"You're not the only ones with trump cards!"
Rosen sneered at the two Chaos Holy Gods blocking his path.
To possess the Immortal Will meant that, for a short time, death and life were indistinguishable.
So no matter how much they wanted to kill each other, until the ownership of the new universe was decided, it was meaningless.
The universe was still on the move. If they clashed for even a little too long, catching up with the universe afterward would be nothing but a fantasy.
So the Chaos Holy Gods didn't want his life—what they truly wanted was to seize the Space Between Universes, to get ahead of him in the coming chase.
Once they were ahead, they could keep attacking from behind and constantly prevent him from approaching the universe.
If Rosen wanted to break out of this situation, he had to overtake them again and reclaim the lead.
He didn't possess an instant-burst acceleration method like they did—but he had the Sea of Miracles.
Originally, the Doomsday Ark wasn't a Primeval Relic, but after being enhanced by the Sea of Miracles, it had managed to catch up with the universe.
Now, the Doomsday Ark had transformed into a true Primeval Relic. It no longer needed to merge with the Sea of Miracles to match the universe's speed.
Given that, and the fact he was already ahead, he hadn't needed to fuse the Sea of Miracles into the Doomsday Ark.
But now, it was time.
At Rosen's will, the Sea of Miracles fused with the Doomsday Ark, instantly elevating its speed, enhancing its spacetime engine. The already blazing-fast Doomsday Ark accelerated by another third, veering forward in an arc.
The Doomsday Ark curved around the side of the Chaos Holy Gods, staying just beyond the range of their maximum attack radius.
Rosen forcibly overtook them again with overwhelming speed, circling around to the front.
The Chaos Holy God and the Dimensional Holy God exchanged shocked glances. Neither of them had expected the God of Heaven and Earth's ship to be that fast!
At this point, there was only one method left to catch up to the God of Heaven and Earth.
They had to combine the Eternal Mantis Mount and the Dimensional Wings, both Primeval Relics. Although the combo wouldn't quite double their speed, it would definitely be enough to catch up to Rosen's Doomsday Ark. A two-against-one scenario would leave the God of Heaven and Earth with no chance of survival.
The Dimensional Holy God removed the Dimensional Wings from His back and attached them to the back of the Eternal Mantis Mount.
Then He entered the dimensional world within the Dimensional Wings, exerting full control to accelerate the Chaos Holy God's mount.
The Eternal Mantis surged forward at a terrifying speed, rapidly closing the distance to the Doomsday Ark.
Rosen tried to use the Immortal Energy Cannons to interfere. It worked well enough against one of them, but against the two working together, it was completely ineffective.
Now they were at least 10% faster than he was—it would take only a few minutes for them to catch up effortlessly.
"Looks like I'll have to use that trump card."
Resolute, Rosen activated the Mysterious Study Room, linking with his Primeval Incarnation—disguised as the ancient god's Dark Sun Clone.
Inside the Dimensional Holy God's dimensional microcosm, the Ancient God was stationed with His own ancient god microcosm, fully prepared for battle.
He had His own opportunities. The Dimensional Holy God believed He could control the Ancient God, but who would truly claim the new universe in the end was still uncertain.
As the Ancient God continued scheming, He failed to notice that the Dark Sun Clone had suddenly become distracted.
To perfectly deceive the Ancient God, Rosen had copied all of the Dark Sun Clone's memories into his Primeval Incarnation. The memories belonging to Rosen himself were completely masked by the Nightfall Parasitic Flower. So after the Incarnation became the Dark Sun Clone, even he didn't know he was fake.
Now, the Nightfall Parasitic Flower lifted its concealment. The Dark Sun Clone instantly recalled his true identity.
At first, the two sets of memories within the Eternal Will conflicted, making him uncertain of who he really was.
But as the Nightfall Parasitic Flower began concealing the original Dark Sun Clone's memories instead, Rosen's memories quickly took over. Using his authority—second only to the Ancient God—he instantly took control of the Ancient God's microcosm and rammed it straight into the Dimensional Holy God's dimensional universe.
Though the Ancient God reacted quickly, he was still a step too late to stop the collision between the two microcosms.
The Dimensional Holy God's universe was suddenly attacked from within. His first instinct was that the Ancient God had betrayed Him—perhaps secretly allied with the God of Heaven and Earth, or even with the Chaos Holy God.
In a split second, the Dimensional Holy God had no way to determine who exactly the Ancient God had sided with.
