supreme deity

Chapter 830 Final preparations
In the Central Continent Divine Palace, a sudden vortex of seven-colored clouds swirled, and the goddess Ao Jue broke through the void and arrived. Her figure lightly passed through layers of clouds and mist, and she slowly landed in front of the majestic palace square of the Central Continent Divine Palace.

Before her lay the 'Universal Temple,' the main building of which covered hundreds of acres. Its majestic shape resembled an ancient mountain, exuding mystery and solemnity. Above it floated enormous clock gears and void bone spears, symbolizing the supreme authority of the two cosmic gods.

Ao Jue frowned slightly and walked into the magnificent temple with a solemn expression.

She saw two deities sitting behind the cloud-shaped gauze curtains deep inside the hall. To the right was a woman covered in silver armor, with an hourglass of time flowing backwards hanging from her hair. The light around her seemed to be condensed into crystals, and wherever she passed, time was like a stream that was imprisoned, stagnating and still. Even the twinkling of the stars became a frozen scene.

On the other side was a man with long, fiery red hair. The space around him was constantly changing violently. With each breath of this god, the surrounding space was like a boiling lake, folding, twisting, and reorganizing. The surging energy impacted all directions, breaking all established rules.

—That is the abyss in the middle, the father and mother gods of Ao Jue.

But at this moment, the two men looked at her with extremely cold and sharp eyes, filled with displeasure and dissatisfaction.

Ao Jue's spirits lifted, and he knelt down, saying, "Your son, Ao Jue, pays respects to Father God and Mother God!"

"Rise." The silver-armored goddess's voice was like thunder from the heavens, deep and majestic: "Judging from your solemn expression, it seems your journey has not been very smooth?"

“Indeed, I have failed the mission of Father God and Mother God.” Ao Jue said with a wry smile, “Mother God, the Lord of Light said that his magnificent altars will never be sold or moved to the Heavenly Demon Homeland. This is because of His covenant with the gods and because the magnificent altars are of great importance to Him and the Church of Light.”

The Lord of Light only assured me that he would expedite the construction of the remaining nine artificial celestial canopy bases, delivering them all within five days at most. He also mentioned the eight completed Pure One Altars of the Church of Light, which had not yet been connected to the network. Once connected, he would grant us the highest level of command authority, provided that during the Celestial War, the two of you would, within your capabilities, provide extra care for the followers of the Church of Light and the divine realm.”

Upon hearing this, the two gods of Zhongzhou both became even more cold and aloof.

They knew that in the past six months, Lin Rui, with the permission of the gods, had crafted eight more Pure One Altars.

Even if we add the 45 unconnected bases they have, and the nine that are about to be completed, the total capacity of the artificial canopy can only increase by 30 billion people, which still cannot contain the true spirits of their two gods.

But their ally had indeed fulfilled his duty, so much so that they couldn't find fault with him.

The appearance of the Abyss of Heaven has made their current situation much better than the best-case scenario they had envisioned years ago.

This being not only helped them withstand the Dream Celestial in the artificial canopy, but also promoted legislation within the Federation to transform 14 base cities, maximizing the speed of immigration. At the same time, it integrated the industrial power of the Earth Federation and the Mech Temple, along with numerous mechanics and refiners, using nearly 40% of the production capacity to forge the canopy base for them.

The only thing that displeased them was that the artificial canopy was completed too quickly, and Lin Rui was unwilling to exert influence at the federal government's top levels to delay the deployment of the canopy's base.

However, Lin Rui cannot be blamed for this. It was the collective will of the gods, led by the Dream Celestial Venerable. Even if Lin Rui joined forces with them to obstruct it, the effect would be negligible.

“Mother Goddess~” Ao Jue’s voice was hoarse. She was about to explain and apologize when she heard her Father God say, “You’ve worked hard. It was expected that the Lord of Light would refuse. You don’t need to blame yourself. Go down.”

Ao Jue was slightly surprised. She had prepared herself to endure her parents' anger and scolding, but the reaction of her father and mother gods was much calmer than she had expected.

Just after Ao Jue left, full of doubt, the red-haired god on the cloud platform looked leisurely towards the outside of the palace gate: "Now the population of the fourteen base cities has reached 970 billion, which can barely support the simultaneous transfer of our true spirits. However, the number of bases is still not enough. Even if we further condense our true spirits and discard some unnecessary things, we are still short of the capacity of at least 150 billion."

