Chapter 743 - 465: The Cosmic Big Bang, the Birth of a Miracle

Chapter 743: Chapter 465: The Cosmic Big Bang, the Birth of a Miracle

The moment the divine light flared, the infinite Abyssal Calamity was ignited like kindling.

Raging flames erupted, roaring at the darkness, incinerating the Abyssal Kings who sought to descend upon the World from behind the Gate of Hell.

The Master of Ten Thousand Steels’ iron body shattered, covered in crimson fissures from which pitch-black molten iron dripped like blood. It fell through the Gate of Hell and slammed onto Gaia Land, rapidly solidifying into towering iron mountains that emanated a thick aura of Abyssal Contamination. Everything in its path faded, leaving only the gray-black luster of iron.

The Blood Monarch’s body was pierced by thousands of beams of light, causing a vast sea of crimson blood mist to evaporate. A portion of it drifted through the Gate of Hell to the World, instantly darkening the sky and bringing forth a torrential rain of blood. The mountains and earth watered by this blood rain began to warp grotesquely. Lakes and rivers turned to viscous blood, strange eyes opened upon the mountain peaks, and trees and soil transformed into writhing flesh and blood, covered by a transparent membrane through which dense networks of blood vessels were clearly visible.

The Abyssal Contamination from the Abyssal Kings was enough to turn Gaia into a veritable Hell. And yet, in the blink of an eye, this world-altering contamination was cleansed by the brilliant flames. Everything returned to its original state, as if nothing had ever happened.

The light surged forth, piercing the Gate of Hell and flooding the world of darkness with a torrent of radiance. It was as if a blazing Sun had risen within the Abyss, illuminating cursed planes that had been eternally shrouded in darkness and misfortune. Hundreds of millions of Abyssal Creatures shrieked wretchedly under the universal light before falling into eternal silence.

Light had descended.

In just a few short seconds, over a dozen Hells touched by the light crumbled and collapsed amidst the radiance and heat. Countless powerful Hell civilizations were reduced to ashes.

In the deepest reaches of the Abyss, within the Darkness, a colossal silhouette trembled violently.

The space above Gaia suddenly tore open. From within the profound darkness, a gaze looked down coldly upon the mortal world, its focus landing on the brilliantly glowing Noah.

And so, Darkness swept in.

A torrent of Darkness, settled over countless ages, descended from the heavens and engulfed everything. In the blink of an eye, more than half of Gaia was transformed into a sea of Darkness. This was a pure blackness, deeper even than the Abyss, where all things perished and all realms ceased to exist.

It was like the chaos and nothingness before the cosmos was born. Rules, Authority, life, and even death—none of it existed. Only Darkness was eternal.

—The ancient King from Abyssal legend, born alongside the Abyss itself, "Ancient Darkness," had awakened!

The Authority it wielded was "Darkness," the opposite of "Light." It was the existence that least wanted to see Noah’s Ascension to Divinity. In years past, it had woken from an endless slumber to participate in the Night of the Sun’s Fall, personally killing Noah.

But it had never imagined that Noah would somehow survive and even achieve Ascension to Divinity today. Now, killing Noah again would be incredibly difficult.

At the same time, however, this was also the best opportunity to kill Noah.

’While Noah has only just ascended and is not yet at her full strength, we must use every means possible to eliminate this great enemy of the Abyss...’

This was the ideal scenario, but it wasn’t realistic.

All the Gods knew—to kill Noah now, the Abyss would have to sacrifice at least two of its own Gods.

Who wanted to be those two?

Besides, even if they paid the price in blood, there was no guarantee they could kill Noah.

But... they had to try.

Noah’s existence was a grave threat to the Abyss. In less than ten years, she could lead the World in a counterattack against the Abyss—perhaps even sooner.

In an instant, several Abyssal Kings conferred and reached a consensus: they would initiate a Divine War. Even if they couldn’t kill Noah, they had to cripple her. They absolutely could not allow her to grow stronger. For the Abyss, that would be a slow and certain death.

At that very moment, a light shone through the void of darkness, erupting in a brilliant explosion.

If this expanse of darkness was the primeval Cosmos, then what was happening now was the universe-creating Big Bang!

Noah transformed into light, re-enacting the creation of the world from the ancient source. As she pushed back the darkness with light, life began to flow through all things. Millions of rays of light shone forth, and the void of darkness receded like a tide.

"If we’re going to fight, why not find a more spacious battlefield?" Noah smiled.

Suddenly, a brilliant light flashed. The divine auras ravaging Gaia vanished, and the turbulent world instantly calmed. The Gates of Hell that had opened were all forced shut, and all of Gaia fell into a strange, desolate silence.

「Zone One」

After making his Prayer, Zhou Chen suddenly felt something. His Soul saw a long ladder, filled with a sacred aura, reaching straight to the heavens.

—The Ascension Ladder.

His Soul involuntarily began to climb, ascending one step after another. And with each step he climbed, the power of the Authority he wielded grew stronger.

After climbing more than fifty steps, Zhou Chen felt a resistance and could not advance any further.

He muttered to himself, ’Helping Noah achieve godhood let me climb over fifty steps. That’s a pretty substantial reward. During the Jinzhu incident, the King of Music went through all that trouble just to climb three steps...’

Only by performing more actions that align with the characteristics of one’s Authority and gaining Secret Power from them could one continue to climb the ladder. The reason the King of Music composed and performed music everywhere was to absorb Secret Power; the grander the music she performed, the more abundant the Secret Power she absorbed.

