Rosen stood atop the roof of the Daming Palace, overlooking the Ming Dynasty officials attending morning court.
They were completely identical to the historical figures he remembered.
The entire course of history in this world also matched everything he knew.
The whole Blue Star seemed like a time-looping dreamscape.
And the looped time span was ten thousand years, with time flowing many times faster here than in the Ancient God World.
Even as a forbidden Godfiend, he could enjoy a significant time acceleration here.
One must know—applying time acceleration to an ant and to a god required vastly different amounts of energy.
The scale of the entire Blue Star world was such that even a demigod could destroy it with ease.
So applying time acceleration to Blue Star should consume very little. In theory, the time laws enveloping Blue Star shouldn't affect a forbidden Godfiend like him at all.
Just stepping foot on Blue Star should have caused the acceleration to stop.
Yet Rosen truly was experiencing time acceleration granted by the time laws here.
For time laws to take effect on me… that would take a monstrous amount of energy.
And yet, even with his Eternal Omniscience tracing the origin, he couldn't find where this energy was coming from.
He couldn't detect any abnormality anywhere in the world.
The more normal things appear, the more abnormal they truly are.
The more normal the Blue Star seemed, the deeper the secrets it was hiding.
He had already exhausted every method—whether probing Blue Star itself or the surrounding ring-shaped mountains—but found not the slightest irregularity. Even if the Ancient Gods were concealing all anomalies, doing so would not have been easy.
Opening the Gate of Realms, Rosen returned to the Spirit Realm on the front side of the Ancient God World.
If he still couldn't find anything, that only proved his strength wasn't enough yet.
Trying to forcibly probe the secrets of Blue Star could potentially awaken a slumbering Ancient God.
Rosen didn't want to dig his own grave—nor ruin the shortcut he had so painstakingly discovered.
Still, he couldn't leave things be. So, he left behind some Root-Origin Broodmothers and several Eternal Avatars.
Time moved quickly there—even if not a thousandfold, a few hundred years there would be just a few years here.
He had plenty of time to wait for the timeline over there to loop back to the modern age.
By then, he could find out if he still appeared in Blue Star's timeline, and whether the boss who hired him to draw manga before his rebirth would show up again. These answers could be obtained in just a few years. His Eternal Avatars could patiently wait in the shadows to observe.
Of course, he wasn't just going to sit around and wait. Without a doubt, the World Will could provide him with valuable information.
Maybe the World Will even knew about Blue Star—after all, mirages of Blue Star's nuclear war had once appeared in the Spirit Realm's upper layers.
Even if it didn't know, the World Will surely had some understanding of the Ancient God World's reverse side.
It wasn't long after Rosen reached the surface layer of the Spirit Realm that the World Will appeared, frowning with visible displeasure.
It was busy, and Rosen was free—that annoyed it.
"What is it?" the World Will asked with irritation.
"Have you ever heard of Blue Star?" Rosen asked.
The World Will paused briefly, its expression instantly shifting into visible solemnity.
Since its birth from the Spirit Realm, it had always been responsible for managing it.
Aside from a few restricted zones like the Spirit Realm Deep Sea, it had control over everything else.
And over the surface layer, it wielded near-absolute control.
The only flaw in its dominion… was the mirage in the Spirit Realm surface layer related to Blue Star.
That unfamiliar historical era… the strange nuclear war… it had never found the origin of that history.
No such civilization or history had ever occurred in the Ancient God World. Despite countless efforts to collect historical traces, it had gained almost nothing—only deducing that it seemed to be a primitive technological civilization that developed on a blue planet.
The World Will hadn't expected to hear the name "Blue Star" from Rosen's mouth.
"I only know of the mirage on the surface layer of the Spirit Realm."
The World Will responded.
"I discovered traces of Blue Star on the reverse side of the Ancient God World. Does civilization also exist on the reverse side of the Ancient God World?"
Rosen posed the question with a display of curiosity.
"Civilization on the reverse side of the Ancient God World?"
The World Will asked in surprise, not expecting Rosen to touch upon yet another blind spot in its understanding.
"I found some clues during the King's Game..."
Rosen explained, "Behind the Sword True God in the King's Game, an immortal Godfiend from the cosmic void mentioned Blue Star. My curiosity was piqued, so I traced a thread of world origin and found a world sealed off by a ring-shaped mountain, isolating the resentment of all living beings. There, I encountered a time loop that was difficult to comprehend.
Because I worried it might be related to the Ancient Gods and risk waking them, I didn't linger and left right away.
