Against the Gods

Yun Che’s current reaction could only be described as stunned and stupefied.

Several years ago, the Ice Phoenix girl had told him that he had inherited not just Evil God’s divine powers, but his duty as well. As for what exactly this “duty” entailed, he never gave it much thought besides mentally preparing himself for anything prior to entering the Heavenly Netherfrost Lake.

He had imagined having to sacrifice his bloodline, his profound veins, or even his life to perform this duty.

But of all the things he had imagined his duty might entail, persuasion… was definitely not one of them!

As the inheritor of the Evil God’s divine powers and the avatar of the Evil God himself, it turned out that his duty was to quell the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor’s anger, hatred, and grudge, and stop her from harming this world… It was because the current Primal Chaos was so fragile that it couldn’t endure her fury or the devils’ wrath at all.

It meant that he must face down an ancient devil emperor when the time was right!

“The terror that is the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor is far beyond your imagination,” said the Ice Phoenix girl. “Her powers should’ve weakened after roaming the world beyond for over several million years, but if she even has even a shred of devilish energy left in her, she could still destroy the entire God Realm in just the flip of a palm.”

Yun Che, “...”

The Ice Phoenix girl wasn’t exaggerating in the slightest… Their opponent was a devil emperor after all!

An emperor among devils!

It was the equivalent of a Creation God among the gods!

“You, and only you have a chance at persuading her.” The Ice Phoenix girl almost sounded almost she was begging. “The Evil God is a divine being of immeasurable greatness. Everything you have inherited is the hope he left behind for future generations, and his will must contain his love and will to protect all of Primal Chaos. Therefore, you are the only one who can transmit his will to the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor and cure her of her fury and hatred.”

“The best case scenario would be her becoming the ruler of the Primal Chaos. As the ruler, it would be her natural duty to protect all of the Primal Chaos… and since she is also the devil emperor of the Heaven Smiting Devil Clan, the devils will obey her command. The rest of the devil gods would have no choice but to obey her and restrain themselves.”

“...” Yun Che’s face was trembling. He still wasn’t able to say a single word in response.

Facing down an ancient devil emperor… It was a scene he couldn’t imagine no matter how he tried.

The devil emperors of ancient times… were terrible beings that could destroy him a million times over with just a glance or breath.

He lifted his hands and felt for the Evil God divine power circulating inside his body. A long silence later, he suddenly said, “Ice Phoenix Spirit, you read my mind before, didn’t you? Then you should know that hatred had once driven me into a devil who lost all of his humanity. That is why I’m well aware what a terrible thing hatred is.”

“No matter how righteous Mo E’s cause was, there is no changing the fact that he tricked the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor using the most despicable method possible.”

Yun Che wasn’t a member of the Era of Gods. Naturally, he didn’t feel the same respect the Ice Phoenix girl had for the leader of the Creation Gods. “The Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor and the rest of the Heaven Smiting Devil Gods must have hated him to the bone for his deception.”

“The world beyond the Primal Chaos is a world of death and destruction. Even if the World Piercer has kept them all alive, it must have been a most difficult life… Several million years. Their hatred and fury has accumulated for several million long years, and it is these emotions that has fueled their will to survive and return all these years…”

“Several million years worth of hate…” said Yun Che before inhaling deeply. He couldn’t imagine how terrible this hatred would be. At the very least, it wasn’t something that even ten thousand “hatred that filled the universe” could describe. “Is it really something the old bond between the Evil God and the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor can resolve?”

After experiencing several million years worth of hell and accumulating all this hatred, the first thing they would surely do was to vent it all onto the world… Yun Che had personally experienced this during his previous life in the Azure Cloud Continent. The return of the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor and the devil gods could only be a billion times worse than that.

Moreover, he was just a man, but they were the devils!

A devil’s negative emotions had always been intense!

Even if they weren’t the devils, several million years worth of grudge and hatred was still more than capable of distorting any living being’s heart and soul. Furthermore, setting the rest of the devils aside, was the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor… even the same Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor from several million years ago?

The Ice Phoenix girl could sense Yun Che’s worry. If she were to be honest with herself, she… had absolutely no confidence that this plan could work. She only knew that Yun Che was the only hope, no matter how infinitesimally small it was.

