Chapter 491 (1): The Tenth Floor, Life and Knowledge

Wayne sat on the divine throne with Hesione in his arms, triggering the Holy Light. With the key in Hesione’s possession, the Holy Light overflowed and gradually reassembled into a doorway. Wayne sent his thoughts inside, leading Hesione into the spatial passage.

All of a sudden, the world spun around them, and a spiral staircase emerged. It shifted constantly, consisting of clumps of randomly writhing tentacles, swarms of eyeballs, pale and boneless arms, and wings of different sizes.

It didn’t stand out at all in this world, so neither Wayne nor Hesione found it unusual.

This was angels’ style!

They floated up and reached the end of the passageway, bracing against the light and entering the tenth level of Heaven.

The sky was golden. A massive ancient text wrapped in golden chains hovered in the heart of it, radiating like a sun, casting an ocean of scintillating golden radiance.

The land was white with two white towers in the shape of twisted spirals rising beyond measurable height, each a thousand meters in diameter. Tentacles that resembled branches stretched outward, suspending macabre white cocoons.

Save for those fixtures, the tenth floor was empty. One divine statue stood alone at the entrance, dressed in a white robe with spinning light obscuring his face. His arms were outstretched to form a cross with his body.

“Father.”

Hesione went up to the cross respectfully and got on one knee.

Wayne looked over, pushing his gaze further in an attempt to pierce through the spinning light. He wanted to get a clear look at Elohim, the Heavenly Father.

The moment her thoughts contacted the light, the cross-shaped statue looked down at the kneeling Hesione, nodding in approval.

That was it.

There was no video, not even a voice message.

Wayne stroked his chin. The statue had completely ignored him, once again proving that he had nothing to do with Heaven’s successor. The fact that it had merely nodded at Hesione... couldn’t prove that Hesione was the sole successor. Perhaps any angel stepping into this place would see Elohim’s approving smile.

For example, Mikhael.

Those who knew the truth had died, including Lahr, the only one who could interpret the prophecy. Wayne wasn’t sure who exactly Heaven’s successor was. Given his belief in nepotism, he decisively crossed out Mikhael on the list of candidates.

Hesione had to take over Heaven, Wayne decided. Not even the Heavenly Father could change his mind.

Hesione’s head was bowed in prayer, so she had not seen the statue nod at her. She felt a warm light shine on her. It felt like a pat on her head and a ‘you’ve grown up’.

Tears ran down her face, unbidden.

Wayne went up to help her up and pull her into his arms, taking her hand. “Don’t be sad. Although our father is gone, He just said that he would entrust you with me, and I promised him that I would take good care of you.”

Did you hear him?

Hesione looked at him in surprise. She had not heard anything.

Of course, it made sense for Father to speak to His son and successor, out of His daughter’s earshot—that sounded wrong, but the idea was sound.

When Hesione realized it, her hand was already in Wayne’s grip, and his shameless face was leaning closer.

She struggled out of his embrace with a blush, wiping her tears away. “Great Anointed One, Father’s here,” she murmured. “Don’t do that.”

“Father has entrusted you to me. He said all that with His own mouth, and I relayed His message truthfully. We aren’t going to lie to you together, are we?”

Right.

Hesione blushed harder. With her parent approving of her relationship, she lost all her guilt.

Wayne once again pulled her in, catching her lips in a kiss. She only offered a cursory struggle before putting her arms around his neck, responding in a reserved but welcoming manner.

After the kiss, Hesione stayed and admired her father’s appearance, while Wayne waved at his father-in-law before walking around the statue, heading for the two towers.

They weren’t actual towers, but trees, and they were the results of Elohim’s experiments.

The Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge. They were Elohim’s legacy for His successor, bearing the fruits of life and knowledge. They would allow one to rule over Heaven.

There was also a Tree of Life and a Tree of Knowledge in the garden of the Heaven of Crystals on the ninth level, but they were replicas, like miniatures displayed in a museum. They were one thousandth of the originals’ scale with fruit that would never mature.

The two sacred trees on the tenth level were different. The fruits they bore were the real deal. Once the Fruit of Life and the Fruit of Knowledge were combined, they would form a new sentient being.

The trees could mass-produce demigods, or angelic vassals.

The Fruit of Life was nourished by Heaven, by the Divine Realm Elohim had created with earth, fire, water, and wind elements; the Fruit of Knowledge was formed out of the Golden Law in the sky—it was Elohim’s knowledge.

Wayne put a hand on the Tree of Life, figuring out how the tree bore fruit. After some inspection, his expression shifted.

The Fruit of Life acquired nutrients from Heaven. Since the nine heavens had become reshaped by him, the fruit the tree bore would be influenced by him. The Fruit of Knowledge, on the other hand, had not been corrupted. The master of the Divine Realm could extract a section of the Golden Law and infuse it into the fruit, granting knowledge of Life and the relevant Laws.

Wayne hovered up to the one-man-tall Sacred Tome of Golden Law, touching it with the tip of his finger and devouring the infinite golden light. Once the Book of Greed had had its feast, it vomited the knowledge it had refined.

