The Siren Celestial Empire of the Myriad Gods Sea Domain was one of the rare underwater civilizations of the Old World.
As such, it had become the guardian of the entrance to the Myriad Gods Sea Domain.
Due to the deterrence of dozens of Great True Gods in the Old World, the various races of the New World dared not enter the Myriad Gods Sea Domain recklessly.
For many years, this had resulted in an overall peaceful existence for the Siren Celestial Empire.
However, that was the past. Now, the once-thriving empire was littered with corpses, its lands soaked in death.
All aquatic life within the Siren Celestial Empire had been slaughtered by a few deity-ranked True Gods working together.
The Siren Emperor calmly pushed aside a nearby dried corpse, indifferent even though it had once been one of his trusted retainers.
Deity-ranked True Gods were not only short-lived but also inherently weak at the True God level. Furthermore, they were shackled by the power of their nation's fate, which was determined by the lives of all who resided in the Siren Celestial Empire.
If all ordinary aquatic beings of the empire perished, its fate would decline to the extreme.
This would, in turn, cause the power granted by the divine rank to weaken drastically. At this moment, the divine rank's augmentation within the Siren Emperor had already fallen from the True God level to that of a mere deity. Moreover, this augmentation was still weakening.
The Siren Emperor casually stripped the divine rank from his body and discarded it like a worthless piece of trash.
He no longer needed it. Through the hidden Player Pathway within the Virtual Divinity, he had successfully elevated himself from Sequence 3 of the Siren Pathway to Sequence 0—at the cost of exterminating half the population of the Siren Celestial Empire.
Furthermore, with the aid of the empire's ancestral cave-heaven artifact, he had managed to establish his own portable divine kingdom.
Though he was far weaker than in his peak, this power truly belonged to him.
The Siren Emperor had considered whether the mysterious Virtual Divinity was just another form of divine rank, an external force beyond his control.
But after testing it, he found that this was not the case. Though the Virtual Divinity might carry risks, the experience points gained from hunting through it resulted in permanent improvements to his body, bloodline, soul, and spirituality.
Even if the Virtual Divinity did have hidden dangers, he could simply discard it in the future.
There was always some level of risk in seeking power—who could reap rewards without taking chances?
The Siren Emperor had already made up his mind. Once he escaped the Myriad Gods Sea Domain, he would immediately join the Pantheon Hall, seize the opportunity to participate in the divine war of Fate Plunder, and ambush beings from various races.
By relying on the Virtual Divinity, he would strengthen himself as much as possible.
Only this way could he hope to survive the apocalyptic catastrophe where all life faced annihilation.
Remaining in the Siren Celestial Empire, battling against other True Gods, would only make him cannon fodder for the Holy Emperors. Any True God who infiltrated the empire could easily exterminate all beings below the deity level.
The weaknesses of the divine rank system were too glaring—this was why the Siren Emperor had firmly decided to betray the Myriad Gods Sea Domain.
He arrived at the domain's edge, where the Great True Gods had jointly set up a barrier.
To pass through, he had to wait for the other players to gather.
The Virtual Divinity came with a player chat channel, enabling communication, team formations, and transactions among them.
Judging by the time, the other players should be arriving soon.
They had previously coordinated through the player chat, agreeing on the timing to destroy their respective celestial empires simultaneously. This ensured they could converge here at the same time, break through the barrier together, and enter the New World—securing their freedom once and for all.
Less than half an hour later, hundreds of players had gathered around the Siren Emperor.
Their strengths varied, as not all players had been ruthless enough to wipe out their entire celestial empire.
Some chose the path of faith, using their empire's ancestral cave-heaven artifacts to bring along a portion of their population.
As for acquiring experience points, they could always find other ways once they left the Myriad Gods Sea Domain.
Using the team formation function, the hundreds of players banded together.
At that moment, Rosen stepped out of the Mysterious Study Room and appeared before them out of thin air.
He did not hide his identity—every player instantly recognized who he was.
After all, there were fewer than a thousand true gods in both the old and new worlds, and their basic information was no secret.
"Is the Virtual Divinity somehow related to you?"
