Tonight, Alice joins the hunt.

Her power surged, and her form gradually became chaotic and pitch black, resembling the aggregate of that cursed entity. Yet her eyes remained bright, like stars.

—The position of Zhonghuang Taiyi is operating slowly.

................................................

Esdeath's ice spike pierced Logan's chest, freezing his heart, shattering his spine, and completely sealing off all his energy channels. And not only him, but the massive humanoid weapon behind him was also frozen, shattered, and disintegrated into countless tiny ice crystals.

“External forces are external forces precisely because they cannot be fully controlled. And at my level, the inability to fully control one's own power is a fatal flaw.” She spoke slowly and deliberately, her tone revealing no emotion typical of a normal human being—she was calm, but for her, calmness meant anger. And she was now…

Furious.

“I thought you could be a substitute to make me stronger. It seems that my previous judgment was wrong,” Esdeath said softly, her eyes frosty, and a chilling aura spreading gradually towards Logando’s still relatively intact limbs—a 'crackling' sound came from his throat, and a green light flashed between his brows. But fate was unchangeable.

He was going to die. And this time, nothing could save him. His body had been strengthened to the limits of what a human could achieve by the 'soul'. And his understanding was insufficient for him to construct a non-human body.

At the end of the day, he was just a college student. Even with his passion for mechanics and his extraordinary talent for manipulating robots, he was still just an average college student with mediocre grades. He didn't know how to start supramolecular engineering, nor how to create bio-energy storage organs and cell nuclear reactors. All he knew how to do was 'strengthen skeletal structure,' 'enhance muscle strength,' and 'improve nerve reaction speed'—basic things that were difficult to accumulate to achieve a qualitative leap. Creating a biomagnetic field was already the limit of his abilities, and going further was extremely difficult.

Therefore, he ultimately failed to catch up with Esdeath in terms of speed of growth. Even though Esdeath was doing her best to cooperate with him in creating carnage, initiating blood sacrifices, and devouring souls, he still stopped growing stronger after reaching a certain limit—a limit that might allow him to unleash power beyond the third tier, but not enough to push him to the fourth tier.

He couldn't reach the fourth rank, so naturally he couldn't exert enough pressure on Esdeath to help her advance to the fourth rank. Thus, he became a useless piece of trash to Esdeath.

"I'll allow you to say your last words, you piece of trash."

Esdeath slightly raised her sword, causing the frost that had been blocking Logan's words to fade a little.

The response she received did not surprise her.

"No...don't kill me." Logando's voice was weak, his limbs motionless. His tone was low, his eyes humble and pleading. "Killing me...it won't do you any good..."

"You're actually weaker than I expected." Esdeath's lips curled into a cold smile. "I really can't understand how someone like you could be strengthened to this extent. In just over ten minutes, you went from a crawler that I could crush with a flick of my wrist to someone who could hold my own against me, and even put some pressure on me... Although trash is still trash, the external force you've gained is far too enormous."

She leaned forward slightly.

"You have a powerful figure behind you, don't you? You use killing to exchange for power, and the medium of the trade is this emerald light?" She reached out, and her slender fingers, in Luo Gandao's horrified gaze, pierced his brow like a red-hot steel rod piercing butter—his skull was easily pierced as if it were a thin sheet of paper, and then his brains began to churn.

He wanted to scream, but only a strange 'hoarse' sound came from his throat. His chest heaved violently, and with each breath, tiny, crimson ice crystals burst from the mostly frozen parts of his heart and lungs. Unimaginable pain and fear overwhelmed him, causing his eyes to roll back and his bluish face to contort abnormally.

He's not dead yet. But this is probably only temporary. The will to live still sustains him, making him unwilling to leave this world like this no matter what.

"Not here?" A hint of doubt flashed in the Imperial General's eyes. She hadn't found the emerald green light source she was looking for in that viscous reddish-white liquid. This caused her brows to furrow slightly.

Clearly, the man before her was no longer of any use to her. So… could the mastermind behind his power become a substitute for the pressure she was under?

She didn't know, but she wanted to try.

