Chapter 496: Dream of the Ancient Sun God

Anderson's expression looked quite conflicted; after a long while, he finally said through gritted teeth:

"You are truly a devil that tempts the heart."

"You think I should pray to which existence?"

Rekton gave a light chuckle and said:

"Try them all; whichever answers you choose, it's just a transaction—whether you believe or not is your own business, no one will care."

Anderson smirked and said: "Then I found out I wasn't sincerely praying, and my misfortune got super doubled."

Before he could finish his sentence, the bright noon sunlight suddenly vanished, the sky turned dark, and another night fell.

The conversation ended there; each returned to his own room, lay on the bed, and quickly fell asleep.

In a daze, Rekton's thoughts gradually cleared; once fully awake, he found himself back in the depths of the God Temple, standing side by side with Anderson in front of that wooden door.

Rekton stared at the wooden door for a moment, then reached out and turned the handle; with a creaking sound, the door was pushed open a crack.

On the other side of the door it was dim and gloomy, hard to see clearly; only fragmented light spots could be seen drifting in the air, an extreme madness and distortion seeping through the gap.

"What are you doing?" Anderson stepped back repeatedly; the thing behind the door gave him a feeling of extreme danger, as if even a trace of that aura would plunge him into utter madness and loss of control.

Rekton glanced back at the now-wary Anderson and said calmly:

"Let's explore the most dangerous dream here; you can return to the Fresco Hall first."

"By the way, here's a prophecy: the deadliest danger often hides in the most ordinary life."

"What do you mean?" Anderson asked, somewhat surprised.

Rekton chuckled and said: "It means that once you leave this sea area and return to the normal world, the price of your misfortune will erupt in a more complex, more silent way."

As soon as his words fell, he stepped into the dream world behind the wooden door, and as he entered, the door began to close on its own.

Anderson raised his hand forward and murmured:

"I thought you were going to say that I drank fake alcohol on the Future Ship and nearly made myself an idiot."

"After leaving this sea of ruins, will my misfortune erupt even more silently? How else could it erupt? Make all the alcohol I drink in the future turn fake?"

After muttering for a while, Anderson turned back to the hall outside the God Temple, filled with splendid murals, having lost the company of a demigod; exploring this dream would become extremely dangerous, or would it be better to stay in the already determined safe zone?

Behind the wooden door, in the dream left behind by the Ancient Sun God before its death.

Everything here is chaotic, whether space or time, pure white light engulfs everything.

In that engulfing pure white, countless surging malice flows, sometimes condensing into a blade of pure death that strikes, sometimes into an extremely tranquil wolf claw, sometimes into countless limblike tumors entwined.

Standing still in silence for two seconds, Rekton turned to look behind him; the door he had entered through had vanished, leaving only pure white.

The next moment, the surrounding light and shadow violently shook, as if stimulated; this dream, already a nightmare, showed signs of impending awakening.

The already extremely chaotic and mad dream began to fragment, countless light and shadow flowing together to form a colossal light-shadow that seemed able to uphold heaven and earth.

Although there was no sound around, Rekton's ears were bleeding scalding hot blood; even with his eyes shut tight, the surrounding images could still reach his mind.

As the colossal light-shadow emerged, the surrounding extremely twisted and evil auras began to coalesce, taking forms such as terrifying hideous dragons, monsters with slick tentacles and bird feathers, twisted demon wolves with eight arms, towering fire giants, countless evil suns wreathed in flame, huge monsters made of piled meat and plants, and a giant serpent with exaggerated, thick wings spread behind it.

Twisted, terrifying monsters infected the dream like a virus, battling the colossal light-shadow that seemed able to prop up heaven and earth; the dream seemed to be destroyed and rebuilt over and over.

In this dream there seemed to be no concept of time; Rekton could only passively watch the colossal light-shadow die over and over, being devoured by countless monsters.

Each time, his spirit grew a little weaker.

This is completely unlike what Bernadette described; could it be a chain reaction from the True Creator's mental imprint? Thoughts in his mind should have fluctuated, but an extreme sense of danger suddenly swept over his whole body.

A giant serpent, its entire body covered in large dark-greenish-black scales with gaps where pure white feathers grew, suddenly came crashing down.

Every feather and scale on its body bore different strange symbols; pale flames burned in its eye sockets, cold and lifeless, it seemed like death itself.

One after another, stars appeared around Rekton, dense and dazzling, but quickly faded into specks of pale blue debris that vanished into nothing.

At the instant the wing‑exaggerated giant serpent was about to crash onto him, countless jet‑black rays burst forth like a tide, surging from deep within Rekton's spirit body, naked in malice and madness, and swiftly engulfed the entire dream.

The originally pure‑white dream turned pitch black; those hideous, terrifying monsters seemed stuck in deep mire, unable to break free for a moment.

