The Cryptic Sun didn't yield, nor did anyone ever trust him to do so. His reputation was not one of honor or straightforward battles. It was always shadowed in deceit, plotting, and twisted motives, and today was no different. As we stood in the suffocating atmosphere of the Dark Garden, every breath felt weighted, as if even the air was trying to warn us of the dangers ahead.
The mont the three pseudo-Heaven Stage slaves had been eliminated, I knew sothing was wrong. A sinking, nauseating feeling crept up my spine, and an ominous ringing filled my ears. It wasn't just fear—it was a sensation that made my very soul quiver, as though the world itself was groaning under the strain of sothing horrible, sothing monstrous, that was brewing deep within.
The ground trembled, faint at first, then more violently as the minutes passed. A subtle vibration at first, it grew into a cacophony of seismic waves that made the very bones beneath the earth creak. The the Dark Garden seed to rattle, as though they were whispering secrets only to themselves.
Every beast, creature, and lurking horror hidden in the shadows of the Dark Garden began screeching, roaring, and howling. Their frenzied cries lded into an unnerving chorus that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.
Creatures that could fly—massive, predatory beasts with wings as wide as valleys—took to the skies in panic, their enormous wings beating the air with such force that even from where we stood, we could feel gusts of wind.
Those who couldn't fly—the beasts that burrowed in the depths of the earth—were even more unsettling, as they began tearing their way upwards, breaking the very ground apart in an attempt to flee. Massive fissures opened, and the structure of the Dark Garden, once so stable, was crumbling as if the world itself was falling apart at the seams.
Everywhere I looked, chaos reigned.
Even the third level of the Dark Garden, a place shrouded in myth and whispers of untold horrors, seed to be reacting to whatever had just been triggered.
"Even the Third Level is affected!" the Wisest Sun's voice was sharp, his usual calm deanor shattered by the overwhelming presence of impending doom. His eyes glead with a mixture of fury and panic, the realization settling in that whatever the Cryptic Sun had just unleashed was beyond what any of us had anticipated.
"What have you done?" His voice carried both an accusation and a demand, the weight of millennia of wisdom sharpening his tone.
The Cryptic Sun, ever the serpent, took a step back, his face twisting into a smug, mocking smile. "Nothing much," he said, his voice dripping with condescension, his words laced with venom. The casual tone in which he spoke made the situation even more unnerving. His eyes glittered with mischief, or perhaps madness—it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.
"But if you're so curious, feel free to follow . You'll see soon enough." With that, his figure faded, disappearing into the mouth of the titan's skull, leaving behind a foreboding silence.
"That's a trap," the Blue Sun said, her grip tightening on her titan-slaying hamr. Her eyes, usually burning with fiery resolve, flickered with a rare mont of doubt.
"As obvious as the sun," I muttered, my gaze fixed on the skull's gaping maw, a dark abyss leading to God knows what horrors.
"But we have no choice," the Wisest Sun finished, his voice now resigned. It was true. Despite knowing the danger, there was no path left but forward.
Without another word, the three of us charged, plunging into the tunnel that led deeper into the lair of the Death Sun. The oppressive darkness within the tunnel was suffocating. The temperature plumted with every second we flew forward, and the walls seed to close in, as though the very ground itself was hungry for our souls.
Tens of thousands—no, hundreds of thousands of skulls lined the walls. They were ancient, yellowed with age, so cracked, others still pristine as if their owners had only just died. Each skull seed to carry a story of its own—a life snuffed out in this place of eternal darkness.
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The atmosphere grew more morbid with each step we took, the thick, overwhelming scent of decay and death filling the air.
But this was not the natural sll of death. No, this was sothing far worse. It was the stench of sothing that had lingered, a death that had refused to die, sothing vile and malevolent that had turned the very air poisonous. The corrosive fog that lingered near the ground seed to seep into the walls themselves, a visual manifestation of despair and life drained away.
For a mortal—or even a cultivator beneath the Ascendant Stage—this place would have been fatal. One touch of this death-laden mist, and they would have turned to a rotting corpse within seconds, their soul ripped from their body and claid by the Death Sun.
The tunnel stretched on forever, it seed, until the screeches of the beasts in the Dark Garden were drowned out by sothing far more sinister.
Walkers.
They ca at us in waves—droves of mindless, twisted figures, their bodies long dead but animated by so vile force. Their hollow eyes glowed with malice, their rotting limbs jerking unnaturally as they charged toward us. They were too many to count, and more kept coming, the sound of their snarls and gnashing teeth growing louder with each passing mont.
