“In the face of Chaos, all intelligent life are natural allies.”

Watching the rotting flesh and twisted limbs quickly turn into ashen-black smoke under the searing holy flames, Aofra sheathed her sword and spoke to the werewolf warrior who was struggling to his feet beside her.

“These monsters are tougher than I imagined,” the werewolf warrior gasped, the wounds on his body healing at a visible rate, but due to the corruption of Chaos, this healing process was particularly painful, causing even a werewolf known for his strong will to wince. “It seems the decision to let you enter the holy mountain was correct… Our tribe’s strength alone wouldn’t be enough to defeat these damned monsters.”

Aofra nodded slightly, her gaze turning to the distance – ashen-black smoke billowed through the valley, and the rotting flesh and blood permeated and corrupted the soil before dissipating, turning the earth a sickening purplish-black. This was the sacred snow mountain regarded as a holy site by the Werewolf Tribal Kingdom, but the monsters from Chaos didn’t care about holy sites or anything else. They descended from nightmares, and wherever there was intelligent life, there was a channel for them to manifest. This place was no exception.

The Werewolf Tribal Kingdom had plenty of brave and skilled warriors, and they had already prepared to defend their homeland on their own, but after the Kingdom of Holleta contacted the leaders of the Werewolf Tribal Kingdom, they still chose to send a reinforcement – because the priests of the Radiant Church had issued a warning in time.

Deep within this sacred mountain was once the place where the Guardian Giant Muru slept. During the millennia when that Guardian Giant fell into a daze, the nightmare of a demigod seeped out from the mountain, deeply affecting the minds of all intelligent creatures in the area, making them more likely to resonate with nightmares. In addition, several cult groups that had been active here in the past had also left behind a large number of blasphemous altars and magical artifacts. Although the cultists themselves had been eliminated, the traces they left behind were difficult to completely clean up.

These two factors combined made the werewolf’s holy mountain one of the most dangerous potential infiltration points in the world. The chaotic source at the center of the universe would almost certainly carry out its first round of infiltration from here. And there were three similar dangerous infiltration points: the Diocese of Beinz (ruins), the Sunset Volcano (ruins), and the Tree of Life (ruins). These three places had once been parasitized by the First Born, and the First Born’s spiritual power had left behind the same “nightmare loopholes” in these areas.

As it turned out, the priests’ judgment was accurate. The first round of erosion occurred in these four regions, and almost simultaneously.

The armies and battle monks stationed in these areas in advance saved countless lives.

Becky rode her warhorse across the battlefield, brandishing her longsword and shouting to the nearby soldiers: “Don’t relax too soon – stay vigilant! The war has only just begun! Until the goddess sends down an oracle that the dust has settled, everyone must hold their ground!”

This heroic mercenary, regarded as a “living legend,” greatly boosted the morale of the ordinary soldiers. Many of them waved the weapons in their hands and cheered loudly, but Becky had long been accustomed to these cheers. She steered her horse around the area that was still scorching hot from the divine magic bombardment and dismounted in front of Aofra: “Lady Aofra! I’m back!”

“You’re very popular,” Aofra looked at this energetic junior with a smile. Becky, who came from a mercenary background, was known in noble circles for her rudeness and impoliteness, but her easygoing personality quite suited Aofra’s tastes. “Many people regard you as an idol.”

“Hey… I’m just relying on that little bit of reputation to be a mascot here,” Becky was quite self-aware. “I was just lucky enough to follow Vivian and the others on an epic quest back then. I’m very clear about what I’m capable of. If it comes to a real fight, I might not even be a match for those Champion Swordsmen under your command.”

As she spoke, she muttered in a low voice: “Besides, I came here just to spend more time with you…”

Aofra tilted her head slightly: “Hmm?”

“Ah, it’s nothing, I’m just talking to myself!”

Aofra didn’t expose Becky’s clumsy disguise, but instead quietly gazed into the distance. The huge floating fortress Hordies was moving eastward from the airspace above the holy mountain, and below Hordies, groups of griffin knights could be seen flying around it like stars surrounding the moon.

“Hordies is moving towards the Beinz region,” Becky shaded her eyes with her hand and looked into the distance. “Hasn’t the fighting over there ended yet?”

“The scale of infiltration in the Beinz region is much larger than here. It’s said that there are even Chaos monsters as big as clock towers,” Aofra said. “Ordinary monks and knights are no match for those monsters – they’ve already sent a request for help to the Einherjar Legion, but the Einherjar’s main force is blocking the infiltration point at Sunset Volcano, so they can only send Hordies.”

Becky vigorously wiped the blood from her face: “I wonder how ‘they’ are doing… We’re only facing the most insignificant claws, and it’s already this terrifying. What kind of things are they facing?”

