Beyond the Timescape - Chapter 1265: The True Radiants’ True God
Chapter 1265: The True Radiants’ True God
It was a gloomy world. A thick, pitch-black substance like bitumen surrounded the world, creating something like an exterior shell around it. Inside the world, the sky was full of dark red striations that spread out almost like a spider web. Drops of blood oozed out of the striations, falling down onto lands riddled with holes. It was like rain.
In the middle of the striations that leaked the rain of blood, high in the canopy of heaven, there was an astonishing sight. It was a massive tumor! Īt looked like a dead sun high overhead, or perhaps some misshapen god that had parasitized this world, creating an incomparably gruish and eerie sensation.
Xu Qing and all the other gods who had disappeared into the halo… were now materializing into that rain. This was where they had been teleported to.
Upon appearing in the gruish blood rain, the gods instinctively scanned the area. Clearly… this was the first time any of thēm had been to this place.
Xu Qing was there, and he surveyed the surroundings more thoroughly. He didn’t just scan the world, he also scanned the area outside of it. Thankfully, he was now isolated from the danger he had sensed earlier, thanks to the unique properties of this place. The divine will in the starry sky could not come here. That realization caused Xu Qing to breathe a sigh of relief. At the same time, he was now a lot more curious about this strange world.
So this place isn’t the location of that earth meridian I sensed?
Xu Qing looked up at the dome of heaven. Upon noting the blood-red striations and the gruish ball of flesh, his pupils constricted. Just looking at the tumor gave him an idea of what might be going on here.
He looked down at the ground. The lands were black, and when the blood rain fell, it created a sludge that looked like a festering scar. Countless blood-red imps came to life when the blood rain fell. They had no facial features, and they just numbly went about doing specific forms of hard labor. Off in the distance were successive mountain ranges that looked like the flayed bones of enormous beasts.
The valleys in between the mountains were full of thick fog. Within that fog were withered trees, monstrous and distorted in appearance. Their bark was a pale, sickly color, and their roots looked like fractured vertebrates strung together. They had long, thin branches that reached up into the sky like hands trying to grasp the canopy of heaven! But when the blood rain fell on them, it corroded them, causing them to leak black sap that converged and grew into umbrella-like mushrooms that could block the rain. The mushroom umbrellas came in all sizes. From what Xu Qing could tell, the big ones were in locations where there were many withered trees, and they were the size of cities.
Beneath the umbrellas grew numerous pustules that almost resembled grapes. Atop the mushrooms were delicate crystals that emitted a glimmering light that contained both illusion and reality.
It was the light that caught Xu Qing’s attention. Apparently, the glimmering light contained a vast minor world! The world seemed to be hiding something as it flickered in and out of view within the angular surfaces of the crystals.
Xu Qing felt even more curious than ever. It’s almost like heaven and earth are at war here!
He came to that conclusion after noting the specific type of work the imps in the blood rain were doing. They had axes that they would use to hack at the withered trees. Each blow of an ax would leave a scar on the trunk of a tree. In other areas, the axes hacked against the rocks on the mountains, causing sparks to fly, along with what appeared to be fragments of teeth and nails.
Apparently, the trees and mountains in this place were living things! Furthermore, there was danger in the work being done by the imps!
As Xu Qing observed, he saw an area in one of the mountain ranges where the imps were at work with their axes. All of a sudden, the withered trees there spasmed. An instant later, a host of mushroom umbrellas sprang out of those trees, covering the grape-like pustules and causing them to explode!
Innumerable streams of sap then swept out like threads that stabbed toward the imps. The skin of the imps that were touched turned as gray as ash. Then, that skin would crack, and red light would seep out from within before they exploded.
Xu Qing’s gaze hardened. He could now see what was really going on in this world.
This is the work of two terrifying True Gods, presumably, peak True Gods! One is up above, one is down below, and this is the manner in which thēy fight each other.
Given this strange state of affairs, thēy must be at an impasse. The True God in the sky wants to break the world apart. Hīs strategy is to send hīs own god blood down, which turns into those imps, which then try to chop down the trees and break apart the mountains. The trees and mountains are the other True God, who is fighting back, but has gradually lost the initiative in the fight.
So, what do the True Radiants want to accomplish here…?
Xu Qing’s mind raced as he kept his guard up. Meanwhile the other surrounding gods were also closely studying the surroundings.
Finally, the True Radiant dwarf seated cross-legged on the black lotus spoke. “Although all of you are mere subservient gods under our rulership, because you answered our call, I won’t hide things from you any longer. Everybody on the outside believes that our True Radiant True God perished years ago, and cannot return, but the truth is… that our True Radiant True God isn’t dead at all. Hē’s right here!”