This is a mental imprint left by the True Creator after Rekton's remote communication with it during this period, meant both to facilitate exploration of this dream and to help him open a passage to the God‑forsaken Land.

". I am dead." A hoarse, low voice echoed directly in Rekton's mind.

Following his spiritual intuition, he opened his eyes and looked toward the direction behind him; a man with somewhat pale skin stood there, looking dazed, his eyes showing both fear and relief.

Although there was no light around, his silhouette was perfectly clear.

He wore a black clergyman's robe, a silver cross hung on his chest; his hair was not long, mainly black but with roots showing a yellowish‑gold tint, his eyes were pure gold, his skin fairly white, his features deep‑set, resembling those of the North Continent people.

Rekton gave him a quick glance, somewhat surprised, and asked: "Are you awake?"

"Not awake? No, I'm just dreaming." The man in the clergyman's robe opposite him spoke in an extremely calm voice, paused, then continued:

"The incomplete mental imprint you carry from me lets me briefly regain a sense of self, but it won't last long; soon I will fall back into an eternal nightmare."

As he spoke, a faint thread of light emerged from the darkness, which he grasped in his hand and handed to Rekton, saying:

"I hope that the future me is guided by humanity, not divinity."

Without waiting for Rekton's reply, the surrounding darkness began to recede; broken patches of light reappeared, devouring everything, purifying everything.

The figure in the black clergyman's robe developed cracks across its skin; countless blazing white light poured from within, his silhouette rapidly enlarged and rose, once again becoming that colossal light‑shadow capable of upholding heaven and earth.

That faint thread of light he had given Rekton drifted down and landed in Rekton's hand.

The next moment, his silhouette vanished from this dream.

Rekton only felt his consciousness blur for an instant; when he came to, he found himself on a black reef, less than ten nautical miles from which rose a towering mountain.

It was a mountain covered by countless magnificent, exaggeratedly huge palaces, towers and walls; its backside was a sheet of frozen sunset, casting twilight colors over the mountain where the city lay.

Far beyond the mountain, where the naked eye cannot see, a gaze filled with madness and an intense oppressive pressure fell upon him.

Merely being gazed at, Rekton felt himself about to be involuntarily torn from the collective dream.

Fortunately, this condition didn't last long; blazing sunlight bathed the surroundings in brilliant white, and Rekton once again slipped out of the dream.

Getting out of bed, he walked to the window and gazed toward the deeper part of this sea, faintly sensing where the passage to the God‑forsaken Land would open.

He glanced back at the room, confirmed there was nothing to tidy, withdrew his gaze, and his body instantly turned transparent, becoming a statue formed from countless gathered starlight; the statue instantly shattered, turning into drifting specks of urging starlight.

These starlights scattered, shooting into the cabin's gaps, surging deeper into this sea area.

Inside the captain's quarters, Jiadelia stood before the captain's room window, gazing absentmindedly at the sea surface that the noon sunlight had made blaze like golden flames.

She suddenly felt something, turned her head to glance toward Leikedun's room, then quickly withdrew her gaze.

In the depths of this sea area lay a small island built from countless gray-white marble blocks, devoid of any life.

Starlight fragments poured out from the Spirit Realm, converged within, and revealed Leikedun's figure.

As his form solidified, a faint beam of light split from him and sank into the sea ahead.

Under the noon sun, it seemed as if golden flames on the undulating sea surface froze for an instant, after which the seawater began to plunge down along a straight line.

It grew deeper and wider, eventually forming a straight chasm, the rushing water's noise becoming noisy yet rhythmic.

The seawater on both sides poured down like waterfalls, disappearing into the bottomless dark abyss.

Leikedun strode unhurriedly to the cliff's edge, glanced into the depths of the bottomless sea trench, then spread his arms, gazed up at the golden hue above, and leapt down as if embracing the sun.

During the fall, a strong sense of weightlessness accompanied it, causing the heart rate to unconsciously speed up until a dizzy feeling from oxygen deprivation surged.

Once the dizziness passed and his mind cleared, Leikedun found himself standing on a cliff edge, with the continual sound of waves crashing behind him; only by the occasional lightning flashing down from the sky could he barely make out his surroundings.

"This lightning frequency, according to Xiao Taiyang's saying, should belong to night."

He muttered softly, Leikedun reached into the shadow beneath him and pulled out a fist-sized crystal ball.

As spiritual energy was infused, the crystal ball, initially veiled in a layer of water mist, quickly turned transparent and brilliant; pure, pale blue starlight poured from it, and its gentle light swiftly dispelled the surrounding darkness.

Having solved the lighting problem, Leikedun began to survey his surroundings; intermittent bolts of silver-white lightning allowed him to see clearly.

Exaggeratedly huge palaces, towers, and walls stood layered upon the mountain peak, appearing grand and ancient, and bearing a distinctly nonhuman aesthetic.

(End of chapter)