“Strange, if it’s not here… then where should it be?” Esdeath tilted her head slightly. A shard of ice condensed in her hand. An incomparably vast amount of freezing air surrounded her and gathered into the shard. And without a doubt, this shard of ice would definitely take Logandau’s life.

“Spit out that green light, and I will spare your life for now.” She looked at Luo Gandao and said with a smile, “If you try to fool me with excuses, I will kill you and then slowly search your body… You want to live, don’t you? Since you want to live, then you should seize this hard-won opportunity.”

Her voice was soft, and her words carried a rare allure. Yet her eyes remained icy cold—clearly, she was not someone who could be stalled for time with words.

Luo Gandao opened his eyes slightly.

"[Ex...save me...]" he cried out in his heart. Pain and fear consumed him, yet all he received was silence.

He dared not speak, for he knew that if he did, Esdeath would kill him—he had no idea how to extract the 'soul' from his body. And if he uttered even a single word of weakness or hesitation, the truth would surely be revealed.

He could only cry out in his heart. Witnessing the increasingly chilling gaze of the imperial general, his fear grew ever stronger.

Please...

I'll do anything you ask... I don't want to die...

He pleaded and pleaded, and then he finally got the voice he had been dreaming of.

—【A deep-seated fear, a deep-seated will to survive, a deep-seated, base pleas—though as a servant, possessing these qualities would only diminish your value. But if it weren't for them, you wouldn't even deserve any value.】 Ex's voice was as calm and indifferent as ever. But at least she made a sound.

[Am I...can I survive?]

—【Of course you can live. After all, you are my servant, and it should be my decision to consume you. And you did well before. So much killing, so many souls. The accumulated amount is enough for me to invest some of my power into this world. And since you have done so well, I naturally have to reward you.】

"Thank you... thank you..." Luo Gandao breathed a sigh of relief. "What reward... what are you planning to give me?"

—【Becoming a part of me, isn't that a great reward?】

The next moment, Luo Gandao's eyes widened suddenly. A piercing howl, unlike anything in human form, escaped his throat!

"No--!!!!!!"

His eyes turned emerald green in an instant, and then Esdeath, enraged by the rejection, smashed an ice shard directly at his forehead!

'boom--!!!'

Esdeath jerked backward, a sudden sense of danger causing her to move about thirty meters away from her original position the instant the icicles struck. Immediately following, an explosion of frost centered on the point of impact obscured her vision!

"I have to admit, while this guy's soul strength isn't great, the quantity is still sufficient. It actually took more than ten seconds to devour him using 'soul'. It's rare that I didn't overeat."

The frost vanished in an instant. In the center of where the icicles had landed, a petite human figure stood silently. Her eyes were a rare golden color, and her long, coiled hair was a slightly lighter platinum. She wore a magnificent black and red trench coat, and an indescribable sense of oppression surrounded her.

The moment Esdeath saw her, every cell in her body screamed for escape. At that moment, the Imperial General felt as if he had returned to the moment of his first hunt in his childhood—alone, unarmed, surrounded by beasts, with no chance of survival.

She had survived such desperate situations before, but this time... she was doomed.

"Hey." Esdeath licked her lips lightly, a strange sense of pleasure filling her with the feeling of life teetering on the brink of death before even making a move. She couldn't help but ask provocatively, "What's your name?"

“I have no name, just call me Esdeath,” the woman said softly, holding up one finger. “And your name is Esdeath, right?”

"So what if it is—"

Esdeath was unable to finish saying the word "like" in "how it is".

Because just as she uttered the third word in a rhetorical tone, Ex's raised finger swept downwards towards her body. And the next moment, her body split open from the center of her forehead to both sides.

The mountain behind her split open from the middle to both sides.

The plain behind the mountain splits open from the middle to both sides.

The entire continent, beyond the plains, split open from the middle to both sides.

In the final moments of her life, Esdeath heard two words—"Setsuna."

Immediately following, the notification sound from the main god suddenly rang out.

"What!?"