The dwarf stood and pointed at the huge black tumor. “Hē set a trap and is now on the verge of assimilating another True God! Your mission here is to help our True God by clearing the trees and mountains. You will alleviate some of the pressure our True God faces, and ensure that hē can complete the assimilation process.
“When the time comes that our True God awakens, all of you subservient gods will be handsomely rewarded. And there will be other benefits as well. You will be granted god seals that can be used to gain one-time protection from our True God.”
Most of the gods who had teleported here were, in the strict hierarchy of the gods, subsidiary to the True Radiants, and thus had no objection to the mission. After receiving the instructions, the gods prepared their various god magics and then headed toward either the withered trees or the wild mountains.
Of course, only those who were at the Altar God level qualified to consider the pros and cons of the situation. Those were the gods that Xu Qing had taken special note of earlier. After further communication with the dwarf via divine will, those gods nodded and joined the effort to help the True Radiants’ True God.
However, thēy did not work at felling trees or chopping mountains. Instead, thēy flew up into the dome of heaven and settled down in the air cross-legged around the black tumor. From those positions, thēy sent their godly aura into the mass of flesh. By connecting directly with the True God in that manner, thēy could help alleviate some of the pressure hē faced.
Offering their godly auras to help the True God was like throwing a cup of water on a burning cart of firewood. However, having even a bit of additional help to alleviate pressure in critical moments would still be of help to this True God.
That was when Xu Qing heard the dwarf speaking into his mind via divine will.
“This entire mission came about because our True God used a bloodline magic to summon me. Hē is hovering on the brink of fully assimiliating. Since you’re an Altar God, you can send your god power into the canopy of heaven and connect directly to the True God. After our True God awakens, you will be bestowed a fragment of godhood!”
That was a very enticing reward. But Xu Qing… had no way of helping out.
In the end, he wasn’t a god. Given the circumstances, he couldn’t actually connect to a True God without his true identity being exposed. All in all, this was a peak True God. In fact, even just being this close felt very dangerous to him.
He sighed inwardly. Here in this star ring of the gods, there were wolves in front of him and tigers behind him. It made it really hard to do just about anything.
“Oh, Exalted God,” he said, “this is a very important matter in which mistakes cannot be tolerated. My level isn’t sufficient for me to be of any help here. Can I request that you simply activate the teleportation and let me leave?”
Xu Qing even sent the true god stone flying back to the dwarf. He had only come here as a last resort. And though it didn’t seem likely he would be able to leave, he wanted to at least try. Being able to leave would be the ideal outcome. But if it didn’t work… well, it chilled his heart to think about it.
As of now, Xu Qing and the dwarf were the only ones left hovering in the rain of blood.
In response to Xu Qing’s request, the dwarf expressionlessly lifted a finger and tapped the true god stone. The black stone trembled and then collapsed into ashes that quickly dissipated.
Hē looked coldly at Xu Qing. “Either cooperate or die.”
Xu Qing’s eyes glittered dangerously. But then, the huge black tumor in the network of red striations suddenly started twitching. Astonishingly, a crack spread out, and then opened up. It looked like a huge eye opening up.
When the eye opened, a turbid gaze emerged, dropping down… to land on Xu Qing. All of a sudden, the dark red light in the sky seemed to become viscous, and the entire world started to tremble and distort. Chanting spread out through heaven and earth.
Xu Qing shivered. The gaze that had settled on him seemed corporeal, and it was like he could hear the sounds of blood flowing, bones snapping, and the scream of the butterfly’s discarnate spirit being incinerated. In an instant, the husk of the butterfly shriveled up. It couldn’t sustain the force of the gaze, and it exploded. A boom rang out.
Xu Qing’s true body was revealed.
At that instant, a sound like that of a fetal heartbeat rang out from inside the black tumor. It was so loud that it caused the rocky surfaces of the mountain to tremble. An immense pressure was about to descend from the tumor, except, right then, all of the mountains and trees seemed to have found an opportunity to fight back. The lands trembled, the mountains shook, and numerous branches shot up toward the sky.
The black tumor hesitated, and then a howl echoed out from nowhere. The eye had no choice but to close, and focus completely on defending against the attack.
Heaven and earth once again went back to fighting each other.
Meanwhile, the dwarf’s gaze sharpened as hē apparently received a transmitted message. Hīs eyes glowed as the 360 ancient corpses all around hīm opened their eyes and looked at Xu Qing.
“You’re not a god. You’re a cultivator! Don’t tell me that you’re… the very same cultivator that God Emperor Death Departure listed as wanted for the kidnapping of Her Grace Starryeyes??”
