Battle Royale of the Sinners

"Don't get involved?" Lilim was puzzled by the message of her mother.

Unlike Zuo Ci, she did not care about the karma tribulation or any kind of backlashes. She was already satisfied with her ten wings and her status and a being at the same peers as gods.

"Mother, you are too overprotective of your daughter. I don't care about those things anymore," Complained Lilim, like an Asian child complaining about their parents' strict house regulation behind their back.

Lilim expanded her sense to check the world for the first time. It was not hard to see the complex thread of karma that Zuo Ci was afraid to touch.

"That thing … is kinda huge."

Awed and shocked, Lilim rushed to see the problematic knots. In a few seconds, she reached the sky above Julu City.

The thread of karma bound several people in this city. Tong, Hua Shi, and Friday were tied together. The knots which tied Tong was in a rainbow color. It shone with bright light, yet a cloud of tainted lightning circled around it as if it wanted to mix into the thread.

The bright light signified that he was the owner of the karma thread, and his knot was already loose. As long as he were to pardon the other or the vice versa, this thread would have disappeared.

The black cloud of lightning was the hatred of the one who held the other end of the karma knot. It stopped Tong's knot from being untied so the thread could go on for the rest of eternity.

There was a black cloud on the others as well, but the majority of the cloud was concentrated on Tong.

"That young man should not be the one at fault. I'll see the other end."

Lilim left Tong and his family alone and followed the thread to the other end. It did not take long for her to reach the other side. Above the sky of Ji Commandery, Lilim found a wandering soul of an otherworlder.

Unlike what she found on Tong's knot, the thread around Liu Ping's soul was dark and sinister. It wrapped around his soul to the point that Lilim felt like the knots could never be released. There was no other color on the thread but black.

"Wow, jeez. I thought only idiots in wuxia novels have this kind of karma. There is actually one over here."

Lilim was astonished by Liu Ping's grudge. It was so deep that even after his memories wiped, the hatred ingrained into his soul.

"The other administrator in here … Zuo Ci, right? Damn, he's an irresponsible coward! If he wants another set of wings, he could have steeled himself and faced the karma tribulation like a man! What kind of cultivator is he getting chickened over a simple tribulation?"

As she was complaining, her black wings grabbed onto Liu Ping's soul and crushed it without hesitation.

*PUFF*

It gave out a muffled sound of an explosion as it shattered into sparkling light. The scattered light flew by the wind like ashes, disappearing into the world.

Lilim saw a large fragment of the soul dropping into the city, yet she ignored it. She believed that she had destroyed its conscience. Thus, the shattered soul could not regain its memory or influence any mortal here anymore.

*RUMBLE*

The karma thread trembled as if it was angered. At the same time, the wiggling black knots, which could not find the soul of Liu Ping anymore, merged themselves into a black ball.

The surface of the ball splitted like an eyelid, and a black eye glared at Lilim. The thread turned into a black chain with the head of a snake with one eye.

The eye transformed into a mouth, which opened wide. It chased Lilim, wanting to swallow her whole.

Lilim snorted, "This is not the first time I've severed a karma thread this size. Don't make me laugh, little punk!"

The ten-winged devil waved her both hands and her ten [Souls of Sins] manifested from her wings. Ten female spirits appeared and surrounded the karma snake. They separated and launched barrages of beam attacks from their palms.

The karma snake screamed as it swung its black chains at the ten souls.

Seeing that their attacks were not effective against the snake, all of them transformed into ten mobile suits, which fired cannons and spirit blasters at the chain snake.

The embodiment of the sinister karma thread was shattered and disintegrated by the relentless barrages.

Lilim had a smug smile on her face as she predicted this, "Told you, don't make me laugh."

*RUMBLE*

"Aw, crap. The dimension …"

Alas, she forgot one fact about this world. It was still inside a fragment dimension, which was not a stable realm to sustain a battle of the immortals or any kind of tribulation.

"EEP! EEP! EEP! I FOOk up!"

*RUMBLE*

The blue sky revealed a crack as the dimension was on the verge of crumble. Lilim sweated bullets as she accelerated her brain to read a billion pages of the administration manual.

The crack continued to expand at a visible speed. Everything would shatter into nothingness in one minute.

"EEP! EEP! EEP! FOUND!"

Lilim finally found a solution to stop the breaking of the dimension. To her surprise, it was the cheat skills of all otherworlders which weakened this realm.

"Dammit, mother and all those sickening gods! You all are the cause of this instability!"

She sent her conscience into the system and began altering the universe.

<<Pausing all active [Law Creation] skills>>

<<Converting unused planets into lifespans>>

<<A total of 108,122,371,819,837 lifespans from [Central Pool] has been consumed>>

<<Universal system skill, [Safe Mode], has been activated>>

<<Dimension repairing in progress>>

The crack stopped expanding, and the rumble sounds also disappeared. The crisis was averted without anyone on earth noticing it.

Lilim wiped away her sweat with the back of her hand, and she resumed her smug V smile.

"This is how you save the universe! Will I get my 12th wing now? No? Eep, shame!"

"But, seriously, those [Law Creation] skills on those guys are the main problem. I should kill all those with the skills and get rid of the source of troubles."

"But I can't kill them directly, or the creator will imprison me like my mother …"

"DAAAHHH! What a pain!" Lilim scratch her head with both hands in frustration, which messed her hair.