But after leaving, I realized the space coordinates I'd left behind had vanished, and the world origin also remained in that world.
No matter how I searched, I couldn't find that world engulfed by the ring-shaped mountain again.
Also, in the King's Game, I encountered a Holy Spirit Emperor who commanded hundreds of thousands of believers.
Originally, this Holy Spirit Emperor had a chance to win the King's Game but ended up leaving it in the final moments.
I thought the Holy Spirit Emperor would appear in the New World, but after returning there, I spent several years searching through the Eternal Omniscience and the Lord God Network—and still haven't found the slightest trace of the Holy Spirit Emperor."
The World Will's expression turned grim—yet another unforeseen variable had appeared.
Rosen was already a variable, but at least his origin was known.
Plus, given enough benefits, Rosen wasn't the kind of person who would act insensibly.
However, the Blue Star civilization on the reverse side of the Ancient God World, the immortal Godfiends from the cosmic void, and the unheard-of Holy Spirit Emperor—if Rosen hadn't told it, the World Will wouldn't have known. That there were so many things about the Ancient God World it didn't understand unsettled it deeply.
"I will investigate these matters. Once I have results, I'll inform you..."
The World Will said, suppressing its anger after a moment of contemplation.
"Then I won't disturb you any further."
Rosen regretfully prepared to leave.
"Wait."
The World Will called out to stop Rosen. "You need to become an immortal Godfiend as soon as possible. There's a place that might help you. Take out your Secret Brass Book—normal means won't point to this location."
"Then I won't be polite."
Rosen cheerfully took out the Secret Brass Book and handed it to the World Will.
A moment later, the World Will drew a special map.
Rosen looked at the Secret Brass Book—it now showed a map pointing to a specific forbidden zone in the Spirit Realm.
He was still useful to the World Will, so it wasn't likely to harm him.
So, this Spirit Realm forbidden zone was definitely beneficial to him. Still, the World Will might also intend to use him to resolve something within that zone.
Rosen didn't mind being used by the World Will—as long as the benefits were worthwhile, there was nothing he wouldn't do.
But if there were only downsides and no gain, he would definitely seek revenge and settle the score.
Following the directions on the map, Rosen piloted the Golden Crow Starship directly from the Spirit Realm.
The fastest path would have been returning to reality and traveling by data transmission or through a cross-world gate, then reaching the corresponding real-world location tied to that part of the Spirit Realm and re-entering the Spirit Realm from there. But if he took that route, he could forget about ever entering the forbidden zone.
According to the map, the only way into that forbidden zone was to follow a specific route through the Spirit Realm.
In the blink of an eye, more than a month passed. The Golden Crow Starship passed through hundreds of Spirit Domains along the way.
Then in each Spirit Domain, one had to stay for at least a month and gather some of the unique specialties imbued within that domain.
To save time, Rosen could only use the Law of Time to accelerate time in each Spirit Domain.
Eventually, following the guidance of the map, he left the final Spirit Domain. This journey, which had actually consumed several decades' worth of mapped paths, was finally nearing its end.
The Golden Crow Starship traversed the last segment of the map's coordinates, passing from the surface layer of the Spirit World into its deeper regions, approaching the abyssal depths.
Then, all the Spirit Domain specialties collected along the way were thrown out. The spirituality contained within each item intertwined and fused within the void of the Spirit Realm, ultimately forming a special passage leading to a forbidden zone.
Normally, teleportation passages like this were composed of spatial power.
But this passage was different—more like a dream passage.
The moment Rosen put away the Golden Crow Starship and entered the passage, a terrifying force of dreams acted upon him.
Before he could resist the impact of this force, a radiant glow formed from the fusion of hundreds of spiritual energies emerged on his skin. The force of the dream continually wore down this layer of brilliance, and by the time he passed through the passage, only a faint trace of the radiance remained.
Rosen appeared atop a mountain peak. It was nighttime, with only a scattering of stars hanging in the sky.
He looked up at the stars, and the Main God Computer instantly calculated a terrifying result.
Rosen had originally thought the forbidden zone of the Spirit World might be a special Spirit Domain at the level of an Immortal Godfiend.
But based on the range illuminated by the starlight, this place was far more than just a Spirit Domain. If the entire world were a false dreamscape, that would be acceptable. But if it was real, then this would be a vast world on par with the Ancient God World.
The power of the Creator's Eye instantly spread toward the moon, and then followed the moonlight to overlook the entire world.
Rosen saw countless mountains, rivers, and streams—this was a massive land-based world.
Countless civilizations and lives thrived in this world, wielding all sorts of bizarre and extraordinary powers.
