Chapter 449: Cognition

In Red Simurgh Star City.

The once-peaceful Security Patrol Hall was now blood-red at its center.

The translucent projection of the Divine Domain, representing the entire star city’s jurisdiction, had once been a faint green. Now, it was completely stained red.

Characters representing destruction flickered continuously across these areas.

The City Lord, Star Master Red Simurgh Xu Shifei, was bound in a pathetic state, kneeling on the floor to one side.

A group of Divine Army soldiers, their uniforms clearly different from the others, had taken control of everything here.

Compared to the regular soldiers, their uniforms bore an extra emblem: a black bird covered in spikes, spreading its blood-soaked wings.

The Bloodthorn Bird. This was a special unit within the Divine Army dedicated to enforcing military discipline.

There were seven branches of the Bloodthorn Bird, totaling no more than ten thousand members. It could be said they were the true pillars and elites of the Divine Army. Their leaders were known as the Seven Resonances of the Divine Army, each serving one of the seven Divine Army Commander-in-Chiefs.

With the exception of one particularly unique Commander-in-Chief who had not established a Bloodthorn Bird unit, every other branch of the Divine Army relied on them to maintain its structure. Even with casualties reaching ninety percent, they never broke.

“I didn’t expect to be a step too late. The situation has already deteriorated.” The one who had come to investigate on orders this time was Zhuo Dan, the General Commander of the Bloodthorn Bird for the Red Simurgh Star System.

He was a burly figure with a full beard and white hair, his face and neck covered in scars of various sizes.

Change his clothes, and he could easily pass for a cosmic pirate from the Black Domain, plundering riches everywhere.

“Ninety percent of the territories under the star city’s jurisdiction have fallen. The patrol fleet dispatched by the automated local response system just sent back a message that they’ve been completely wiped out. The situation is extremely grim,” the garrison officer, Yunxia, said softly.

She had followed Zhuo Dan for many years and knew her superior’s personality and temper well. The calmer Zhuo Dan appeared now, the more violent his eventual eruption would be.

“There should be all sorts of distress calls that were reported from below, right?” Zhuo Dan looked at Star Lord Xu Shifei.

“Yes… there are. You can’t touch me! My father is Xu Zhouyan! You…!!!” Before Xu Shifui could finish, he was silenced again by a Magic Technique.

“If Divine Shepherd Xu knew his son was such a useless waste, he’d probably be the first one to want to get rid of you,” Zhuo Dan said coldly.

Ignoring Xu Shifei, he took out the urgent military communication crystal he had just used to report to his superiors.

This beautiful, diamond-shaped crystal, its periphery encircled by rings of golden text that rotated on their own, was a powerful tool capable of forcefully piercing any blockade to establish military communication.

But half an hour had passed since the report was sent, and still, no response had come down.

No response was, in itself, a response.

A flash of understanding crossed Zhuo Dan’s eyes.

‘It seems those above don’t consider the situation here serious enough…’

This was something he had always despised. If it were ants like the Insect People, it wouldn’t matter; their deaths would just be numbers. But now, it was their own kin, the Divine Race, who were dying. Yet the high-blooded superiors were still ignoring it all, failing to dispatch an immediate response force to intercept and rescue.

“Perhaps they want to take the opportunity to observe. Red Simurgh Star City will most likely be cut off and rebuilt,” his assistant, Yunxia, guessed.

“Yes. All it takes is a flimsy excuse to get the test data they need, and they won’t face any punishment afterward. An opportunity like this is indeed hard to come by,” Zhuo Dan said with a hint of sarcasm.

“Then, General Commander, what do we do now…?” his assistant asked softly.

“We wait. Without orders from above, we can’t intervene,” Zhuo Dan said coldly.

“So you’re saying we just have to watch as all the remaining survivors are wiped out?” Yunxia asked softly.

“Yes.” Zhuo Dan’s voice grew even colder.

The surrounding Bloodthorn Bird soldiers stood guard as if they hadn’t heard a thing, remaining as still and silent as statues, straight as spears.

Just then, a hurried report sounded from outside.

“Someone! Someone’s escaped from the Calamity-infected zone!”

Zhuo Dan jolted. He instantly flew out of the hall and saw a messenger flying hurriedly into the base and dropping to one knee.

“How many!?”

“Fourteen in total, including a six-month-old infant! It’s the child of the war hero, Song Xueku!”

“Song Xueku… Commander Song?! He’s here too?!” Zhuo Dan was stunned. ‘Song Xueku is a Five Rings expert. If it’s him…’

‘No!’

His heart suddenly sank. ‘If that were the case, Song Xueku would never send only his child out.’

‘So, either there’s a problem with the child’s identity, or…’

“Take me to them!”

*

*

*

「In Songxiang Town, within the jurisdiction of Red Simurgh Star City.」

Lin Hui looked up at the two massive rifts in the false sky, both vying to spew forth Calamity. He then looked down, confirming that Qinqin and the others had escaped successfully and that the Teleportation Gate had closed on its own, leaving not a single trace.

Only then did he turn and fly toward the next Divine Food Statue.

This Divine Domain, once a paradise, had now completely devolved into a hellscape.

As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but flames.

Crimson flames, dark red flames, and black-red flames had ignited everything. Even the paving stones on the ground were red with the fires of Purgatory. Things that couldn’t burn were still endlessly billowing thick smoke.

The dense smoke formed a massive shroud, turning this sealed, spherical Divine Domain into a high-temperature steamer.

