Great, we're doomed now!

"..."

He looked around and found himself standing on a huge circular platform, with polished black stone bricks under his feet, reflecting his blurry image.

Scattered around the platform are numerous stone pillars of varying thicknesses, each as thick as several people could hug. Their surfaces are covered with layers of patterns, some resembling written symbols, others like diagrams of the internal structure of a living organism.

Some were completely unrecognizable, just a jumble of twisted lines piled together, looking chaotic and unsettling, even making Ye Shou feel nauseous after staring at them for a while.

What's even more striking is that among those stone pillars stand many statues, each with a different shape. Some resemble reptiles, some resemble modified insects, and some are completely unrecognizable as any familiar creatures, more like a random collection of flesh, organs, and shells...

Light poured down from an unseen source overhead, giving the statues a dark, reflective sheen.

Ye Shou looked up in search of a light source, but could only see a dark nebula that kept spinning, like a huge, half-closed pupil looking down at the desolate ruins from above.

—Clearly not on Earth!

He glanced down at the device on his wrist. The signal indicator on the screen had completely disappeared, leaving only a flashing red question mark. Even the most basic positioning function could not be activated.

"……who?!"

Ye Shou suddenly turned around and asked a question in a deep voice to a pillar.

rustling...

The sound, like the rustling of coarse cloth rubbing against a stone surface, came from the back of the stone pillar, slow and even.

Ye Shou turned to the side, his gaze fixed on the stone pillar. He did not adopt a defensive posture, but his center of gravity had been subtly lowered.

A figure slowly emerged from the shadow of the stone pillar. The man wore a large black robe with the hood pulled low, completely obscuring his face. He was hunched over, his shoulders slightly forward, and he moved slowly, like an old man on his deathbed, each step requiring considerable effort.

The hem of the black robe trailed on the ground, and as he moved, one could see dark, tentacle-like outlines of varying thickness wriggling slightly beneath the fabric, leaving long, thin damp trails where it touched the ground...

"You are...do I know you?"

Ye Shou was somewhat bewildered and surprised, as if he had guessed the other party's identity but dared not believe it. He watched as the hunched figure stopped about ten steps away, with two dark red glows faintly visible under the hood, like the embers of a long-dried-up ember.

"Illusion?" Ye Shou asked, his tone calm. "As an evil god, one should die cleanly and decisively after defeat. To resort to such tricks after losing is simply too undignified."

"Illusion? Hehehe..."

The man in black robes let out a hoarse, broken laugh, interspersed with subtle, leaking noises, as if squeezed from the parched throat of a mummy.

"You're wrong... This is just a projection made up of fragments of a remaining memory... I'm dead, completely dead in the way you see it... Even my body and the remaining consciousness have been completely worn away by that golden light."

The creature known as 'Gatanothor' can no longer exist in reality.

—Did he speak?

Ye Shou's pupils narrowed slightly: "So you can communicate normally... Could it be that you were originally a humanoid race?"

"No, I have been a non-human biological weapon from the very beginning... Of course, my intelligence is sufficient to communicate with any race."

The reason I only spoke up now was simply because there was no need to before.

"necessary?"

"When I am seen as a 'monster' by intelligent life, I naturally cannot speak human language. Instead, I must be as evil as a monster, as terrifying as a monster, as devouring everything like a monster, denying all the beauty in this world."

But now… the evil god has been defeated, the monster's body has been destroyed, and only a few lingering echoes remain, which won't last long, so naturally it no longer needs to be bound… Bayeri, you must be very curious about where this place is, right?”

Gatanothor continued speaking, his voice more steady than before, the broken noises diminishing, as if he had firmly grasped Earth language.

"This planet... is known as Planet A21 in your universe... was once my home, or rather, the place where I was created..."

A very, very long time ago, it was a normal world with a prosperous civilization.

They developed biotechnology and created massive weapons to protect themselves from threats in the universe. They also researched cutting-edge energy technologies to extract inexhaustible energy from the universe's dark matter!

With a wave of his hand to the side, distorted images appeared between the two stone pillars:

Colossal biomechanical machines traverse the cosmos, carapace-covered cities stand atop the dark planet's surface, and bright bands of light extend from gaps in the nebula, received by antenna-like structures atop those cities...

"Finally, one day, the humans of this planet obtained the 'fundamental forces' of the universe, opening the door to the realm of gods."

Gatanjee's voice lowered, but one could clearly sense its emotion and pride.

"Extracting energy from dark matter will inevitably lead to something from the deepest part of another dimension, a fundamental force that tends toward the opposite of order and toward the dissolution of existence."

It has no will, no purpose, but it will punish every living being that tries to dominate it!

The city in the footage began to change. The once bright building surfaces were gradually covered with a dark color as if soaked in ink. The bodies of the citizens began to become distorted, some becoming bloated, some becoming thin and elongated. Some people grew organs that should not have been there, while others began to merge together.

The biological weapons they created were increasingly deviating from their original forms. Their uncontrolled proliferation caused them to lose their original regular structure, turning them into a combination of randomly pieced-together chunks of flesh and shells...

"After obtaining the power of darkness, we became gods in the universe, conquered numerous planets, and ravaged the entire galaxy with our power!"

Weak races worship the weapons we create like gods, including myself!

Ye Shou's gaze sharpened as he looked around carefully and discovered that there really was a statue of "Gatanothor" standing there... but it was relatively "clean" at the time, without so many tentacles on its body.

