Chapter 132: The Finale (Part Two)

In the blink of an eye, the flames were devoured.

The scales on the black serpent stood on end, as if something terrifying had appeared overhead.

A contortion that was hard to conceal appeared on Old Lu's face, and the pupils in his eyes shifted from gold to a deep, dark, pitch-black.

Around the Dawn Palace, dark lines gradually rose. These lines twisted and writhed, climbing along the sky like countless black snakes scrambling to converge upward.

Gradually, an eggshell-like black dome enveloped the entire floating island, and the outside world could no longer see what was happening within.

Su Lin felt he had overplayed his hand.

Although he knew this person had a trump card, he hadn't expected this person to flip the table without the slightest hesitation.

The Old Lu before him overlapped with a "black dragon," black blood-like substance dripping from its wings.

To be precise, a suspected black dragon.

This thing was just like the final big villain in every film and television work—dark energy surged with every breath, and the space around it twisted in chaos.

Su Lin perceived through his divine spark that this darkness was devouring light. The black dragon that existed in everyone's eyes was not something "seen"—even with eyes closed, its existence remained.

Should he grease the soles of his feet and slip away first? This thing felt a bit scary.

Su Lin was considering this question.

"Hui Liyi?"

"Hui Liyi."

"Hui Liyi~"

The black dragon first spoke the name in a questioning tone, then flatly, and finally in a cheerful voice—three times in total.

Hui Liyi stared at the half-human-shaped creature before her in disbelief. Even the previous Old Lu still carried the shadow of Lu Mingfei, but this thing before her eyes felt utterly unfamiliar to Hui Liyi.

"I sense this matter isn't simple." Miss Kelaien walked to Su Lin's side and said, "Su Lin, what's your take?"

"Nonsense…"

"No, you still don't understand."

Miss Kelaien shook his head, pointed at the black dragon over there, and said, "That thing reminds me of those mythological beings from our world."

"It seems he's trying his utmost to suppress his influence on other creatures, but beneath the surface, chaos and disorder are his underlying logic?"

Miss Kelaien's tone carried a hint of uncertainty at the end, because he wasn't entirely sure—he just felt this thing was very similar.

"Those few over there seem to be my friends."

"And my dear little brother."

A chaotic distortion rippled through space, and the next second the figure overlapping with the black dragon appeared before the three of them.

He was bent over, his spine and neck twisted at an eerie angle, his deep-set eyes gazing up at the three from below.

"…"

"…"

"…"

At such close range, Su Lin only felt an inexplicable disgust and nausea toward this thing, like a person who hates eating fatty meat having a chunk of pure white fat shoved into their mouth.

Divine power began circulating involuntarily, like blood starting to flow. What Su Lin wanted to do now was spit this fatty meat out or burn the fat off its body with searing flames.

"Hello there," he said politely. "We're on pretty good terms with each other, right?"

The three fell silent, not a word spoken. Miss Kelaien even felt a familiar sensation…

"Oh, right."

He reached his hand into his own chest, rummaged around as if searching for something, and after a moment, pulled out three candies wrapped in festive candy paper, with a bow tied at each end.

"Have some candy."

"This is good stuff—I wouldn't give it to just anyone."

He smiled gently, his body gradually returning to a normal posture, like a friendly big-next-door brother, with a fair and neat face

Miss Kelaien's spiritual intuition alerted him. Although he couldn't bring the Source Fortress when traveling to other worlds, he had brought a wisp of gray fog's aura.

He focused his gaze—the surroundings were still gloomy, and Lu Mingfei was still that eerie, grotesque, uncanny creature. What he had just seen was actually an illusion.

What he held in his hand was no candy at all—clearly three writhing dark-purple creatures, like blood-sucking leeches, their bodies composed of unknown energy.

Light flickered in Su Lin's hand, dense light element compressed and gathered, and dangerous glints appeared in his platinum-white eyes tinted with divinity.

