Chapter 709: The End of the Long Road
Gloomy blue flames erupted from the great fissure in the earth. The silver nine-tailed demon fox burst out of the surface, wrapped in smoke and dust. Hu Li ran all the way to a nearby hill in one breath.
"We made it out, we made it out!" Eileen, riding on Hu Li's back, shouted excitedly. "Holy crap, that was too intense! Felt like the whole world was collapsing beneath us. Good fox, you're something! Body cultivation is a good civilization..."
As she spoke, another pure white radiance drifted over from the side. The artificial angel with wings on its back landed slowly beside Hu Li. It curiously looked at Hu Li's many swaying tails, then slightly raised its head to look at the sky, seemingly lost in thought.
"I don't know where this is," Hu Li muttered, looking around as she spoke. "The tunnels we took when we went into the mountain have all collapsed. More than half of the caves below were unfamiliar paths. I think we drifted at least ten kilometers when we rushed up."
"The terrain around here has changed," Luna said with a serious tone.
The setting sun and the smoke from afar dyed the sky red. What met the eye was a vast wasteland. A forest in the distance was billowing with thick smoke. The nearby hills had been plowed by artillery fire. Amidst the rubble and huge craters, some twisted wreckage could be seen. The road they had taken into the mountain facility was completely gone.
The ground was trembling slightly. An unsettling low rumble came from deep underground from time to time, making direction impossible to determine.
"It feels like an earthquake," Hu Li said nervously. "No, not just an earthquake..."
"Is there?" The little puppet riding on her back raised her head. "I only hear some rumbling sounds."
"Nonsense, you're sitting on my back, of course you can't feel it," the great demon fox twisted her head to bare her teeth at the cheap passenger on her back. "You'd have to be crazy to feel the vibration reduction of my four-leg suspension."
The little puppet didn't take it to heart at all. She just straightened up, shaded her eyes with her hand, and looked into the distance. She saw some large and small smoke columns rising on the horizon. Then, with another rumble, a hill not far from them suddenly collapsed and cracked open. Among the collapsing mountain body, what seemed like a passage leading to the deep layers opened up. Thick smoke, along with gushing crystal dust particles, shot straight into the sky.
"No, no, this doesn't feel right," the little puppet suddenly became nervous. "What big thing is Yu Sheng doing down there..."
Just as she said this, a voice suddenly came into her mind: "Eileen."
"Yu Sheng? What's up?" the little puppet said quickly. "I just saw a nearby mountain collapse! Many huge smoke pillars appeared on the horizon..."
"Notify Bai Liqing. All ground forces immediately withdraw to space," Yu Sheng's voice sounded very serious. "I'll mark available surface assembly points. The artificial saintesses and the knight order will head to the nearest assembly points. Take them."
"Ah? Ah, okay, got it," Eileen was stunned for a moment but quickly reacted. Then, while arranging for her other bodies to send a message to Bai Liqing, she quickly asked the situation. "What's going on down there? Why suddenly order the troops to withdraw? I thought this planet was about to be taken..."
"There's no need to occupy it anymore," Yu Sheng interrupted her. "The 'Saint Throne' and the Dim Angel behind him have already dug up the interior of this planet to the limit over hundreds of years. Now this crust is only supported by the power of the angel. The planet is about to disintegrate."
"...Holy shit!"
---
Radiant holy light surged around the planet's core, like a vast ocean of scorching brilliance. Yet there was also an abyssal black hole that devoured all light, located in the center of this sea of light. This scene was eerie and discordant, like a shadow of utmost darkness within the light.
Countless spatial rifts of all sizes covered the surface and surroundings of the Eden Gate. Distant starlight was reflected in the rifts. Dense crystalline branches grew out from them, tightly entangling the glorious, holy body hundreds of meters away.
That body's light was gradually dimming. The psychic energy that made up its flesh and blood shrank back, leaving only a hollow skeleton. Only the face, as if fused from countless people, still stared fixedly at the direction of the Eden Gate.
"Saint Throne" found that he could not stop the loss of power. All matter and energy composing this shell were rapidly becoming nourishment for the Eden Gate.
"Why..." he muttered unconsciously.
"Have you forgotten? 'Supply power to the Eden Gate'," Yu Sheng's voice came from among the wildly growing crystalline branches, answering the Saint Throne's question very patiently. "This is the last and strongest wish you and the entire Hermetic Order made. Now the wish is about to be fulfilled."
Then there was a brief silence.
