually talk,” Hao Ren replied out of reflex.
“Hmm?” The goddess of annihilation frowned. “Not affected by my voice at all? What are you?”
“Huh, is there a rule that I must die when I listen to your voice?” Hao Ren grinned, “I’m still a demigod all things considered.”
“A demigod?” Since when did this world have such a thing like you…” The goddess of annihilation titled her head before shrugging nonchalantly. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll just kill you.”
As she spoke, an almost imperceptible semi-transparent wave was launched with a swing of her hand. It trudged along slowly towards Hao Ren’s direction.
Where the wave passed through, visible cracks and distortion appeared in the surrounding space.
In just that short moment, Hao Ren felt goosebumps all over hi, as a sense of foreboding danger ran across his body. And this sense of danger was even stronger than when he clashed against Lockmarton. He quickly realized that the seemingly harmless wave was actually very lethal. It did not destroy the dimensional structure along the way, it was instead deleting everything in its path!
Dodging it was impossible. As slow as it may look Hao Ren realized that the ‘slowness’ was just an illusion created by space and time being consumed. He was going to get hit, and have no options to escape.
He could only pin his hopes on Raven 12345 being reliable for once.
He muttered Raven 12345’s name in his head as the wave struck his body. At the moment of contact, a thin, hollow layer of “holy light” appeared over his Steel Membrane Shield, and the blessing from Raven 12345 made contact with the attack from the goddess of annihilation. There was a collision of force…
Alright, there were no explosions nor any blinding light. What happened was seemingly harmless strands being deflected away from Hao Ren towards the nether. And where the strands landed, everything disappeared in a blink of an eye, regardless it was rock or mud, or the ancient ruins floating above.
Cold sweat formed on Hao Ren’s forehead. Whatever he may have had in mind, Raven 12345’s blessing actually warded off the attack, and he almost wanted to believe in that unreliable goddess.
At the same time, the goddess of annihilation, realizing that her attack had failed, titled her head. Perhaps it was in confusion, as she had never thought such a thing would happen. A seemingly ordinary “mortal” actually blocked her attack with just a mere shield. “Hm? You… interesting…”
Hao Ren’s confidence grew after he managed to block the attack with his divine shield of this half-baked, weakened goddess. Of course, he knew that he was not an equal match for the goddess, but he too understood that he was not alone.
As long as he was not being outright run over, there were still things that could be done.
“Interesting right?” Hao Ren responded, trying to buy time to let the divine shield and his shaken spirit have a breather. He then pointed towards the void around. “But there’s more to come!”
The pale evil goddess curiously looked at his movements, not understanding what sort of tricks this weak opponent might come up with. She did notice Hao Ren had a team ready for battle by his side, and her other self standing not too far away. She realized that these people were capable of being a nuisance but were not a threat, and as for her other self…
The latter was still in a weakened state.
So she thought Hao Ren was just bluffing…
Until dimensional rifts started opening en mass across the entire void and two massive fleets broke out of the rift and materialized into real space.