The Blue Sun, ever fierce, swung her titan-slaying hamr with devastating force, each blow disintegrating dozens of Walkers into dust. Her movents were fluid and precise, as though the hamr was an extension of her body. But despite her efforts, the sheer number of Walkers was overwhelming. For every wave she destroyed, two more took its place.
The Wisest Sun remained calm, his eyes focused, though even he was aware of the overwhelming numbers.
"They're stalling us," the Wisest Sun said, his voice carrying a deep concern.
"Can't you do that thing you did before?" I asked, my mind racing for solutions. "Transport us through the dirt, like before?"
"Too risky," he replied quickly. "Especially in the Death Sun's domain. If I make us that vulnerable, he'll capture us with ease."
I gritted my teeth, knowing he was right. We were dealing with the Death Sun.
"Then there's only one way left," I muttered under my breath. My arm transford, stretching and morphing, becoming the massive serpent that could devour worlds.
"Blue Sun, care to move a bit, please?" I said with a smirk.
Understanding, she stepped aside, and I unleashed the Primordial Serpent God. The beast roared as it tore through the tunnel, its endless jaws devouring everything in its path. Walkers, formations—none of it mattered. The serpent swallowed it all. The gaping maw of the Primordial Serpent God seed to open into a void where nothing could escape, an endless abyss that consud all.
The formations the Cryptic Sun had left behind shattered as they were swallowed whole by the serpent. No anchor, no power—just nothing. The serpent had devoured every last one of them, leaving behind only silence and a clear path.
With the Walkers and traps gone, we moved quickly, flying through the tunnel until it opened into a massive chamber.
There, in the main hall, they were waiting. The Lording Sun was strapped to a large stone, his body emaciated, his skin tight against his bones. Several hundred seals and chains, each glowing with seven-colored energy, wrapped around his body, burrowing deep into his skin. His eyes were blank, his mind clearly shattered by whatever tornt he had been subjected to.
The Dusking Sun, anwhile, was strapped to a circular stone that seed to pulse with malevolent energy. Blood dripped from his body, pooling beneath him, his once vibrant aura now reduced to a faint flicker. He barely clung to life, his face pale, lips trembling in agony.
Standing between them was the Death Sun, a grotesque figure of withered flesh and bone. His skeletal body was draped in tattered black rags that seed to float around him like a cloud of death. His sunken eyes, devoid of any warmth or rcy, glead with a twisted pleasure. He smiled, a ghastly, toothless grin that only added to the horror of his appearance.
His presence alone felt like it was draining the life out of the room, as if death had taken physical form and was now mocking us.
He pointed a bony finger at , and his voice crawled out of his throat like a disease. "You, the man who cheated death, welco," he hissed, his voice like the rustle of dry bones. His eyes flicked toward the Wisest Sun and Blue Sun with indifference. "As for the rest of you, you may leave… unless you'd like to see your fellow Suns perish before your eyes."
The temperature dropped instantly, the air growing thick with the scent of rot. His voice carried an authority that defied all reason—it felt like he could summon death itself at will.
"I didn't like how he worded that," I muttered to myself, every instinct in my body screaming at to be on guard. His invitation felt more like a trap—a predator toying with its prey. This wasn't an offer for dialogue or compromise. No, the Death Sun wanted a spectacle.
"Death Sun, you've gone too far!" The Wisest Sun's voice thundered through the hall, his rage unmistakable. His usual calm deanor had shattered; the sight of his friend, the Lording Sun, reduced to a broken shell was enough to ignite a fury that made the very air tremble. His fingers twitched, ready to summon the very Laws of Heaven to bend to his will.
"Too far?" The Death Sun laughed, his bony fra shaking with a hollow, sickly sound. "No, you've been the ones living in delusion, content to exist within this prison of life, waiting for death like sheep awaiting the slaughter. I, on the other hand—I have transcended. You have no idea what it ans to live beyond death."
With a single wave of his hand, a massive amount of Qi surged from the Dusking Sun, forcibly extracted by the Death Sun. The Dusking Sun scread, the sound of it so wretched and filled with pain that it pierced through my chest like a blade. His face twisted in sheer tornt as his very life force was drained away.
"STOP!" the Wisest Sun shouted, and the force of his command seed to halt everything for a split second. Ti itself bent to his will, as the laws of the universe obeyed his words.
But even the Law of Ti was not enough. The gate—that cursed, circular stone—continued to rotate, its insidious power siphoning the last remnants of the Dusking Sun's strength.
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