The Record of Unusual Creatures

The light was fading away.

The fairy-tale crystal jungle, the sparkling river, the shiny shrubs and flowers, as well as the wonderful crystal stag, everything gradually merged into hazy lights. Amid those lights, Vivian saw a vague figure waving at her. She unconsciously extended her hand, but the figure was so dim that it was almost impossible to distinguish.

Soon all the lights were gone, and thick darkness came from every direction.

The darkness lasted for some time. Suddenly, there was a glimmer of light in front of her, and Vivian heard a familiar voice calling her name. “Vivian, wake up. Vivian, how are you? Wake up. Salaman, isn’t the connection supposed to be disconnected now?”

As she regained consciousness, a flicker of light suddenly expanded before her eyes, and the flat crystal wall reappeared in front of her. Vivian felt dizzy. It was a strange feeling that was hard to balance when you suddenly transitioned from weightlessness to being on the ground. After she stopped wobbling, she took a deep breath and calmed down.

“I’m fine,” Vivian said after she breathed in deeply and quickly readjusted herself, both mentally and physically. Then she nodded at Hao Ren, who was looking concerned beside her. She smiled and said, “You look so nervous. Don’t worry.”

Seeing that Vivian had regained consciousness completely, Hao Ren was finally at ease. He wiped his forehead with a slightly embarrassed smile and said, “You’re finally awake. You scared me.”

Vivian rubbed her forehead. “What happened just now? How long have I been in there?”

“In there? You didn’t go anywhere,” Hao Ren said, a little surprised. “You just stood there and suddenly stopped moving, then your whole body became translucent, and you started glowing like those sprites. But the MDT said it was a protective measure. It lasted for about ten minutes.”

“Only ten minutes…” Vivian frowned. “It looks like time flows at a different speed. Then?”

Hao Ren pointed at the crystal wall. “Then? Then all of a sudden, the system crashed. A sprite popped up and said that something went wrong with the main system and the connection was down. I kept calling your name, and it took me two minutes to wake you up.”

“Crashed?” Vivian looked back at the crystal wall and found that it was not completely restored to its original appearance. It was still “on”, but at the top of the crystal wall, there was a jumble of runes bouncing around.

Below the string of runes, there was a little figure bowing in a loop…

A dozen sprites had already emerged from the crystal wall and were now bustling about on the crystal clusters around the cliff, probably trying to restart it.

“The goddess designed a lot of useless functions…” Vivian said while she looked at the little man who was bowing.

“Did you see the message left by the goddess of creation?” Hao Ren deduced from Vivian’s attitude. “Have you figured out what this place is all about?”

“Hmm,” Vivian replied gently but did not continue to answer. She then looked at Salaman who was standing nearby and asked, “Salaman, this main system suddenly… crashed. Did I pass or fail?”

At that moment, Salaman’s head was surrounded by a few glittering sprites. He listened carefully to their jabbering, and finally, he nodded gently. Next, the guardian giant took two steps back and knelt on one knee. “You have passed the test. You are now the master of the Throne of Destiny, the queen of all resonance nodes, the controller and executor of the new age. In accordance with Articles 1266 and 8325 of the Annihilation Protocol, the command of all defense forces in the Holy Land has been transferred. The Agodal, the hub defense circle, and the fleet of the Denizens of the Stars will be at your disposal.”

Hao Ren and Vivian were still thinking about how to solve the system problem. They were not expecting Salaman to suddenly kneel down. It confused both of them. Hao Ren was taken aback for a few seconds before he reacted. He quickly pulled Vivian and said, “Hey, he knelt for you…”

“Please get up.”

Salaman nodded and stood up.

However, after he stood up, Salaman continued to emphasize the throne. “Please forgive our caution, but we really never thought the guide would experience memory loss, so we had to take this test. Now your identity has been recognized by the Throne of Destiny’s main system. This will be the greatest turning point in the world’s destiny. Mother’s plan can finally resume.”

“Plan?” Hao Ren raised his eyebrows. “By the way, Vivian has now passed your verification. According to our deal, you should now be able to explain the origin of this ‘holy land’ to us, right? What’s the goddess of creation’s plan?”

Before Salaman could say anything, Vivian interrupted, “I already know what’s going on here. The goddess of creation left a document in the system detailing all her plans here.”