Crystalline shards of Holy Light gradually took shape in the space around them. The Divine Kingdom materialized, eroding half the area within the black space. The sky on Su Lin's side split in two—one half bright daylight and azure, like a summer dawn; the other half dark night with stars dotting the heavens.

"Not eating?" he said, a little dejected. "If you eat this, everyone will be able to see the real world."

"The real world is very beautiful, nothing like the ugly Fake World."

"I originally wanted to give Hui Liyi this candy too, but that lunatic wouldn't let me give it to Hui Liyi. He's very stingy, very selfish."

As this creature was speaking, with the brow as the dividing point, white lines appeared on its face—Su Lin had made his move; he couldn't stand this thing any longer.

It split in two and collapsed on the ground, but its mouth kept moving.

"Oh right, by the way, which one is Su Lin? You all look the same to me, I can't tell you apart."

Its two eyeballs rolled once, looking at Su Lin and Miss Kelaien respectively.

"Don't worry, I won't force you to eat candy. He only told me to grab you and lock you in a cage."

Without hesitation, Miss Kelaien pointed at Su Lin beside him and said, "It's him."

Then his entire body dispersed on the spot.

A pitch-black, ink-like cage descended, locking Su Lin within. Countless small black cubes piled and stacked, attempting to crush and seal Su Lin.

"Go help the Light God over there. Something's off with Lu Mingfei now—take him down first." A magnetic male voice rang out from the necklace.

The long blade in Hui Liyi's hands swept through the air, and Judgment Flame formed a pillar of fire that engulfed the two lumps of flesh on the ground.

Endless light feathers slowly descended, each one bursting into pure white Holy Fire upon contact with an object, clinging and burning.

Wails came from ahead, and the small black cubes on Su Lin's body were destroyed into nothingness by the power of Holy Light.

"He never told me you were a Law God."

"Where did the old body go? Strange, when did it get this weak."

A voice that sounded like complaining came out, two burned bodies merged into one, a pitch-black vortex appeared, and dark, chaotic sludge flowed out from within.

"What the hell is this?!"

If it were an ordinary evil thing, it would have been purified the moment it stepped into the God Kingdom.

That guy couldn't have found some evil god and done some weird py transaction, right?! How did he end up like this.

Su Lin frowned tightly as he looked at the black sludge before him.

"Be careful." Lu Mingze's voice came from the side, "My brother is awake, he's sealing off my authority."

"I can't help you much."

"No need." Su Lin drew out a sword of light, six wings of light unfurled behind him, and countless light elements leaped with joy.

"Give me some time." Lu Mingze finished speaking and vanished.

A roar came from the sludge, and Su Lin felt something in that voice trying to burrow into his brain.

Something like psychic contamination and brainwashing?

To the God of Light's ears, this voice was as if someone was scratching a blackboard with their fingernails, scraping a steel pipe with an iron sheet, and a tone-deaf burly man was singing and dancing on the side.

'Sacred Song!'

Heavenly music played, and Su Lin immediately felt much better—this was a sound fit for human ears.

"You want to contaminate me?!!" An irritable voice rang out from the sludge: "I treated you as a friend, yet you want to contaminate me!"

A black dragon the size of a building flew out from the sludge, its body wrapped in dark, translucent, slimy tentacles, densely covered in golden eyes.

Su Lin raised his hand and waved, several chains of light's judgment flew toward the sky, closely following behind that massive dragon. A speed and agility completely at odds with his enormous body was displayed, countless chains sprouted from the void, yet he could always dodge them through flips, acceleration, and various other methods.

"He's a decoy, don't go chasing him!" A voice came from Hui Liyi's necklace: "That sludge is still increasing, he should be using the sludge as cover to conceal that spatial vortex."

Hui Liyi took the hint, channeled power into that long blade, and hurled it toward the sludge below. It sank into that pool of sludge, a magic array unfurled, and with that long blade as the marker, dozens of stories tall swords of red lotus descended from the sky, transforming into a massive wave that incinerated everything below.

