Chapter 997: Breaking Through to the Supreme Level, the Reincarnation of A Primordial Being (I)
Time flowed on. In the blink of an eye, another two days had passed, and that beam of light in space was now nearing the sun.
Meanwhile, deep within Purgatory Demon Clan territory, over thirty million kilometers from the human's forbidden zone battlefield, endless dark-red demonic qi churned across the sky. Below, across a stretch of hundreds of thousands of kilometers, the earth had collapsed and the void had crumbled, forming a vast black bottomless chasm as large as Jupiter.
At the center of this chasm floated a sprawling complex of thousands of towering demonic palaces, stretching more than ten thousand kilometers. The surging demonic qi surrounding it pressed heavily on everything like a suffocating cloud.
Within the rolling waves of qi, two massive black shadows, each ten thousand meters long, drifted silently, radiating ancient-level power as they guarded the demonic palaces.
Boom!
The sky quaked. The dark-red cloud layer above twisted violently and was torn apart by an immense force, revealing a rift more than a thousand kilometers long.
Behind the crimson rift, a towering figure slowly emerged, standing a hundred thousand meters tall, with three heads and eighteen arms. Invisible waves of demonic force spread from its body, distorting time and space.
Behind that towering figure, a dark-red abyssal world surfaced. Dozens of chains of dark-red principle extended outward, piercing through the body of another massive figure thirty thousand meters tall.
It was burly and covered in red fur, its legs bent backward and its back towering and broad like a red mountain. It resembled a giant carrying a turtle shell on its back, but this once-mighty being now looked broken. Its aura was weak, its body was riddled with enormous wounds from which black smoked hissed and sizzled, and its expression was twisted in agony.
Boom!
The Ancestral Court's palace below trembled as a black pillar of light shot into the sky. Beneath the light-obscuring dark-red clouds, a colossal phantom tens of thousands of meters tall took shape as Constantine's will manifested. It looked up at Tyretis, whose aura seemed to pierce through heaven itself. Constantine's pupils contracted slightly as a wary glint flashed in its eyes. "Tyretis... it's been a long time."
Hovering high above in the crimson sky, Tyretis's three ferocious heads lowered slightly, its voice deep. "Indeed. So many centuries have passed... How is the Primordial Ancestor's recovery?"
Constantine slowly replied, "The Primordial Ancestor's wounds have healed quite well. Not long ago, its will briefly awoke and issued a command to expand eastward. However, since you were still locked in a stalemate with the Heavenly Feathered Race at the time, and the Ankor Empire was in a similar situation, we only informed Deorus and its side."
As Tyretis's stern gaze swept over the vast palace complex below, it remained silent for a moment before speaking again, its voice low and heavy. "I had just returned from the Dark-Red World when Livedes came to meet me. It asked me to come to the Ancestral Court to discuss the matter of the human alliance in the east."
When Tyretis shifted the topic, Constantine's expression immediately turned serious. "That human race is unlike any civilization we've encountered before. It's difficult to deal with. Not only are they growing at an alarming rate, they have also formed alliances with other civilizations. Their strength has multiplied severalfold almost overnight, and they've managed to suppress Deorus and the others. Currently, this alliance formed by three major factions is led on the surface by that veteran divine king of the Alliance of Gods. It's at the peak of the demon god level and stands tall within the divine region. Even you, Tyretis, may not be its match. In addition, there's the Heavenly Feathered divine king, Tolstoy, who once fought your forces, and the enigmatic First Councilor of the humans, Qian Tian. Both possess late-stage demon-god-level power. Then there's that colossal beast with strength approaching the true spirit level. Only by gathering the full might of our Purgatory Clan can we hope to suppress them. To avoid any unexpected complications, I have already begun preparing the prayer ritual to summon the Primordial Ancestor's return ahead of schedule."
Chen Chu's insane cultivation speed, along with the existence of the Dragon Emperor, had created an unprecedented sense of danger within this demon god priest. It was possible that even a joint effort by Tyretis and Cardeos wouldn't be enough.
That was why it had dispatched envoys to the six great empires, and almost simultaneously begun preparations to awaken the Purgatory Primordial Ancestor in advance, hoping to crush the humans in their cradle with absolute power.
The idea of first gathering the forces of the six empires to launch a war against the humans, and only summoning the Primordial Ancestor if that failed, had never even crossed its mind. This demon god had existed for thousands, possibly tens of thousands, of years. It was no fool. Why would he allow the humans more time to grow?
Especially when that human genius was rising by a level every single day-cycle. If a few more cycles were allowed to pass, even an awakened Primordial Ancestor probably wouldn't be able to suppress them.
Tyretis lowered its heads slightly, and its three demonic faces radiated terrifying gazes that fixed on Constantine. After a long pause, it finally said, "You've changed, Constantine. You've grown more cautious. This approach is indeed more prudent. But to us, only that summoned colossal beast poses any real challenge. The others are not worth worrying about. Take that demon god from the Alliance of Gods, for example. The battlefield between us and the humans is far from the Alliance's territory. If he can still maintain peak-ancient-titan-level strength from that distance, his foundation must be deep. Therefore, we only need to limit Chu Batian's summoning methods. Without awakening the Primordial Ancestor, we can still crush this alliance with ease."