After the silence, a violent struggle.
The light-forged body desperately tried to break free of the crystal shackles binding it. For a moment, Yu Sheng even suspected that this terrifying creature might really break free—a jet of holy light even pierced a small part of the crust above, leaving a terrifying gap in the planet's shell through which starlight could be seen. A shattered mountain fell from above, plunging into the burning holy light sea near the core.
Some large and small pieces of the planet also fell from above, but were captured by the holy light around the core, orbiting the Eden Gate like satellites.
The terrifying energy fluctuations gradually calmed down again.
"This is a really crappy place."
A voice calmer than before suddenly reached Yu Sheng's ears.
No pretentious gentleness, no mystifying tone, only genuine calmness, along with a hint of fatigue and nostalgia.
Yu Sheng looked at the "Saint Throne" with some surprise.
He saw the skeleton raise its head, a blurry phantom covering it.
Wearing a thick field operation protective suit, unshaven, expression tired, face calm.
"Really, really crappy. Cold, dry, depleted earth veins, toxic atmosphere, can't even grow food. Even things planted in ecological pods often get sick and die for inexplicable reasons.
"Even this star system is crappy—pirates, interstellar warlords, military conglomerates, angel cultists and warp-space lunatics always popping up from every nook and cranny... Every planet is at war, either already destroyed or in the process of being destroyed.
"In this crappy place, even rats running out of the sewers are cleaner than people."
Yu Sheng looked at him calmly.
The middle-aged man in the heavy work suit closed his eyes, then his face changed to that of a young man.
"Some of us were exiled here, some were prisoners of pirates. We even had a scientist who was once a Star Noble of Algrade before being expelled by the Astrological Guild.
"We got together, got an industrial carrier from a warlord—we found a safe zone in the gravity fault, and we thought we could change this place."
"You did change this place," Yu Sheng said slowly. "Is this what you planned?"
"...If the road you've walked is too long, it's hard to always keep one direction," the face on the skeleton turned into a short-haired woman. Star-flecked eyes showed that she had once been an Algrade elf. "But no matter what, we built order in this crappy place. Twelve habitable planets, a fleet, laws, an industrial system. Even the worst place was better than the warlords' recruitment planets."
"We once represented progress and hope here," the short-haired woman's face faded, and a golden-haired young man appeared on the skeleton. "But transformation was endless, and the cost grew heavier."
"Like that ranch planet? And your series of 'Holy Spirit' technologies?"
"...You should be able to see that this technology was also used on ourselves."
Between flickers of light, the Algrade elf reappeared on the Saint Throne's face. She raised her head and calmly looked into Yu Sheng's eyes.
"Your story deeply moves me."
Yu Sheng sighed softly.
The holy light around the "Saint Throne" seemed to surge slightly. A trace of hope appeared on his face.
"So, do your best from now on," Yu Sheng's face on the surface of the Eden Gate said calmly. "Come fight me. Exert all your strength, so as not to disappoint this thousand-year pursuit."
All the crystalline branches suddenly tightened. The countless cracks on the surface of the Eden Gate began to grow again. The massive light-forged body of the "Saint Throne" struggled desperately, but began to be dragged little by little into the black hole at the planet's core.
Inside the sacred planet, the surging holy light let out one last roar. Scorching waves erupted in the hollow planetary core and spread outward wave after wave, striking the already crumbling, cracked fragile crust.
The planet boomed like a giant bell. The crustal structure supported by angelic power began to disintegrate layer by layer from the inside out. Countless rocks and crystals detached from the dark dome of the earth, raining down like a storm into the sea of holy light at the core.
The Eden Gate began to grow, devouring all matter and energy within its feeding range that could be used as material for the gate.
The "Saint Throne" (the shadowless skeleton) also rapidly fell toward the Eden Gate. In almost the blink of an eye, half of this massive body had already been swallowed into the hole.
Even the shell of a Dim Angel could not resist this creation that could tear spacetime and even penetrate world barriers.
It began to be crushed bit by bit. Countless faces rapidly changed on the skull. Countless bodies emerged and rotated on its remaining structure.
Finally, even the only remaining skull touched the surface of the Eden Gate.
Yu Sheng's face looked down slightly.
"Did you give it your all?"
"Yes," the skull said calmly.
"Any last words?"
"No."
"Good. Your path to sainthood is over."
"..."
Then the skull quietly submerged into the spacetime rift opened by the Eden Gate, becoming its nourishment.
(End of this chapter)