The Sea of Consciousness stretched out, Old Lu was not surprised by this situation at all. He pulled out another Lu Mingfei from an iron cage, "You, get out."

"I refuse!" That Lu Mingfei's body was burning with flames all over, his eyes filled with madness: "You—"

Old Lu grabbed this Lu Mingfei and threw him out, then pulled from the side a chaotic thing woven from madness and chaos.

"Wake up."

This thing took on Lu Mingfei's appearance, and he stared blankly at Old Lu.

"Going to save the world?"

"Yes."

"Is it to save lives?"

"Yes."

"How nice."

"Yeah, how nice."

Old Lu carried this Lu Mingfei as they walked out together, leaving this gloomy cage of consciousness.

The black dragon dodging chains outside suddenly roared as its power and speed dropped sharply. It seemed puzzled and bellowed: "Hui Liyi! You've been contaminated too?"

"Pain, too painful!"

Su Lin flashed to appear above this black dragon's head, weapons condensed from light were inserted into the black dragon's back one after another.

The pained black dragon plunged downward, and mid-air, those elemental weapons detonated, transforming into a great sun.

Hmm?

Su Lin sensed something was wrong and flashed away from his previous position.

After the dazzling white light dissipated, what hung in mid-air was a burning skeleton, with only two eyeballs constantly rolling atop the bones.

The bizarre sight gave Su Lin a chill down his back, but this situation didn't last long. Soon, the flames gathered into a fireball whose interior could not be seen.

The fireball kept collapsing and shrinking, and finally, turned into a Lu Mingfei with disheveled hair.

"Um, sorry about that." He politely apologized to Su Lin: "That guy just now had something wrong with his head, I apologize on his behalf."

"Ah, a rare moment of clarity." He stretched lazily.

Su Lin did not act rashly. He looked at this Lu Mingfei and felt it was very strange—there was an extremely terrifying power on him, but the previous slimy, nauseating feeling was gone, and now he gave off a refreshing feeling.

"I don't want to fight you guys." He sighed, "Wait a moment, in a bit that guy will come out."

"Who?" Su Lin asked.

"Who else could it be, the guy who let us out to lock you in a cage." He said with quite some emotion: "I'm a pacifist, so he'll definitely come in person."

"This body can still hold one more chaos-infected entity, that is, something just as crazy as that guy from earlier. I'm the second one."

"But it's fine, he just wants to beat you up and then lock you away."

Su Lin was a bit surprised, "I feel like you're completely normal."

"Two negatives make a positive." This Lu Mingfei spread his hands, "Two chaos from different systems corrode each other, and then I became normal."

"Oh, he's coming out." He waved goodbye to Su Lin.

Silver thread-like substances appeared on his body, like tassels, his flesh swelled, and in less than a few seconds he transformed back into a black dragon.

Su Lin tried to interrupt the other during those few seconds of transformation, but unfortunately, the old law held—attacks during transformation are ineffective.

This massive dragon spread its membrane wings, those wings seeming to hold a starry sky, beautiful yet mysterious. Su Lin felt a sense of unease—this was the first time he had felt this way since obtaining his divine spark.

The threat the other party now gave him was greater than Zhongli's signature Geo spear.

The black dragon's eyes opened, yet within the golden pupils was clarity and brightness.

He raised one dragon claw, and Hui Liyi, who had been flying over, appeared in the dragon claw.

"Hui Liyi, stop throwing a tantrum, listen to my explanation."

He twisted the long blade in his hand and thrust it into Old Lu's dragon claw, glancing at the blade with some surprise.

Then surging divine power poured into his hand.

Old Lu did not pull his hand back; he simply stood there, quietly meeting Hui Liyi's gaze in his palm. Then, with some annoyance, he looked toward Su Lin and roared:

"You're sticking your nose where it doesn't belong!"

