Chapter 314: Pride's True Identity

The Undead King's pupils contracted. "You... you..."

He instinctively wanted to mock Su Mu for daring to call himself a god—a title even he, a Gold King, would not dare claim. But watching the man open the Two Worlds Passage with a raise of his hand, flood the Imperial Palace, and summon a hundred thousand undead sirens along with hundreds of sea monsters—with the numbers still climbing...

...not to mention an actual deity watching like a predator in the background. Such power was simply... simply...

He dared not think any further.

A terrifying thought suddenly seized his mind: perhaps Pride truly was a god of the Nightmare World, an avatar of a deity!

He was powerful, mysterious, and seemed to have appeared out of thin air. It defied logic; a powerhouse with no past and no trace could not just manifest in this world. Unless... he wasn't from this world at all! He was from the Nightmare World!

That had to be it! Pride was a nightmare monster invading reality, an avatar of a god. The aura rolling off him was identical to the deity behind the black hole. He could make a nightmare god descend, and he could control these nightmare monsters...

Horror washed over the Undead King as the realization clicked. He... finally knew Pride's true identity!

Yet the price of uncovering this truth was something even he, a Gold King, could not bear.

Annihilation! Once a god descended, the Blood Moon Empire would be completely eradicated. No one could stop it.

By this point, a few quick-witted Blood Clan members had brought out Mithril Chains to imprison the undead sirens. Since the creatures could not be killed, containment was the only way to deal with them.

The Blood Clan was undeniably powerful. After a brief panic, they quickly suppressed the undead sirens. But the true threat had only just begun. They could not suppress the seawater, much less the increasingly maddening ravings echoing from its depths.

The Sea God's invading power was growing stronger!

Gradually, the weaker members of the Blood Clan began to lose their minds. They tore frantically at their own bodies before desperately drowning themselves in the seawater.

Before long, undead Blood Clan members crawled back out of the sea to join the Sea God's army.

Seawater had already washed away more than half of the Imperial Palace and was even surging into the rest of the Imperial Capital. More and more of the Blood Clan were swept up in the flood, and the Sea God's undead curse spread like a plague.

"Stop this!" the Undead King roared. "Or I will immediately order the execution of everyone from the Seven Deadly Sins!"

"Oh?" Su Mu cast a detached look his way. "Are you attempting to threaten a god? Gods fear no threats, nor do they lack believers."

The Undead King clenched his jaw so hard his teeth nearly shattered. A long-forgotten sense of powerlessness spread through his heart. It was the first time since becoming a King that he felt so utterly helpless.

Just then, beneath the Silver-White Mask, Su Mu furrowed his brows. The Sea God Divinity inside his body was acting up!

He immediately realized the cause: drawn by reality, the Sea God was continuously descending from the Nightmare World. The ocean of the Sea Kingdom was only a fragment of the Sea God. Strictly speaking, every ocean across the entire Nightmare World was a part of the Sea God.

Now, the Sea God seemed poised to gather all its power together and surge into reality.

As the Sea God accelerated its descent, the Divinity within his body would uncontrollably seek to return to the Sea God.

He could not let this continue. If the power of the Sea God's descent crossed the critical threshold, he would likely die before the Blood Moon Empire was even destroyed.

Su Mu had never forgotten that he was already a dead man. The only reason he could live like a living person was the undead trait granted by the Sea God Divinity. Without it, he would truly die.

"What exactly do you want?" the Undead King asked in a low voice.

Su Mu offered a faint smile. Even though he was on the verge of death, it did not stop him from enjoying this amusing process.

"I still prefer the way you looked down on everything earlier."

The Undead King's face turned as ugly as it could be. "Do not assume this King is truly out of options against you. I still have a Royal Power Artifact, and the Progenitor is still here. If..."

"Shh." Su Mu pressed a finger lightly to his lips and said coolly, "When begging, you must have the attitude of begging. A weakling's threats are always laughable, aren't they?"

Having said that, Su Mu felt the Sea God Divinity within him becoming almost impossible to suppress. He seemed to be losing control over his body, and several black fleshy tentacles actually sprouted from his face beneath the mask.

"This King..." The Undead King finally lowered his noble head. "I have lost."

Snap!

Su Mu snapped his fingers. The black hole in midair slowly closed. As the black hole closed, the seawater stopped pouring in, and the black fleshy tentacles on his face ceased their growth.

The Undead King blanked, completely caught off guard. The other party had actually just stopped like that?

Despite having just skirted the edge of death, Su Mu remained arrogant. "Remember, a god's tolerance is given only once."

With that, his figure slowly disappeared.

The Undead King stood frozen in place for a long time. His expression twisted into an exceptionally ferocious scowl as an unprecedented sense of humiliation welled up in his heart.

Pride had spared the Blood Moon Empire just like that. It had been so simple and easy... What did this mean? It meant that in Pride's heart, whether or not to destroy the Blood Moon Empire was nothing more than a trivial matter!

He could summon a god to descend and obliterate the Blood Moon Empire with a raise of his hand, and he could just as easily restore everything with a snap of his fingers.

This involuntarily reminded the Undead King of his own past actions. He, too, had once casually spared his enemies, even if they hated him to the bone, simply because he did not care. He had never viewed the weak as enemies. Sometimes, rather than killing his foes, he preferred to watch them hate him to death yet remain utterly powerless to do anything about it.

As much as he had enjoyed that feeling back then, he felt just as suffocated now. Because... in front of Pride, he was the weak one.

At this time, a member of the Gold Blood Clan gathered his courage and walked over. Because the Two Worlds Passage was closed, the seawater had lost its continuing supply and was receding at a visible rate. He waded through the water to stand before the Undead King.

He asked cautiously, "Your Majesty, the regions have noticed the disturbance in the Imperial Capital and are asking if they need to return to bolster our defenses. Also, regarding the captured members of the Seven Deadly Sins... should we bring them back to the Imperial Capital?"

The Undead King snapped his head up. His completely blood-red eyes fixed a death glare on the Gold Blood Clan member, terrifying the man so thoroughly that his legs gave out and he dropped straight to his knees in the seawater.

"Mercy, Your Majesty!"

"Shut up! Release the people of the Seven Deadly Sins... all of them!" His voice was exceptionally low, as if the words were forcibly squeezed out of his throat.

"R-Release them?" The Gold Blood Clan member blanked.

"Did you not understand when this King said to release them?! Go release them! Let them leave the Empire, and no one is allowed to stand in their way!!"

"Y-Yes... Yes, Your Majesty!"

In the Dream World.

Su Mu slumped onto the Immortal Emperor's Throne. With great difficulty, he took off the mask. Several black fleshy tentacles were constantly squirming on his face. He drew out the Void Devourer and slashed fiercely at his own face.

The flesh bearing the black fleshy tentacles fell to the ground. It writhed like earthworms for a moment before losing all signs of life.

He steadied his body and leaned back against the throne, silently mobilizing the Divinity of the Three Gods to suppress the Sea God Divinity. After a long time, he slowly exhaled, having finally recovered.