Hao Ren was overjoyed. “Then…”

“It is a plan that will shock everyone. We need to find a safe place to talk about this,” Vivian said, glancing around. “Shall we go back to the ship? How about the Aiur?”

Soon, they returned to the Aiur. The other guardian giants had learned about Vivian passing the test through their mental network. Hao Ren and Vivian could feel the warmth as well as respect from all around when they entered the warship. All eyes were obviously on Vivian.

Despite that, in order for them to talk quietly, most of the guardian giants could only wait outside. Only Hao Ren, Vivian and Salaman entered the “reception room”.

Vivian began to explain once they sat down. “The goddess of creation’s plan is very simple: for the goddess and the Mad Lord to be annihilated forever. Then, a special thinking network will be used to bring the Plane of Dreams into the ‘the Godless Age’. Whether it’s the Creation’s Engine, the Throne of Destiny here, or the stellar skeleton-based Network of Divinity Resonances, which we previously discovered outside Star Cluster X, they all serve this project. In short, everything is an effort to erase the goddess’ imprint on the Plane of Dreams completely.”

“The Godless Age?” Hao Ren could not believe it. “Tell me more, I have to digest it slowly…”

Vivian nodded. “We already know what happened to the goddess of creation before she fell—you probably know something about it, Salaman, but what we don’t know is that the goddess also reverse-mastered a fatal weakness of the Mad Lord.

“Strictly speaking, this weakness is not inherent in the Mad Lord, but a result of the interaction between divine and chaotic forces after their battle. The power of the Mad Lord infected the goddess, forcing her to split in two. However, the power of the goddess also infected the Mad Lord, making him less pure.

“Yes, that’s what happened: the goddess of creation infected the Mad Lord at the same time.

“Since the Mad Lord is a chaotic, nihilistic being, he did not split by the divine power of the goddess of creation, instead, he absorbed some of the goddess’ ‘characteristic elements’. This is part of the reason why the Mad Lord was able to be sealed permanently. On one hand, the ‘memory’ of the goddess of creation within the Mad Lord causes the Mad Lord to never really disappear or stand still completely, while on the other hand, the Mad Lord’s own divine imprint allows him to gradually break through the seal.

“So the existence of the Mad Lord cannot be erased, and the seal is bound to be broken.

“The goddess of creation counteracted the first factor by cutting off her own memory. But this only delayed the Mad Lord from breaking the seal. She still had to deal with the second factor.

“She didn’t even know the second factor existed. But after the Mad Lord’s power caused her to split, not only did she learn how she had unwittingly ‘infected’ the Mad Lord, but she also knew it was an opportunity.

“The divine force factor that infects the Mad Lord is the cause of the loophole in the seal, but actually… it is also the Mad Lord’s biggest weakness, causing him to lose his invincibility. Hao Ren, guess what the real function of Creation’s Engine is?”

“What is it?”

“It’s the deletion of a true god—a god can be destroyed truly and thoroughly, never to rise again.” Vivian took a breath. “The Creation’s Engine will essentially be a ”simulated god’ when completed, so it will have ‘equal authority’ to destroy a true god. However, since the Creation’s Engine inherited its authority from the goddess of creation, its priority in executing the goddess will be lower than the divine power of the goddess of creation. That’s why the rebellion of the godslayers was needed. Whether or not the godslayers actually kill the goddess of creation, their actions would cause ‘divinity’ to be absent from the Plane of Dreams. With the goddess gone, the priority of the Creation’s Engine goes up…”

Hao Ren got it. “It’s like a sequential set of instructions. Because the goddess was still alive, and she’s a self-looping never-ending first-level instruction, the second-level instruction of the Creation’s Engine could never be executed. In order for the Creation’s Engine to work but also eliminate the hidden danger of the Mad Lord’s resurrection with the help of the goddess’ memory, the goddess directed and staged the rebellion herself?”

“That’s right.” Vivian nodded. “After the divine power of the goddess of creation dropped to the second level, the Creation’s Engine executed its own instructions, and it only has one function: Remove all information entanglements that have divine characteristics of the goddess of creation and are close to a true god in terms of power within the entire Plane of Dreams.”

There were only two such information entanglements: one was the goddess herself, and the other was the Mad Lord.