Tonight, Alice joins the hunt.

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

The girl suddenly opened her eyes.

Her vision was blurry, and her ears were filled with a cacophony of sounds—as if shadowy figures were moving about, or as if whispers were emanating from her ear. But she couldn't discern the specific components of these sounds—she didn't know what was happening, and all she could manage to do was keep her brain working and thinking.

what happened?

In her memory, she was pushed to the ground one moment, followed by countless trampling and crushing—she clearly felt her ribs breaking one by one, her internal organs collapsing, and when an exceptionally heavy crushing blow struck her head, causing her to lose consciousness, she heard the crisp sound of her spine breaking.

I should be dead already—but why?

Was I saved by medical staff...? But medical expenses in North America are so high, how could anyone possibly save me...? Could it be because I wasn't seriously injured...? No, that's impossible...? Then, did I just happen to run into some important figure in North America putting on a show?

[Ugh... What happened...?]

She was utterly bewildered. Yet, no matter how bewildered she was, the fact remained that she was still alive—she struggled to raise her hand, trying to touch her surroundings to ascertain her situation. But all she felt was a warm, smooth texture—it didn't feel like the ground, nor like a hospital bed. If she had to rely on her senses to make a judgment, a single word clearly surfaced in her mind.

—Warm jade.

The word appeared in her mind for no apparent reason.

And just as she was about to dismiss this unrealistic idea with self-mockery, she regained her sight and hearing, which she had recently lost.

She closed her mouth—even though she hadn't actually opened it.

What came into her view was a palace made of white jade, shrouded in mist and ethereal, perfectly matching her understanding of a celestial palace as an Easterner—she saw smooth, clear jade ground beneath her feet, and on this white mirror-like surface, she saw a perfectly intact version of herself.

She was neither crippled nor injured, nor did she have a halo above her head. She wasn't wearing white clothes but was still draped in her faded student suit. She turned to look behind her, where countless pavilions and towers floated in the swirling clouds. And in front of her stood a white jade staircase that stretched straight up to the heavens, its end impossible to discern.

All around was quiet, without sound or movement—she saw no unusual structures. She also saw nothing that could move. Even though everything in this palace gave her the feeling of an Eastern celestial palace, her heart couldn't help but tremble.

She tried to wait, but nothing changed.

She tried to call out, but nothing or no one responded to her.

In the end, she could only turn her gaze to the only unusual thing in the palace—the top of the steps that led to the highest heavens, with no end in sight.

She was determined to climb higher—

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

Luo Ye lowered her eyes, watching everything unfold, focusing on the changes reflected in her gaze—she disliked change, but precisely because of this, she wanted to exert the power of change on this newly born land. Only in this way could she suppress her own Dao erosion to a minimum, thus preventing 'Luo Ye,' an individual with whom she shared a profound karmic connection, from transforming into her.

There's no way around it; forming a bond is easy, severing it is difficult. The karmic connection between 'Luo Ye' and Luo Ye is far too profound, so profound that if she only needs to pay a little attention, 'Luo Ye' will directly transform into her own incarnation, thus constructing another entirely new paradoxical cycle, and Luo Ye does not desire that outcome.

Therefore, she had to be careful and could only proceed indirectly—in her original plan, she would decorate this Heavenly Court to look like a real thing from the primordial Heavenly Realm. As for herself, she would use her status as the Heavenly Empress to find any excuse to bestow favors... or rather, to send a cheat code to the 'Luo Ye' in front of her and send her back to Earth.

Of course, if necessary, 'Luo Ye' could also embark on a thrilling and exciting adventure in another world, essentially a journey through another realm like Feng Jiaotian's, before returning to Earth. Regardless of the development, the essence is to give 'Luo Ye' a script that allows him to dominate the world while also being quite entertaining, thus enabling him to live a pleasant life as the protagonist.

—Or countless lives.

Unfortunately, Luo Ye found herself unable to take the first step. The moment she tried, she discovered that this more authentic 'Luo Ye' began to change drastically the instant she became aware of her existence. In just a very short moment, 'Luo Ye's' internal structure underwent a radical transformation. Even though her thinking itself had not yet been distorted, some of Luo Ye's talents appeared in her!

What does it mean for an ordinary person to possess a portion of the talents and abilities of a top-tier expert?

It's very simple. This means that even without any contact with or knowledge of supernatural forces, this mortal could create a path out of thin air in a magic-free universe simply through intuition and talent! And right now, 'Luo Ye' is on such a path. Every second, countless inspirations and insights burst forth from her mind as she climbs that ladder. And at this rate, when she reaches the top of the steps, even without accepting the cheat code Luo Ye prepared for her, she will directly possess power almost equivalent to a God-level A enhancement!

This was so terrifying that Luo Ye had to immediately detach herself from the fake heavenly palace, along with all the creations bearing traces of her power. However, it was precisely because of this that she was able to remain calmly in this place, observing the changes and growth of 'Luo Ye'.