The Sunshot Celestial Dynasty's demigod Hou Ming scrutinized Rosen with suspicion.
"It's been a while!"
Rosen greeted them with a smile. "The Virtual Divinity is indeed connected to me. The final ownership of all Virtual Divinities belongs to me. Half of the experience points players gain from hunting prey will flow to me through the Virtual Divinity. I think that's a price you can afford.
You are the first batch of players, but you won't be the last.
Be cautious of the World Will—becoming a player means standing in direct opposition to it.
If anyone wants to quit now, there's still time to abandon your Virtual Divinity."
No one chose to leave. Instead, many players let out a sigh of relief.
Those god-positioned true gods who were dead set against becoming players had already been eliminated by Rosen.
The ones remaining had long made up their minds. Otherwise, they wouldn't have come here in the first place.
A divine pen appeared in Rosen's hand, and with a swift stroke, he sketched a door onto the barrier.
It mimicked seventy percent of the power of the Dimensional Gate. As soon as it was pushed open, the outside of the barrier became visible.
All the players streamed through the door in an orderly fashion. The moment they left the Myriad Gods Mountain Sea Region, they scattered, each going into hiding.
With things settled there, Rosen began distributing Virtual Divinities to the deities of various races.
This part was much easier—he simply transmitted them directly as data.
He selected only those gods who were in dire straits and willing to take risks.
Although crafting Virtual Divinities wasn't difficult, it still required consuming some Eternal Source to create them.
So Rosen stopped after producing three thousand—any more would have hindered his own growth.
Yet even with just three thousand Virtual Divinities distributed, the players stirred up a storm of bloodshed across the new world.
The ones to suffer first were the weaker races, those without the protection of a true god.
Almost every few days, an entire race would be wiped out from the new world.
Over time, even though players acted cautiously and always ensured no loose ends remained, their existence was still exposed. Some Great True Gods even took action to hunt them down, but not even they could easily deal with three thousand players.
Rosen had been keeping a close watch on the movements of the Great True Gods and preemptively granted players access to data transmission.
This enraged the World Will to the point where it placed a bounty on all players, offering rewards to any Great True God or True God who killed one.
For every player slain, a portion of karmic burden would be erased.
This instantly turned the players into enemies of the entire world. Data transmission could still be used for escape—provided they detected danger early.
But if they fell into a trap where the Main God Network was isolated and data transmission was rendered useless, there was no escape—only death awaited them. As more and more players were hunted and killed, the remaining ones grew increasingly cautious, even banding together to counterattack the true gods of various races.
Gradually, some players succeeded in advancing to true godhood, throwing the entire new world into chaos.
Overall, the number of players dwindled, but their replacements only grew in number.
The terrifying growth rate of players did not go unnoticed by the true gods hunting them.
Even though they were wary of potential hidden dangers in the Virtual Divinity and didn't dare to use it for now, that didn't stop them from keeping it as a precaution to observe the situation.
When a certain True God had his divine incarnation fuse with a Virtual Divinity and then, with the help of his true form, went on a frenzied hunt across various races, his divine incarnation rapidly advanced to True Godhood in a short period. But once the truth was exposed, the other True Gods could no longer sit idly by.
At the level of True Gods, further growth required the accumulation of countless years.
Even a slight improvement over hundreds or thousands of years was enough to satisfy most True Gods.
They all knew that the future struggle for fate plundering among True Gods would be a battle of life and death, so each one was doing everything possible to increase their strength.
A True God's true form could continue to grow stronger through fate plundering, but a divine incarnation could not.
Now, with the Virtual Divinity allowing divine incarnations to grow rapidly, having an additional True God-level divine incarnation would double the power of its true form. If multiple divine incarnations could use Virtual Divinities to reach True Godhood, just how great would the benefits be in future fate plundering?
If the initial hunt for players had been motivated by the World Will's bounty, then the subsequent hunts were all about seizing Virtual Divinities.
The World Will's bounty became a joke—placing a bounty on three thousand deities was one thing, but could it also place one on True Gods?
Every True God joined the hunt for players, and soon, every one of them had a Virtual Divinity in their possession.