"I understand that well," Constantine replied, shaking its head slightly as an unprecedented seriousness appeared in its eyes. "Livedes previously carried four strands of the Primordial Ancestor's power to support Deorus. It sealed Chu Batian's summoning secret art and severed the humans' fate, but even under those conditions, Chu Batian escaped. Just a few star-hours later, he reappeared in human territory. That alone would be bad enough, but not only was the summoning secret art unsealed, the Primordial Ancestor's power, drawn from the supreme plane, was also worn away and nullified. This human's threat has far surpassed our expectations. It's not just his talent, but the fate he carries. That is why I intend to awaken the Primordial Ancestor ahead of schedule."
Four demon gods had fallen in the previous battle. While the other demon gods focused their attention on the summoned beast, Constantine had instead gathered every piece of information available on Chen Chu and meticulously studied the key figure responsible for the failure of that battle.
From the very beginning, when the split soul of a demon king from the Assassination Division infiltrated the Blue Planet and first encountered the name Chu Batian, to the later attempt on his life using the summoned Void Demonic Eye, Constantine had examined everything.
It had also analyzed Chen Chu's actions of killing a demon king on the Abyssal Battlefield, resisting the attacks of demon gods head-on, breaking through to the mythical level, and single-handedly destroying the Demon God Alliance.
The more Constantine studied Chen Chu's growth trajectory, the more deeply alarmed it became. Other geniuses from various civilizations typically displayed monstrous talent from the very start. They rose swiftly, but after reaching the mythical level, their growth would slow significantly, with most ultimately halting at the titan level. Only a rare few, the most exceptional, could step into the ancient titan level and become entities that commanded the principles themselves.
However, this human was entirely different. According to intelligence gathered from the Blue Planet, his performance in the beginning stages of the transcendent level had been fairly average. Only later did his talent begin to shine. Once he became an advanced transcendent being, his strength began to expand at a rapid pace. Even after crossing to the mythical level, his speed didn't slow. If anything, it accelerated.
In what felt like the blink of an eye to them, he had transformed from a native of an undeveloped world into a being capable of slaying demon gods. This growth rate, which defied the laws of the principles, was so exaggerated that it nearly led Constantine to believe that Chen Chu was a reincarnated primordial being.
That wasn't out of the question. After all, there had once been a primordial lifeform that had fallen within human territory. Primordial beings were nearly eternal, naturally possessing immortal and indestructible attributes. Even if their true forms dissipated and their divine souls and wills were extinguished, it didn't necessarily mean they were truly gone.
According to the data, humans had only entered the vast world about twenty years ago, fifty years in Blue Planet time. If a sliver of an indestructible primordial origin had entered the Blue Planet through a world passage and begun to reincarnate and awaken during that time, it would coincide almost exactly with this human's age.
That would also explain why this human's early talent had seemed ordinary, yet the stronger he grew, the greater his potential became. As the reincarnated lifeform developed and advanced in strength, the scattered power of the primordial being, lost in the river of time and the world itself, would be drawn back to him.
This speculation made Constantine break out in a cold sweat. If it were true, then once this human reached the ancient titan level, his growth wouldn't slow at all; it would instead accelerate further. In just a few more day-cycles, he could very well reach the true spirit level. If he did, then even if his level was only at the beginning stage of the true spirit level, not even the revived Purgatory Primordial Ancestor could potentially be able to defeat him.
Of course, Tyretis was unaware of Constantine's conjecture. Looking down at the demon god standing below, Tyretis said in a deep voice, "The failure last time was because you all underestimated the enemy. The power of the Primordial Ancestor is indeed formidable. Every word it spoke became law. But if the force is too weak, it can be eroded by principle origin alone. The only question is how much it costs to do so. That's why my method for dealing with Chu Batian this time isn't to seal him, but to destroy his summoning art completely."
"Destroy his art?" Constantine narrowed its eyes slightly.
Tyretis gave a slow nod. "I once witnessed that human summon the colossal beast. Though it was only a single breath of its power, I saw enough. When he summons the beast, a blue altar forms beneath his feet. Though I don't know its exact mechanisms, the foundation clearly involves both time and space. Therefore, we only need to erase the time or space structure of the summoning altar. Once the altar collapses, the beast cannot be summoned again. Of course, this isn't a permanent solution. Chu Batian can still reconstruct the art and condense the altar anew, but to rebuild the altar to the point where it can once again summon that colossal beast would, under normal circumstances, require decades or even centuries. Even with his immense talent, it would still take several day-cycles. Do you think we'll give him that much time?"
As a being who had reached the peak of the ancient titan level. Tyretis was knowledgeable beyond comparison. It had seen and studied countless secret arts and divine abilities.
While it spoke, a killing intent colder than ice surfaced in its eyes. Because that human had interfered, the Divine King of Light had succeeded in completing the Crimson Annihilation. Tyretis had suffered a massive loss, obtaining only a portion of the Eternal Divine Tree's trunk, a piece that lacked the tree's core. This loss had nearly rendered centuries of effort worthless. Tyretis was now filled with murderous intent toward Chen Chu.
If it had succeeded in refining the Eternal Realm and monopolizing the complete "corpse" of the Eternal Divine Tree, and the Primordial Ancestor never awakened, it could have had a chance to break its bloodline shackles.