Chapter 1 The Intense Bombardment

The intense bombardment lasted a full thirty minutes—or perhaps longer. The overwhelming, dazzling light disrupted everyone's senses, and the powerful energy even distorted the flow of spacetime near the epicenter to some extent. Hao Ren only felt that it was a long process, and this time, no mirror images emerged, nor did the Goddess of Annihilation suddenly jump out to cause any more trouble.

It was as if she had truly been suppressed by the bombardment, unable to raise her head, or perhaps even completely annihilated.

To be honest, he didn't believe that this could truly eliminate a life form at the level of a true god—even if that life form was in an unprecedentedly weakened state and had been given internal injuries by Dou Dou. The best development he had envisioned was to severely injure that evil god, buy everyone a chance to retreat, and then find a way to use the power of the World Tree to deal with the guy.

But after the saturation bombardment continued for a while, he vaguely began to feel some hope: Maybe he really would get lucky and kill the Goddess of Annihilation just like that? This would be worth at least three years of year-end bonus!

Just as he was daydreaming, the bombardment finally stopped.

It wasn't that the warship's weapon systems had overheated or run out of energy and ammunition, but rather that the bearing capacity of this space-time had reached its limit. The Dark Domain itself was a fragile zone located on the border of the World Barrier, adjacent to the Void. The battle that had taken place here had greatly weakened the orderly environment in this area. If the bombardment continued, the orderly zone here would most likely be breached, thus triggering a terrible disaster known as "Void Inversion."

That would cause everything in the entire Dark Domain—including Hao Ren's group, who hadn't yet evacuated, and that planet of Lahrien—to be disassembled into basic information units. It might even damage the already fragile World Barrier of the Dream Plane, dragging most of the universe into the Void Storm, thereby destroying all of Raven 12345's performance bonuses for the rest of her life…

Everyone nervously watched the scene in space, and the energy surges stirred up by the bombardment rapidly subsided. When that scorching, high-light space finally cooled down and could be visually observed, Hao Ren found that it was empty.

The pale evil god was no longer visible.

A flock of bats fluttered to Hao Ren's side and quickly condensed into Vivian's figure. Her face was even paler than before, and her expression was full of fatigue, but she still came up to support Hao Ren's arm at the first opportunity: "Are you okay? I was entangled by mirror images just now and couldn't help…"

"I'm fine. Several bones were broken before, and my heart seemed to stop for a while, but now it's healed. It just hurts a little," Hao Ren said through gritted teeth. The pain that he had suppressed with willpower during the battle had all rushed back at this moment, making him feel like half of his body no longer belonged to him. "Hiss… Part of that guy's attack could directly penetrate my shield. It's probably divine energy…"

Vivian frowned, full of heartache: "I told you to put a little more thought into divine magic. The Goddess is pretty nice, and believing doesn't cost anything…"

"Damn, it's precisely because it doesn't cost anything that my faith can't be firm," Hao Ren twitched at the corner of his mouth, even unable to resist blurting out a curse. "'Becoming stronger without spending money' is brazenly printed on the latest edition of the Bible. Don't even mention strengthening my faith; I'm relying on willpower to keep from laughing…"

Openly complaining about his own god was the best way to relieve stress. After saying these words, Hao Ren indeed felt much more comfortable. He breathed a sigh of relief and looked at the space that was still flickering with faint light and constantly had arcs of electricity jumping across it: "By the way… Did we really kill that evil god?"

A heavy sound of footsteps came from behind. Izhaks, in his Flame Demon form, walked over. His rocky body had several more wounds flowing with magma and flames, but his spirit seemed very invigorated. It was probably because he hadn't had a hearty battle with an evenly matched opponent in a long time. Today's battle had greatly exercised his muscles. Hearing Hao Ren's words, the old demon opened his mouth with a rumble: "It should be taken care of, right? I can't feel her aura anymore, and with that level of bombardment… Could anyone really survive?"

"She was bombarded like that once at the beginning, but she bounced out unscathed and even brushed a wave of mirror images on our faces," Hao Ren waved his hand. "Don't underestimate the vitality of a true god. If you used that kind of firepower on a god in their prime, it would probably just be a scratch…"

"Your concern is right," the voice of the Creation Goddess came from the side before Hao Ren could finish speaking. "She ran away."

Compared to the serene, indifferent, and snow-white image when she had just awakened, the goddess's state at this moment was obviously much more disheveled and much weaker.

Hao Ren was stunned, and his expression immediately turned terrible. Although he himself felt that it wasn't very realistic to kill the Goddess of Annihilation with this one encounter, he had still had some thoughts just now. But at this moment, he received a clear answer from the Creation Goddess, which was really not pleasant.

"Can you be sure?" Hao Ren looked at the goddess with a wry smile, but before the other party could answer, he waved his hand again. "Okay, you can definitely be sure. After all, she's something you split off from…"

The Creation Goddess ignored Hao Ren's actions and said to herself, "She didn't run away on her own initiative. She was dragged away."

Hao Ren was taken aback and said in unison with Vivian, "Dragged away? Dragged away by whom?"

“…It’s troublesome to explain, and my theory isn’t necessarily correct,” the Creation Goddess thought for a moment and said cautiously. “You can think of it as being dragged away by the Lord of Pandemonium—but given that the Lord of Pandemonium doesn’t have subjective consciousness, she was actually dragged away by the ‘natural phenomenon’ in that dark abyss.”

Hao Ren had just caught his breath not long ago, but upon hearing this, he almost passed out: “What?! You’re saying that in the case of a barrage of artillery fire just now, right under our noses, the Lord of Pandemonium snatched that evil god away?!”