He couldn't afford to gamble. So, almost immediately, He detached the Dimensional Wings from the Eternal Mantis Mount and fled from the Chaos Holy God.
At this point, the Dimensional Holy God didn't dare to approach anyone. He didn't want to risk getting pincered from both inside and outside.
So He had to eliminate the internal threat before dealing with any external ones.
Inside the Ancient God's microcosm, the Ancient God had already realized that there was something wrong with his Dark Sun Clone.
How was He supposed to explain this to the Dimensional Holy God? There was no way.
Unless… He could capture the Dark Sun Clone alive and hand him over.
Though both his main body and the clone were Eternal Lifeforms, the Ancient God had already converted all of his Eternal Will into Immortal Will. Meanwhile, the Dark Sun Clone had only around a hundred points of divine origin supporting his Eternal Will. Against his true body, he barely had any chance to fight back.
The Ancient God reached out with his bare hand to grab the Dark Sun Clone by the neck. At the moment of contact, his hand would instantly suppress the clone.
However, unexpectedly, the Ancient God's sure-grip grab missed.The Dark Sun clone moved faster than He had imagined. That speed was nowhere near what a mere hundred or so points of Eternal Will should have—at least a few hundred points of Life Essence must be supporting it. As the Dark Sun clone retreated, an unstable door appeared behind it.
Seeing the Dark Sun clone about to retreat into the door, the Ancient God immediately manipulated his Ancient God microcosm to suppress space-time.
Just as the door was about to collapse, the Ancient God's microcosm was suddenly struck heavily from outside.
The suppression on the door immediately weakened greatly. The Dark Sun clone retreated into the door and had already escaped the Ancient God microcosm.
The Ancient God's expression turned grim. At this critical moment, the Dimensional Holy God's external attack had inadvertently freed the problematic Dark Sun clone.
Under the current circumstances, would the Dimensional Holy God still listen to his empty excuses?
No explanation would suffice. The Dimensional Holy God's plan to profit from their conflict had been shattered.
The Ancient God knew that now any explanation was useless. From the Dimensional Holy God's perspective, he had stabbed him in the back at the most crucial moment. Without proof of innocence, the Dimensional Holy God would no longer trust him. Thus, the urgent task was to escape the dimensional microcosm.
Only a being of equal power could open a space-time door inside his Ancient God microcosm.
Excluding the Dimensional Holy God and the Chaos Holy God, the Ancient God already knew where the problem with the Dark Sun clone lay.
It must have been when the Celestial Holy God attacked the Moon Holy God back then—his Dark Sun clone was unknowingly controlled by the Celestial Holy God.
The Ancient God instantly retracted his Ancient God microcosm into the ocean of consciousness. At this moment, the Dimensional Rubik's Cube had already layered seals over the Ancient God microcosm.
Facing this terrifying lockdown, the Ancient God sliced the void with his Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe, tearing open a rift in space-time.
The Ancient God stepped in and vanished into the dimensional maze of the Dimensional Rubik's Cube.
The Dimensional Holy God was stunned watching this. His dimensional microcosm was sealed by one layer of space-time lockdown, the Dimensional Rubik's Cube was another dimensional lockdown, and the original divine law's palm-sized universe was yet another lockdown. Three layers of lockdowns—yet they could not trap the Ancient God?
Was the Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe he wielded really just an ordinary Eternal Sacred Artifact?
After escaping the dimensional microcosm, the Ancient God appeared in the endless deep space far from the Dimensional Holy God.
The Dimensional Holy God hesitated, watching the Ancient God, but ultimately did not turn back to pursue.
Because if he stopped now, the new universe would not stop following him.
The Ancient God watched the receding new universe and the three Dimensional Holy Gods, showing no intention to immediately set off to catch up.
He did not possess a terrifyingly fast original sacred artifact, but he had other means to catch up.
Endless deep space was shrouded in darkness, with the only light coming from scattered universes.
However, the radiant range of that light was limited. As the new universe drifted farther away, the residual light dimmed, and the Ancient God seemed abandoned in the darkness.
Yet at this moment, the Ancient God lightly sliced once more with the Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe.
The void tore open another rift. The Ancient God crossed the rift and slipped inside.
If the Dimensional Holy God had seen this, it would have completely changed his opinion of the Ancient God.
Endless deep space held no laws, only the purest energy.
Its space-time was terrifyingly stable—no matter how strong eternal life was, none could shake endless deep space's space-time. Only true primordial life could barely shake and tear space-time to traverse across space. But the Ancient God had done so easily with his Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe.
