Once upon a time there was a greedy snake.

Chapter 215 Three Deaths
Long, long ago, Du Yi had heard that a person's death actually occurs in three parts.

The first death is the death of the body; the heartbeat and breathing stop, and the brain permanently loses its function—which means that the body itself loses all its functions and is about to undergo the most thorough decay, turning back into part of the soil.

The second death is a social death, which often occurs at the funeral or the moment when relatives and friends receive the news of the death. Whether it is a farewell at the coffin or a distant tribute, it means acknowledging the passing of this person and that this person no longer exists in this world.

As for the third death, which is the final death, everything about this person is gone, and all memories of this person have completely disappeared. It is not just an acknowledgment of this person's passing, but a true cessation of any trace of their existence.

This even corresponds to the concept of body, consciousness, and soul previously given by the Chosen Champion Elias.

The first death was physical death—although in common sense, or rather in Du Yi's understanding, this was definitely death, after personally experiencing the astral projection, Du Yi also knew that this was not real death.

Of course, as the vessel that holds the soul, the destruction of the body often means that the soul itself can no longer maintain its shape. But conversely, if the shape of the soul can be maintained in some way, then it doesn't really matter if the body is destroyed.

As for social death, it's not easy to equate it with consciousness. However, Du Yi had heard those priests talk about things related to divine descent—for example, a god like the sun god Ujat, as long as there are believers reciting the sun god's prayers, can attach their consciousness to him, thus achieving the so-called divine descent.

To put it simply, it means using one's consciousness to take over another's body when that other person is aware of them. Although Du Yi himself doesn't understand how this is done, at least according to those priests, such a thing does exist.

This also means that, conversely, if all means of divine intervention are cut off, then even so-called gods will no longer be able to attach their consciousness to anything else, and will only have one life left.

That is, the soul itself, which is encased within the body.

This is the third death, the death of the soul. There will be no more divine intervention, no more resurrection. Everything will be completely annihilated and never exist again.

And now, amidst the surging information in Du Yi's mind, the God of Death who single-handedly created this Netherworld is facing the latter two deaths.

Yes, the last two died.

The death of the body is meaningless to the god of death who has mastered the soul. Even without the body as a vessel, He can still maintain the shape of the soul at will. But the real trouble comes after the death of the body.

Initially, the God of Death didn't realize the problem. After all, it was just the death of the body; it was simply a matter of changing bodies, or even not changing bodies at all. Maintaining the spiritual body with willpower was actually more conducive to his study of the soul itself.

However, as time went on, fewer and fewer people worshipped this god of death.

Although life and death are matters that are relevant to almost everyone, strictly speaking, not many people are actually willing to worship death. Compared to death, people value life more, want to see what it's like to live, and want to see things flourish.

As for death, even though it objectively exists, no one wants to think about it. Perhaps only when remembering the dead will people think of it and offer a few strands of sorrow from the living for those who have returned to the underworld.

Yes, it's only for the dead.

As for the god of death himself, he can only be considered an afterthought.

Of course, the God of Death had not actually perished at this time, but the pantheon to which he belonged had already been annihilated in time before him. Obviously, unlike the God of Death who was proficient in the way of the soul, the other gods were far less able to live. In the repeated battles with other powerful beings, those gods who once had infinite glory were eventually annihilated in time.

Since the deity himself was dead, his original followers naturally scattered.

Only the god of death himself remained.

This deity, who wasn't originally listed among the Nine Pillars, became their final guardian. "The Nine Pillars... why does that sound so familiar?"

Du Yi tried hard to think about it, but this kind of knowledge could hardly be considered common sense, at least not to Du Yi.

For a moment, he could only feel that the name was familiar, but he couldn't recall any specific information.

"Do you know about the Nine Pillar Gods?"

Thinking of this, Du Yi simply turned to look at the chosen champion, Elias.

At least based on the past period of time, this chosen champion Elias is practically an encyclopedia, so there's no reason why Elias wouldn't know the term "Nine Gods," which even he has heard of.

But to Du Yi's surprise, the chosen champion Elias actually didn't know.

"It sounds like some kind of rural pantheon."

Elias pondered for a moment, then shook his head.

"This situation can only occur when a planet itself cannot be unified and can only occupy a small place to act arrogantly. Therefore, adopting this crude family-style management will not cause any problems... In reality, how can one power have nine voices? Any god who can set foot in the sea of ​​stars has definitely already achieved complete unification of the planet from which they originated."

"This……"

Although Elias spoke of it casually, Du Yi felt as if he had heard something extraordinary—in a sense, this was another opportunity for him to see the world for the first time.

The pantheon is merely a small family workshop; only by unifying the planet itself can one be qualified to enter the cosmos…

"That does seem to be true. How can we concentrate our efforts on building spaceships if we don't unify our plans?"

Although the information provided by Elias was too shocking, Du Yi thought about it carefully and surprisingly found it to make a lot of sense.

So he kept those words in his heart.

Of course, chatting aside, Du Yi at least remembered why he came here.

Du Yi's gaze then fell upon the largest obelisk in the distance.

Clearly, compared to the nine named obelisks, this nameless tomb is the final burial place left to him by the god of death.

"But... have you felt it?"

It was at this moment that the Chosen Champion Elias suddenly frowned slightly.

"It feels like someone is watching us from the shadows."

(End of this chapter)