Mythology: Spiritual Ruler

Under the dark sky, the lava from the fire river shines as it flows, illuminating half of the sky. On the vast land, the souls of mortals are shadowy.

This is a scene that is hard to see in the real underworld. As the lord of the underworld, Hades has been particularly busy recently, because the war in the human world has exposed the hidden contradictions between the gods of Olympus, and the number of human casualties has increased, causing a large number of souls to flow into the underworld in a short period of time.

However, watching the gods on earth fighting each other, while he was just watching from the sidelines, Hades was somewhat happy in his busyness, but now, Hades' good mood has come to an end.

Looking at the strange visitor in front of him, Hades's face slowly darkened.

In many cases, Hades does not care about what outsiders think of him, so even if there is no temple of his on the ground, and it is rumored among mortals that he has trembled more than once because of the power of other gods, he has never made any big reaction to this.

Those prejudices or forms, if they can't bring him any practical benefits, Hades doesn't care much. It can be said that he is more pragmatic than his father in this regard.

Kronos at least cares about some face, but in Hades' eyes, they are worthless. So Hades had no intention of provoking this strange god, if he had not declared that he wanted to destroy the underworld.

After all, as the god of the underworld, he is part of the underworld, and destroying the underworld is equivalent to destroying himself - yes, Hades did not think that Ryan was referring to the whole world, he only thought that the other party was talking about the underworld. Although just like the gods cannot commit suicide, even Hades himself does not know how to destroy the underworld.

"Strange god, I think you'd better take back your words."

The voice became cold, as if he realized that the visitor was not kind, and silently, half of the power of the underworld began to converge on Hades.

The power of the interface has added an invisible pressure to the entire Garden of Truth. However, even so, the power displayed by Hades at this moment is actually not as good as that of himself in reality. Because of Ryan's influence, although he has been deprived of the authority to manage souls, the power of the underworld in reality has increased rather than decreased compared to the original trajectory.

After all, although the souls of mortals in mythology exist in the underworld, they actually do not really bring benefits here. The Titan god Iapetus is the original god of souls, and even the name of "Lord of the Dead Souls" is more often attributed to Hecate.

"I don't know what you want to do, sir, but destroying the underworld - excuse me, I'm afraid no one can do this."

At some point, several streams of light rose from the Pluto's Palace. The God of Destruction, the God of Doom, and several other gods stood behind Hades and looked at Ryan vigilantly.

"The underworld is part of the world. Even the king of gods cannot destroy it."

"Tell me what you want to do... or stay here forever. Although the Garden of Truth is not Olympus, it will not allow you to be so rampant!"

The power is hidden, and only the sense of oppression sweeps over. But when it falls on the god in front of him, it seems to press on the empty space, which makes Hades more vigilant.

Hades can't help but start to recall what grievances he had with this strange god - even now, he didn't take action directly, because he didn't believe what Ryan said before. Destroying the underworld is simply a fantasy.

And standing opposite him, Ryan had to admit that if you don't consider this as an illusory world, then what the other party said is indeed correct.

The underworld can be weakened and damaged, but it can never be destroyed. Unless the person who does it has the power to fight against the whole world, or the world itself has no time to care about other things, the world itself will not allow such a thing to happen, just like whoever wants to destroy one of the seven spiritual worlds actually has to have the power to surpass the whole spiritual world.

However, the current situation is undoubtedly the latter one. There is not much meager power of creation lingering in the memory. It has already been the limit to maintain the existence of this world and cannot have more impact. So in this case, Ryan only needs to consider how to really destroy the underworld from the root.

"Just like I have been thinking, one day in the future, when the collision between Chaos and Hermenu reaches its peak, what should I do to truly destroy the root of that world."

Looking at the illusory underworld without paying attention to others, the reason why Ryan did not go directly to Olympus before was naturally not just to see whether the original god existed or not. After all, it was just a matter of a few steps for him. In fact, the real reason is that he doesn't know how to destroy a world.

Is it enough to just destroy it? I'm afraid that may not be the case. And like a complete world, "swallowing" the world from a macro perspective is something he cannot do at present. In this case, the underworld, which is a world of its own, naturally becomes the most suitable target.