At this moment, inside the cabin of the Doomsday Ark, a space-time rift silently appeared.
The moment the Ancient God stepped out, Rosen sensed it and immediately manipulated the Miracle Star Sea to envelop the cabin.
The Ancient God, transported into the Miracle Star Sea, was surprised to feel the familiar miracle power sensed by the Miracle Star Sea.
Had he known that gathering miracle seed could create a primordial miracle artifact, he would never have traded away the miracle seed.
But now it was not too late—if he killed the Celestial Holy God, all would belong to him.
The Ancient God raised his Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe. At this moment, Rosen's true body aboard the Doomsday Ark instantly felt death's shroud descend.
The moment the Heaven-Splitting Divine Axe fell, Rosen's thousand points of Immortal Will were instantly cut down across space by the axe.
Immortal Will possessed an undying characteristic. Even primordial life could only erase memories of Immortal Will and disperse the Immortal Will itself.
But the Ancient God's single strike instantly obliterated all of Rosen's Immortal Will.
The Ancient God's state was also poor after delivering this blow. His own Immortal Will was destroyed simultaneously.
A thousand killed, a thousand lost—the Ancient God sacrificed his own Immortal Will to instantly annihilate Rosen's Immortal Will.
It was only while destroying Rosen's Immortal Will that he realized the Celestial Holy God was actually Rosen himself—the Rosen everyone thought had died at the hands of the Celestial Holy God.
Now Rosen, having lost his Immortal Will and severely injured, would surely die from another strike.
However, just as the Ancient God prepared to strike a second blow, he sensed danger.
The blade lightly fell again, tearing open a space-time rift.
Rosen, watching the fleeing Ancient God, nervously ceased the Fate Bronze Book's fate erasure.
The Fate Bronze Book controlled the destinies of all beings in the universe, managing everything except primordial life.
But for every spear, there was a shield. Many means could escape fate's control.
However, most of these means relied on the universe. Now the universe had undergone nirvana, and the Fate Bronze Book carried the fate of the entire Origin microcosm. It was powerful enough to concentrate the Origin microcosm's fate energy to erase all invaders who breached the microcosm.
The Ancient God still had Immortal Will and could resist erasure, but having lost his Immortal Will, resisting meant only certain death.
If he had been any slower, he would have died from fate erasure before landing a second strike.
Although the Ancient God had escaped, Rosen's current state wasn't good either.His Undying Will was gone. Fortunately, what had been destroyed was only the Undying Will itself—his divine source, life source, and undying source were all still intact. However, to elevate Eternal Will back into Undying Will, it would take at least ten thousand years—there was no hope of doing so any sooner.
Just as Rosen was struggling with how to restore his Undying Will, he suddenly felt the Undying Will that had been destroyed reappear.
At first, it was just a trace, but gradually, more and more returned, and the restoration speed increased.
Rosen finally let out a sigh of relief. It turned out the Ancient God's strike hadn't truly and permanently destroyed the Undying Will. Instead, it had used some kind of power to temporarily sever it. As that power gradually faded, the Undying Will, with its undying nature, would soon recover.
Even though it wasn't a permanent destruction, this temporary severing was still terrifying.
Once the Undying Will was lost, even a Primordial Law would become nearly useless. A Primordial Relic could only display thirty percent of its full power at most. This alone was enough to reduce beings like him and the Dimensional Holy God to mere Eternal Lifeforms.
So this was the Ancient God's trump card. That Heaven-Opening Divine Axe of his was definitely not just a simple Eternal Relic.
It was already known that the Heaven-Opening Divine Axe could kill a thousand at the cost of wounding a thousand—temporarily severing Undying Will. It could also tear through space in the Boundless Deep Void. These were feats no known Primordial Relic could achieve. Therefore, the axe was very likely an artifact that had transcended even the Primordial level.
After pondering for a moment, Rosen allowed his recovering Undying Will to reach out toward the pursuing Chaos Holy God and Dimensional Holy God.
Then, he revealed the Ancient God's trump card to them, making them realize how dangerous the Ancient God truly was.
The Dimensional Holy God was half-skeptical, but after thinking carefully, stopped doubting.
It had puzzled them—why would the Ancient God suddenly sabotage things from the inside?
Judging from the Ancient God's assault on the Heavenly Holy God, it was obvious the Heavenly Holy God had framed him.
But this had also forced the Ancient God to reveal his hidden trump card—and this trump card was so powerful it even made the Dimensional Holy God feel wary.