The [Law Creation] was the origin of all otherworlder's created skills. It was a function that Lilith had created to relieve her boredom in this dimension to twist the laws of the realm, which allowed the authorized persons to possess the power of their imagined [Skill].

Unfortunately, it was used by the gods and other immortals for their entertainment in the Netherworld.

Lilim left Ji Commandery to Mount Kunlun again as she liked the weather on the top of the mountain best. She also planned to settle a temporary office to manage this dimension on the there.

…

Zuo Ci had witnessed the brief collapsing dimension and the fight between the karmic tribulation snake and the new goddess of the realm. He gritted his teeth in bitterness as he lacked the resolve and the skills to face the tribulation.

'Will I have that mindset in the future?'

'Will I ever get more wings?'

A heart devil budded in his mind as his ambition still remained unextinguished.

Shaking his head to forget about his goal, Zuo Ci descended into Ji Commandery City and stopped at one of the city well. He poured a cup of his blood into the well as he continued doing his job, giving immortality and souls to the empty shell natives.

'This city is done. Next …'

The sage also left the city to spread the seeds of souls to the locals. Once he finished this job, he would consult with Lilim about soul management later.

…

Both Lilim and Zuo Ci did not pay attention to a fragment of Liu Ping's soul. As a tiny piece of it would not affect any mortal in this world, they saw it as useless ashes that could be disregarded.

On the side of Ji city road, a young man with large ears in a ragged grey robe picked up a shining fragment of stone.

"What's this? A jewel?"

The man's eyes brightened as he thought that he could sell this to get a few golds for his mother.

Alas, the stone shined for a moment before it dimmed, reverting itself into an ordinary rock. The man did not notice that the light had entered his body before it dimmed.

The young man stared at the rock with a baffled look before he threw it away.

"Bah! I was hallucinating. I must be hungry."

The large-ear man returned to a shack, which was his home.

"I'm home, mom. I've brought some food." The man took out three dumplings from the inside of his ragged clothes.

The mother, who was in his 50s, smiled at him. She was sitting and sewing straw sandals in the shack. She had white hair and had a similar robe like her son, a patched robe.

"You eat first. I'll finish these shoes, then I'll eat."

"Nah, you first. I'll take the finished sandals to sell now."

The man took 5 pairs of straw shoes with him and left the house. The shoes that his mother made was popular in this neighborhood as they were sturdier than ordinary hand-made shoes.

As soon as he carried the shoes outside his home, a neighbor noticed him right away.

"Xuande! Are those a new batch?"

"Yes. You want a pair?"

"Give me two pairs! The last set wore out last week. I need another pair for my wife too."

"Sure, sure. Same price!"

"Xuande! I want a pair, too!" Another neighbor also wanted to buy it.

Within five minutes, all his shoes were sold out. The man with the nickname "Xuande" smiled in happiness as he returned to his house.

"Mom! They're all sold!"

"Well done, Xuande."

"Mom, you haven't eaten your food yet? Please eat. It's getting cold. You know, it's winter now. You should take care of your health."

"Bah! I'll take care of my health. The only reason I'm still here because you refused your mentor's invitation! If you had accepted, I wouldn't have been here sewing shoes right now!"

Xuande smiled bitterly, "Mom, it's not that I don't want to, but I can't! The Lord that my mentor wanted to recommend to is actually a rebel. You see, there's an edict of the Emperor and an announcement in the city. Had we joined them, we would have been in trouble!"

The mother sighed, "Xuande, rebel or not, it doesn't matter. I knew what you're thinking so listen to me. Sometimes it's better to bow your head and be a subordinate of a lord than being a lord yourself. I know that you want to be a governor too. Am I right?"

Xuande bit his lower lips. He was found out.

The only reason he refused his mentor's invitation was that he did not want to be someone's subordinate to be pointed or ordered around. He wanted to live free without anyone ordering him.

"Your dream is impossible. Stop deluding into your fantasy and reply to your master's letter. Those rebels and edict are all nothing but a ruse! They are political warfare! Warlords and governors are always picking a fight with each other to expand their power and wealth! If you want to be a governor, you will eventually fight with them. So if you want to be someone big, take a gamble and join a lord!"

"But mom, people will continue to suffer. If I'm not someone in charge, how can we save them?"

The mother smiled, "Xuande, blindly following your ideal will bring more harm to the people. If you care for the people, it's better to pick the righteous lord and serve him instead of trying to fight on your own. You're not the only one with that dream. There will be the others who had dreamt the same dream as yours as well. If you can somehow become a warlord in the future, you will end up fighting those righteous rulers! It will be people like us who suffer from the war. So, Xuande, don't be ambitious."

Xuande, AKA Liu Bei, lowered his head as he listened to his mother's sermon. However, in the depth of his heart, he still disagreed.

'To be honest, I wanted to join the Zhang family too. But I don't want to serve someone younger than me. Heck! He's even my junior of the same mentor! He just got lucky that he was born into a noble family. That's all!'

'Err, wait. They weren't originally a noble family. That Zhang Tong climbed up with his skill ... Hmm?'

'I don't know why. For some reason, I'm getting annoyed thinking about this person.'

'EHHH! No matter what, I can't be a part of Zhang Tong's men. That's for certain!'