With normal vision, not even a member of the Divine Race could see more than ten meters ahead.

Even the senses of one’s Heart and Spirit would be swallowed layer by layer by the smoke, thick with the Power of Calamity, making contact impossible.

Lin Hui strolled through the sea of fire and thick smoke, surrounded by gray smog, unable to see anything. The ground was scorching hot, and a sulfuric, red glow was subjecting everything to Purgatory Transformation.

‘Looks like the Chaos Emperor really went all out this time,’ Lin Hui mused.

Immediately, he activated the Calamity sigil he shared with the others.

“As we agreed, I will head in the direction of Purgatory first to complete my preparations. Duke, is everything all right on your end?”

“No problem, it’s all over here,” the Duke of Purgatory laughed. “The Divine Race members here have mostly been converted. We’ve finally managed to recruit some decent troops. The individual quality of the Divine Race is truly high…”

For Secondary Calamities to acquire powerful fighters, they must screen and convert them themselves. And this time, one of the powerful fighters converted by the Chaos Emperor was actually far stronger than the Duke of Purgatory’s true form.

Coupled with the tens of thousands of other converted Divine Race residents, Purgatory’s gains from this trip were more profitable than invading ten lesser worlds.

“As long as you’re satisfied,” Lin Hui smiled. “Now that this star city’s jurisdiction has been mostly devoured, what are your plans?”

“Brother Lin, since we’ve arrived at our destination and can find our own way without further cooperation, why don’t we go our separate ways?” Zhang Xin Fan’s voice suddenly spoke through the sigil.

‘Heh. So they’ve got the coordinates and found the place, and now they’re ready to ditch me and go it alone?’

Lin Hui had long anticipated this and wasn’t annoyed. Although he was the spokesperson for the Wind Calamity, with Qimei backing him, he couldn’t use that status to forcefully stop them from corroding more territory.

“Very well. I wish you smooth progress.” He offered a final blessing, then closed the sigil, no longer listening to the Fusionists’ nonsense.

He knew very well what this Fusion Sect was thinking: corrode the Divine Race, then use them as a springboard to invade the even vaster Star Realms of the Human Realm.

Their appetite for awareness was insatiable—the more, the better. Now that they had seen such a large cake, of course they couldn’t resist.

‘Except… the Endless Divine Race are not some weaklings that can be dealt with easily… Right now, only a single horn has been devoured. Once they react…’

Lin Hui didn’t even bother to ask Purgatory about the “explanation” it had promised earlier. Instead, he quickly found a new Divine Food Statue and began to devour the Power of Existence within it.

By now, he was no longer concealing his objective. The Divine Food Statues were his core target; he didn’t care about the other Divine Race residents.

Fortunately, the other Calamities were true to their word and didn’t deliberately damage the Divine Food Statues. They even helped preserve and protect some of them.

Of course, nothing could be done about the Divine Food Statues that were destroyed in the crossfire.

Soon, Lin Hui found a new Divine Food Statue in the area Purgatory occupied. Parts of the huge statue were already starting to faintly melt.

‘A miscalculation… I didn’t expect high temperatures could also damage these things.’ Lin Hui’s heart trembled. He quickly stepped forward, reached out his hand, and began to absorb.

With the Heart Source Demon Emperor Crown, his concealment was at its peak. Countless creatures of Purgatory came and went around him, yet not a single one noticed him absorbing the Power of Existence.

At one point, even a Fourth Ring Purgatory-transformed member of the Divine Race flew overhead, completely oblivious.

「Five minutes later.」

The time remaining on the Blood Seal was now less than ten thousand years.

Lin Hui continued toward the next statue.

Just then, his expression suddenly shifted.

He looked up at the sky.

Not at the two rifts that were still endlessly spewing monsters and Power of Calamity, but beyond them, at the outer layer of this spherical Realm.

Into the endless Black Domain.

A brilliant golden light was shooting in from the distant Black Domain Void.

Floating within the golden light were shuttle-shaped warships, entirely silver and encircled by defensive rings of Golden Divine Power.

Countless ports opened on the undersides of the warships, and millions of small, golden, cross-shaped fighters swarmed out like bees.

The dense formation of cross-shaped fighters flew straight for the sphere of the Red Simurgh Star City’s Divine Domain, which had been completely stained black.

At that moment, CRACK.

The side of the entire Endless Divine Domain trembled slightly, and it actually stripped away the star city sphere corresponding to the Red Simurgh Star System.

The Red Simurgh Star City sphere, as massive as a small planet, was torn away from the main Divine Domain, stretching out countless golden tendrils at the point of connection.

But those tendrils snapped rapidly, section by section.

Like an abandoned child, it tumbled slowly, rolling toward the outer edges of the Black Domain.

Arcs of residual Golden Divine Power flickered and flowed across the surface of the now-blackened sphere, but they were all rapidly extinguishing.

Just then, Lin Hui successfully absorbed another Divine Food Statue.

‘Yin Time Self-Origin Skill evolution complete.’

Finally, a notification from the Blood Seal appeared in his vision.

Once again, a stream of information even more immense than the one from the Longevity Spirit-Stealing Technique flooded into his soul.

This time, he felt as if he were in a gray, hazy, primordial universe, where everything around him was a chaos of undivided yin and yang.

As time slowly passed—a thousand years, ten thousand years, a million years, ten million years…

Finally, after an endless, tedious wait, a tiny, incomparably pure gray flame quietly sparked into existence in this universe.