This population size is actually insufficient to sustain their true spirits for a long time.

However, in the Earth Federation, due to the Federation's substantial subsidies and social welfare, policies aimed at increasing employment, and the continuously improving living environment in major cities, the Federation's citizens have far less negative sentiment and are more stable.

Therefore, the population issue can be put aside for now and addressed later.

So the key is still the capacity. For the two gods to transfer their true spirit to the artificial canopy, they need at least 1800 billion.

The silver-armored goddess fell into deep thought, and after a moment she said calmly, "It seems that we have no other choice."

If they couldn't see any hope of 'transcendence', that would be one thing, but now they are only 150 billion units away from securing their ticket to the battle for transcendence, making them extremely unwilling and unable to give up.

The silver-armored goddess then waved her sleeve, controlling a smart terminal bracelet that was floating in front of her.

Soon after, a holographic projection screen appeared in front of them. The projection contained nothing but a figure completely shrouded in a black cloak.

"You two have contacted me again, it seems you are ready to cooperate with us?"

The cloaked figure had only a pair of deep, abyss-like eyes exposed. After exchanging a glance with the two men, he let out a hoarse laugh: "It's actually quite a good deal, isn't it? I don't need much, and I can even help you distract Dream and the Great Sun Celestial Venerable. Without them, the two of you have a 90% chance of winning."

The silver-armored goddess and the red-haired god looked at the cloaked figure and felt an intense killing intent rising within them, yet they remained calm on the surface, showing no sign of it.

The two were extremely wary and suspicious of this being who was trying to manipulate the 'fate' of the gods in secret and resurrect the 'Supreme Celestial Venerable' through primal corruption, and they were also extremely angry and disgusted with him.

Cooperation with this Lord of Fate is undoubtedly a cup of poison. If the 'Supreme Celestial Venerable' is fully revived, the entire celestial canopy will be further eroded and assimilated by the source, at which point the gods will have no place to stand in the celestial canopy.

However, as the silver-armored goddess said, they had no choice but to obtain the ticket to participate in the battle for transcendence.

And as long as they can successfully transfer their true spirits to the artificial celestial canopy outside the realm and achieve 'transcendence', then no matter how bad the situation inside the Celestial Pole Star is, it will be irrelevant to the two of them.

※※※※

At this moment, Lin Rui was piloting the 'Divine Source' armor, slowly moving forward in the chaos of the Origin World.

The void before him was like stirred paint, with countless conceptual forces intertwined into twisted veins, sometimes tearing through his vision like lightning, and sometimes wrapping around him like tentacles.

However, none of this could shake Lin Rui. Runes flowed across the surface of his armor, and the golden light of the power of truth and the silver radiance of the law of purification intertwined to form a barrier, resisting the erosion of the root.

It had been a month and a half since he first entered the Root.

Lin Rui brought back a large amount of data, allowing the three of them—Divine Mechanic Angel, Tai Xuan, and Huangfu Qing—to carry out targeted modifications and enhancements while continuing to repair the 'Divine Source' armor.

They have abundant materials. Before his death, the Divine Talisman Celestial Venerable left a contingency plan, building a large treasure vault 3 kilometers underground, containing a large number of rare materials born in the Middle Ages. Since the Earth Federation's scientific research community was able to directly study the 'Abyss' led by Lin Rui, their materials technology has also made great breakthroughs.

Lin Rui is sensing the most basic concepts of 'matter' and 'energy' within the root.

These two are one of the cornerstones of all things, but since ancient times few people have practiced these two methods. Energy is okay, but matter is really scarce, and at this moment it is scattered randomly in the void.

However, their derivatives—metal, wood, water, fire, earth, wind, thunder, yin, yang, darkness, etc.—are very popular in the world.

Using the martial intent of 'One' as a guide, Lin Rui transformed his divine sense into invisible threads, gently manipulating these concepts.

In an instant, the surrounding torrent of matter and energy seemed to find its home, beginning to revolve around his will and gradually coalescing into a vortex.

Lin Rui formed a hand seal: "One life gives birth to all things!"