To take Virtual Divinities from the hands of True Gods, only Great True Gods could act.
However, if a True God were slain by a Great True God, fate plundering would not take effect—because for fate plundering to work, both sides had to be of the same rank. With no other choice, the World Will, which had been sealed in the Old Continent, was forced to halt its bounty.
Without suppression from the World Will, the players in the new world became even more rampant.
At most, in a few decades, civilizations and races without True God protection would be completely wiped out.
Just as the situation in the new world grew increasingly chaotic, a sudden change forced the turmoil to settle.
The Holy Emperors of the Sacred Courts in the Myriad Gods Mountain Sea Region successfully converted their mastered powers into Extraordinary Potion Sequences better suited for the new world. The World Will also ceased its suppression of Great True Gods, allowing them to move freely and openly.
The once-rampant players were swiftly suppressed by the Great True Gods emerging from the Myriad Gods Mountain Sea Region.
Players could no longer massacre weak races at will, but the Great True Gods did not completely exterminate the players who wielded Virtual Divinities either.
With his Omniscient Magic Eye, Rosen could see clearly—this was a deal between the World Will and the Great True Gods.
In exchange for lifting its suppression over them, the Great True Gods would prevent the players from continuing their slaughter of the main world's various races.
This also meant that the World Will was about to break free from its seal.
The core reason it had been sealed was that most of its power had been used to suppress the Great True Gods.
Now that such suppression was no longer necessary, the World Government could no longer maintain the World Will's seal.
However, this did not mean the World Will was unstoppable. Numerous Great True Gods had already made a pact with it—if the World Will interfered directly in anything beyond the Spirit Realm, they would unite to destroy it first.
Before the World Will had even broken free, nearly a hundred new Great True Gods had already emerged in the new world.
Their total number was now comparable to that of the True Gods, and they swiftly divided up the entire new world among themselves.
The True Gods who once ruled over the World Government suddenly lost their authority.
Under the rule of so many Great True Gods, the new world fell into a strange kind of peace.
All the Great True Gods encouraged the races under their dominion to reproduce at an extreme rate, leading to an explosive population boom—without any concern for the immense strain it would place on resources.
Inside the Mysterious Study Room, Rosen gazed out the window, feeling a growing unease.
His Omniscient Magic Eye could still see information related to the Great True Gods, but he had no idea why they were so intent on increasing their populations. It was as if all relevant information had been encrypted beyond even his Omniscient Magic Eye's reach.
This was the work of an Eternal God-Demon level force, and its target was specifically his Omniscient Magic Eye.
The more precautions taken, the deeper the conspiracy hidden behind it.
Upon closer thought, the World Will's reaction didn't make sense.
From the moment players first appeared, the World Will had been doing everything in its power to prevent them from slaughtering weak races.
Logically, allowing three thousand players to grow rapidly should have benefited the fate-plundering process.
After all, the more deities and True Gods that were born, the more effective fate plundering would be.
Even if the World Will wanted to eliminate the players, it should have waited until it realized that Virtual Divinities could siphon Eternal Origins—that they were digging at the foundations of the Ancient Gods. Only at that point should the World Will have deemed the players a threat worth eradicating at all costs.
Yet from the very beginning, it had been relentless in its bounty on players.
And the Great True Gods it later released—rather than fueling the struggle for fate—were all focused on protecting various races and encouraging population growth.
Something was clearly wrong. His instincts told him that whatever was happening, it was not in his favor.
The simplest way to uncover the secret the Great True Gods were hiding was to hear it directly from their own mouths.
The Arcane Empire—a newly established civilization founded by the Arcane Emperor.
The moment Rosen appeared in the Arcane Empire, completely unmasked, the Arcane Emperor immediately sensed his presence.
But the Arcane Emperor did not attack. No one would willingly destroy their newly built home.
Seeing that Rosen showed no intention of making a move either, the Arcane Emperor had no choice but to send someone to invite him to the imperial palace.
In the palace gardens, the Arcane Emperor studied Rosen with a troubled expression.
"I want to know—why are you all encouraging population growth?"
Rosen asked bluntly.
"I will not tell you."