“The world hasn’t been destroyed yet,” Aofra said calmly. “Then they must still be fighting.”

…

“The main shield’s recharge rate is dropping! Overload, the recharge can’t keep up with consumption!” Along with the alarm suddenly sounding on the bridge, Nolan’s voice also rang out at the same time. “Activating the backup shield recharge incrementer! Redundant energy lines are being switched to the shield system!”

Waves of vibration came from all directions. The chaotic cosmic constants put enormous pressure on the various systems of the ship, and even the inertial stabilizers inside the hull could hardly smooth out this level of chaos, and began to experience frequent anomalies. On the screen from the external monitors, it could be seen that the ship seemed to be passing through a dark and narrow tunnel, and the chaotic clouds and lines were intertwined like whirlpools, pressing in from all directions and then being quickly thrown to the rear. On the inner wall of this tunnel, inexplicable lights and shadows and “tentacles” were constantly emerging. The Giant Tortoise Rock Terrace, traveling through it, was like a canoe traveling through a storm, perilous every second, yet always managing to turn danger into safety.

“Divert the navigation system’s energy to the shields,” Hao Ren said loudly. “They’re useless in this broken place anyway.”

There were almost no continuously solvable spatial structures in the Dark Abyss. The starship’s navigation computer was like a decoration in this chaotic spacetime. The only thing that could guide the way forward was Lilya’s divine power sensing, so the navigation computer could be completely shut down.

As more energy was injected into the shield generators, the external interference on the ship also rapidly decreased, and the shaking in the bridge finally calmed down.

Lilya sat in the seat next to the captain’s seat, her eyes glowing slightly. She watched the chaos outside the ship, but also watched the things that were happening throughout the universe.

She could see the battle taking place at the Watch Fortress, the repeated struggles over the entire Dark Abyss defense line, and the efforts made by those mortals on every planet to protect their homes.

She closed her eyes slightly and said softly: “At first, I prepared a lot of inspiring words, thinking about how to encourage them when crises appeared on various planets and mortal armies were in trouble, but now it seems… I always overthink things.”

“After seeing what happened in the Lahrian world, you should have known these things,” Hao Ren shook his head. “They don’t need you to protect them.”

“It’s mainly because I still remember them when they were just ‘taking their first steps,’ when they just learned to make tools, when they just invented writing, they were clearly so weak…” Lilya said, unable to help but laugh mockingly at herself. “As a result, in the blink of an eye, they can already fight the Lord of Madness without changing their expressions… Although they are only dealing with the Lord of Madness’s claws.”

Vivian glanced at her: “Does it feel like your child has grown up? Very happy but also a little lost?”

“It really does a little,” Lilya admitted generously. “But more than that, it’s regret… Originally, there were so many civilizations in this universe, but most of them died young because of my failure ten thousand years ago. If I could have been stronger back then…”

Hao Ren interrupted her: “Gods can’t always be obsessed with the past – if even you don’t look forward, what can those who believe in you look at?”

Lilya laughed and stood up from her seat: “You’re right, daydreaming isn’t what I should be doing… Especially now.”

As she spoke, she raised her right hand, and a stream of light gradually formed in her hand: “We’re about to reach that chaotic spacetime. As we pass through it, this ship’s stealth and my divine power shield will fail at the same time. We will be completely exposed to the Lord of Madness… Are you ready?”

Hao Ren also stood up and picked up the crowbar that had been placed next to the captain’s seat from the beginning – that crowbar was made of the same material as the Genesis Engine core, and the four golden characters “Planet-Destroying Crowbar” were written on it in gilded letters. To increase its metaphysical power and bring good luck to this operation, Hao Ren also specially had Raven 12345 bite a tooth mark on its end, making it a peerless artifact that could be used for both offense and defense.

He held the Planet-Destroying Crowbar in his hand and smiled slightly at Lilya: “I’ve been ready for a long time – by the way, what’s that thing in your hand?”

“A new weapon, I said it a long time ago,” Lilya shook the black leather book in her hand. “I’ve been thinking about what kind of weapon is more suitable – those two swords are indeed very powerful, but when dealing with the Lord of Madness’s intangible forces, we need some support in terms of the power of laws.”

Vivian blinked: “But I see it’s just a book…”

“That’s right, a book, but it records all the knowledge I’ve learned during this time, as well as a thousand mantras with powerful power that I’ve selected from those ‘textbooks.’ Perhaps it doesn’t have that much destructive power, but in the depths of the Dark Abyss, it can play a greater role than any divine weapon: it can provide us with a more stable, more order-oriented battlefield to offset the Lord of Madness’s endless chaotic power.”

Hao Ren stroked his chin and thought: “So you plan to flip through the book on the battlefield?”

“…If you have to understand it that way, it seems to be right…”