A point of white light suddenly appeared at the center of the vortex, and matter differentiated into elements such as 'metal,' 'wood,' 'water,' 'fire,' and 'earth,' while energy split into 'light,' 'heat,' 'force,' 'wind,' and 'thunder'—they stretched out like branches, yet returned to the same source under the rule of 'one.'

Next, he touched upon the surrounding 'past' and 'future', 'present', as well as the spatial realms of 'measurement', 'gravity', 'space travel', 'space folding', and 'space expansion', and so on.

The martial intent of the two gods of Zhongzhou is the overlord of the space-time domain, and their combined power is comparable to that of the God King.

However, the two of them control 'Yu' and 'Zhou' respectively, which, in Lin Rui's view, are more like two dimensions of four-dimensional spacetime.

Lin Rui was very careful, trying not to touch them and avoid arousing their suspicion.

However, all these spacetime-related forces are unruly; time flows like a wild horse, and space is like a shattered mirror, layer upon layer.

Lin Rui's brow truly opened like a heavenly eye, and the power of purity transformed into chains, nailing the turbulent flow of time into the vortex of 'One'.

He then unleashed a magic array plate, crafted for him by the divine angels, using it to suppress space and cause it to collapse into a stable node.

With a soft sound, the threads of time and space were forcibly connected, becoming a branch under the concept of 'One'—unfortunately, it was only a small part of the structure of these concepts, and Lin Rui still had to travel all over the Root World to continue collecting and connecting them.

This job is much more complicated than being a maintenance worker in a large computer room.

At that moment, a shadowy figure emerged from the chaos.

It was a female spirit, surrounded by stardust-like light, with eyes as deep as black holes.

Her lips didn't move, but her thoughts went straight to Lin Rui's mind: "Why have you come? This is not a place for you. What are you doing?"

"You are cleaning up and integrating this world? But I sense that you harbor a strong malice towards our world and our race."

"Can you tell me why? I can help you, we can communicate—" The voice was seductive, as if it could penetrate armor and strike straight at the soul.

Lin Rui sneered and ignored him, continuing to focus on connecting the concepts of 'life' and 'divine power'.

Life was originally a power controlled by the Undying Dragon Lord, but Lin Rui took advantage of the fact that this person had not recovered and was unable to resist.

As the process progressed, Lin Rui's movements became increasingly skillful. He combined the methods of 'destruction' and 'creation' into a yin-yang symbol, and then incorporated 'order' and 'chaos' into it, transforming it into a three-dimensional tai chi diagram.

With each concept he integrates, the vortex of "one" behind him expands a little, gradually revealing the rudimentary form of all-encompassing diversity.

At that moment, the armor suddenly emitted a piercing alarm—the erosion of the source had breached the outer defense, and he had less than twenty minutes left.

Lin Rui's gaze sharpened, and he accelerated the forced integration of the remaining hundreds of secondary concepts around him.

Lin Rui dared not touch concepts like 'probability,' 'cause and effect,' 'fate,' and 'weight' for the time being. However, other concepts such as 'dispersion,' 'evaporation,' 'corrosion,' 'dust,' 'thorns,' and 'expansion'—although relatively weak, were like writhing giant pythons, but under the guidance and whipping of his primordial martial intent, they were gradually returned to their proper places.

The chaotic scene around him was terrifying. Various colors intertwined and churned in the sky, and the ever-changing energy fluids on the ground exuded a chilling aura. The pervasive mist was composed of chaotic thoughts, emotions, and conceptual forces, constantly assaulting his mental defenses.

The spirits from the extinct ascended races, in various forms and full of aggression, such as ferocious beasts, twisted humanoids and flickering light and shadow, rushed towards him, like moths to a flame of holy lightning burning around his body.

Just as Lin Rui's Divine Source Armor issued its fifth alarm, nearly a thousand conceptual forces in the vicinity flowed like rivers into the sea, forming a perfect closed loop under the rule of 'One'—they were both the starting point and the end point.

Lin Rui's fundamental martial intent was like a large, open net, obscuring and covering the distorted void around him.

The female spirit reappeared, this time much more solid, her voice filled with shock and bewilderment: "You want to be the source and end of these powers? You want to control this world? We need to talk—"

Lin Rui remained unresponsive. He sent a signal to the rear, and the cable located behind the armor instantly transmitted a tremendous force, pulling him away from the source.