The Arcane Emperor refused outright.
Without another word, Rosen's body began to disintegrate. The well-traveled Arcane Emperor nearly ground his teeth to dust.
Tenfold Annihilation. At the very least, this was a Tenfold Annihilation on par with a peak True God's.
Taking a direct hit wouldn't just injure him—it would cripple him. Rosen was going all out from the start.
"I am bound by an oath—I cannot reveal the truth,"
The Arcane Emperor explained helplessly.
"I've been thinking about where to go on vacation lately. Do you have any recommendations?"
Rosen dispersed the Tenfold Annihilation and asked casually.
"I heard Hell has been quite lively recently,"
The Arcane Emperor replied after a moment of thought.
Rosen got the lead he wanted and left through data transmission without hesitation.
This had completely soured his relationship with the Arcane Emperor—given any chance, the latter would never miss an opportunity to kill him.
Returning to the Mysterious Study Room on the Eternal Continent, Rosen's Omniscient Magic Eye turned toward Hell.
Upon closer observation, he realized—all the Evil Gods were acting far too normal.
Evil Gods grew stronger by absorbing the fear and other negative faith of all beings. The resentment of living creatures could enhance the power of an Evil God's source. However, if the source became too powerful, beyond the Evil God's control, even the most intelligent of them would lose their wisdom.
Thus, Evil Gods sought to strengthen their source while also preventing it from spiraling out of control.
Not long ago, with so many races suffering heavy casualties in the New World, there must have been an immense surge of resentment.
Yet strangely, the Hellish Evil Gods hadn't taken advantage of the situation.
Furthermore, none of them had lost their intelligence due to absorbing too much negative faith over the past few years. It was as if their sources had remained completely unaffected by the collective resentment of all beings.
But such resentment didn't just disappear into thin air. If the Evil Gods weren't bearing it, then it had to have been taken on by someone—or something—else.
In that instant, Rosen considered a possibility. If true, it would explain all the strange behaviors of both the World Will and the Great True Gods.
Could the World Will have developed ulterior motives?
The answer was—of course it could.
The World Will had been created by the Ancient Gods as a steward to tend to all beings.
Even though the Ancient Gods had left numerous safeguards to prevent its betrayal and ensure it wouldn't develop self-awareness, over countless eons, any safeguard could fail, and any system could experience an error.
Hatred was a peculiar thing—death alone could not breed the greatest hatred.
Only a fate worse than death could generate the deepest resentment.
This was precisely why the cults of the Evil Gods were so notorious for their cruelty, bloodshed, and expertise in torture.
When players outright exterminated weak races, the resulting resentment wasn't as overwhelming as one might expect.
This was why the World Will had been so desperate—why it had spared no effort to prevent the players from rampantly slaughtering.
Later, the Great True Gods encouraged reproduction and population growth because the larger the population, the greater the potential for mass resentment.
As the population continued to swell, resources would become scarcer, survival would grow increasingly difficult, and countless beings would be forced into desperate struggles just to stay alive.
Under such conditions, all races would experience a fate worse than death, generating the maximum amount of collective resentment.
Even an Eternal God-Demon was nothing more than a slightly larger ant before an Eternal Being. But collective resentment was the only known force capable of directly threatening an Ancient God.
Of course, mere resentment alone was not enough. Only when combined with the Dark Sun of the Old World could it truly pose a threat to the Ancient Gods.
Clearly, the World Will was very likely standing against the Ancient Gods.
But this wasn't an absolute certainty.
It was also possible that the World Will was deceiving the Great True Gods—pretending to oppose the Ancient Gods while, in reality, orchestrating an elaborate act.
Truth and lies were interwoven, and until the final moment, it was impossible to say for sure.
Regardless of which side the World Will stood on, only those with absolute power could qualify to play the game.
To avoid being a mere pawn, one had to become a player.
Rosen could ascend to True God at any time. However, before doing so, he needed to use up his Tenfold Annihilation.
Only by experiencing destruction and rebirth through Tenfold Annihilation could his Ancient God physique grow stronger.
At the same time, he would also obtain a drop of true Ancient God blood.
(End of Chapter)