Chapter 531: The Codex and the Scarlet

The twentieth day after Earth was reshaped.

The noise in Celestial Imperial City had finally died down. But deep beneath the Red Dwarves’ Undercity, a violent tremor shook the earth.

The Red Dwarves’ underground volcano had once been a calm source of lava. Now, it had become a boiling demonic abyss.

"Aiden! Something’s wrong! The ancestral land... the laws there have gone out of control!"

Malcolm’s voice came through the communicator. It was filled with fear and sounded rougher than ever before.

Earth had been reshaped, and a new system of laws had arrived. This had completely destroyed the balance that had existed underground for thousands of years.

The Scarlet Crystal, worshiped by the Red Dwarves Clan as a sacred object, had soothed the ancestral Codex for ten thousand years.

But under the new laws of the world, the crystal was seen as something foreign. The new laws began to reject it violently.

The crystal shattered.

The drop of Heavenly Demon blood sealed inside it was forced out and slowly dissolved by the new laws.

However, the Codex did not calm down after losing its "soothing seal."

Instead, it let out an angry roar, as if it had finally been set free.

"The Codex is not a weapon of war!"

Malcolm shouted hysterically through the communicator, shaken by the truth that had been hidden for ten thousand years.

"He is our ancestor! He was one of the heroes who fought the Heavenly Demon alongside Yves ten thousand years ago!"

"That drop of Heavenly Demon blood was never meant to calm him. It was poison! The Heavenly Demon used it to speed up its corruption and take control of his body!"

"For ten thousand years, our ancestor was never asleep. He had been using his own laws to fight the Heavenly Demon’s corruption!"

Aiden’s eyes narrowed.

Ten thousand years of constant struggle.

No wonder the moment the new laws forced out the Heavenly Demon blood, the law distortion that had built up over ten thousand years went out of control.

"Wait for me."

Aiden ended the call.

He raised his right hand slightly. A strand of golden flame danced at his fingertip.

It was the source of the Divine Golden Sunflame.

Although the 10,000x Critical Hit System had removed some of his excess power, the Golden Sunflame, which served as the source of his own laws, had become purer and more controlled.

Rip!

Aiden tore open space with his bare hand.

The next moment, he crossed through space and appeared above the underground volcano of the Red Dwarves.

A wave of heat rushed toward him, mixed with a violent aura that made him feel sick.

Aiden looked down, and his pupils tightened slightly.

That was no ordinary dwarf.

It was a dark-red giant standing fifty meters tall, its body reaching toward the sky.

After ten thousand years of clashing laws and corruption, its body had swollen and twisted beyond recognition.

Countless dark-red, web-like layers of hardened law covered its skin completely, like several layers of cruel armor that could never be torn away.

With every breath, the giant breathed dark-red sparks of destruction from his mouth and nose.

"Aiden!"

Malcolm and the other Red Dwarf elites knelt at the edge of the volcano. Their faces were pale.

"He can’t hold on much longer! The twisted laws are turning against his soul!"

Aiden remained calm. He walked through the air, slowly approaching the fifty-meter-tall giant.

"After holding on for ten thousand years, this should not be how it ends."

Aiden spoke softly.

Boom!

He pressed one hand against the air. The golden flame at his fingertip instantly turned into a rain of golden light.

The source of the Golden Sunfire erupted!

This was not a flame of destruction. It was the light of law, filled with holy and purifying power.

A sea of golden fire instantly swallowed the fifty-meter-tall Codex.

Sizzle—

When the dark-red layers of hardened law touched the Golden Sunfire, they began to melt with a sharp, grating sound. Wisps of black smoke rose into the air.

Aiden’s eyes changed, revealing twin pupils. Through them, he saw the tangled threads of law that had twisted inside the Codex for ten thousand years.

"Return to your proper place!"

Aiden gave a low shout.

His hands moved through the air like a musician plucking the strings of a harp.

With every flick of his fingers, a golden thread of law shot into the Codex’s body. The threads forced the twisted and distorted Red Dwarves’ Law of Origin back onto its original path.

This was not destruction.

It was the most complete form of healing and restoration.

Time passed slowly.

Deep inside the volcano, golden light and dark-red flames intertwined, as if a god were forging the perfect weapon.

Six full hours passed.

Aiden stood motionless in the air, his face calm. Only the golden light in his twin-pupiled eyes shone so brightly that no one dared look directly at them.

Boom!

With one final explosion, the golden light withdrew like a receding tide and vanished completely.

The fifty-meter-tall dark-red giant began to shrink rapidly.

The sound of cracking bones filled the air like popping beans.

At last, a Red Dwarf warrior about three meters tall landed steadily on the lava-covered rock. His skin was a healthy bronze color, and his muscles were hard and well-defined like granite.

The dark-red layers of hardened law covering his body had disappeared completely. In their place were the purest flame patterns of the Red Dwarves.

