Ethan slowed a half-step, his expression sinking.

He spread his aura outward, then pulled up the system interface and started scanning the surrounding panels.

An invisible sweep expanded fast—ground to sky, outer boundary to the deeper internal structure—layer by layer, ripping the world's data loose and dragging it into view.

The results surfaced almost immediately.

This really was a complete, independent world.

The outer rim had the same kind of spatial dimensional wall you'd see around other small Plane Worlds, but the internal build was astonishingly self-contained—stable, and absurdly vast.

Judging by sheer internal volume, it was even broader than the main world outside.

Ethan watched the data refresh in a constant stream, his brows tightening inch by inch.

Then his gaze snapped to a location so well-hidden it almost didn't register.

On the surface, there was nothing wrong with it. The surrounding terrain was… normal. Forgettable, even.

But what the system was feeding him said something else entirely—power in that patch was bizarre. And compared to the world's overall circulation, it was unnaturally independent.

The energy between heaven and earth around it didn't blend with it at all, like something that didn't belong to this world had been shoved in and sealed there anyway.

Ethan steadied his breathing and walked straight toward it.

No more probing.

The moment he got close, he lifted a hand and pulled power up. Transparent lightning compressed in his palm at speed, condensing into a massive sphere. Before he even fully pushed it out, the ground around him started to crack under the pressure.

Then he slammed his hand down.

A thunderous boom erupted.

The "quiet" zone collapsed on the spot—earth buckling inward, the surrounding ground peeling up and rolling outward. Dust and shattered rock blasted into the air, and the power saturating the天地 itself surged with it, as if the whole world had flinched.

A moment later, a huge crater had been carved out by brute force.

And down in the crater, another kind of power finally… drifted up.

The instant that aura appeared, the air changed.

Lily's eyes flew wide, shock written all over her face.

"Primordial Death Essence…"

She stared into the pit, her breathing turning uneven.

"I can't believe something like this exists here…"

Ethan heard her and didn't hesitate. He stepped forward, his own power rolling out at the same time, forming a protective layer around his body. Eyes locked on that strange haze at the bottom, he slowly reached toward it.

"What kind of power is this…?"

He could feel it—yes, it was tied to death. But it wasn't only death.

"I can feel death, but inside it… there's something holy."

Lily kept staring, breathing faster.

"This is the purest divine death energy of the Infernal Abyss."

Ethan's pupils tightened.

It was the first time he'd ever had to place "death" and "holy" inside the same sentence and mean it as a single kind of power.

But before he could really digest what that meant, his instincts had already made the call.

He drew on his own power and pulled a portion of that Primordial Death Essence into his body, trying to make contact—trying to circulate it.

The change hit instantly.

The moment it entered him, there was no buffer at all. It tore into his flesh like countless razor-thin wires.

It didn't merge along any normal energy pathway. It carried an extreme, brutally pure corrosiveness, cutting straight into the depths of his meridians, muscles, even bone.

Ethan's face changed on the spot.

The pain came too fast, too heavy—worse than forcing his way through the Abyssal Corridor earlier, savage in a way that made his vision tighten.

He forced himself back several steps, dumping all his power at once. As fast as he could, he suppressed the out-of-control Primordial Death Energy, then started driving it out of his body—bit by bit.

Transparent lightning went berserk around him, herding that invasive power out inch by inch.

When the last thread of Primordial Death Energy finally got expelled, Ethan's chest was rising and falling hard. A sheen of cold sweat beaded at his temples.

Only then did Lily speak, her voice sharp.

"You're seriously too greedy. You've already got lightning that strong, and you still want to put your hands on other power?"

She looked at him like he'd personally offended her.

"This kind of Primordial Death Energy can only be controlled by someone with pure Divine Power. There's no way you can do it."

Ethan let out a long, slow breath.

Only now did he truly realize how dangerous that little "test" had been.

If his own power hadn't been strong enough to force the invading Primordial Death Energy out the instant it entered him, the outcome probably wouldn't have stopped at "injured." It would've been much worse.

Even so, his eyes never left the crater.

That power was too strange—too strong.

Leaving it here like this would be a waste.

"I'll try," a cool, clear voice said from behind and to the side, cutting cleanly through the tension.

Queen Seraphine walked in from not far away. She wasn't moving fast, but the air itself seemed to part for her, sliding aside without being told.

She lifted her palm, fingertips aimed straight at the roiling Primordial Death Energy. No protection. No hesitation. She simply reached out with her will—and drew it into her body.

Ethan's pupils tightened hard.

More than anyone there, he understood just how incompatible that death essence was with the power Queen Seraphine usually displayed.

One was absolute holy order.

The other was the most primal aura of death.

Force them together and, at best, the powers would clash. At worst, the whole thing would collapse—body, soul, everything.

He started forward to stop her—

Humm.

The frenzied, churning Primordial Death Energy suddenly paused for a heartbeat. Then, as if caught by an unseen hook, the darkness across the entire area began to funnel toward Queen Seraphine's palm.

No rejection. No backlash.

Instead, a clean, unmistakable flow formed, drawing in from every direction.

The air grew heavy in an instant.

The scattered death aura spiraled around her in rotating bands, compressing layer after layer until it all sank into her.

And when that violent, chaotic energy entered her… it didn't explode.

It was swallowed.

Contained.

Reforged—pressed down and reshaped by a higher-tier force that simply took control.

The atmosphere of the entire world began to shift.

Holy radiance spread out from Queen Seraphine, but it wasn't purely bright anymore. Deep darkness bled through the light, like two extremes being reordered under a single, absolute law. Space around her was smothered by that presence. Even the loose stones on the ground sank slightly, pressed down by the weight of it.

Everyone froze.

Two completely different powers hadn't clashed.

They'd fused.

Queen Seraphine showed no sign of strain. If anything, her aura kept climbing—steadily, relentlessly.

Holy power and Primordial Death Energy circulated inside her, devouring and transforming each other, until what came out the other end was a calmer, more stable… mixed pulse.