Take this place as the first experiment, and then use the entire illusory world to verify it, and the Hemenu world is the time to finally apply the experimental results.

Swish--

With a light sound, the black sword condensed by [Death] was pulled out inch by inch from the void. In the absence of a special combat artifact, this is Ryan's favorite method.

"You are right. No one has been able to destroy the underworld before. In the real world, I have not been able to do it, let alone have any experience."

The voice was calm. Instead of talking to these false gods, it was better to say that Ryan was talking to himself.

Holding the hilt of the sword, he stood in the void with the sword in his hand. He looked beyond Hades, across the entire field of truth, and looked at the source of this illusory underworld.

"So even though I know it probably won't be useful, I still have to give it a try. How much impact can disintegrating the underworld have on this world."

The next moment, the tip of the sword pressed down, and the final edge of the sword touched the underworld. In front of Ryan, when he pulled out the black sword, Hades had already taken action.

Although the power was mixed into one and was not leaked, as the god of the underworld, Hades still felt an extremely terrifying threat from that sword. Even though he still didn't believe that Ryan could destroy Hades, he couldn't tolerate the other party destroying the symbol of his priesthood like this.

But it's meaningless. It's clearly right in front of you, but it seems like the world is so far away. Until Ryan suppressed the black sword as if no one was watching, Hades was unable to make any meaningful resistance.

So under the shocked and angry gaze of the gods of the underworld, the seemingly ordinary black sword came into contact with the underworld.

······

Crash--

At the entrance to the underworld, on the River of Pain, Charon sat on his wooden boat and sailed towards the shore again.

Recently, due to the war in the world, his work has become very busy. After all, as the ferryman of the River Styx, only Charon can carry mortal souls across this endlessly rolling river.

Of course, corresponding to his busyness, his 'income' has also increased a lot. After all, according to regulations, everyone crossing the river must hand over a silver coin to Charon as a means of crossing the river - this is also the origin of a custom in the world.

Even if they are afraid of death and do not want to mention the names of the gods of the underworld, mortals will still put a silver coin in the mouth of the deceased when he is buried. Otherwise, the souls of loved ones after death can only linger at the entrance to the underworld, or sink to the bottom of the River Styx, unable to rest in peace forever.

Of course, Charon is a god anyway, and what he needs is not the silver coins themselves. What he can really get is the thoughts of the deceased's family members on the silver coins and the awe of him as the ferryman.

"Hey, I really hope the war in the world can last a little longer. Good times like this don't come too often."

A smile appeared on the old face, and Charon picked up the wine glass from the boat and took a sip. He looked towards the shore, where there were densely packed souls crowded there.

"There's just one bad thing - in the war-torn times, it seems like there are a lot more mortals with no one to collect their bodies after death."

He complained casually, but after all, it was a happy trouble, so Charon quickly put it behind him.

He mobilized his strength and made his wooden boat go much faster, speeding towards the shore.

As the distance got closer, the eager and awed eyes of the souls became clearer, which made Charon feel even better.

He knew what these souls were thinking. They could only endure the cold wind and hunger and thirst if they stayed here. By crossing the Styx, even if their actions during their lifetime were not enough to allow them to enter the Elysee Paradise, they could at least stay on the Narcissus Plain. Under such circumstances, they naturally couldn't wait to leave here first.

But the right to choose who gets on the boat first is in my hands... With a smile, Charon stood up from the boat, preparing to find a few people who liked him.

"Huh? What are they looking at?"

Suddenly, Charon seemed to find something different from the past. The souls on the shore were indeed looking in his direction, and they were indeed looking in awe - but also mixed with fear.

There were even people shouting something loudly, or kneeling on the ground shivering.

"Is this some new trick..."

Charon didn't notice anything unusual, and Charon was a little confused. But this is Hades, and there may be things here that frighten mortals, but they definitely don't include the incarnation of Styx. So he shook his clothes slowly, then turned around to check.

