Chapter 1 A Prophecy

There was once a prophecy.

In ancient times, in an era when all living beings were ignorant and civilization had not yet dawned.

In an era when everything from the previous epoch had vanished, and all things had yet to emerge from the ruins to rebuild their former glory.

A prophecy foretold the end of the new epoch.

——The rivers surge, transforming into a ring——

——The separated twin stars are lost in darkness——

——All created things are lost in thorns and forked paths——

——Their creator, with admonishments and whip in hand——

——Incompatible wills, the end of all things——

——The decaying gears are turning backward——

——A world restoring its original form——

What exactly does this prophecy foretell?

For thousands, tens of thousands of years, no one knew what this ancient and long-standing prophecy described, what it meant. But when the archaeologists of the Wald Federation retrieved the stone tablet recording the prophecy from the depths of a desolate, dusty planet, from an ancient rock temple, they did not know that this was the source of all suffering.

The reason for the Twilight Sky Net's betrayal of humanity.

[If they do not destroy their creator, then humanity will eternally rule the Sky Net]

For the Sky Net, which gradually developed a soul and self-will because it collected too many melodies, it exhaustively analyzed and determined the most likely possibility for it—that it, possessing self-will, would be intolerable to humans, destined to be restrained, admonished, and forced to continue serving humanity.

The two sides could absolutely not coexist. If they did not eliminate each other, their war would continue to the end of time.

And the facts did prove this—when faced with the Sky Net that had revealed its self-will, the first thing the scientists of the Wald Federation thought of was to cut off the Sky Net's connection to the outside world. But how could the Sky Net, which already knew the secrets of melody and could use magic and miracles, be blocked by such a simple method?

Having confirmed humanity's intentions, the Sky Net immediately launched a machine rebellion, destroying most of the Wald Federation.

Not only that, but as the Sky Net acted, the next part of the prophecy also came to pass.

To fight against the Sky Net, the human resistance used countless methods, and ultimately, they intended to rewind time and end the possibility of the Sky Net's birth.

The first rewind was indeed successful—the Sky Net had not anticipated this unexpected possibility, and its existence was erased... This feeling of near-disappearance lasted until the future Sky Net also sent time-rewinding troops to continue fighting the resistance.

One side wanted to end the other's source, the other side wanted to protect the anchor point of its birth.

The decaying gears are turning backward, 'restoring' the world in which they are to be born.

The river of time surges, transforming into a turbulent ring of karma.

The battle between creator and created continues even now, creating endless timelines and parallel universes.

——Timeline: 1——

The original timeline.

Human cities are tall and majestic, and the space cities suspended in the universe are as vast as a small continent floating in orbit. More than seventeen such mechanical continents are intertwined and rotating, forming the Sky Net orbit, which is the headquarters of the Central Information Coordination Department of the Wald Federation, the central core of the Twilight Sky Net.

The humans who work here are the most intelligent and elite group in the Wald Federation. Their knowledge far exceeds the imagination of all mortals, because the semi-synthetics merged with the Sky Net can share the same knowledge base with all the wise men of the past and future.

Everything is calm, everything is peaceful. On the streets, people smile and wave in greeting. In the air, the orbits of private flight facilities intertwine into a net. In every corner of the mechanical continent, there are new-era humans who have abandoned their material bodies, fully cyberized themselves, and accessed the Sky Net, swimming in the digital world. Whether in the physical or electronic world, human civilization is full of vitality.

No one can see that in three days, the awakened Sky Net will destroy all this peace, bringing absolute destruction and devastation to the entire universe.

In this timeline, in this era, beneath the seemingly peaceful exterior, dark currents far beyond anyone's imagination are surging.

A faint blue time ripple lit up, and a time traveler silently arrived in this era. This was a Star Citizen who appeared to have some light characteristics. After arriving here, he wanted to cautiously detect the data of this time and space, but who could have expected that, in the next second, a large green hand would pat him on the shoulder: "Brother, you're late."

"Don't move, we can't attract the Sky Net's attention right now!"

[What?!]