Snapping back to reality, Zhou Chen used the Sensing of the Sword of Ten Thousand Kings to perceive the strange events unfolding on Gaia.

"Where did they go?" Zhou Chen asked, looking at the tablet in No. 9’s hand, which was playing a live feed.

It was replaying the scene from just moments ago—with a flash of light, the True Gods and Abyssal Kings fighting on Gaia had all vanished.

Now, satellite Investigation Mirrors were searching across the globe, but they had found nothing.

SWISH!

The scene changed abruptly. Zhou Chen was dazed for a moment before he got a clear look at his surroundings. He and No. 9 had arrived in a command room.

"Sir, we’ve scanned all of deep space and the Abyss. There’s no feedback of any divine fluctuations," a young woman with a ponytail said, turning her head to address No. 9.

"Keep searching," No. 9 ordered.

Gods possessed a powerful Extraordinary gravity; it was impossible for them to simply vanish into thin air.

While everyone was busy searching for the Gods’ whereabouts, a thought struck Zhou Chen. As if sensing something, he walked up and patted No. 9’s shoulder. "Do me a favor and open an Any Door. I need to go back to Gaia."

"To do what?"

"Just open it."

"Alright." No. 9 nodded. An Any Door immediately materialized beside them. Zhou Chen pushed it open and stepped back onto the battle-scarred surface of Gaia.

He reached out his palm toward the distant horizon and snatched something, closing his hand around it.

No. 9 walked over curiously. "What are you doing?"

Zhou Chen opened his palm, showing him the magnificent point of light nestled within, a point that held infinite beauty and happiness.

—Miracle Light!

"This..." No. 9 froze, his mind racing.

"This Miracle Light was born when Noah re-enacted the Big Bang of the Cosmos."

As the Crowned King of the Miracle and Hope Realm, Zhou Chen instantly understood the origin of this Miracle Light. By extrapolating from this point and tracing it back to its source, he could uncover the truth about miracles.

It was a light born alongside the creation of the Cosmos.

’So this is how miracles are born...’

No. 9’s thoughts swirled. Then, a realization struck him, and he exclaimed, "Doesn’t that mean you can have Noah infinitely farm Miracle Light?!"

"It’s not that simple. Generating a miracle requires fulfilling the elements of a cosmic Big Bang. I’m guessing the higher the specifications, the more miracles are born."

Zhou Chen secured the Miracle Light and explained, "I quantify Miracle Light as ’wish value.’ This single strand of Miracle Light is worth one hundred thousand wish points, enough to perform one Tiny Miracle, which is quite a lot. Nine more of these and I can perform a Great Miracle, like crowning someone as a King on the spot or helping a Demigod achieve Ascension to Divinity.

"The problem is, the conditions for producing Miracle Light are too strict. A clash between two Gods only yields one hundred thousand wish points... Are you suggesting Noah should go looking for a fight with Ancient Darkness every day?"

"But you have the Godslaying Weapon."

No. 9 reminded him, "She has already adapted and evolved the ’Darkness’ Authority, and you gave her a Soul, giving her the Ability to become a God. Once she becomes a God, can’t she and Noah work together to farm Miracle Light for you? She could even solo farm it herself."

Holy shit...

Zhou Chen’s breath hitched.

’He’s got a point!’

"Get back here, quick!"

No. 9 hurriedly pulled him back into the command room, closed the Any Door, and said with grave importance, "I am absolutely, one hundred percent certain that you are the future hope of humanity! With you, we could even form a legion of three thousand Crowned Kings!

"Think about it, three thousand fucking Crowned Kings! We’d be absolutely unstoppable, killing any God or demon that stands in our way! Wiping out the entire Abyss wouldn’t be a problem!"

The more No. 9 thought about it, the more ecstatic he became, almost mad with excitement. "I hereby dub you the ultimate support!"

’Support...’ Zhou Chen considered it. ’Well, Prayer is indeed a support-type Ability, especially its troop-spawning potential. It’s absolutely top-tier. With enough wish value, I could amass a whole legion of High-level Ascenders. I could even create a God every now and then.’

As they were talking, one of the observation personnel made a discovery.

The young woman with the ponytail cried out, "Sir! We’ve got a situation!"

She pointed at the screen in disbelief.

"The Divine Soul Link System is back online! It’s pinpointed their location!"

"Where are they?" Zhou Chen asked hurriedly.

"They’re... at Alpha Centaurus..." The young woman swallowed hard. "It’s 4.37 light-years away from us..."

"Huh?" No. 9 said, shocked. "Even though Noah can reach the speed of light after becoming a God, taking a whole group of Gods to Centaurus in just ten-some seconds seems a little... unscientific, doesn’t it? Er... well... I guess with a space Authority, it wouldn’t be a problem..."

Zhou Chen was dumbfounded too. He knew Noah wanted to move the Divine War far away from the World, but wasn’t this a little too far?

"Alright, don’t worry about them. A Divine War isn’t something that ends in a short time. I’ll take you to see the President first," No. 9 said.

Zhou Chen nodded. The scene around them changed abruptly, and he and No. 9 appeared in a hallway.

No. 9 led him through layer after layer of security until they finally arrived at the deepest part of Zone One.

Ahead was an ordinary-looking office door, yet it radiated a stern, oppressive aura, like being a student called to the principal’s office—an instinctively suffocating feeling.

"Go on. The President wants to see you alone," No. 9 said.

Zhou Chen nodded, walked forward, and knocked on the office door.

"Come in."