Chapter 367: Unknown Danger

Stardust condensed into frost within the Gui Xu fissure, Ao Li's Dragon Scale flickered with each breath frequency. She lowered her head to watch the entwined patterns in her palms— the jade basin seal on her left hand glowed with moonlight's clear radiance, while the Abyss Return Ruler etchings on her right arm steamed with bronze blood mist. Lín Jìn draped a crimson phoenix veil over the sleeping baby, crimson flames wandering over the swaddling cloth's surface, weaving a cage that sealed the starlight.

"The tide of the Sea of Rebirth arrived seven thousand years early." Lín Jìn suddenly grasped Ao Li's wrist; the bronze vessels beneath her skin rasped his palm, "Look at the star specks at the confluence of the twin moons."

Ao Li looked up, and her pupils reflected a bizarre sky: the Gui Xu twin moons, which should have been silver‑white like frost, now resembled blood‑soaked pupils. Black star specks sprouting from the moon's edge spread at a speed visible to the naked eye, like a fungus parasitizing spacetime.

"It's withered spores." Her dragon tail swept the void, and the stardust suspended in midair solidified into a mirror. The mirror reflected the black‑haired baby's dream‑babbling scene— each bubble he exhaled turned an entire galaxy within it to ash.

Lín Jìn's fingertips ignited sky‑burning fire, but the flames abruptly extinguished upon touching the mirror. "The world‑ending causal chain has already begun contaminating our…"

A deafening cracking sound shattered his words. The sleeping baby suddenly opened both eyes; the left pupil streamed with a galaxy, the right churned lava. Ao Li's jade basin in her arms emitted a wail, spider‑web‑like cracks appearing on its bottom— those fissures matched the trajectory of the black spots on the moon disc perfectly.

"Back off!" Lín Jìn yanked Ao Li and fled three thousand stellar li. The meteor belt they stood on instantly crystallized, ink‑black crystal clusters freezing the struggling remnants of star beasts. The baby's laughter resonated in the vacuum as it waved its tiny hand, shattering three nascent nebulae.

The Abyss Return Ruler traced an arcane path in the void, its bronze etchings turning into celestial shackles. Just as the chains were about to bind the baby's ankle, the silver‑haired baby suddenly cried, and the trajectory of its falling tears tore through twelve layers of the Dimensional Barrier.

"Creation tears…" Lín Jìn's crimson phoenix veil ignited a cerulean karmic flame, erecting a fire wall before the spacetime rift, "Quick, seal the senses!"

It was already too late. Ao Li's dragon horns were sheathed in a mother‑of‑pearl iridescence; she saw countless parallel timelines within the tear droplets: in some, she was using the Abyss Return Ruler to cleave the baby's chest, in others Lín Jìn's crimson phoenix veil was tightening around the newborn deity's neck. What made her shudder most was a particular timeline's afterimage— herself, body covered in bronze rust, cradling a withered, corpse‑like baby, screaming to the heavens.

"This is a causal omen." the silver‑haired baby suddenly spoke, its voice like a million galaxies collapsing simultaneously, "Mother, which future will you choose?"

A metallic scraping sound echoed along Ao Li's spine as the Abyss Return Ruler's etchings had corroded into the third dragon bone. She inverted the jade basin over her head, and the chaotic star sand pouring from it temporarily shielded her from the tear's erosion: "Choose the future where you shut up."

The bronze blade flash split from the Abyss Return Ruler severed the tear's causal chain. Seizing the moment, Lín Jìn hurled three hundred sixty star talismans, whose sigils interwove in the void to form a phantom of the Cosmic Instrument. At the instant the Cosmic Instrument aligned with the twin moons, the rampaging baby suddenly fell into slumber, icy spacetime shards crystallizing on its eyelashes.

"The Frost‑Moon Cosmic Array can last at most three days." Lín Jìn's temple hair leaked silver sand, a sign of over‑driving the crimson phoenix veil's life‑burn, "We must find…"

His words were shredded by a sudden gravitational turbulence. Ao Li's dragon tail coiled around Lín Jìn's waist, and the Abyss Return Ruler slashed a Z‑shaped fissure ahead. Nine layers of star rings erupted behind them in succession, and a massive colossus was forcing its body out of a Dimensional Crevice.

"It's a Star‑devouring Serpent!" Ao Li's pupils narrowed to vertical slits. The beast's scales were made of extinguished stars, its single eye a rotating black hole, and its venomous fangs were entwined with shattered causal threads, "This thing should be eradicated in…"

The Star‑devouring Serpent's roar shattered her voice. The beast's back suddenly sprouted ten thousand pairs of insect wings, each reflecting a destruction scene from a different timeline. Lín Jìn recognized one such pair—the very scene of them sealing the holy relic on the Star‑Chariot seven days earlier.