"It's you who's sticking your nose where it doesn't belong." Su Lin paid no heed to Old Lu's attitude and said, "You don't even think about the fact that she's on a pure-love route, yet you keep obsessing over your broken save file."

"You don't know anything at all!"

Boom—

Su Lin was sent flying by a black dragon that suddenly appeared and vanished from sight. Two seconds later, a six-winged figure condensed once more within the divine kingdom.

"That was brutal."

Su Lin glanced at the distant position, wanting to charge over and kill. Just then, a private chat window suddenly popped up in his view.

"Hmm?"

After taking a look, Su Lin said, "Fine, it's your own business, handle it yourselves."

"I'll handle the buffs."

Hui Liyi was in Old Lu's dragon claw. She had clearly pushed her power output to the maximum, yet the giant dragon still held her pinned in its palm, regardless of the flesh in that palm that kept burning away and regenerating.

"Stop throwing a tantrum, alright?"

The black dragon said softly, suppressing the chaos corruption to zero.

"No!"

Old Lu was somewhat helpless. He extended his other dragon claw, intending to let Hui Liyi sleep for a while. "Sleep first. When you wake up, your akura will be by your side."

"I don't want to!"

Hui Liyi tried to resist with flames, but found she couldn't stop it. She lowered her head, a hint of grievance in her eyes. She had clearly helped him so much, yet he still didn't care about her thoughts. Was this person really the akura of the future?

The akura of now would grant her every wish no matter what. She wanted to see the sea, so akura took her to see the sea. She wanted to know what the Sky Tree looked like, so akura took her up into the air to overlook Tokyo Tower.

Would watch her write, listen to her speak, always stay with her, only her.

Would only stay with her, only her.

Akura was clearly so good to Hui Liyi.

You're not akura!

She raised her head, tears hanging on her face, and called out softly, "Akura, save me."

Old Lu's dragon claw paused, paused for a long time…

But then he continued pointing toward Hui Liyi. All he had to do was erase her memories of the past few days, let her sleep well for a while, and when she woke up—

Let her hate herself if she must. It wasn't the first time he'd felt this way anyway.

A long time ago, starting from that half hour when he was late…

A streak of white light flew toward them from the horizon, carrying a thick aura of radiance.

'Su Lin again? Let's teach him a lesson.' Old Lu squinted, thinking this. He looked toward that dazzling white light, then his dragon eyes suddenly widened, filled with disbelief.

In an instant, that streak of light crossed space, reaching the giant dragon's face through a Dragon Race alchemy spatial transposition.

"Don't you dare!"

As space rippled and shockwaves rolled out, scattering the clouds dozens of kilometers away, the figure within the light punched Old Lu's dragon claw.

"Touch her!!!"

Lu Mingfei roared at the top of his lungs, wrapping his fury into this punch as he blasted it out.

Hui Liyi's pupils contracted slightly, her eyes widening as she looked at the youth before her—great membrane wings sprouting from his back, a ferocious body, a delicate face still touched with a trace of boyishness, filled with rage, a lion seeming to roar in his eyes, dragonized fists gleaming with a reddish-gold sheen, sharp bones protruding from the surface of his body. He struck the black dragon's claw with all his might, sending that hill-sized claw flying.

"Akura!?"

Lu Mingfei wrapped one arm around Hui Liyi and pulled her free from the black dragon's claw.

"How are you here!" Old Lu was full of shock and doubt. He sensed within himself and found that Lu Mingfei's soul was still quietly sleeping.

Quietly sleeping?!

At some point, Lu Mingfei had stopped trying to seize back control of his body, and was instead quietly sleeping within.

The soul within raised its head, and its expression changed.

"Did you forget? Brother."

"We are one. My body, soul, and spirit combined with yours make up the whole."

Transposition… when did that happen?

"When? Hasn't my part always been together with you?"

His eyes trembled, but now was not the time to dwell on this. He immediately looked toward Lu Mingfei over there.

"The conflict between you and me is meaningless!"