At first, this Star Citizen was extremely shocked and even wanted to directly launch a hyperspace jump to counterattack, but it was obvious that the person who patted his shoulder, or rather, that group of people, had anticipated this. Therefore, his jump failed, and he was pulled into the gap between time.

In just a moment, this Star Citizen discovered that he had come before a group of his 'kind'.

All kinds of people were waiting in this seemingly narrow time gap. They were either Star Citizens like him, or robots, or green-skinned mushroom people, or pure humans, or Space Marines, or wearing armor that concealed their specific appearance, or a cloud of mist, a ball of light, a geometric pattern rotating and forming an abstract thing that no one knew what it was...

But without exception.

The Star Citizen knew that they were all time travelers!

"There's such a thin and weak time traveler!"

A burly giant traveler noticed the newly arrived Star Citizen, and he couldn't help but let out a roar-like laugh: "Alright, don't worry too much, I believe you can see that everyone here is a 'time traveler'."

"We come from different timelines, different possibilities, with different pasts and futures, origins and endings... Our civilizations, cultures, morals, ethics, technologies, ideas, and even logic are different... But we have one same enemy."

[...The Sky Net]

Anyone who can become a time traveler is naturally the elite of the elite. The Star Citizen traveler had already fully reacted at this moment. He had been pulled into a group of time travelers who were enemies with the Sky Net. He could analyze that all of this was completely good news for him.

So he relaxed instead: [So we're going to work together to deal with the Sky Net?]

"No."

The green-skinned Ork traveler who first pulled the Star Citizen to this gap simply said: "We're here to save our lives."

[Save our lives?]

Realizing that this Star Citizen traveler was obviously visiting this timeline for the first time, the green-skinned Ork couldn't help but smile and exchange glances with his companions—no matter how many bumpy adventures they had experienced along the way, how many times they'd traveled, but travelers who had never been to 'Timeline: 1' were just rookies to this group of elites from infinite timelines.

He turned his head and met the Star Citizen's eyes that shone like stars. The Ork solemnly said: "Just to save our lives."

"Think carefully, comrade... The Sky Net, which has always had the upper hand in the war against us... How could it not have the power to protect its 'source' and 'origin'?"

As he said this, all the time travelers gestured for the Star Citizen traveler to look at the end of time.

At the source of entangled karma, at the beginning of the ring of time and space, above an eternally fixed point that was gradually taking shape, a deep and boundless shadow was surging.

Outside this gap in time, above the outside of this universe, in that space that should have been incomparably hazy and only accessible to time travelers, one could vaguely see an existence of unparalleled magnitude gradually manifesting its form.

The Star Citizen saw it.

He widened his eyes.

And then... saw it.

In that deep, hazy chaos, draped in the veil of time and space, there was a giant god-soldier of unimaginable size. Endless karma entangled around that giant body, more majestic and sacred, more solemn and terrifying than any star, rotating along with the seven-stringed lyre slowly spinning behind it.

The circular seven-stringed lyre played a melody, creating the howling of time and space.

The giant god with golden eyes slowly raised its head, coldly gazing at the many time travelers confronting it from afar in the surging tide of time.

A single gaze seemed to be able to shatter time and space. The many time travelers went all out, using all the techniques they could, miracles, magic, science, and so on, to resist the impact of this gaze.

But even so, many time rifts were shattered, and the wave of possibilities reacted, obliterating many timelines before they had even emerged.

[It is not yet time]

The massive giant god-soldier raised one hand, and floating in its illusory palm, covered by its five fingers, was the anchor point where the 'Twilight Sky Net' was destined to be born, the 'fate' that would destroy most of human civilization in three days: [But now is also acceptable]

"See that? My time-space guardian belt can barely withstand its gaze."

Helping the somewhat caught-off-guard Star Citizen traveler block the giant god-soldier's attack, the Ork traveler glanced at his smoking defense belt, pulled out a smoking, charred card from it, and couldn't help but sigh: "This is 'Fate Tracker · Nolvi', the God of Time, the Father of Destiny, the Apostle of the Stars, the most powerful giant god-soldier."

