Secret World: I Became a God Through Lies

Chapter 528 The Twilight Moment
God said, "Day and night go on in an endless cycle."
I insist on stopping this sun at dusk.

—The Tale of the Guardians of the Hanakain Palace

The clouds above Tokyo were torn apart by fire and runes.

Under the sky, the entire city was ablaze.

From high above, the battlefield doesn't look like a battlefield.

It was a huge Go game.

Onmyoji wields white, while Deep Sea Nightmare wields black.

The black ball landed between the ruins and the bay, amidst the roar of artillery fire;

White stones spread across the streets of Tokyo, and the barrier flowers bloom.

Nuclear missile launch site, silver missiles stand tall.
It is the "ko eye" in the center of the chessboard that is being contested.

The black and white pieces are locked in a deadlock.

The thick smoke in the sky transformed into the patterns of a chessboard.

Firelight and magic spells intertwined in the night, speaking two languages—

One was labeled "Destruction," the other "Order."

The countdown timer floats above the sky:

【02:07:32】

Every second that passes,
They are all like new chess pieces thrown into the game of fate.

The God of Fate stands at the center of the illusory chessboard.
That was the "key point" of the game.

He looked down; the ground beneath his feet had been replaced by his chessboard.

The folded void of black and white squares seems to lead to another world.

In the secret channel,
The echoes of Calvino, Lilia, Xiao Jinyan, Xin Nai, and Xiao Lianyin returned one by one.

They are the four corners of the black pieces, guarding the breath of the entire chessboard.

Meanwhile, the Hanakain family holds a parade of one hundred demons.

Their shikigami army, like a white chess piece's encirclement and attack gesture,
It presses down on the center of the board from all directions.

The streets and alleys of Tokyo were rewritten by the barrier.

Each building became a "chess move" in the rune array;
A hundred demons surged forth, treading upon the cursed seals.

Every roar is a strike on the chessboard.

Artillery fire exploded in the air.

The pirates' cannon fire flew like black bullets.

The barrier created by the Yin-Yang technique bloomed instantly like a white flower.

The two intertwine, creating a dynamic yet serene beauty.

The color of the sky no longer distinguishes between day and night.

Black and white are devouring and overlapping each other.

The air was thick with the smell of gunpowder and blood.
Illuminated by runes—it was as if the heavens and earth were chanting scriptures.

The Red Dragon glided between the clouds.

Like a floating chess piece.

The naval guns fired in rapid succession.

The firelight reflected on the illusory chessboard below.
It flashes on and off, like a chess player's hesitation and contemplation.

Si Ming raised his eyes.

In the distance, Tokyo is woven from the sounds of gunfire and magical light.
In his eyes, it was not a battlefield, but a web of fate.

"Every shelling is where the black pieces land."

Every time a spell is unleashed, it becomes a counterattack by the white pieces.

The chessboard stretches to the sky, and we, under the watchful eyes of the gods, gamble with fate.

He exhaled slowly.

The wind blew his cloak.
In that instant, the entire battlefield seemed to breathe in rhythm with him.

Time continues to pass.

【01:57:00】

The nuclear weapons depot in the center of the base was shaking.
The three-hour countdown has been halved.

This is a betting game with the odds closed at all four corners.

If any corner is breached, the entire game will collapse.

At this very moment——

Southeast of Tokyo
Suddenly, a strange golden twilight appeared in the night sky.

The light did not come from artillery fire.
Rather, it was a gentle, unsettling tranquility.

The Onmyoji looked up.

That was—a sign of the demon's arrival.

Hideyuki, the head of the Hanakain family, is finally about to make his appearance.

That light was neither sunrise nor sunset.

That was an eternal twilight, the prelude to his realm.

The white light of the Hundred Ghosts Night Parade Formation dimmed completely in an instant.

On the battlefield, all the black and white chess pieces seemed to have stopped moving.

The wind has calmed down.

The colors of the sky have lost their direction.

Someone murmured:
"Flowers bloom and wither, all at the time of demons."

Then, the air throughout Tokyo,

It was completely engulfed by the light of the Oma.

The night outside Tokyo, on the edge of an abandoned military base, is torn to shreds by the flames of war.

The yin-yang magic formula and the explosions of cannonballs flashed alternately, making the entire sky seem as if it were being written by gods and demons at the same time.

The countdown hung in the center of the sky—

【01:47:09】

Every second of flashing is like a burning thread.

The runes of the Flower Garden Front ignited with white flames.

The roars of the shikigami merged into a tidal wave, and the rhythm of the incantation intertwined with the beat of drums.

It was a kind of fanaticism—not just fighting, but a belief.

An Onmyoji's barrier was torn apart by pirate cannon fire, his amulet shattered, and a piece of burning iron pierced his shoulder.