At this time, the others also came over one after another, including Lily, who had found a place to transform back into her original form and change her clothes (the husky girl was asking May for a water balloon to moisten her throat). Hearing this explosive fact, everyone's movements involuntarily froze, quietly waiting for the goddess's next words.

The Creation Goddess also knew that the impact of this fact was probably a bit big. She carefully sensed the residual aura in the surrounding environment again and confirmed the movement of that evil god at the last moment through some kind of induction method that only she possessed. After a long time, she nodded slightly: "Indeed. I guess it's because that evil god herself belongs to an extension product of the Lord of Pandemonium. Her connection with the source of Pandemonium is almost like a clone and the main body, so this kind of thing happened. Although the Lord of Pandemonium does not have subjective consciousness, it has its own operating mode. If an important part of its power is blocked outside and is being fatally threatened, then it will immediately take back this part of its power—that evil god obviously completely meets this condition."

"Damn it, I was thinking of taking advantage of the isolation of the Goddess of Annihilation and the Lord of Pandemonium to at least solve one of them," Hao Ren slapped his forehead. "But does the Lord of Pandemonium really have the ability to snatch people away from here? This is the Dark Domain! It's snatching people from outside the World Barrier…"

At this time, the data terminal floated out: "The Dark Domain is not completely located outside the World Barrier. Strictly speaking, it is a special space-time that is integrated into the World Barrier. Although it and the main universe of the Dream Plane are isolated from each other, the isolation is limited. The World Tree can pull us out of here if it has our beacon, and the connection between the Lord of Pandemonium and the Goddess of Annihilation is their natural beacon, so the Lord of Pandemonium can naturally do similar things—even if it is acting unconsciously."

"If a part of its clone is about to be destroyed, it will immediately take it back…" After Lily drank a water balloon, her throat finally felt a little more comfortable. She muttered to herself, "It sounds like a mollusk with only basic nerve reflexes. It immediately curls up when poked…"

The kitsune Nangong Wuyue next to her immediately raised her tail and shook it dissatisfied: "I just got you a water balloon. Don't be so sarcastic…"

Lily rolled her eyes: "I didn't say it was you."

Hao Ren sighed and spread his hands: "Anyway, no matter what, our previous fierce battle was in vain. Alas, let's think of it positively. We fought a god-level guy, and being able to survive in the end can be considered a phase victory."

The Creation Goddess glanced at him and smiled slightly: "Actually, you can be more optimistic—although that evil god was taken away by the Lord of Pandemonium, this doesn't mean absolute bad news."

Hao Ren was stunned: "Huh? What do you mean by that?"

"First of all, although that evil god escaped from here alive, she definitely didn't escape unscathed. I can sense that she suffered heavy damage in the final round of attacks. For her, who had just woken up from a deep sleep and was still seriously injured, this is not just adding insult to injury. This injury is probably permanent. In other words, she will never be able to recover to her full strength; secondly, she was dragged into the dark abyss prison instead of running to other places. The Lord of Pandemonium's 'rescue' is actually locking her up. I still have some confidence in the seal I left behind that year. That evil god can't run out for a while, and we will have time to do a lot of things; finally… I think we accidentally prepared a 'gift' for the Lord of Pandemonium…"

While speaking, the silver-haired, blood-eyed goddess cast her gaze on Dou Dou, who was jumping around on Nangong Wuyue's coiled tail.

The little girl raised her head ignorantly, met the goddess's eyes, and confirmed that the person in front of her was not the same as the "white guy" who had attacked her before. She then raised her hand and introduced herself in a soft voice: "My name is Dou Dou! Hao Ren is my daddy!"

"Is the 'gift' you're talking about related to Dou Dou?" Wuyue asked in confusion.

The Creation Goddess pinched her chin, her face full of research interest: "First of all, I want to know, how did this little guy who doesn't look very strong block 'The End of the World'?"

"If I'm not mistaken, that so-called 'End of the World' is essentially an attack with causality attributes, right?" Hao Ren asked. "It completely 'annihilates' the target by severing the target's causality?"

"That's right. Moreover, strictly speaking, what it severs is the connection between the target and the entire world," the Creation Goddess explained. "People are born in the world, so they have countless connections with everything in the world. Your body comes from the world, and your actions will leave corresponding traces in the world. Even if you are a grain of sand, you have your own desert—and The End of the World is an attack aimed at this point. It will sever this connection, thereby causing the victim to lose the basis of existence from the level of causality…"

"Then everything is very easy to explain," Hao Ren laughed, thinking that it was indeed as he had expected. "Dou Dou's specialness is something you can't imagine—her world has already been destroyed. The End of the World? She has already experienced it, and that was a more real End of the World than any half-baked destruction divine magic. Now her basis for survival is no longer rooted in a certain universe, but in the Xiling God System that rescued her from the world of the end. I think that apart from my boss and my boss's bosses, no one has the ability to interfere with this level of causality, so…"

Speaking of this, Hao Ren was stunned and suddenly reacted: "Damn it, I finally know why that Shunzi asked me to bring Dou Dou here… This is equivalent to letting that Goddess of Annihilation smack her face against reactive armor!"

"I don't know what you mean by reactive armor and Shunzi, but I can see very clearly that after that attack of 'The End of the World' failed, that so-called 'Goddess of Annihilation' suffered a very serious backlash," the silver-haired, blood-eyed goddess said with a smile. Hao Ren thought that her expression was hiding a very black-bellied schadenfreude attitude. "And the divine power turmoil caused by this backlash must be released, but she simply didn't have the opportunity to release this runaway divine power just now…"

Hao Ren finally understood and showed a smile of schadenfreude like the Creation Goddess.

The "backlash" caused by Dou Dou's immunity to The End of the World turned that evil god into a living bomb. Now, this living bomb has been pulled back to its lair by the Lord of Pandemonium…

Bombs, of course, must explode.