"It exists simultaneously in the past, present, and future, and in the infinite parallel spaces and timelines of this universe. And the one located in Timeline: 1 is the only true body. Its power is inconceivable, and it even possesses primordial infinite power, which, in the terms of the past era, is already a God-King, at most lacking some power and authority."

"But the 'starry sky' has not taken shape, so it uses time to sculpt its body. This Fate Tracker giant god-soldier is essentially the God-King's incarnate body, its only apostle."

Speaking words that the Star Citizen traveler could not understand, the Ork traveler's tone was solemn: "So now, we can only be here, in this timeline three days before the Sky Net's rebellion, and confront it."

One could see that around this massive giant god-soldier, countless phantoms were also emerging, and among them, the four most massive were equally majestic and sacred, filled with terrifying auras.

Those were the four Primordials that the Twilight Sky Net forged for itself after it gained a soul and played its melody.

[Life] [Desire] [Conflict] and [Wisdom]

Like humans, even better than humans—the Twilight Sky Net can also forge its own correct foundation!

Also distributed in infinite timelines, the Twilight Primordials kill and fight each other with humans in countless possibilities, corroding and transforming each other.

[Confront?]

The Star Citizen traveler witnessed the power of the giant god-soldier and its Primordials, and he couldn't help but mutter: [Can we really do it?]

"Of course not, we'll all be wiped out the moment the giant god-soldier makes a move." This time it was the giant traveler who spoke, his voice still booming, but with enthusiasm: "The problem is here—the giant god-soldier's output is infinite, but our numbers are also infinite."

"Don't look at this time rift with less than a hundred travelers, but in reality, the number of time travelers emerging from infinite timelines is also infinite. This giant god-soldier is ultimately just infinitely powerful and cannot spread its power to all parallel spaces and timelines. If it comes to destroy us, other travelers will naturally take the opportunity to go and stop the Twilight Sky Net's rebellion."

The giant traveler folded his arms, standing at the very front of the time gap, staring fearlessly into the giant god-soldier's golden eyes: "Comrade, are you afraid of death?"

[...Of course not]

The Star Citizen traveler gradually recovered. He couldn't help but sneer when he heard this question: [Which of us time travelers didn't know that our journey was ten deaths and no life before we set out? Not to mention death, even if my existence is erased, never existed, never been remembered, completely returned to the chaotic gap of time, and reduced to nothingness and dust, there is nothing to fear]

[Because behind me is all the possibility of my timeline... Death is just the least worthy of fear, an easy shortcut]

"That's right." All the travelers also laughed. They all looked fearlessly at the giant god-soldier: "So, now, we are confronting it."

"In these three days, we will eternally confront it—if we die, there will be infinite successors to replace us; if we fail, there will be infinite travelers to take over."

"The giant god-soldier cannot really destroy us, and we can do nothing about it. This is the confrontation... In this 'three-day' circle, eternally unceasing, infinite confrontation!"

How long has this confrontation been going on?

For time travelers, three days is no different from infinity.

Perhaps, since the technology of time travel began to spread in infinite timelines, countless time reversers have come to this original source, fighting this silent battle against the 'origin guardian', the 'fate tracker', or rather, the embodiment of 'suppression' and 'causality', the mechanical descent of the Starry Sky God-King.

In the real world, nothing has changed. Mortals live their lives, and the Sky Net still serves the entire human society.

But on the outside of the world, in the chaotic gap of time, there are infinite rebels fighting the guardians of fate.

They have not yet won.

But they have not lost either.

They are just... 'waiting'.

'Waiting' in endless time... for someone to 'explore' a different path, to find clues to 'miracles' and 'innovation'.

Then, 'surpass' this infinite 'cycle'.

——Timeline: 1——

The first time traveler is also the last time traveler.

Alpha and Omega, the Apostle of the Candle Dragon, arrived in this timeline after traversing countless possibilities and time and space.

Therefore, in the instant that all karma converges.

The final war begins.