Chapter Eighty-Six: Welcome Me, Miniature Garden!

It was a vast, bottomless pit so immense that it made one feel small by comparison, strewn everywhere with human bones, while countless tiny black-scaled creatures nested and skittered through the gaps and hollows between the skeletons.

Only the pale, ruined mountain of bones at the very center gave this hellish place a faint, ghostly glow, and that mountain was made entirely of skulls.

A gigantic black-scaled beast, serpent-dragon in form, coiled atop the mountain of bones, standing guard over the lone throne.

Black scales stirred within the emperor’s robe as the Dark Death Emperor leaned on the throne, resting his right hand against the side of his head, his hollow face turned toward Zhang Liaoyuan and Chang Shengqin as they approached step by step.

Separated by an entire mountain of bones, the tyrant demon of a thousand years past and the world’s foremost figure of a thousand years hence stared one another down in utter silence.

There was no real clash, no collision of power, only pure gaze and will washing over one another’s souls.

With a wave from Chang Shengqin, more than a dozen pulse users suddenly appeared, bound by black-scaled tentacles and hanging helplessly in midair, their skulls pried open and connected to a web of black scales.

Chang Shengqin covered his mouth and laughed softly. “Lord Zhang Liaoyuan, are these your subordinates? To dare intrude upon His Majesty’s mausoleum like this—truly, they deserve death ten thousand times over.”

Zhang Liaoyuan said nothing, only looked at the Dark Death Emperor as before.

“Then I shall take care of these pulse users,” Chang Shengqin said, gathering his smile and slowly retreating, preparing to depart with the captured men.

With a faint sigh, Zhang Liaoyuan’s figure vanished for an instant. In the next moment, under a storm of stunned eyes, the heads of the dozen-odd pulse users were all blown apart, freeing them at last from endless torment.

Chang Shengqin cried out in anger, “You—”

Then, suddenly, he glanced fearfully at the silent Dark Death Emperor and dropped to his knees. “Forgive me. I have overstepped. This minister will withdraw at once.”

And so Chang Shengqin knelt and hastily backed away.

With a thunderous crash, Zhang Liaoyuan set down the crystal coffin, placing it horizontally before the Dark Death Emperor.

The Dark Death Emperor was visibly moved. It stared intently at the crystal coffin, as though it had entirely forgotten the pulse user before it, its mortal enemy.

It swooped down like a specter, extending black palm bones to stroke the coffin’s surface.

“Alyu... so you did not die. How wonderful.”

Unexpectedly, the Dark Death Emperor’s voice held not the slightest trace of gloom. It was rich and mellow, drifting out like wine long aged; had one closed their eyes, they might have thought a handsome man was speaking.

From above, one could see a delicate young woman asleep within the crystal coffin, dressed in an ancient-style gown, with faint red patterns and a cascade of black hair. Her face was as pure and flowing as water, as though she had stepped straight out of a painting.

It was Shen Yun, the one Li Zhicheng had taken away earlier.

“Dark Death Emperor, I found your final queen. More precisely, her descendant,” Zhang Liaoyuan said.

The Dark Death Emperor pressed its blurred face against the coffin lid, seeming especially intoxicated.

“It matters not, it matters not. I engraved everything about her deeper than marrow. Her descendants, generation after generation, will all bear the same face, the same memories. Merely the knowledge I have gained from these intruders is already enough to astonish me. As expected, humans are fascinating. I would very much like to go out and converse with them again.”

A deafening crash suddenly rang from far above, and several massive stones came tumbling down.

Zhang Liaoyuan flicked away a boulder the size of a man with casual ease, while another huge stone that happened to drop directly above the crystal coffin was caught without effort by the black-scaled beast and tossed aside.

The Dark Death Emperor sighed. “It has come.”

A whistling sound of falling came from somewhere, and a small shadow dropped onto the sea of bones, scattering many rat-like black-scaled creatures.

Taking the form of a boy, Adonsa appeared and said, “Deeper than marrow—that would be genes, then. To squander such precious genetic will on an ordinary human female... you disappoint me greatly, Dark Death Emperor.”

“Hehehe... You have no idea what it means to love another. For the first time in my empty one hundred thousand years, that gave true meaning to my existence.” The Dark Death Emperor threw its arms open to the sky. “You are just as I once was: calm, intelligent, knowing when to advance and when to retreat, knowing how to weigh gains and losses. But that is not enough. Not enough!”

The Dark Death Emperor roared, “Have you ever thought about the meaning of your own existence, the goal you strive for? Does all you do truly bring you pleasure? Evolution, evolution, evolution—was that really what you wanted? When all is said and done, have you obtained the thing you pursued? Is there still any meaning left worth clinging to?”

Adonsa wore an odd expression and sneered. “You have been too deeply corroded by humanity, Dark Death Emperor. Meaning is merely an excuse weak humans invent for themselves because they cannot even survive alone. We are super lifeforms, cheats upon the tree of evolution. My existence is singular and supreme. Everything else is but food.”

The Dark Death Emperor shook its head, the beaded curtain of its broken crown swaying. “No. Evolution is not like that. It is a dazzling spark erupting from chaos—perhaps deformed, perhaps brief, perhaps without light at all. But this cycle of birth and culling is evolution. It is the miracle of life, repeated billions upon billions of times, giving rise to radiant vitality in an ocean of inorganic matter. Adonsa, learn to love. Learn to hate. And then, embrace chaos.”

“Long solitude and the fear of death have scared you senseless, making you pour too much feeling into a frail existence like humanity, even to the point of willingly lowering yourself to their level.” Adonsa looked at the Dark Death Emperor with pity. “The era has limited you, Dark Death Emperor. That is precisely what I have always tried to avoid. Once the collective unified mind grows rigid, the entire race will suffer irreversible decline. You have already been ruled by desire. You are no longer fit to be a super lifeform.”

“Enough!”

The Dark Death Emperor’s fury became a tangible force, cutting off Adonsa’s wild speech. The mountain of skulls trembled, then rapidly rose and split apart, transforming into a black banyan tree that reached all the way to the dome overhead, with countless skulls hanging from its branches.

Adonsa sneered. “Humans are not qualified for eternity. No matter how much you like this make-believe game, they will still rot away under the erosion of time. And you will vanish with them.”

The Dark Death Emperor said coldly, “No existence has the right to decide what I ought to be! Are you not also driven by the desire called evolution?”

Adonsa’s smile faded, and his voice turned indifferent. “The moment I saw you, I knew. Your genetic will had already been shattered by someone. No matter what you do, there is no hope of resurrection.”

The black-scaled bone tree continued to grow, blanketing the entire pit, as though the Dark Death Emperor’s rage would sweep away everything in its path.

“Then what do you want?”

Adonsa’s purple eyes gleamed with icy greed. “I will devour you, and move forward over your corpse. The dead of the past should remain in the past!”

As though something had broken through its restraints, the rocky layers above split open with a huge tear, and a giant worm the size of an ocean liner crashed into the sea of skulls, stirring up a nightmare tide.

The black-scaled bone tree shrieked, its densely packed branches forming an impregnable wall that trembled only slightly as it blocked the worm’s crashing blow.

The worm refused to yield, opening its maw to tear and gnaw at the branches, shuddering against the black-scaled bone tree and shattering countless skulls.

Adonsa’s boyish form was also sent flying by a lash of branches, vanishing into the darkness.