"It is devouring the Time Line!" Lín Jìn's crimson phoenix veil transformed into a fire phoenix soaring skyward, "I'll distract it, you…"

Ao Li's dragon claw had already pierced her own chest. She tore out a dragon bone entwined with jade patterns; where golden blood splashed, a seventy‑two‑grade chaotic lotus platform blossomed: "Stand on the lotus heart!"

When the Star‑devouring Serpent's fangs clamped, the lotus platform enveloped the two, slipping into the Gui Xu's dark currents. Ao Li coughed up bronze fragments amid the spacetime turbulence, her organs gradually being transmuted into metal by the Abyss Return Ruler. Lín Jìn's palm pressed against her back, the primal fire of the crimson phoenix veil continuously pouring into her body.

"Did you see?" Ao Li suddenly seized his wrist, "The reflection on the lotus petal."

Lín Jìn focused his gaze; within the iridescent, iris‑like patterns of the chaotic lotus petals, twelve versions of them fleeing in different timelines were reflected. Each afterimage cradled a baby of varying form— some bearing luminous wings, others covered in bone spines, and the most bizarre bore the insect wings of a Star‑devouring Serpent.

"These are possible branches of the newborn deity," Ao Li's dragon horns began to crystallize, "Each of our choices creates new…"

The Star‑devouring Serpent's single eye suddenly appeared above the lotus platform. From its depths emerged a star gate, from which countless pallid arms extended— each arm's surface etched with Star Chart tattoos, the long‑lost Dragon Clan's "Star‑Plucking Hands."

"Ancestral vengeful spirit!" Ao Li's Abyss Return Ruler quivered violently. The pallid arms seized the lotus platform's edge; as the Star Chart tattoos ignited, all seventy‑two lotus petals withered simultaneously. Lín Jìn's crimson phoenix veil coiled around both waists, the karmic flame climbing up the pallid arms, but it was snuffed out by some presence upon reaching the star gate.

The silver‑haired baby's wail pierced the dimensions. The sleeping newborn deity, having awakened at an unknown moment, seized the black‑haired baby's umbilical cord and swung like a swing into the fray. As the Star‑devouring Serpent's fangs were about to pierce Lín Jìn's chest, the silver‑haired baby suddenly thrust a finger into the black hole's single eye.

Spacetime fell into a bizarre stasis. Ao Li saw the silver‑haired baby's palm proliferating infinitely within the black hole, each finger transforming into a radiant galaxy. The Star‑devouring Serpent emitted a mournful wail; its body was being reshaped by creative power, the extinguished stellar scales reigniting, and within the black hole's eye a star cluster embryo formed.

"He's creating a new species…" Lín Jìn's crimson phoenix veil shielded the two. The reborn star beast unfurled luminous wings, each feather a flowing nebula, and a third eye on its forehead flickered with causal fire.

The black‑haired baby suddenly grinned. It leapt onto the reborn star beast's back, its tiny hand slipping into a nebular wing and gently tearing— the newly‑born luminous creation instantly rotted into gray mist, from which millions of parasites oozing entropy crawled out.

"Enough!" Ao Li's Abyss Return Ruler pierced the void. The bronze etchings eroded backward along the two babies' causal lines, weaving a law cage around them. Lín Jìn seized the chance to hurl the core of the crimson phoenix veil, its silk turning into a sky‑burning inferno that engulfed the entire battlefield.

As the flames dwindled, Ao Li's dragon tail clung tightly around the two babies, the jade basin pattern spreading from her neck to her cheek, while the Abyss Return Ruler's bronze veins etched into half of her body: "We need…"

Her voice cut off abruptly. In the distance, Gui Xu candles flickered and simultaneously turned, countless gazes piercing the dimensions. Within those wavering candlelights, a faint silhouette of Ao Li wielding a broken sword and a single‑eyed Lin Jin shedding blood could be seen—the remnants of the Godslayer reflected by the Frost‑Moon Cosmic Array.

The black‑haired baby suddenly bit through its own wrist. Its blood painted a coiled‑snake totem in the void, and all the Godslayers in the candlelight simultaneously raised their weapons. The silver‑haired baby, meanwhile, displayed an innocent smile, channeling creative power into the totem's center.

"They're summoning…" Lín Jìn's warning was drowned by spacetime shockwaves. When the coiled‑snake totem completed its final stroke, the entire Gui Xu dimensional structure began to invert. Ao Li saw her left hand fading, while a certain reflection of a Ruler‑wielding Godslayer grew ever clearer.

The newborn deity let out a delighted, playful laugh. In their innocent eyes, the spectacular collapse of countless timelines unfolded.