The Sacred Tome of Golden Law remained in the sky, while the eye of Holy Light on the Book of Greed’s cover radiated intensely. The Holy Light content had almost reached the book’s limit.

At least it seemed that way. The book could actually eat more.

Elohim wasn’t an ancient god. He was merely a scholar on the path of evolution. He had mastered the Holy Light and become a god, but that didn’t mean he had learned all information there was about the Holy Light.

The free feast on knowledge sated Wayne. He felt like Holy Light was coming out of his pores.

“As expected, the Golden Law is different from the Divine Comedy of Seven Deadly Sins...”

Heaven’s Golden Law had already taken shape with the Sacred Virtues forming a unified entity, while the Seven Deadly Sins of Hell was still divided into cantos, and the sins were ranked according to their severity.

“Heaven is Elohim’s Divine Realm. Mikhael was ordered to impersonate Pride and manage the sins in Hell...”

“Hell should be Elohim’s Divine Realm, too...”

“It seems to defy commonsense for one person to own two Divine Realms. Is that why the sins cannot be integrated?”

Wayne murmured to himself. The strongest god lived up to his reputation.

Suddenly, a possibility occurred to him: Hesione was the successor of Heaven, able to become a god by entering the tenth level and succeeding Elohim’s full heritage, while Hell’s successor was Mikhael, able to become the great demon god by integrating all sins.

“Then both the strongest angel and the most favored angel can become gods...”

“He so fairly divided the inheritance in half. Father-in-law is a good father!”

“Then why hasn’t Mikhael done anything? Given his wisdom, he should’ve long become the great demon god... Is it because he’s still attached to Heaven?”

Wayne frowned. Mikhael still refused to share his real mission. He acknowledged the Anointed One but insisted that the Anointed One ranked lower than the Heavenly Father, and the second in command had no authority to make him talk about the mission given to him by the commander in chief.

Mikhael had thought of himself as the second in command before, and now, the third in command.

Hesione, who was a fellow viceroy, was a vermin who had sold her body for status, no different from the Lord of Lust in Hell. The only difference was whether their business was private or public.

“Forget it. Given his pride, once he becomes the great demon god, he’ll definitely look down on Hesione and decide to conquer Heaven to manage his father’s company on his own.”

Wayne shook his thoughts away. Looking at the land below, he sent his tremendous thoughts sweeping down, trying to locate the laboratory and the research data, but there was nothing to be found. It seemed that before Elohim made a run for it, He had erased His browser history.

Wayne lamented his losses. The research data would be a form of knowledge, too. The data could’ve accelerated the evolution of an Astral life like him. It was valuable to him.

“Still, it should be erased. If He let His successors see that they had been created in a lab, numbered and ranked alongside their siblings, their faith would waver...”

“But the data! I’ve been yearning for it for so long. At least leave the deleted files in the recycle bin.”

While mumbling, Wayne expanded white foam from his feet, infiltrating the tenth level to turn it pale as fast as possible.

At this moment, all of Heaven had become his, from the first to ninth floor and even the most supreme tenth floor. With one thought, he could lockdown Heaven and change the life essence of all angels.

The Astral creatures Elohim had cautiously created would become true Astral life in the wild!

Yes, the angels weren’t true Astral life while they resembled ones. In corruption, none of the angels were qualified as Astral life.

“It’s unlikely that He couldn’t do it. It must have been accidentally on purpose. Elohim nerfed His creations to deprive them of the ability to corrupt...”

“Or could he not corrupt others, either?”

Wayne had gained a lot after entering the tenth floor, but he also had many more questions. As a vermin, he decided that a problem didn’t exist as long as he didn’t think about it and put all those questions aside, returning to study the Tree of Life.

“Oh, interesting. This is possible, too...”

“As expected of Elohim. This makes things easier for me.”

Feeling assured, Wayne called out to Hesione and said once she was close, “Hell’s Seven Deadly Sins have entered a new phase, and the Seven Sacred Virtues of Heaven must follow suit. You’re no longer pure. Have you considered changing your title?”

Hesione’s eyes widened. Was that how he honored his promise to Father? Yes, she was no longer pure, but Wayne was the one person who shouldn’t say that.

Perhaps it was because she had met her parent and earned His support that Hesione now faced the Anointed One with more assurance. Wayne’s eyes lit up. He felt like the defiant Hesione he had known was coming back.

An obedient Hesione was nice, but he still felt like something was missing when she wasn’t looking at him in disdain.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, Hesione. I’m not picking on you for being impure. It’s just that my name in Hell is Deceit, and since the Seven Sacred Virtues are foils to the Seven Deadly Sins, there should be a Sacred Virtue that corresponds to Deceit.”

He took Hesione’s hand and said adoringly, “My viceroy, you wouldn’t want that title to be taken by another angel, would you?”

Hesione’s expression turned grave. She had to admit that he was right. “What do you think the counterpart of Deceit should be, Anointed One?”

“Sincerity.”

“Sincerity...”

Hesione’s heart pounded. She wanted to be Wayne’s counterpart. Deceit and Sincerity. Sincerity would triumph over Deceit in the end. However, she had been the representation of purity, and she was reluctant to lose the name.

Besides, who would be the next angel of purity? What if she was a terrible vermin?