The God of Underworld-Chapter 319 - 18

The Chinese Pantheon, once a realm of eternal harmony and golden light, was now a charnel house of cosmic proportions.

Saint Nuwa stood upon a fragment of the shattered South Heaven Gate, her breath coming in ragged gasps.

It was a slaughter. There was no other word for it.

She watched as a venerable Cultivator, a man who had spent ten thousand years tempering his soul to the hardness of diamond, was swarmed by a hundred of the infant-like "Silent Wailers."

Their tiny, needle-toothed mouths didn’t just bite his flesh; they bit into his cultivation base, drinking his immortality until he withered into grey ash.

Gods who controlled the fundamental elements found their fires extinguished by a single touch of the black tide.

Immortals who had bypassed the cycle of reincarnation were finding that there was a finality worse than death: consumption.

"The Outer Ones are inevitable," Nuwa whispered.

It is the ancient, haunting proverb that had been passed down since the time immemorial.

Years ago, she would utter those words with indifference, but now it is finally tasting like copper and bile in her mouth.

The outer ones were truly inevitable. Just because Hades had succeeded and pushing them back doesn’t mean they can as well.

Hades was an exception, not a rule. The rule remained the same; You cannot stop an Outer One.

The sky above the Chinese Pantheon didn’t just crack, but it was being peeled open by massive, slick tentacles, each as thick as a galaxy and pulsing with a sickly green luminescence, pried at the boundaries of their universe.

The "Black Tide"—that endless sea of multi-eyed infants—poured through the gaps, a physical manifestation of the Writer’s desire to erase a failed draft.

Even more horrific were the fallen: the legendary General Nezha and the Four Heavenly Kings had already been consumed, only to rise again as hollowed-out puppets of chaos, their divine weapons now leaking a corrosive darkness as they turned on their own soldiers.

"Is this truly the end?" She couldn’t help but wonder, "Oh Heavens! Why must you be so unfair!?"

How come Hades can succeed and they couldn’t!? How!?

Just then, the space behind Nuwa vibrated with a frequency so pure it momentarily silenced the wails of the dying.

Three figures emerged from the void, radiating an aura that predated the concept of "beginning."

Nuwa turned, her eyes widening. "The Three Pure Ones?"

The Yuanshi Lord, the Lingbao Lord, and the Daode Lord, the Three Pure Ones, had appeared behind her, and stood in a row.

They did not look like warriors; they looked like the very principles of the universe made flesh.

Their voices merged into a single, resonant chord that bypassed her ears and spoke directly to her soul.

"Nuwa," they intoned, "the time for preservation is over. You must gather the surviving Saints and the remaining Sages. Take the Heavenly Dao—the very Heart of our Pantheon—and breach the dimensional walls. You must find the other ’Heavens’ and join the Hyperverse. Only in unity is there a shadow of a future."

Nuwa hesitated, her grip tightening on her divine staff. "But to leave... to abandon the Jade Palace and the ancestral lands... our pride as the Central Pantheon—"

"Pride?!" the Lingbao Lord roared, his eyes flashing with the fury of a dying sun. "Would you rather have all of existence deleted because you refused to bow your head? Look around you, Girl! Look at what your ’pride’ has done to this beautiful universe! Look at the brave warriors being turned into meat for these abominations! Are you not satisfied with the carnage yet?!"

The words struck Nuwa harder than any physical blow.

She looked at the millions of heavenly soldiers being erased, their screams echoing in a sky that was no longer theirs.

She saw the carnage, the futility, and the absolute end of their path.

She bit her lips in pain, and bowed her head, her face pale but determined. "I understand. Pride is a luxury of the living. I will take the Dao and lead the survivors."

She looked at the three ancient masters. "But what of you? If I take the Heart, the universe’s collapse will accelerate."

The Three Pure Ones shared a soft, knowing smile, like a look of peace amidst the ultimate chaos.

"We were here before the first word was written," the Daode Lord whispered. "We will remain to see the last ink dry on this Chapter. We will hold the breach. We will burn our very essences to create a wall of pure conceptual order that these creatures cannot cross until you are long gone. Go, Nuwa. Do not look back."

Nuwa stared at them, her heart breaking.

She wanted to argue, to stay and fight by their side, but the determination in their eyes was absolute.

It was the resolve of those who had accepted their role as the final sacrifice.

And at that moment, Nuwa knelt.

She did not bow as a Saint, but as a junior. Nuwa is one of the most powerful beings in the universe, and also one of the most Primordial existence, but before the Three Pure Ones, she was like an infant.

These three existed since before creation, symbolising the three fundamental forces of their universe.

Nuwa kowtowed three times, her forehead touching the cold, vibrating stone of the broken Gate.

Then, without another word, she turned and vanished into a streak of prismatic light, heading toward the Great Void to gather the Heart of the World.

The Three Pure Ones turned back to the prying tentacles and the infinite tide of monsters.