"I think it has meaning." Lu Mingfei spread his membrane wings and said slowly, "Because Hui Liyi doesn't like it, and I don't either."

"I came to tell you, your arrangements…"

"I don't accept them."

"My goal has already been achieved. From now on, I just want to live a peaceful life. No one will set their sights on me again, and the war between dragons and humans can be settled with a single order."

"Buddy, it's time for the grand finale."

"The girls you arranged are all pretty good, really not bad. There's even the senior sister I used to pine for day and night."

"But I don't want a harem. I have no emotional foundation with any of them. A forced melon isn't sweet."

He turned his head to look at Hui Liyi beside him and said with a smile, "When should we go meet your family?"

Hearing this, the joy in Hui Liyi's dark red eyes nearly overflowed from within.

She hugged Lu Mingfei tightly, with the same force as when Lu Mingfei had embraced her underwater the first time they met, not letting go.

Old Lu looked at that young man — that was his past self.

"Of course you liked that girl. I liked her too. I liked her more than you could imagine, because the memory has been fermenting in my mind for long years. That girl…"

He looked at Hui Liyi, and what followed were images buried deep in his memory for many years — the girl lying thin and wasted at Red Well, holding a little bear in her hand…

Being able to admit your own 'shifting of affection,' instead of realizing your love for her only after she withered like cherry blossoms the way I did — the future really has changed.

I am entrenched in the future, time and again unwillingly wanting to go back to the past to start over, but what returns to the past is only a single thread of spiritual will, and there can only be a single thread.

No matter how many times I fiddle with time, I can never affect the future. I seek solace in false timelines, yet you can carry everything forward into the future…

"Indeed, somewhat enviable." Old Lu asked, "But unfortunately…"

"In the short term, I'm afraid you can't change my script."

Old Lu arched his body, hovered prone in midair, wings spread — from below he looked like a sacred cross standing in the sky.

Those solaces were among the few real things, keeping him company through the long years.

He made promises to every girl along the way — no betraying each other, until the end of life.

But he was truly exhausted; he could barely count the number of restarts anymore. This last special restart, this real restart, had to be done to absolute perfection.

"You want too much, brother. You're already nearly half-mad."

"Everything I want, I must possess!"

Old Lu conversed with Lu Mingze in his heart; in reality, the elements began to fall into disorder.

"A forced melon isn't sweet, but it quenches thirst."

His wings, as if melting, dissolved into the air, dissolved into the sky.

Like clear water being dyed with ink, the night and stars slowly emerged, presenting a cosmic starry sky. But this nightscape did not feel beautiful — on the contrary, seeing it brought a terror of the soul being devoured.

Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Pitch-black liquid, carrying starlight, fell from the heavens, anointing the black dragon in baptism.

Occasionally, when liquid dripped onto the divine kingdom, a new patch would appear on the verdant earth through which the cosmic stars could be seen.

"The grand finale?"

The black dragon snorted a laugh. "Beating me is called an ending. Losing to me is called a prologue."

Chaotic distortion began to occupy the divine kingdom's territory. These substances could not only provide him with power, but also gradually corrupt the framework of this divine kingdom.

Hui Liyi sheathed her long blade inside her black windbreaker.

"Alastor." One hand gripped the necklace; the other hand lightly held Lu Mingfei's ferocious dragon claw.

"I need time to prepare," said the male voice within the necklace.

"Hui Liyi has a question." She looked at the terrifying black dragon before her and spoke. Her eyes held a trace of puzzlement; her dark-red pupils stared fixedly at the great dragon. "Why does Hui Liyi have no memories of the future?"

She had learned that those girls all possessed memories of the future, yet she alone did not…

Old Lu's movements stalled for a moment; only the starlit liquid continued to fall slowly.

"It's nothing more than a few memories…" the great dragon said.

"So Hui Liyi isn't important to you, is that it?" she said, a touch of disappointment in her voice.