Blood splattered on his face, but he just smiled, raised his head, and pointed his finger in the air.

Flames erupted from the talisman on his chest, engulfing his body.

He didn't cry out in pain, but only uttered one last incantation in the fire:

"By my command, I hereby deify you as a god—the Divine Punishment Technique, activate."

At that moment, he became the outline of the fire.
They transformed into countless talismans that scattered across the sky.

Runes rained down, and the shikigami of the Hundred Demons Parade turned to ash in the burst of light.

"Burning Star - Your Highness."

This phrase became the prayer of the Flower Garden Front.

Countless Onmyoji willingly burned themselves.

Their bodies disintegrated in the cursed fire.
Fragments of the soul became the fuse for divine magic.

Each explosion is a miniature divine punishment.

Flames bloomed on their bodies.
Each petal is a soul that will never be resurrected.

The sailors of the deep-sea nightmare also began to roar.

"They're crazy!"

"Yes! Then we should go crazy too!"

Liu Xi's guards drew their twin swords, the sharpness of fire and ice intertwining in the night.

He was the first to ignite the Cataclysm, and sea monsters danced and roared wildly.
He slashed through the first layer of the barrier.
The poisonous wave simultaneously engulfed the sorcerer formation of the Flower Blossom Courtyard.
The shattered runes reflected off his sword.
Like a series of falling solar eclipses.

Chen Mei's Crimson Roses followed closely behind.

She jumped off the Red Dragon, carrying a heavy cannon.
Her hair flew wildly in the fire, and her skin was splattered with blood.

"Sisters, let's light up with laughter!"

Her entire team ignited the Star Calamity.

Blood-red light bloomed along their figures.

Each person transforms into a crimson "blood rose".
The sky was filled with red as the flowers bloomed in front of the front line.

Blood and cursed fire intertwined to form the most beautiful fireworks in the sky.

The sky surrounding the base is no longer night—

It became a huge, burned scroll.

Southern route.

Xiao Jinyan's Mirror Lake was half shattered, and the world reflected in it was on the verge of collapse.

He sneered, "Who gave you permission to target my place?"

In the next instant, the fragments of Mirror Lake transformed into blades of light.

Each mirror reflects the image of a warrior.

Slice through the charging Oni warrior formation.

"I'm fine here—a few more wouldn't hurt."

He said softly in a whisper.

North side.

Lilia unfolds her inverted sea.

The wreckage of the ships tumbled in the air, and the waves crashed backward.

"If the sea can hang upside down, then the sky can also collapse."

She forced a smile through gritted teeth.

At the center of the base,
Xiao Lianyin and Xin Nai stood back to back.

The fox's tail tumbled, flames meeting in a blur.

The nine-tailed fox and the eight-tailed Tamamo-no-Mae circled around the missile bay.
It forms a fiery lotus flower, interwoven with gold and red.

Beneath the missile bay, a metallic pulse lit up. It was the heartbeat of a countdown.

【01:12:48】

A gap was torn in the Huakaiyuan's lines.
But a new Onmyoji immediately filled the position.

They had no more hesitation.

Some ignite the cosmic calamity, while others choose to "resurrect and return."
Blood and soul cycle endlessly.
Like a prayer that never stops.

Hideyuki watched from the high tower behind him.

His eyes were vacant.

But his lips uttered Haruhiko's decree:
"Your Highness is Heaven itself, and the Mandate of Heaven cannot be defied."

He pointed with his fan and gave a low command:

"Ignite the Stars—The Entire Army"

And so the battlefield was ablaze once more.

In an instant, the colors of heaven and earth vanished.

Only twilight and blood remain.

The flames illuminated their faces.

They laughed, they cried, they burned.

It was a sacrifice of faith.

It was also humanity's last act of madness.

The battlefield fell silent at that moment.

It's not that the wind has stopped. It's not that the artillery fire has stopped.

It was the "breath" of heaven and earth that was held back at the same moment.

All the spells dimmed.
Even the cold, white numbers of the nuclear countdown seemed to have been paused.

Then—a white butterfly flew in from a crack in the night sky.

It glided lightly over the corpses of a hundred demons, over the smoke of gunfire.

In that twilight sky, it was like a light that shouldn't exist.

It landed on the back of a person's hand.

Huakaiyuan·Xiuxing

The butterfly's wings trembled slightly.

Haruhisa's voice came from afar, as if it were echoing from the other side of a divine realm.
Cold and dignified.

"Hideyuki, the guardian of the imperial palace—the twilight of the divine kingdom is entrusted to you."

That voice was not a command.
It's more like a gentle form of hypnosis.

Xiuxing's shoulders trembled slightly, and the fox-like growth on his forehead slowly opened.

That nightmarish "eye" opened for a fleeting moment beneath his skin.
Then, his expression went completely blank.