They didn’t draw weapons. Instead, they sat in a meditative circle, joining hands.

And instantly, a pillar of absolute, blinding white light erupted from them, a conceptual shield of Purest Origin that began to push back against the encroaching darkness.

They were three old men against an infinite void, yet as they began to chant the First Scripture, even the Great Eye in the sky seemed to pause in its hunger.

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Nuwa streaked through the collapsing celestial layers like a needle of jade sewing through a burning shroud.

Below her, the once-orderly continents of the Immortal Realms were being pulled apart, the tectonic plates of reality dissolving into a slurry of grey static.

Soon, she arrived at the Altar of the High Firmament, the most sacred point in the universe.

Floating above the altar was a spinning, multifaceted sphere of light that defied human geometry: the Heavenly Dao.

This was the "Heart" of the Chinese Pantheon, the conceptual blueprint that defined the laws of yin and yang, the flow of qi, and the cycle of reincarnation.

Standing guard were the few remaining Saints—men and women whose faces were pale, their robes stained with the golden blood of their fallen disciples.

"Nuwa!" one yelled. "What happened!? The Three Pure Ones have used their full power and the universe is becoming brittle!"

"I know!" Nuwa shouted over the roar of space-time fracturing. "No time to waste! We are leaving. We take the Dao to the Hyperverse. Prepare the Heaven Sailing Immortal Ark!"

At that moment, as she reached out to touch the Heart, the sky above the altar shattered.

"No!" She screamed as she tried to protect the heart as a tentacle, larger than any before, slammed into the temple.

It wasn’t looking for life; it was looking for the Heavenly Dao, as if the Outer Ones knew exactly that if they consumed the Heart, the entire history of this people would be erased—as if they had never been written at all.

"Protect the Dao!" Nuwa screamed.

The Saints formed a circle, weaving their life essences into a defensive lattice, but the pressure was immense, and the "Black Tide" of infant creatures began to rain from the ceiling, their wails a psychic poison that caused the weaker Immortals to burst into flames of pure despair.

Meanwhile, at the breach, the Three Pure Ones were no longer visible as men.

They had transformed into three massive pillars of conceptual light—Golden, Violet, and White.

A fragment of an Outer One, sensing the blockade, let out a roar that vibrated the very atoms of the universe.

It thrust hundreds of limbs into the light, trying to crush the three masters.

"The Dao is Formless, thus nothing escapes the Dao!" the Daode Lord’s voice boomed, echoing through the dying stars. "This is the truth! Engrave it to your soul!"

The Golden Pillar flared, and every tentacle that touched the light was burned away, and their chaotic flesh was forcibly converted into rigid, inert stone.

But the Outer One was infinite, as for every mile of limb turned to stone, a thousand more miles of meat and eyes pushed forward.

"Yin and Yang were once united, thus all laws must return!" the Lingbao Lord responded. "This is my decree!"

The Violet Pillar emitted a pulse of pure conceptual separation.

It forced the fragment of Outer One to be separated from space, and experience the weight of time—a concept alien to it.

For a moment, the creature’s movements slowed as it suddenly felt the "seconds" and "minutes" of a reality it was trying to erase.

"Before order, I am chaos." Declared the Yuanshi Lord, "I am, the beginning."

The White Pillar, representing the Yuanshi Lord, stood at the center, holding the fabric of the universe together with sheer will.

They were burning their very existence, with every second they held the line, a piece of their immortality vanished.

They were literally erasing themselves to buy Nuwa time.

Back at the Altar, Nuwa finally grasped the Heavenly Dao.

The weight was staggering; it felt like holding the weight of billions of years of history, billions of souls, and the very concept of "Nature."

"Into the Ark!" she commanded.

The remaining Saints and Immortals poured their power into a massive vessel made of starlight.

"ALL THOSE WHO ARE LEFT! RETREAT TO THE ARK!"

Her voice echoed throughout the universe, the entire existence hearing her call.

Without hesitation, they all flew towards her and entered the Ark.

As the last of them entered, Nuwa looked back toward the breach. She could see the three pillars of light flickering, growing dim as the Outer One’s shadow began to swallow them.

"Thank you, Masters," she whispered.

With a final surge of power, Nuwa used the Heart of the Pantheon to punch a hole in the side of their reality.

She didn’t head for the void; she headed for the specific "Scent" of the Hyperverse, the place she knew was where the former Greek Universe is located.

As the Ark slipped into the dimensional tunnel, the Chinese Universe behind them gave a final, mournful shudder.

The three pillars of light vanished, as the Three Pure Ones already exhausted their power.

In that instant, the Outer One’s have finally pried open the Universe, and instantly a reality of infinite wisdom and beauty was reduced to a blank page.

But in the dark tunnel of the void, a single spark of jade light remained—fleeing toward the Anchor, carrying the last hope of the East.