"do not know either--"

歘——

His eyes went dark, and he didn't have time to see anything, nor did he have time to react. In an instant, as a black light swept across, Charon's divine body was instantly wiped from the world. Behind him, the black light was still crossing the River Styx at an incredible speed, spreading farther away.

The souls of mortals disappeared in an instant, and the few plants and trees turned into dust. There was no sound, only 'disappearance', and there was no more sound on the banks of the Arkron River.

Everything became quiet, except for the River Styx still flowing.

After a while, the river rolled slightly. Through the river, an illusory shadow can be seen condensed under the water.

As the ferryman of the River Styx, Charon obviously did not die just now. But when he recovered from the shock just now, he was still a little at a loss.

"What just...happened?"

Charon was a little confused and didn't know what happened, but the inexplicable power just now seemed to come from the direction of the Garden of Truth. So he looked through the river at the center of the underworld.

Everything is the same as before, and the incident just now is like a dream. Except that the underworld is even more empty, there are only black spots in the distant sky...

"Um?"

As if he had discovered something, Charon looked fiercely into the distance. It wasn't a black spot, but a figure at the top. Faintly, the figure shook his head in disappointment, then held the long sword in his hand and slashed downwards.

boom--

An inexplicable warning sign came to mind. It was the fear conveyed to Charon by the River Styx itself. He instinctively wanted to escape, but there was nowhere to escape.

The next moment seemed to be a continuation of the previous changes. When the black sword pressed down, the entire interface was shaking. The water of the Styx River rolled out of the river bank, and the lava of the River of Fire flowed in the cracks in the ground. Then everything ended with a sword mark that separated the entire Hades Land from east to west, as if he had died completely. .

The River of Pain is no exception. This River of Styx, which makes all those who approach it sink to the bottom of the river, howling in despair, seems to have lost its life. Even if the river bank cracks, its water remains still there.

Charon's consciousness was dancing in the river, and he could not feel the pain, because he knew that he was about to become another sleeping god.

No, at this moment, the Styx Crosser, who was wandering between life and death, seemed to have noticed something. He would not sleep forever. Because of the falseness and emptiness that overflows in all things...

The next moment, Charon's consciousness completely disappeared. In this false world, he was the first god of Khaos to die, but he would never be the last, because high in the sky, Ryan raised his sword again.

······

Zheng——

Flicking the edge of the sword, although it was a black sword with temporarily condensed authority, it seemed to have an entity at this moment.

Listening to the crisp and sweet metal chirping sound, Ryan looked at the underworld beneath his feet.

This is already the seventh sword. After killing the creatures in the underworld, cutting the central axis of the underworld, and suppressing the three Styx rivers, looking at it now, the entire Hades looks like a doomsday natural disaster.

But this is only the perspective of ordinary things. If you look past the appearance and look directly at the roots of all things, Ryan will suddenly find that everything he has done is actually of extremely limited use. The world is both material and spiritual, and more importantly in a conceptual sense. What he just did destroyed its material structure at best, and even reflected on its roots. The impact on Hades was not as severe as imagined.

It will be traumatizing, but only traumatizing…

"Stop, what on earth are you going to do?!"

An angry shout interrupted Ryan's thoughts. Not far away, the broken-armed Pluto looked at this strange god incomprehensibly.

The strength of the opponent was simply unimaginable. He had just tried to stop it once, but the sword light almost destroyed his arm without stopping, and then continued to tear apart the earth.

"You can't destroy the underworld, just like you can't kill me... Your behavior will make the whole world angry, just like Typhon, the king of demons who also wanted to destroy the world, you -"

"No, we are different."

Interrupting, Ryan raised his head and looked at Hades in front of him, and his originally clueless thoughts were instantly picked up.

He needs a way, a way that can directly harm the roots of the world. This is something that cannot be achieved by simply destroying the material structure. But looking at Pluto with his broken arm at this moment, Ryan suddenly understood.

The gods are the agents of the law, and the origin of the gods is the fastest way to reach the root. As for the nature of immortality…

This illusory world did not exist, and neither did the gods of Hermenu and Upper and Lower Egypt.