Finally, as if having made a decision, he stood up and whispered:
"Flowers bloom and fade—the hour of twilight."

The colors of heaven and earth changed completely at that moment.

The light no longer illuminates the shadow, but is instead swallowed by it.

The sun and moon rise at the same time and orbit each other.

The entire city of Tokyo was plunged into an eternal twilight.

The wind stopped. Cherry blossoms fell from the sky.

But every single piece was stained with blood.

The ground began to shake.

In the center of the battlefield, the stones and runes rearranged—

Nijo Castle rises from the ground.

It is a city forged by time and memory.

Each stone brick is engraved with the family crest of Huakaiyuan;

On every wall, runes of blood and thunder flowed.

The sky split open at the same time.

With a clap of thunder, Po Jun appeared from behind Xiu Xing.
Full-body black armor, twin blades gleaming in the light.

The Thunder Beast fell from the clouds, transforming into the embodiment of heavenly thunder, with lightning coiling along its back.

The two intertwined, and in an instant, heaven and earth transformed into a sea of ​​light, a mix of silver-blue and deep black.

Hideyuki extended his hand and calmly, without any emotion, uttered the command:

"Po Jun, advance into battle."

"Thunder Beast, Judgment."

The thunder beast roared in response.

Po Jun's blade trembled, and ten thousand bolts of lightning fell down at once.

At that moment, all the sounds of the battlefield became echoes.

The troops of the Flower Garden cheered, "High Priest! High Priest, go into battle!"

Countless Onmyoji knelt down, their heads kowtowing to the ground.

They arrived with the weapons of God in a frenzy.

Hideyuki himself, however, simply walked quietly toward the battlefield.

His steps were completely even.

Every step felt like it was controlled by some kind of "prophecy".

Wherever he passed, the air shattered like glass.

The explosions of shikigami, incantations, and even artillery fire.

Under the resonance of thunder within him—everything shattered.

unstoppable.

He cleaved a corner of the illusory chessboard's boundary with a single stroke.

Light streamed from the chessboard, and the chess pieces shattered.

He looked up, his eyes meeting a blank sky.

Yet it seems that he can see a deity "watching him".

"Flower-Blooming Courtyard... Xiuxing".

An old Yin-Yang Master murmured the name from afar.

He was a former subordinate of Xiuxing, now just a dying sorcerer.

The young man before him was no longer the "Guardian of the Cherry Blossom Sea" of yesteryear.

His memories flashed through the blood mist.

That year, the sea of ​​cherry blossoms was not dyed red.

Young Xiuxing did not yet have a fox-like growth.

He sat lazily under the cherry tree.

He yawned as he peeled the pear.

"God? I don't have time for that kind of thing."

He once said this.

He spoke with a smile on his lips.

Like a young man who has seen through life and death, yet full of human warmth.

And when he went into battle—

That was the most glorious era for the Huakaiyuan family.

He single-handedly suppressed eight demon caves with the Po Jun sword.

The light of the Thunder Beast once illuminated the entire night of the Cherry Blossom Sea.

People called him "the genius of Sakura".
All Onmyoji consider it an honor to fight alongside him.

...until that day.

The one who called himself "God" descended.

Abe Haruhisa, with just a word and a seal,
Then the Broken Army collapsed, and the Thunder Beast howled in agony.

Xiuxing knelt on the ground, his forehead gently stroked by those "divine" fingers.

Since then, the sea of ​​cherry blossoms has never bloomed again.

He stopped smiling.

The old Yin-Yang Master murmured:
"He is the sharpest knife."

But ultimately, the knife is held in someone else's hand.

The evening wind rose from around Xiuxing's feet.

Po Jun and Lei Shou travel side by side.
Knives flashed and thunder roared, lightning and fire intertwined.

Anyone who stood in his way was instantly reduced to ashes.

He walked through a sea of ​​blood and fire.
They forged a straight path of blood.

He raised his hand and pointed to the core of the chessboard in the distance.

That is the direction of the Lord of Illusion, the God of Fate.

"The Lord of Fate—His Highness—wants your head."

His voice was deep, yet it resonated throughout the battlefield.

Every Onmyoji shouted in unison.
"Long live Your Highness! May the divine kingdom prosper forever!"

The Red Dragon roared above the clouds.

Xu Long looked down at the twilight.

The sea breeze lifted the cloak on his shoulders.
He smiled and said softly:
"General against general, king against king."

He raised his musket.
Aiming in the direction where Hideyuki Kakaiin is.

The distant twilight resembled a curtain.
On one side is a divine warrior, an incarnation of thunder.
On one side is the Pirate King, burning the seas and skies.

Dusk has officially fallen.

"Flowers bloom and wither, all at the moment of encountering demons."

As dusk begins, so too does the Kingdom of God.

—The Twilight Hour

(End of this chapter)