Chapter 71 The Decisive Battle

—'Killing one member of the Zhongzhou team scores one point for the Senzhou team and one point for the Zhongzhou team.'

Exusia's ears twitched. When she swung her finger, cleaving Esdeath and the continent behind it in two, the scoring notification from the Supreme God rang in her ears—this sudden, shocking news even caused a fleeting pause in her thoughts. However, she reacted instantly, regaining control of everything before any unforeseen events could occur.

"This guy is actually a reincarnator from the Central Continent Team?" She looked at Esdeath's lifeless two halves of her body. Her gaze swept over them, and she was certain that every cell in that body had been shattered by 'Setsuna'. From any angle, it was clear that it was nothing more than a pile of dead flesh.

She died, and her death was accompanied by a message from the Lord God.

"Is this a trick by the Central Continent Team? As expected, this 'Gate' world didn't arise out of nowhere. I knew the rules of this world were so imperfect, its operational logic and spatial structure so unstable that I couldn't even directly descend in my physical form. But..."

She looked up at the sky. In her vision, within the clouds that had faded from pale yellow to colorless, there flowed a vast energy like a boundless ocean—she clearly felt countless wisps of fortune surging towards the sky along with Esdeath's death, and then flowing into some unknown place.

The protagonist died, but the destiny shifted. This indicates the emergence of a new protagonist—or rather, that someone has absorbed the destiny.

She raised an eyebrow slightly. A tiny flame ignited in her golden eyes. The numerous pieces of information she had gathered since her arrival converged in her mind, quickly piecing together a rough outline of a plan.

"One protagonist, one antagonist. One world, two reincarnators—ah, I roughly understand. So that's what you're planning. To send the two reincarnators most likely to ascend to the fourth tier to the mortal realm, then have them possess the main antagonist and the protagonist of this world. Then they'll fight each other to trick the world's fortune into granting them a breakthrough to the fourth tier—"

"While I don't quite understand how you managed to evade the will of the world and break free from the causal shackles of destiny, I suspect it's simply through some kind of secret treasure or otherworldly artifact provided by a supreme god. Honestly, if only I had something like that, I wouldn't have to descend so indirectly and risk destroying this fragile world—even the supreme god sometimes makes arrangements that don't go my way."

Ex sighed softly, her toes lightly touching the ground, and suddenly a magnitude 10 earthquake erupted from the center of her feet, spreading outwards in all directions. The earth was violently ripped up, like a boulder falling into a lake, creating massive waves of mud and rubble. These waves of earth and rocks expanded outwards at her will, sweeping across nearly ten thousand square kilometers of land in no more than twenty seconds!

With her single step, she carved a plain across the ruins of this great western capital. All the architectural rubble, remains of corpses, accumulated snow and other biodegradable or non-biodegradable materials were buried underground by the surging waves of the earth. What finally appeared in her view was a vast, pristine plain stretching to the horizon, with no protrusion exceeding a meter in height. The surging waves continued to extend outwards until nothing could obstruct her view.

She made an inviting gesture. And Alice, holding the scepter of dominion, floated down from the sky before her very eyes, landing on a huge slab of stone that 'just happened' to emerge from the ground about ten kilometers in front of her, parallel to the horizon.

Ten kilometers.

This distance is not much different from the phrase 'within reach' for extraordinary beings.

“Anomalies in soul form—so this is your true nature.” Ex sized up her interlocutor, lingering briefly on his striking blond hair and blue eyes. “You don’t look like one of those xenophobic Central Plains people, so you must be a member of the Southern Flame Team? Whatever, congratulations on crossing the boundary between mortal and extraordinary, becoming a truly independent individual.”

Alice chuckled softly, offering neither a yes nor a no answer to the other's guess. She gazed at Ex, and to her senses, the humanoid figure ten kilometers away was nothing more than a white dwarf compressed to a mere meter in height. Light, heat, gravity—boundless power was confined within a tiny shell, poised to destroy anything that dared defy her will.

Since Ex didn't act immediately, Alice cooperated by stalling for time, while simultaneously working to stabilize her newly ascended soul form. The immense resentment and curse originating from this entire world were rapidly transforming into her power under the guidance of her will and the Staff of Control. This process, however, was not instantaneous.

