Chapter 449: Nightmare

"It's the Seven Deadly Sins!"

"That mask... it's Wrath!"

"Run!"

"I knew it! How could such terrifying monsters suddenly appear? Wrath was behind it all!"

"He's going to destroy the Blood Moon Empire! Run for your lives!"

People scrambled to flee. Some lost their shoes in the sheer panic, too terrified to turn back for them.

Yang Dongqing fell silent.

"Is this what he calls cleaning up? Scaring everyone away?"

...

...

The next day.

News that Wrath of the Seven Deadly Sins had joined forces with the Pain Divine Cult to slay the Undead King and destroy the Blood Moon Empire sent shockwaves around the globe.

The entire world reeled. The Undead King—one of the Seven Kings—had actually fallen, and the Blood Moon Empire was on the brink of total collapse.

After the shock came a deep, creeping terror. The shadow of the Seven Deadly Sins descended over the world like an inescapable net.

"The Seven Deadly Sins won't stop until the world is dead!"

"That damned Wrath is worse than a beast!"

"We're finished! The Seven Deadly Sins are going to destroy the world! If even the Undead King is dead, who on earth can stop them?!"

Chiyan Empire, Star City District 13, inside a detached villa.

Yang Dongqing slowly set the newspaper down on the table, his fingers trembling slightly.

He turned to Jasmine, who was cooking, and said, "Don't go out for a while."

Jasmine smiled as she stir-fried the vegetables. "Whatever you say."

A blissful smile shone on her face. Not only had she been resurrected, she had also regained her humanity and reunited with the one she loved. It was as if everything had returned to how it was in the very beginning.

The Land of Origin.

Su Mu gazed at the Crystal Blue Teardrop hovering just above his palm, suspended somewhere between reality and illusion.

This Crystal Blue Teardrop was the soul blood of the nightmare, or rather, the divine blood of Xuan Tian, the God of Nightmares.

He had spent an entire year inside the Dream Time Chamber suppressing and refining the God of Pain. Ultimately, he sacrificed the deity to Supreme Heaven in exchange for this drop of divine blood.

"Once you assimilate the divine blood and become the only nightmare in the world, you will inherit this Dream World and the Creator's Authority. You will be the heir to the God of Nightmares."

Listening to Xiao Yuan, Su Mu offered a faint smile. "Will it really be that simple? Everything Xuan Tian traded his life for, just to pave the way for me?

"If anything, I suspect he might be planning to use my body to be reborn."

Xiao Yuan shot him a puzzled look. "Trying to understand a God with mortal logic is doomed to fail. Why would Xuan Tian need to use your body to be reborn? You are Xuan Tian."

Surprise flashed through Su Mu's eyes. 'I am Xuan Tian? Interesting. On top of being the Mad King, I've got the God of Nightmares tacked on now?'

Xiao Yuan shook her head. "No, that's not what I mean. I mean that you are Xuan Tian, and everyone within the Xuan Tian World is Xuan Tian.

"The existence of a God is wonderful and strange. The Xuan Tian World is him; every blade of grass, every tree, and every living creature within it is him. When gathered together, he is the God of Nightmares. When scattered, he is the current world.

"Yet those two states—gathering and scattering—exist simultaneously, layered over each other.

"Your will has inherited the Xuan Tian World. That is the equivalent of Xuan Tian gathering together with you at the center. In essence, you are Xuan Tian, and Xuan Tian is you.

"In human terms, it's like a person changing their name. The name might be different, but they are still the exact same person."

Su Mu looked thoughtful, the corners of his lips curving up. Gods truly were bizarre beings. Every definition of a God was just humanity forcibly describing them through the lens of their own limited cognition. Perhaps only by truly becoming a God could one understand what a God was.

Just like how the outside world used countless adjectives and labels to define a person—was that really accurate? Could those adjectives and labels truly encompass everything about them?

Unless you became that person, you could never truly understand them in full.

Absolute understanding didn't exist between humans. Only relative understanding.

Naturally, it was even more impossible between humans and Gods.

Suddenly, Su Mu clenched his hand. The Crystal Blue Teardrop shattered in his palm, and countless specks of blue light drilled into his flesh, burrowing straight into his soul.

Hum—!

Endless darkness flooded his consciousness like a tidal wave. He sank continuously, as if plunging into a bottomless Abyss. Memories flashed before his eyes like a spinning lantern; time seemed to flow backward.

He saw the descent of the God of Pain. He saw the Nightmare Invasion, the founding of the Seven Deadly Sins, his first time entering the Nightmare World, and his first contact with that miraculous dream. He saw himself babbling as a toddler, heard his first wails as a newborn, all the way until his consciousness dissolved into a primordial chaos.

Su Mu seemed to vanish entirely from the world, his consciousness wiped out of existence.

Just then, a soft, crystalline blue light bloomed slowly from the depths of his soul, as magnificent as an unfolding flower.

Wherever the light touched, the darkness melted away like ice in the sun. Washed in this power, his soul became light and pure.

His consciousness stretched infinitely, drawn from a single dot into a continuous line. That line duplicated, split, and spread without end, ultimately weaving into a sky-blotting net that slowly blanketed the entire Dream World.

At that moment, he felt he could touch all things in creation. He could hear the whispers of flowers and grass carried on the wind, and sense the emotions of billions of living beings. He was no longer a person. He was... the world.

Completely transcending the limits of the flesh, his soul soared through this wondrous state, constantly transforming and elevating to unprecedented heights.

Hum—!

With a resonant hum, his consciousness pulled back into his body like a receding tide. Su Mu slowly opened his eyes. His crystal blue pupils were clear and translucent, faintly reflecting the world within them.

The nightmare... was complete!

"How does it feel?" Xiao Yuan skipped over to his side.

Su Mu lowered his head, staring at his hands as if possessing a body for the very first time.

"Marvelous. I think I understand what you meant now. Right now, I feel like I've become the entire Dream World."

Xiao Yuan tilted her head, studying him. "You can actually abandon your physical body now, you know. A true nightmare isn't a physical entity anyway."

Su Mu smiled and shook his head. "Without a physical body, a person misses out on a lot of fun."

He slowly raised his head. His gaze pierced through layers of obstacles to land on the spiderwebbed cracks of the Seven Kings Barrier.

The next second, the Old-Fashioned Computer in the Land of Origin morphed into a beam of white light, dropping into Su Mu's loosely curled hand. The light shifted and warped, ultimately solidifying into a Snakewood Cane.

He tapped the Cane lightly against the ground.

Tap—!

Rings of crystal blue ripples radiated outward.

Ignoring the distance of space and time, the rippling waves appeared over the Seven Kings Barrier in an inconceivable manner.

As the crystal blue light spread, the heavily fractured Seven Kings Barrier was instantly restored, returning to pristine condition.

The Nightmare Creatures preparing to squeeze through the cracks slammed into a solid wall, bouncing right back out.

Down in the Abyss, pair after pair of evil divine eyes slowly slipped shut.