She had already foreseen 'Luo Ye's' future. She saw the tumultuous waves that would be unleashed upon 'Luo Ye's' return to the earth. And she was certain that 'Luo Ye's' later life, her next life, and countless lives to come, would inevitably be filled with flowers and applause as she grew up.

It started strong but ended weakly, but that might not be a bad thing. It means she doesn't need to expend too much energy and time here. It also means that the connection they had initially made has come to an end.

From then on, Luo Ye owed 'Luo Ye' nothing—even though the latter was never aware of this debt.

And after that—

—The spirit that Gaia had delivered appeared in Loya's hand.

There are still two places to visit...

She shifted her gaze to another universe—as she looked, her form also moved into that universe. And her target looked up at her in her eyes—

—Binana, the Son of Heaven.

☆, Preparations before the end of the war - Emperor Hinana

War broke out in an instant.

This was no ordinary skirmish, nor a tentative attack born of mutual apprehension—it was a clash between two transcendent beings, two high-level beings, two near-quasi-saints, and two forces that had reached the quasi-saint realm—two completely different powers collided violently the instant their eyes met, creating a deafening echo throughout the vast seas.

Then--

In the instant of the battle, Luo Ye was killed more than ten million times.

Each time, she was shattered to pieces; each time, her body and soul were annihilated. From her physical form to her spiritual structure, from the source worldline to the light of her soul, she couldn't even comprehend the attack methods of that Heavenly Emperor before facing death time and time again. She revealed her fighting spirit, she made her move, she stepped into death, and then—she forgot everything.

She knew she had died more than ten million times because at the ten millionth and first death, her mind finally formed a complete thought process, making her realize that she had been sent back from the abyss of death ten million times. However, in the blink of an eye, the number of deaths in her perception increased from ten million to fourteen million, and when the memories that had been erased time and time again accumulated to make her 'stop', the number of deaths had reached nearly thirty million.

She didn't know what was happening, nor was she aware of it.

When her number of deportations stopped increasing, she found herself in the abyss outside the single universe where the emperor resided—and on a conceptual level, about six hundred other universes of different sizes and specifications near the emperor's universe had been reduced to wasteland!

That was the aftermath of the battle—even if Luo Ye couldn't fully comprehend or remember how he fought against Bina Naki, it was still a result left over from the battle between the two sides.

The battle came to an end as she left the universe where the emperor resided—she looked at her hands.

She still couldn't understand how Hinajiro Tenshi had managed to do all this. She couldn't comprehend the attack methods, the principles behind them, or why the battle had ended in such a way—no, she did have some guesses about that. It was that the timeline, world lines, and even the records in the multiverse that she possessed, extending from the start of the war, had been erased time and again in her battles with Hinajiro Tenshi, which pointed to the current situation where she felt as if she had done nothing at all.

No, perhaps she truly did nothing—all traces and memories of what she did had been erased, which was tantamount to doing nothing—she focused her gaze on the desolate universe around her and, unsurprisingly, discovered that the records accumulated within those universes all pointed to the natural decline and decay of the universes. Even though many of the details seemed to be the evolution of her power, Miss Luo, she couldn't detect even the slightest trace of her own power remaining within them.

She felt nothing, perceived nothing—if she hadn't discovered records of being repatriated over thirty million times in the Abyss of Death, she wouldn't even have realized she had experienced over thirty million one-sided battles. And this finally made her understand one thing.

She can't beat her.

—She couldn't beat the emperor.

—She wasn’t even qualified to fight the emperor properly.

She came to realize all of this, and all of this made her subconsciously let out a sigh—

"Is the gap between a fourth-tier advanced cultivator and a quasi-saint who has unlocked the gene lock really this large?"

The next moment, she sensed another voice echoing in her ear—

“Wrong.” — She turned her head and found that she had somehow stepped back into the universe where the Heavenly Emperor of the Bina Mingju resided. The pale being with pure white wings looked up at her — “This is the power of a True Saint, not the authority of a Quasi-Saint.”

She saw the Heavenly Emperor, the one with white hair and white feathers, whose blood-red eyes were fixed on her—those outstretched wings seemed to extend infinitely into the depths of the universe they inhabited. And scattered feathers of light tumbled and floated around Luo Ye.

"Should we fight again?"—She heard the question from the emperor, his voice calm and gentle, almost devoid of any emotion.

"You've become a saint?" Luo Ye asked.

"Not yet, but I will complete my ascension at a very recent point in time—a true sainthood that will last forever. So, at this point in time, I will naturally be able to unleash the full power that comes with the ascension."

Then Luo Ye's shoulders slumped.

"I also intend to settle this karmic debt with you on Alice's behalf—"

“You’ve already done it.” — She received a cold response.

Strangely, Luo Ye's slumped shoulders even lifted up again the instant the words were spoken—

"What do you mean?" She raised her head and looked at the Emperor of the Ninagaku clan before her. "I had no idea that there was a settlement method in this world that could kill the liquidator more than 30 million times!"