Her entire clan had been tricked and exiled to the world beyond the Primal Chaos… their grudge and hatred had grown unbridled for several million years… there was no man, creature, True God or True Devil who could tell what the final form of their hatred would take when they finally returned.

“Yun Che,” the Ice Phoenix girl said quietly, “be it in the ancient times or now, the world has always had an extremely biased and distorted view of devils and darkness profound energy.”

“...” As the bearer of darkness profound energy himself, Yun Che fully acknowledged this point.

“The Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor is the emperor of devil gods, but she may not be as scary as you imagine her to be. The great, righteous, and kind Evil God wouldn’t have fallen in love with her and married her otherwise. At the very least, the Heaven Smiting Evil Emperor has never been known to be brutal or tyrannical be it during the ancient times or now.”

“The God Race knows little about the Heaven Smiting Devil Clan. All they know is that they are a clan of monarch devils that can transform into swords just like the Sword Spirit God Clan.”

Yun Che, “...”

“The Evil God clearly loved the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor deeply, or he wouldn’t have gifted her something as precious as the World Piercer willingly. Just the same, the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor must love the Evil God just as deeply, and she will surely not ignore the Evil God’s final will and power completely.”

“Besides that, several million years is an extremely long period of time to most living beings, but not so much to a devil emperor. Also, a devil emperor wouldn’t be so weak as to succumb to the hatred and the passage of time so easily.”

“If she can sense the Evil God’s last will to protect the world, then maybe, just maybe, there is a chance that she may choose to honor it. Furthermore, the reason the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor has even survived to this day is because the Evil God gifted her the World Piercer. Her love for her husband isn’t the only thing that will change her mind.”

“I’ve never fallen in love with anyone myself, but even I know that ‘love’ is the one thing that can transcend everything regardless of plane, or dimension.”

The Ice Phoenix girl worked hard to encourage, console, and give hope to Yun Che from multiple angles. Some of her attempts might seem forced and deliberate, but Yun Che was literally the God Realm’s only hope. She had to supply him with enough confidence no matter what.

“You’re right,” was what Yun Che said, but his expression hadn’t relaxed in the slightest. “But there is one problem with your plan: I’m not the Evil God, I’m just the inheritor of his power. Her love for the Evil God and her love for the inheritor of the Evil God’s power are two completely separate things, not to mention that the ‘Evil God’s will’ you’re speaking of is unreal to say the least, even if she did sense something like that… Whew.”

If the Evil God was still alive to this day, then there was a high chance that he could calm down the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor and persuade her to put down her hatred. But Yun Che himself… ultimately wasn’t the Evil God himself.

It just wasn’t a thing anyone could feel optimistic about.

“I understand your concerns,” said the Ice Phoenix girl, “the Evil God’s will and the Evil God himself are two separate things, of course. However, you don’t just possess the Evil God’s will and inheritance. You have another trump card that may be far, far more persuasive than even the will and inheritance of the Evil God.”

“Huh?” Yun Che was caught off guard by her declaration. “What’s that?”

The Ice Phoenix girl explained, “The Heaven Punishing Divine Emperor fought a battle against the Evil God after exiling the Heaven Smiting Devil Clan. That great battle between Creation Gods shook the entire Primal Chaos to the point where detailed records of the battle still exist to this day. As for the reason behind the battle… it was stated in both ancient and current records that the Evil God challenged Lord Mo E to battle because he was disgusted by Lord Mo E’s methods, and because Lord Mo E’s actions were undeserving of his title as a Creation God.”

Yun Che nodded. Only the Creation Gods of the ancient times knew that the Evil God and the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor were husband and wife back then.

“Do you remember me telling you that the Evil God’s loss of his wife wasn’t the only thing that drove him into fighting Lord Mo E? Do you also remember me telling you that this battle had decided the fates the Evil God and the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor’s offspring? It was something I accidentally heard from Lord Li Suo a long time ago.”

Yun Che nodded again. Everything the Ice Phoenix girl had said back then was a shocker, so it was no surprise that he remembered it as well as yesterday.