After 300 breaths, Lin Rui's main body, which was stationed in the Ninth Base City, began to regain consciousness.

When entering the source, Lin Rui was unable to use the One Yuan Two Transformation technique. However, he had the twin goddesses Lin Xi and Lin Yi protecting him in the Ninth Base City, and his master, Tai Xuan, and the three gods of the Divine Machines also protecting him in Purgatory. He didn't need to worry about his safety.

When Lin Rui opened his eyes, he saw Fang Ranran sitting not far in front of him.

She wore a helmet that was entirely silver-white and streamlined in shape. The helmet shell was made of a special alloy and covered with fine, bright silver runes. The patterns intertwined and flowed like an electrical circuit, shimmering with a faint blue light, as if drawing power from a flowing galaxy.

The helmet has curved wings extending from both sides, with micro-crystal arrays inlaid along the edges for energy conduction and spiritual amplification. A rhombus-shaped core is embedded in the center of the forehead, sealing compressed purification techniques and holy lightning tribulation fire inside.

This is another achievement of the Divine Mechanism Angel and the Supreme Celestial Venerable – the Mind Guardian Type A, a helmet specifically designed to counter the power of the Dream Celestial Venerable.

The two are old rivals of the Dream Celestial Venerable. They have a deep understanding of the power of dreams and have both reached the pinnacle of runes and formations.

In particular, the Divine Mechanic Angels possess divine-level mechanics and precision. The Mind Protection Helmet they designed together is powerful enough to allow martial artists at the eighth and ninth realms to temporarily resist the mental power of the Dream Celestial Venerable.

It is said that this helmet can monitor the wearer's mental state at all times, issue a warning when their mind is invaded, and even withstand the mental erosion of dreams for ten minutes—however, this is their own estimate, and the actual effect is unknown.

The Mind Guardian Type A was extremely expensive to produce, so the two also designed Types B and C, which were widely adopted by Lin Rui's forces. They were not as powerful as Type A, but were cheaper to produce and suitable for mass production.

Starting two months ago, all members of the Ruifang Forest Group, including Lin Xi and Lin Yi, as well as the high priests of the Light King Cult and the Light God Cult, began wearing this helmet. Lin Rui ordered that it must not be removed before the artificial sky curtain war ended.

Forest Group also shipped large quantities of goods to the upper and middle levels of the federal government.

In fact, all parties are very wary of the power of the Dream Celestial Venerable and have prepared countermeasures.

However, none of their methods can compare to the convenience and ease of using this mind protection.

Fang Ranran was handling official business using the virtual screens in front of her. She was unaware that Lin Rui had woken up. His expression was sometimes serious, sometimes indifferent, sometimes disdainful, and sometimes thoughtful.

It wasn't until Lin Rui asked, "How is Ranran today? Is there anything unusual?"

Fang Ranran was startled. She glanced at Lin Rui and then gave a bitter smile: "How should I put it? In short, chaos is rampant, and the conflict between the gods is intensifying. Today alone, there were as many as 423 wars fought over the artificial sky base, and nine eighth-realm armored martial artists have fallen."

Lin Rui's expression remained unchanged upon hearing this.

Things are different now than they were three years ago. Back then, martial arts practitioners at the eighth level were highly valued, especially those with bloodlines above the Super King level.

However, now, thanks to Ruifang Pharmaceutical's new implantation technology; the Federation has made many new breakthroughs in pharmaceutical technology; and the gods have invested heavily, resulting in a large number of seventh and eighth realm martial artists emerging in the Federation. Currently, the Federation's implantation martial arts world is practically a dog's den, with eighth realm practitioners everywhere.

"The gods had a brief clash at 6:23 a.m., which stemmed from the fact that the two artificial canopy bases ordered by the Eastern Abyss from the eleventh base city 'Western Heavy Industry Group' were about to be completed. This battle almost destroyed the third satellite city of the eleventh base city. It was only thanks to the president's foresight that he ordered the refuge facilities there to be upgraded to the highest level."