"No…" The black dragon seemed to want to explain, but in the end simply gazed at Hui Liyi for a few seconds before giving up.

A faint crimson glow rose from the necklace.

Lu Mingfei knew this had something to do with Su Lin, but he assumed Su Lin had truly conjured up a Heavenly Judgment God.

"I'll go buy time."

He transformed into a slightly smaller black dragon, but before he could make any move, the light brand on his body began to burn fiercely.

Su Lin sat on a beach chair in the distance, watching the sky alongside Miss Kelaien.

"That confident?" Miss Kelaien asked.

"Probably. If this is his trump card, then I should be just a little stronger than him." Su Lin held up his thumb and forefinger to indicate a small gap.

Not a fingertip-universe kind of gap, but a genuine fifty-fifty or sixty-forty level.

【Divine Descent】

A hairline crack, nearly imperceptible, appeared on the divine spark.

Vast light elements poured into Lu Mingfei's existing dragon body; divine power cloaked him, divine blessing shone upon him, and the dragon scales on his body began to turn the color of white gold.

Lu Mingfei transformed into a sacred white-gold dragon and, carrying the newly acquired power of light's authority, lunged at the black dragon Old Lu had become.

When rules collided and authorities canceled each other out, the two great dragons tore into each other — tails, fangs, claws became their finest weapons in that moment.

Although Lu Mingfei started taking a beating the moment he engaged, retreating step by step, he still bought time for Su Lin.

Thirty seconds later.

Within the divine kingdom, the six-winged God of Light had vanished without a trace.

The necklace in Hui Liyi's hand grew ever more dazzling; crimson light flickered and pulsed amid the fresh blood of the two great dragons.

"Then, this journey ends here."

The magnetic male voice within the necklace rang out.

"Thank you, Alastor."

"Heaven Splitter, Earth Shatter!" Hui Liyi uttered the finishing move from the anime.

The necklace shattered; the gemstone of the pendant broke apart; a crimson giant appeared in this world — immeasurable, towering, vast.

【Divine-Tier Spell · Genesis of Light】

Boundless light and endless heat converged upon a single point, then burst outward — along with that crimson giant, within which a six-winged figure could faintly be seen.

Between heaven and earth, only a sheet of crimson remained; the previous black eggshell had been utterly shattered.

Endless, boundless flame-light, like the explosion at the birth of the universe, surged forth from Dawn Island; in an instant, this flame-light had already engulfed the solar system.

One minute later, within the divine kingdom, nothing remained except the six-winged God of Light.

……

……

When Lu Mingfei opened his eyes, he was lying in Hui Liyi's arms; she was carrying him through the sky over Tokyo, below them the glittering metropolis and towering skyscrapers like a forest.

"Arastrael left me a trace of power, so I ran away again—otherwise my brother would scold me." Behind Hui Liyi were a pair of crimson wings; she smiled at Lu Mingfei, "Go play, akura."

Her face was very close; Lu Mingfei could almost smell her scent, and at that moment, Lu Mingfei mustered his courage for the first time—

He kissed her.

At that moment, a background song echoed through Jingcheng.

【And when the moment comes again to stain this sky / I will move forward with this body alone】

……

Inside an animation studio, the boss and staff were watching tonight's historic battle; to be honest, even if the Dragon Clan won, they felt nothing—except…

"Will our anime 'Shokugeki no Xia Na' Season 3 still air?" asked a staff member.

"……" Don't ask—who can you even ask? The anime's opening theme is still playing outside.

They stared at the TV screen, at the couple kissing in the sky, and fell silent.

Knock knock knock—

One staff member opened the door, only to find a box outside.

When they opened it, they discovered stacks of cash inside.

Written on it were a few words—Royalty Fee.

"Boss, can we settle our wages?"

Su Lin walked onto the eaves of Dawn Hall, holding a small golden trophy, and asked the figure ahead:

"I brought you a trophy—congratulations, you've won tonight's Oscar for Best Actor."

End of Chapter