No, she didn't attack because she saw I wasn't at my peak... I see, the arrogance of the strong? Well, thank you, you've eliminated one of the few risks I planned to take.

“Thank you for your praise.” The newly born extraordinary witch bowed slightly to Ex, and within those few seconds, her aura became several times more solid than before. “My name is Alice, Alice Margot Lloyd. Although it may be a bit presumptuous of me, I will soon become your opponent.”

“Alice Margot Royd, is that it? I’ll remember that.” Ex nodded slightly in return. “There aren’t many people who can climb to the fourth tier on their own—or rather, reach the equivalent of the fourth tier. Every single one of them deserves my remembrance. So, before we fight, I have a suggestion.”

She reached out her hand and looked intently at Alice.

“Become my teammate, Alice Margot Lloyd. I have a transfer certificate from the world of ‘Hellblazer.’ And an independent, extraordinary individual shouldn’t just die quietly in this small and fragile world. You have so much more potential to be discovered.”

"As far as I know, the Senzhou team is a small aquaculture team."

"Aquaculture? Oh, in the eyes of those who can easily mass-produce seventeen or eighteen products, my team might indeed be an aquaculture squad. Because they are just an aggregation of complex molecules, and there are countless substitutes to choose from. Although I don't know what power system you're following, you have undoubtedly reached a level similar to the middle stage of the initial fourth level of the Gene Lock—"

She paused, then continued, "—You should know very well how fragile those reptiles are in our eyes. They can't even look directly at our unrestrained bodies. They can provide us with almost no benefit, and even as chosen reincarnators, I don't think they have any value other than providing reward points before reaching the threshold of the fourth tier."

“But you are different, Alice Margotrovid. You are already an irreplaceable real individual, and it is almost impossible for a transcendent being with an independent soul to be enslaved by oaths and curses—join me, and I can ensure that every member of your current reincarnation team returns safely to the God Space. As long as you nod, there will be no more casualties in this team battle.”

However, Alice just looked at her without saying a word.

“It seems you’ve chosen death.” Ex sighed softly, her voice filled with regret. “I truly regret it—a deep regret. I thought I could find a companion, but I guess I was just being wishful thinking.” She looked up at Alice and asked, “Are you ready? Although I can only exert about a third of my full strength now, it’s still something you can’t contend with.”

“I’ve adjusted,” Alice replied, raising her scepter of dominion. “Whether I can win or not, we’ll have to try to find out.”

The next moment, dazzling light covered the entire land.

....................................

Judging from the word count, there will definitely be more than one section today.

Chapter 72 The Decisive Battle Part 2

As the other side of the world is gradually destroyed by the battle of extraordinary beings, on the other side of the 'Gate' world, in the frozen land of the Southern Territory, which was once the first battlefield, a group of Imperial Arms users who were once enemies and irreconcilable are huddled together for warmth in a hastily opened underground cave.

It's not a metaphor, but a literal reference to sticking together for warmth—while Esdeath didn't intentionally attack the ground when she made her move, she also never considered that her unintentionally released power might harm innocent people.

Naturally, creatures living in the perpetually hot and humid South cannot survive in temperatures approaching -100 degrees Celsius. Moreover, the aftershocks of Esdeath's battle with Logan easily stirred up the frigid atmosphere and triggered a terrifying ice storm. And when the storm swept through, what would be left on this land... is easily imaginable.

"The general has gone mad." Kurome, who had been hysterically trying to kill Akame not long ago, now sat quietly beside her older sister. While adding firewood to the campfire, she muttered under her breath, "This world is doomed too."

No one objected to her words. Not because she was right, but because the technique of 'Zhonghuang Taiyi'—connecting the thoughts of all those who know the concept of the Way of Tranquility except for specific individuals—was in operation, creating a vague connection between people's wills. They couldn't clearly read other people's thoughts, but they could sense other people's vague ideas, their goodwill and malice, and... how many of them were still alive.