"A religious war has also broken out in the Seventh Base City. The two churches of the East and West Abyss fought fiercely on Peter the Great Street for believers. The surrounding civilians were affected, with 373000 dead and injured. This shocked the entire Earth Federation. It is said that some believers of our Church of Light King were also implicated. The Heart of Light 7 is currently dealing with the situation."

As Fang Ranran finished speaking, a strange light appeared in her eyes.

This matter actually has little to do with the Church of Light. It was a group of registered believers of the Church of Light who had breakfast at the Church's place, changed into a different set of clothes, and went to the 'Eastern Emperor Church' in the Eastern Abyss to have dinner. As a result, they got involved.

"I've already had Yu Feicui send you the daily intelligence summary. Take a look for yourself. The government is unusually quiet, eerily quiet!"

Lin Rui has handed over all affairs of the Ruifang Forest Group to her, and Fang Ranran herself has become the chairperson of the Congressional Budget Committee, so she is extremely busy.

Originally, intelligence gathering was the responsibility of Lin Xi, the intelligence director. However, Lin Xi has been very busy lately, so now she not only has to manage the government and the company, but also oversee the intelligence department.

Lin Rui opened the email and began to browse the brief intelligence report.

His main concern is the Celestial Base. It is possible that the Celestial Venerable has been searching for the Lord of Destiny for a long time without success. More than a month ago, he called on all the gods to make a blood oath to stop deploying the new Celestial Base before dealing with the 'Lord of Destiny' and the 'Supreme Celestial Venerable'.

This move was welcomed by the Abyss, which immediately responded to the Dream's call and used both soft and hard tactics to force the gods to sign a blood pact. However, although the gods were forced to agree, they were not so honest in private and made frequent moves.

Secondly, there are the positions of the 'Master of Destiny' and the 'Supreme Heavenly Venerable'.

Although the gods have not been able to find the whereabouts of these two, they have made some progress after repeated investigations and sorting through the information. They have narrowed down their possible hiding places to the special celestial structure of the 'ring'.

Even Ruifang and Forest Group's supercomputing model speculated that these two were inside the Star Ring.

Lin Rui squinted, thinking that these two were probably hiding here, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to hide from any etheric fluctuations.

The rings of Celestial Pole are enormous, with a width of an astonishing 49 kilometers and a thickness of 13 kilometers, containing countless meteorites and small satellites.

Looking at the sky from inside Celestial Pole, this ring of stars is what people perceive as the Milky Way.

However, with the powerful divine strength of the Dream Celestial Venerable, it is estimated that he can sweep through the star rings of the Celestial Pole Star in half a month. They can't hide for much longer.

Fang Ranran reported: "Today, the twenty-sixth Bright-class battleship completed its outfitting. The two major groups now have 5200 warships directly under their command, the Bright King Cult has 1100, the Bright God Cult has 2500, and there's also our Dyson gun group. Currently, we have a total of 11200 Dyson cannons, and the energy array has also been upgraded and perfected. However, our finances have collapsed. At this rate, we will be crushed by our loans and completely bankrupt within a month and a half at most—"

Bankruptcy is impossible; after all, these are the assets of the gods. Even if they can't repay their debts, the major federal banks won't dare to collect their loans.

However, their financial pressure was indeed very heavy. In order to expand their combat power to the greatest extent, Lin Rui had almost emptied dozens of medium-sized banks in the Federation.

Fang Ranran paused here, looking at Lin Rui with concern and hesitation in her eyes: "Xiao Rui, how are things on your end? What exactly is the situation?"

She never knew what Lin Rui was doing. This wasn't because Lin Rui didn't trust her, but rather to guard against the Dream Celestial.

Even though Fang Ranran wears this mental protection helmet every day and has stayed here for the past three months without going out, only handling various official matters online, Lin Rui is still worried.

Fang Ranran only knows that Lin Rui and his gods are carrying out a plan that is crucial to their future. As a result, these gods have kept their original bodies and alternate forms in the core of this dock base for a long time without using them. Even Lin Xi, the intelligence director, has no time to care about them.

“It’s almost time.” Lin Rui’s lips curled up slightly. “Don’t worry, even if the God War starts now, I’m fairly confident.”

Just then, Lin Rui received a message from Lin Xi: Brother, how's your concept recording progress?

Lin Rui smiled slightly and immediately edited a message and sent it over.

(End of this chapter)