"But the more we conquer, the less we resemble ourselves... Individual differences become greater, and our understanding of each other begins to break down."

Ultimately, we could no longer exist as a unified whole—so we began attacking each other, using biological weapons, dark matter energy, and every means we had ever used to conquer external enemies!

In the final few images, the planet is torn apart from within, with lava and debris spreading across space, forming a sprawling asteroid belt...

"Was it destroyed?"

"Yes... I was the ultimate victor in that war!"

I slaughtered all my kind and became the last living creature of that civilization!

But victory is meaningless—a king without subjects is nothing but a madman.

I left that nebula and began wandering the universe, searching for a new purpose.

His voice contained neither sadness nor regret, only a detached indifference as if stating a fact.

"Over the long course of time, I have descended upon one inhabited planet after another. Each time, I have dragged the civilization of that planet into darkness, watching them struggle, collapse, and perish..."

I relish those cries of agony and fear—they were among the few pieces of evidence I could feel of being alive.

Ye Shou stood opposite, remaining silent until Gatanothor stopped, at which point he finally spoke—

"What are you trying to express by saying all this? Repentance? An explanation?"

Gatanothor let out a low laugh: "No, I said all this just to mock you!"

Your victory is meaningless... Bayeri, Kuze Yoshimori... You will always have to face some kind of truth after you win.

I used to think that my own will was in control of everything—that I chose destruction, that I enjoyed the suffering of others… But later I gradually realized that everything I did was actually just the result of being driven by that 'trend'!

Every time I land on a planet, that planet's civilization is destroyed, regardless of whether I want to destroy them or not.

My very existence is the means by which that process is realized.

"You're the same, Lord of Light~"

Volume 11: To the Day of Destiny: Chapter 519: The Dark Lord, the Emperor (6K)

I truly pity you... really...

When I started to get tired of it all, I even began to deliberately fall asleep, to give those eroded civilizations a little more time to breathe... not out of pity, but simply to prolong the process itself and make the fun last longer.

But even so, the current of my 'fate' was never stopped; what was destined to happen would happen.

He raised his head slightly, and the two dark red lights beneath his hood became extremely dim.

"So, in the end, I realized that I am not the true ruler—and you are no exception."

This is the only thing I want you to know before I dissipate... You defeated me, but you didn't defeat 'fate'. It won't disappear because of my defeat; instead, it will expand unchecked because of the loss of its vessel... Be trapped in an endless battle, Bayeri~

I will be freed, but darkness will endure forever…

The outline of the black robe began to blur, its edges spreading outwards like thin smoke blown away by the wind. The dark tentacles also gradually faded, disappearing one by one... Finally, it turned completely to ashes and vanished into the shadows between the stone pillars.

As the evil god departed, cracks began to spread down the top of the tallest stone pillar, gradually disintegrating into small fragments. The starless night sky overhead also collapsed, as if someone were tearing the entire curtain apart from the outside.

Before the collapse reached his feet, Ye Shou raised his right hand and slightly spread his five fingers—

hum~

A golden ripple spread from his palm, and wherever it passed, the crumbling stone pillars and statues, the blurry, writhing shadows... seemed to melt away under the golden light, becoming thinner and fainter, until finally disappearing completely.

call!

Ye Shou felt as if his body was being pulled upwards by an invisible thread, passing through the gaps in the night, and seeing a line of white light at the edge of his vision, which then rapidly expanded.

"cough!"

The real sea breeze rushed back into his nostrils, and the gray, turbid current exploded on the man's body, bursting from the inside out with golden light, like a balloon being inflated to its limit. Fragments turned into tiny gray specks that scattered in all directions, only to be swept away by the subsequent surge of golden light.

Ye Shou's figure appeared from the light, his feet landing in a puddle on the reef, creating a shallow ripple.

"Ye Shou!"

Carmilla was the first to land beside him, her gaze sweeping from his face to his arm, and then down to his lower body. Only after confirming that there was no obvious injury did she slightly relax her furrowed brows.

It seems that only a moment has passed in reality, and everyone is just beginning to realize it.

Ye Shou looked down at his palm, where a dark badge lay. It had no extra decorations, only a clear outline engraved on the front, which was the silhouette of Gatanothor.

He silently put the badge away, then looked up at the sky again. The enormous vortex was still expanding, now nearly twice its original size. The dark substance at the edge was slowly spreading outwards, like a drop of ink spreading in clear water, showing no sign of stopping.

Carmilla looked up as if she sensed something, and asked Ye Shou, "What should we do with this?"

"We definitely have to destroy it; it's obviously not a good thing."

Shinjo spoke first, as direct as ever, his voice still tinged with fighting spirit: "I still have some energy left, let's do it again, let's all blast this thing apart together!"

"That won't work."

Ye Shou shook his head: "Destroying a cave will only make the breach bigger... That vortex itself is just an entrance, or rather, a door that is not fully opened. Once the things connected to it rush in, the entire solar system will be filled instantly."

"Huh?" Shinjo then realized that it was something like a bomb.

"Will it...will it explode?"

Daigo frowned, glancing at the sky with a worried expression. "What should we do? It doesn't seem like it'll just dissipate on its own. Should we just do nothing?"

"I estimate that... it would probably require a force in the opposite direction to counteract it, allowing it to slowly contract in the energy clash until it is completely closed."

"Opposite forces?"

Masaki stood on the shallow water a few steps away, without saying a word, but his brow twitched slightly after Ye Shou finished speaking.

"Megatronics!"

Xincheng turned to look at him: "What?"