The Codex slowly opened his eyes.

They were clear and full of age, yet they still held an eternal flame that would never go out.

He looked around. At last, his gaze fell on the trembling Malcolm.

The Codex opened his mouth. His voice was hoarse, but it carried a warmth that had survived ten thousand years.

"Malcolm..."

He called out the name.

Thud!

Malcolm, King of the Red Dwarves—a powerful ruler known for his fierce temper and commanding presence—collapsed to his knees the moment he heard that name.

Because he knew.

The Codex was not calling the Malcolm of the present.

It was the name of the baby Codex had personally placed in the hands of the first elder of the Red Dwarves ten thousand years ago—a helpless infant who was still crying for milk.

That baby was also named Malcolm.

"Great Ancestor..."

Malcolm covered his face with both hands. Like a lost child who had wandered for ten thousand years, he sobbed uncontrollably in front of his ancestor.

The Red Dwarf warriors around them also fell to their knees, tears streaming down their faces.

Codex said nothing. He simply watched his crying descendant, his eyes filled with comfort and relief.

After being cleansed by the new laws, he was no longer a warrior who had to sleep in order to resist corruption.

He had become the eternal guardian of the Red Dwarf Clan’s sacred flame.

As long as he remained alive, the forging fires of the Red Dwarf Clan would never go out.

Codex slowly rose to his feet.

He stepped across the scorching rocks and looked around the underground volcano where he had lain for ten thousand years.

"So this is where my battlefield was."

Codex whispered softly.

Then he walked over to Malcolm and reached out his broad hand. He gently patted Malcolm on the head.

"When your father brought you to me, you were only this big."

Codex held up both hands to show a length of about forty centimeters.

Malcolm began to cry even harder and kept bowing his head to the ground.

Codex smiled. Then he turned around and looked at Aiden, who was standing in the air.

A deeply complicated memory flashed through his ancient eyes.

"Young human."

Codex looked at Aiden and slowly spoke.

"I’ve seen the flame inside you before."

Aiden raised an eyebrow but said nothing.

"Ten thousand years ago, Yves had the same flame."

Codex pointed at the faint golden light in Aiden’s chest. His voice was deep.

"But your flame is much calmer than his."

"Yves’s flame was used to fight and kill."

Codex paused, then gave a sincere smile of admiration.

"Your flame is used to fix things."

...

The thirtieth day after Earth was reorganized.

The commotion in Celestial Imperial City had finally settled down. Under the new laws, the entire city was full of life once again.

Aiden stood alone on the balcony of the City Lord’s Mansion, holding an ancient scroll that shimmered with a dark golden light.

This was the ultimate reward from Bane of All Races 2—the Ancient Battlefield Teleportation Scroll.

It was also the most precious item in his possession, and the only one he had not yet used.

On the evolution-node map left behind by Yves, this scroll had been marked with a line of striking red words:

"Can only be used after Earth has been completely reorganized."

Aiden took a deep breath and slowly tightened his fingers.

Crack!

The scroll shattered in his palm. A curtain of law-light that could not be described in words instantly swallowed his entire body.

There was no pain from his body being torn through space. Instead, he felt an almost heavenly sense of freedom, as if he were leaving his mortal body behind.

When Aiden opened his eyes again, the sight before him left him completely stunned.

This was the Ancient Battlefield.

But there were no mountains of corpses, rivers of blood, broken weapons, or brutal killing aura like Aiden had expected.

Instead, an endless ocean of dazzling starlight stretched out before him, so beautiful that it almost took his breath away.

Hundreds of millions of law fragments and Inner Spirit fragments floated, intertwined, and drifted through the dark void like fireflies.

Every faint light represented a god or Demon God who had once fallen within Earth’s laws.

Here, they flowed in silence, like tears shed by history in the deepest part of the universe.

"Shocking, isn’t it?"

A gentle yet weathered voice suddenly sounded behind Aiden.

Aiden turned around.

In the void, countless lines of law intertwined and slowly formed the figure of a carefree-looking middle-aged man dressed in old cloth robes.

It was Yves, the legendary figure of the Great Shaw Empire.

This was only the last image of law he had left behind in this place.

Yves looked at Aiden with a gentle smile filled with relief.

"By the time you reached this place, the 10,000x Critical Hit ability should have been completely removed from you, right?"

Aiden gave a slight nod, his expression calm.

"Good. That proves you didn’t rely on an outside power. You reached this point through your own Strength."

Yves clasped his hands behind his back and gazed at the ocean of starlight, his eyes filled with distant memories.

"I know you have many questions, especially about what humanity will face after making the evolutionary leap."

Aiden looked at him, waiting for the ultimate answer that had troubled countless great minds on Earth.

Yves turned his gaze back to Aiden and slowly spoke five words:

"The answer is nothing."

Aiden’s double-pupiled eyes narrowed slightly.

"Nothing?"