"Indeed, no." The white-haired man nodded slightly, his gaze never leaving Luo Ye's left or right. "So how many more times do you plan to commit suicide? Ten million, twenty million, or round it up to a hundred million?"

"What did you say—" Miss Luo Ye's eyes widened.

And in the next moment, she saw the indifferent-looking Emperor Bei lightly snap his fingers—

She saw herself burst into the Emperor's universe, saw herself, without a word, unleash all her power to create a fallen sun equivalent to the end of the universe, smashing it towards the head of Hinanagi Tenshi! But that wasn't the point. The point was that Hinanagi Tenshi didn't make any move in the face of such an attack. She simply stared at Luo Ye, at her own disintegration, and at Luo Ye's hand, which had naturally disappeared after successfully avenging Alice!

Killing a sage comes at a price.

Even if the sage who is killed does nothing, at the moment of his death, the uncontrolled phenomenon of Dao erosion will burst outward from the corpse of the dead sage. Luo Ye saw himself easily kill the Emperor Bina, who did not put up any serious resistance, and then at the moment the other party stepped into death, everything about himself was instantly assimilated!

He accomplished everything, and he destroyed everything.

The destroyed evil triggered a surge, which in turn drew itself back into it—the entire timeline it had possessed since its arrival was completely erased. Then came eternal silence and stillness.

And so, time passed.

Thus, Luo Ye, whose timeline had been erased, returned to the coordinates of the universe where the Emperor resided. And in the next moment, she launched a battle of the same scale once again!

She killed Hinana no Tenshi once, and was destroyed once by the aftershocks of the sage's death. Then she returned to the point in time where she had done nothing, and after observing Hinana no Tenshi who had also been revived from within the same timeline, she took almost the exact same action as in the previous cycle!

No, the cause and effect are wrong.

It's not that Binagi Tensei killed Luo Ye thirty million times. Rather, it's that Luo Ye used various methods to disrupt Binagi Tensei's source world line, killing him more than thirty million times. After each victory, the natural forces triggered by the collapse of the sage's avatar would erase everything that entered the battlefield, including Luo Ye herself, thus causing her to enter the same battlefield on different timelines with the same thoughts!

Luo Ye couldn't help but give a wry smile. She felt...extremely embarrassed.

Of course, she felt embarrassed because she allowed 'embarrassment' to be part of her emotions. And this was also beneficial for her to continue contact with Emperor Hinanagi in this unpleasant situation, rather than simply walking away, or even having another encounter.

"I'm sorry..." she said politely.

“No need to apologize.” — She heard the calm reply from the Heavenly Emperor of the Ninaga family: “All intelligent life forms must pay the price for their actions. Whether it is you or me, it is the same. Since I was willing to be killed once by Captain Zheng Zha with my nascent body in order to get rid of this relationship as soon as possible, then being killed by you more than 30 million times is not much beyond my expectations.”

She looked at Luo Ye, her wings fluttering gently behind her, scattering feathers of light.

"Besides, I wouldn't mind being killed by you a few more times. Luo Ye—you should know why."

Luo Ye lowered her eyes.

Ah, yes. She did have some guesses—guessing why Gaia had given her that spiritual essence, and why she had come to contact Hinanaju Tenshi. She had the answer in her heart from the beginning, and that answer was perhaps why she chose to act decisively after observing Hinanaju Tenshi, instead of the usual pre-battle procrastination.

She knows why.

Why would a reincarnator who transcended the previous cycle of reincarnation and attained the quasi-saint status fall into such an ordinary and insignificant universe? Why would a quasi-saint be so enamored with a mere puppeteer's centuries of companionship? And why would this adoration be so profound that she would rather sacrifice herself than the Heavenly Emperor, holding back the cosmic catastrophe to try and recreate the deceased puppeteer through repeated cycles of civilization? And most importantly, the puppeteer's death clearly didn't exceed the transcendent level, yet the Heavenly Emperor was unable to resurrect her or pull her from the abyss of death!

The answer is simple, obviously simple.

Especially when Alice is identified as the puppeteer, and when the vast amount of water she released during the Central Continent Team's reincarnation mission is taken into account, this simple answer has a greater than 90% probability of being supported by data.

"How should I address you? Rather than the title of Emperor Ju?" Luo Ye slowly raised her lowered eyelids, and with them, she also raised her slightly bowed head.

“My sister.” She paused slightly. “Or perhaps—”

"—The previous me?"

She gazed upon the emperor who resided in the palace.

The latter, however, did not show any weakness or back down.

“Strictly speaking, I am not the previous you.” She heard the calm and indifferent words uttered by the Heavenly Prince. “I was merely the last one who could have become you, become Luo Ye, become the last Gaia maiden connected to the special life form of 'Alice.' And when I failed, and you succeeded, the identity of the last maiden was already locked in. As for me, I can barely be considered a transcendent individual who is about to become a primordial demon god—”

"I am a primordial demon god."