“No one knew who had won that battle, not even Lord Xi Ke or Lord Li Suo. The only ones who knew about the result were probably the combatants themselves, Lord Mo E and the Evil God. Naturally, I was also clueless about the final victor of that battle… until I’d read all of your memories a few years ago. Thanks to your memories and my own knowledge, I’d uncovered much of the secrets and truths that was hidden in my history, including the result of the battle between Lord Mo E and the Evil God...”

“...and the final fate of the offspring of the Evil God and the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor.”

“Me? You’re talking about my… memories?” Yun Che was confused. His knowledge regarding the Era of Gods was completely hearsay. Everything he knew had come from either Jasmine or the Golden Crow Spirit. In fact, most of his revelations regarding the Era of Gods had come from the Ice Phoenix girl herself. He himself knew nothing about the Era of Gods.

However… the Ice Phoenix girl claimed to have learned the truth from his memories, a truth that not even the gods or even the Creation Gods of ancient times were privy to!

If this wasn’t nonsense, then what was!?

If the truth was in my memory, then how did I not know about this!?

“That’s right,” said the Ice Phoenix girl without explaining what she had seen in his memories. “Judging purely from the results alone, the Evil God had won, and then lost the battle against Lord Mo E.”

Yun Che: “???” (Won… and then lost?)

“I told you about this before… there are also some records that still exist to this day. Although Lord Mo E was the leader of the four great Creation Gods, he was also the one who passed away the soonest. He had died before the war between gods and devils had even truly began.”

“His passing wasn’t caused by an injury or an accident. He passed away simply because he had reached the end of his lifespan.”

“As the Creation God with the strongest divine power, Lord Mo E undoubtedly had the longest lifespan out of any living being. But for some reason, he ran out of lifespan earlier than any other gods. There is only one thing that can explain this, and that is the Heaven Punishing Ancestral Sword. This is public knowledge.”

“However, Lord Li Suo also told me that Lord Mo E had only used the Ancestral Sword once in his whole life… and it was the time he had cut open the Wall of Primal Chaos and subjected the Heaven Smiting Devil Clan to the world beyond Primal Chaos. Although his lifespan had been reduced greatly as a result, he still shouldn’t have passed away as early as he did.”

“It doesn’t make sense… unless he didn’t use the Ancestral Sword once, but twice in a short time, burning his lifespan at an accelerated rate as a result. If that is the case, then anything is possible.”

Yun Che’s pupils shrank. “Are you saying…”

“That is correct. It is very likely that the second time he used the Ancestral Sword was during the battle against the Evil God!”

Yun Che, “...”

“That battle also decided the fate of the Evil God and the Heaven Smiting Devil Emperor’s offspring. Undoubtedly, their offspring would turn out to be a half-man and half-devil, and Lord Mo E is such a righteous and evil loathing person that he would never allow such a person to exist in this world… especially because they are the offspring of a Creation God. That is why he wouldn’t allow himself to lose that battle no matter what.”

“However, the battle didn’t go as Lord Mo E had expected it to go. Lord Li Suo once said that the Evil God’s strength may have surpassed Lord Mo E’s, so Lord Mo E probably lost that battle… but he couldn’t accept his defeat or the consequences of his defeat, so he ultimately decided to use the Ancestral Sword.”

“The Evil God… lost, because of the Ancestral Sword’s power.”

“When the two engaged in battle, Lord Mo E had just used the Ancestral Sword to cut apart the Wall of Primal Chaos a short time ago.”

“The consequences of using the Ancestral Sword twice in such a short time isn’t just as simple as losing twice the amount of lifespan. That was why Lord Mo E passed away so early… Lord Mo E must’ve known about the full consequences of his decision, but that was just the kind of person he was. He was the highest monarch of the God Race and the leader of the Creation Gods. He couldn’t allow even a single grain of sand to sit in his eyes… especially when this ‘sand’ had offended the pride and bottom line of the God Race.”

Yun Che asked, “So… the offspring between the Evil God and the Evil Smiting Devil Emperor was killed just like that?”

But the answer the Ice Phoenix girl gave caught Yun Che by surprise. “No, they weren’t killed… they were ‘split into two halves’.”