Western Divine Church, Papal City.
A stooped old man with deeply sunken eyes walked into a hotpot restaurant named “Laozi Shudao Mountain, Let’s See If You Come or Not,” and said in remarkably authentic Chinese, “The usual, extra spicy!”
The owner, who knew him well, replied with a smile, “Please take a seat. I’ll go prepare your broth and ingredients.”
As the owner turned and left, the old man’s expression froze. He raised his head and gazed eastward, muttering to himself, “Something’s off… something feels very off…”
A bold child at the next table asked curiously, “Grandpa, what’s off?”
The old man turned to the child, his worry vanishing and replaced by a beaming smile. “I think there’s something off with the roast meat in your hand. Give it to me.”
The child shrank back, too frightened to say another word.
The old man smiled kindly, then got up and left the hotpot restaurant, his face now shrouded in gloom.
The child’s parents were still trying to comfort their son, “That grandpa was just joking with you…”
Little did they know, the man before them was the current supreme leader of the Western Divine Church—the Western Pope himself!
…
Beast Alliance.
In a bedroom thick with hormones, the alliance leader, a towering muscle-bound man over two meters tall, was in the middle of vigorous exercise.
Suddenly, he stopped moving, prompting a string of coquettish complaints:
“Darling, I was just… How can you just stop like that…”
“Shh, quiet! Something’s happening!” The Beast Alliance leader swiftly got up, put on his clothes, and was about to stride out when he suddenly paused. “No, space is being torn apart. Could it be an S-Class has emerged?”
Without hesitation, he walked out. “I have to go see for myself!”
The beauty behind him was left with nothing but reluctance swirling in her eyes.
…
Star Island, ISO Organization Assembly.
Fern rose abruptly to his feet. Howard, who was in the middle of delivering a speech and expressing an opinion, stopped dead, thinking he had said something wrong.
“There’s trouble in East Asia. Long Tianyu, Oda Makoto, you two come with me to check it out.”
With those words, he turned and left immediately. The two men, though completely baffled, still followed.
Everyone else was left utterly bewildered.
What emergency could have happened?
Why is even the world’s number one powerhouse, Fern, so flustered?
Out of the eight committee members, three had now left. The highest-ranking member remaining, Howard, temporarily took charge, “Everyone, the Chairman must have an urgent matter to attend to. Let’s all head back for now. The meeting will be rescheduled for later.”
Everyone dispersed like a swarm of bees from the meeting room, but the few strongest members at the very center all wore expressions of deep confusion.
What on earth is going on?
…
Xia Country, Capital City.
In the small top-floor chamber of the Scripture Library, an old man with a white beard suddenly opened his eyes, his face grave as he looked toward the east.
“What’s happening? Why does space feel so unstable?”
He exhaled a puff of stale air, a flicker of worry flashing in his eyes.
“Could it be… this day has truly come…”
While he was muttering to himself, a figure suddenly flashed before him. It was Nangong Xuan. “Master, although I can’t see clearly what happened, I feel something is definitely wrong.”
“The spatial fluctuations are violent. An S-Class battle must have erupted. Nothing else could possess such might.”
Nangong Xuan frowned. “S-Class… the highest realms in this world belong only to you and Fern. Since neither of you have taken that final step, who else could possibly have this power?”
The old man sighed. “That would be the best-case scenario. If the prophecy left behind by the first-generation Tian Shu Star senior has truly come to pass, then it’s really all over…”
Nangong Xuan was silent, his heart growing exceptionally heavy.
“Let’s go. It’s time for me to leave seclusion. If I don’t, I may never have the chance again!”
Bells hanging from the eaves of the Scripture Library chimed incessantly, as if heralding something momentous.
…
Hokkaido, Sacred Temple.
The Chief Priest, who had not left the sacred temple in decades, suddenly focused his gaze, and the space around him began to warp.
“It seems today is the day I come out of seclusion.”
In the next instant, space swallowed him whole, and he vanished from where he stood.
Almost at the exact same moment, a figure abruptly appeared in the sky above Kagawa Prefecture. It was none other than the Sacred Temple’s Chief Priest, draped in his divine robe.
He swept his gaze downward and saw that a once-flourishing city had been reduced to nothing but ash and dust.
The explosions at the Mount Kaga crater continued, and the spatial fissures were growing wider. With a wave of his hand, he whispered the incantation, “Spatial Law, Mend!”
Waves of rolling heat and shockwaves radiated outward one after another, yet they couldn’t harm him in the slightest, as if his body didn’t truly exist in this plane.
As his incantation resonated, the ruptured space actually began to slowly close. But in the very next moment, an even more violent explosion erupted.
This blast shook the earth into violent tremors and stirred massive waves upon the sea.
“No! It’s a relic site explosion!” The Chief Priest’s calm face flashed with panic. “How could a relic explode? How can something this absurd happen?”
Seeing it was impossible to stop, he gave up and instead stepped into the spatial rift and disappeared.
When he reappeared, he was back at the Sacred Temple.
“Your Holiness, what happened?”
The Chief Priest frowned and declared, “Gather everyone from the main temple. All will enter the secret realm with me to take refuge.”
Seeing even the Chief Priest in such a panic, the other priests dared not ask further questions. They could only obey.
Back in Kagawa Prefecture, without the Chief Priest’s intervention, the spatial rupture grew far worse. Some unknown substances also made their way to Earth through the spatial fissures.
Disaster was spreading. Massive amounts of magma erupted and flowed rapidly, eventually affecting the entire island of Shikoku. Even the sea waters beyond Shikoku began to churn, gradually forming enormous tsunamis.
Almost simultaneously, tremors were felt in the vast majority of regions around the world. Some of the more active volcanoes, seemingly triggered by the tremors, began to erupt one after another.
Thick volcanic ash was hurled into the atmosphere. Heaven and earth turned into a dim twilight.
Powerhouses from various nations appeared to take charge, only to discover they could do absolutely nothing.
In the face of nature, superhumans who were normally all-powerful became as helpless as babbling infants. Utterly useless.
An immense fear enveloped the Earth, like a giant hand of death tightly clutching every living heart.
A single thought arose in everyone’s mind: Is humanity… about to perish?
Will humanity become extinct?
…