If the Heavenly Holy God hadn't set up the Ancient God, provoking him to act early, then in the future, it might have been her who had to face that terrifying strike. The Heavenly Holy God had narrowly escaped, but there was no guarantee she would survive such a blow.
It wasn't that she was weaker than the Heavenly Holy God, but rather, she might not be skilled in what the Heavenly Holy God excelled at.
The Ancient God dared to reveal his hand and forcefully strike at the Heavenly Holy God—it meant he had confidence in success. What he didn't expect was that the Heavenly Holy God's hidden trump card was just strong enough to drive him back. The Dimensional Holy God couldn't guarantee she had a similar backup.
Although the threat had been exposed and eliminated, the Dimensional Holy God still felt extremely uneasy.
In front of her was the Heavenly Holy God, behind her the Ancient God—caught between a wolf and a tiger. If she couldn't eliminate one of them, how could she hope to compete for the new universe? Now that it was proven the Ancient God had been framed, it was clear that she and the Chaos Holy God would have to cooperate more deeply.
What the Dimensional Holy God could understand, the Chaos Holy God could too.
There was no question about it—who should be killed first, the Heavenly Holy God or the Ancient God?
Although the Heavenly Holy God was powerful, the Heaven-Opening Divine Axe posed a greater threat.
If they killed the Ancient God and took the axe, catching up to and defeating the Heavenly Holy God would be much easier.
However, they soon realized that killing the Ancient God first wasn't feasible at all. Even though the Dimensional Wings and the Eternal Mantis mount stacked together to massively boost speed, the Ancient God could tear space at any time and escape. No matter how hard they chased, they'd never catch him.
With the Ancient God uncatchable, the only remaining target was the Heavenly Holy God.
But they also worried that if the Heavenly Holy God counterattacked in desperation, the Ancient God might seize the opportunity and profit from the chaos. As they hesitated, unsure where to begin, the new universe underwent another change—it no longer expelled unassimilable junk.
The new universe began expanding in the Boundless Deep Void—not by internal space-time inflation, but rather by expanding its cosmic barriers.
As the new universe grew larger, it began to exert a strange influence on the Deep Void.
A needle passing through air feels no resistance, but a fan swung through air clearly feels drag. Though the Deep Void had no laws and no perceivable energy, space-time itself still acted as resistance for a universe.
In the past, the cosmic barrier was small, so the resistance was minimal. Now that the barrier had grown, resistance began to increase.
Resistance should've slowed it down, but the new universe moved even faster—because it began absorbing a higher-grade form of space-time power than Primordial Space-Time. The cosmic barriers of the new universe were rapidly evolving.
As the surrounding space-time power was absorbed, the resistance that should have increased actually diminished.
The Doomsday Ark, which previously had ample speed after a one-third boost, was now pushing full throttle and still watching helplessly as the new universe pulled further away.
Seeing that they would never catch up at this rate, Rosen could only reduce speed and wait for the Chaos and Dimensional Holy Gods.
The situation was now clear—other than the Ancient God, no one could catch up to the new universe alone.
The three who had once been at each other's throats now clearly had no choice but to work together to pursue the new universe.
The Doomsday Ark shrank and landed on the back of the Eternal Mantis mount. The space-time engine at the ship's stern spewed energy, causing the mantis's speed to skyrocket. The Chaos and Dimensional Holy Gods also landed on the deck—several times, they nearly made a move, but each time they held back.
This was a golden opportunity to eliminate the Heavenly Holy God. But if they started fighting and damaged the vehicle, it would all be over.
Then no one would catch the new universe—and the Ancient God lurking in the shadows would reap all the rewards.
Rosen and the others thought things were finally stable, but unexpectedly, the expansion of the new universe didn't slow down at all. The larger it grew, the faster it moved. Soon, not even the combined strength of three Primordial vehicles could keep up.
At that moment, the Ancient God tore through space and arrived on the deck.
Without a word, the Ancient God ripped open space in front of the Eternal Mantis. Seizing the opportunity, the mantis plunged through the rift, drawing closer to the new universe.
His appearance here clearly meant that even the Ancient God could no longer chase the new universe alone.
The Heaven-Opening Divine Axe could tear space in the Boundless Deep Void, but doing so obviously consumed the Ancient God's power. Moreover, the distance of each spatial tear was clearly limited—otherwise, the Ancient God wouldn't have risked boarding the Doomsday Ark.
(End of Chapter)