Chapter 373: A New Era Begins!

"We won!" The pale Dragon King felt a surge of joy. Drained by the exertion, many of the scales on his body had receded, and his once-towering frame had shrunk back to a mere 1.3 meters.

Then a disappointed voice echoed through the air. "You all fall far short of the first Kings."

The Dragon King jolted. He suddenly remembered the battle was far from over—in fact, it had only just begun.

The Seven Kings looked up at the elegant figure hovering in the air. Their earlier arrogance and casual indifference were gone, replaced by deep dread and genuine fear.

"They at least managed to stop me for a while back then. It cost them their lives, but they accomplished it. Who would have thought today's Seven Kings would be reduced to such a pathetic state just dealing with a little pet."

Su Mu's words struck fear into the Seven Kings.

Had Pride really begun invading the Present World all those years ago? The Nightmare Invasion of the past was entirely his doing!

The current Seven Kings had never lived through the Nightmare Era. They only knew of that chaotic time from history books, and that the first generation of Kings had brought it to an end.

Back then, after leaving behind their final testaments, the six original Kings had all vanished on the exact same day. No one knew where they went. Humanity only knew that after their disappearance, instances of the Nightmare Invasion grew rarer and rarer, marking the dawn of a new era.

"Pride! Your plot to destroy the world will never succeed! Whatever our ancestors could do, this King can do as well!" the 1.3-meter dwarf shouted.

The Undead King, who harbored a bone-deep hatred for Su Mu, sneered. "Pride, even if you are a God, so what? You cannot enter the Real World. At most, you can only drive some Nightmare Creatures. Now your minion has been slain, and all you can do is stand there and watch!"

The Undead King was being overly optimistic. In his mind, Pride's goal was to destroy the world. If he still had powerful subordinates like the Faceless Angel, they would have been unleashed long ago, rather than leaving the angel to die.

This proved that while Pride's methods were formidable, they were ultimately limited. At most, he could unleash a few weak Nightmare Creatures, much like he had at the Blood Moon Imperial Palace.

The Undead King felt he had simply been bluffed by that divine aura. Otherwise, he never would have ended up looking so pathetic. Now, with all Seven Kings present alongside numerous Gold powerhouses, what could Pride realistically do?

Naturally, the other six Kings shared the same thought.

Their logic was perfectly sound. The only problem was that Su Mu was not trying to destroy the world. He was trying to save it.

If Su Mu truly wanted to annihilate the world, he could have just unleashed several Saint Grade nightmares and destroyed everything in an instant. That was precisely why he chose to release the creatures gradually. He simply had not expected the Seven Kings to mistake his restraint for weakness.

This mindset among the Seven Kings was a terrible sign. Once they felt confident again, it would not take long for them to revert to their old habits. King Chi would go back to eating potato chips, the Dragon King would resume his arrogant posturing, and the Undead King would continue oppressing humanity...

In the end, they would remain fractured, guaranteeing the world's destruction.

Saving the world was never a burden Su Mu intended to shoulder alone; it involved everyone.

He had no interest in playing savior. He was only doing this because it was amusing, and out of self-preservation. If the world was destroyed, he would die too—and his death would likely be far more gruesome than anyone else's.

After all, the Gods were highly likely to target his dream realm.

But he refused to carry the weight of the world for everyone else. That would just be boring.

An indifferent gaze swept out from behind the Silver-White Mask. "It seems you harbor some misunderstandings about me. You kill a mere pet, and suddenly believe you can comprehend a God?

"Foolish mortals. Watch closely. Starting today, your era is over. What follows next... is the era of God!"

Su Mu slowly ascended into the sky. He drifted higher and higher, piercing through the clouds until he gradually eclipsed the sun.

Staring up at that supreme, godlike figure, a terrible premonition gripped everyone's hearts.

Abruptly, Su Mu spread his arms, as if embracing the sun.

Under his embrace, a pitch-black rift tore open right through the center of the sun. The rift expanded, and the sunlight began to dim at a visible rate.

When the rift reached its absolute limit, the sky... went dark!

The massive tear had completely swallowed the sun.

The rift stretched over the sun like the gaping maw of a colossal Abyss. It was utterly terrifying. The darkness inside was suffocatingly thick, squirming and shifting.

A moment later, countless indistinct whispers drifted out from the rift. The sounds grew louder and louder, evolving into the agonizing wails of hundreds of millions of vengeful souls until the noise became... deafening!

Countless evil eyes blinked open within the darkness. A chaotic blend of terrifying auras intertwined and spilled out from the rift, cascading into the mortal realm.

The Seven Kings paled in horror as they stared up at the rift, which was now vastly larger than before.

"This... Could this be..." The Dragon King's face drained of color, his shrunken frame trembling.

Under everyone's despairing gaze, one, two, a hundred, a million, ten million... A dense, seemingly endless horde of Nightmare Creatures poked their heads out from the Abyss.

That elegant figure stood before the endless tide of nightmares, like a demonic god who had just thrown open the gates of Hell.

From beneath the Silver-White Mask, that indifferent voice echoed once more, heralding the arrival of a new era.

"As the God of this new era, I shall personally open its gates. And the only thing left for you to do... is fear!"

Roar! Roar! Roar!!!

Hundreds of millions of shrieking Nightmare Creatures poured out of the massive rift. They rained down like a terrifying torrent, crashing into the ocean below.

"No! Stop him!" the Dragon King roared, his eyes splitting with rage. As a Gold King, he could vividly sense just how many Nightmare Creatures Pride had unleashed.

In a brief moment, at least a million Nightmare Creatures had already flooded into the Present World, and this was only the beginning.

Most terrifying of all, he could already sense the auras of over a hundred Gold Grade Nightmare Creatures among them...

Pushing his exhausted body to the limit, he continuously spewed scorching dragon flames, blasting the falling torrent of monsters.

The Dragon King's flames were incredibly powerful, burning so hot they warped space itself. A single breath incinerated at least ten thousand Low Tier Nightmare Creatures. But... it was useless. In the face of such horrifying numbers, ten thousand was merely a basic unit.

The other six Kings also unleashed their full power without holding anything back, attempting to stop the invading tide. However, reality dealt them a cruel lesson. In the face of a God, mortal strength was insignificant.

The Gold powerhouses didn't stand idly by either; they launched their own attacks. For a moment, the entire ocean boiled under their combined assault. But it still wasn't enough.

More and more Nightmare Creatures crashed into the ocean. Gradually, a sprawling black tide formed across the waters—a tide made entirely of Nightmare Creatures. The ocean was turning black at a visible rate.

Plenty of Nightmare Creatures were also capable of flight. Like a plague of locusts, they swarmed the skies, blotting out the horizon as they scattered in every direction.

Thud!

A Gold powerhouse collapsed to the ground. His face was completely drained of color, and his entire body was shaking. It wasn't out of exhaustion—it was from fear.

"It's over! Humanity is finished! The world is going to be destroyed!"

Staring at the endless swarm of Nightmare Creatures that almost covered the ocean, he sank into total despair.