Such an enormous real world couldn't possibly be hidden within the Ancient God World.
Maintaining the operation of such a world would require an unimaginably vast amount of energy—only the Primordial Dark Sea could support its existence. Neither the Ancient God World nor the cosmic starry sky could sustain a world like this.
So, this certainly wasn't a real world. Sure enough, under the omniscient probe of eternity, the truth was revealed.
This was not the real world, but a dream world—only, it was so incredibly lifelike that it was difficult to distinguish reality from illusion.
This world clearly contained a Dream Source Seed. Otherwise, it couldn't possibly hold the eternal dream source that blanketed the entire world.
And even if an Immortal Godfiend obtained a Dream Source Seed, they still wouldn't be able to construct a dream world of this magnitude.
So there was only one answer—this was the dream of an Eternal Being.
The Creator's Eye spied upon the world of living beings, and the Main God Computer compiled and organized the information it captured.
In just moments, Rosen was no longer unfamiliar with this dream world.
This world originated from the Eternal Dream Fiend. Its creation myth told of how the Eternal Dream Fiend fell into slumber, then opened the heavens and earth in a dream, creating the world and all its beings. Because of this, the world was named Eternal Dreamscape.
The supernatural systems of this world were wildly varied, but in essence, all of them led to the same destination.
No matter what kind of supernatural system it was, none could escape the realm of energy and law.
The most powerful beings in the Eternal Dreamscape were equivalent to Immortal Godfiends, and there were actually five of them.
No wonder the World Will couldn't do anything about this place. If they called in the Old Angler and the others, it wouldn't be impossible to defeat and destroy the Eternal Dreamscape—but with over ten Immortal Godfiends clashing, the commotion would be too great. If it woke the Ancient Gods, then no one would survive.
Because this was a dream world, the Eternal Dreamscape was filled with things that would seem absurd in the real world.
It was unclear whether it was influenced by the Ancient God World, but many lifeforms in the Eternal Dreamscape didn't differ much from those in the Ancient God World.
Rosen flashed through the void, crossing thousands of miles in an instant and arriving outside a mountain range, near a village with a civilization level similar to ancient times.
At this time, dawn had not yet broken, and the villagers were busy within their homes.
Candles and oil lamps were precious. In a pitch-dark, ancient society, the most common entertainment was making babies.
But unlike the real world, where it took ten months for a child to be born, here it shockingly took only a single night.
By the time the sky grew faintly bright and roosters began to crow, cries of newborns rang out from many homes.
Then, after each household finished breakfast, the village already had several new children running about on the ground.
The elderly in every household stayed behind to take care of the children, while the young and strong began farming and hunting in the village.
Farming here required no seeds at all; seeds could be generated simply through imagination and planted.
Then, blood would be used to water the seeds, and the crops would be fully matured before the sun set.
Harvesting the crops was also very simple: any part of the crops that could not be eaten would vanish once they reached their full growth.
The remaining edible portions would be collected by the village chief, who would toss a special bag above the village. All the harvested crops would immediately rise from the fields and fall into the seemingly bottomless bag. The crops would then split in two, with one part being distributed to the villagers, and the rest disappearing back into the bag.
When the young and strong returned home after a day of hard work, they were already aged and entering their twilight years.
Meanwhile, the newborns born just that morning had already reached full adulthood by the end of the day.
As for the elderly in the village, after their final meal, they would head into the mountains to be devoured by the wild beasts.
"Only three days to live; everyone is born with knowledge, which can be passed down to future generations."
After summarizing, Rosen left the village and headed toward the nearest county town.
Compared to the villages, the people in the county could live for seven days.
It was still a day to adulthood, but since there was no need for bloodletting to farm, adults could live for five days. Children were also born on the last day, and the elderly still had to take care of children during the day. At night, they would not need to go into the mountains but would have to self-immolate on the city walls.
Every night, the city walls would be lit by countless torches made from flesh and blood.
These torches were used to repel the various monsters that appeared in the darkness.
As for the larger cities, the people there could live for a year.
In the state capital, they could live for a hundred years.
From the county capital onward, people could start mastering true supernatural powers.
All supernatural powers were related to dreams, and only those who mastered supernatural abilities could defend against the monsters born from the night outside the city walls.
The larger the population, the easier it was for stronger monsters to be born outside the city.
The villages, on the other hand, had small populations, so they were less likely to be attacked by monsters and only had to deal with wild animals.
However, with the elderly feeding the wild beasts, the villages were rarely attacked.
After observing carefully, Rosen didn't find anything particularly valuable.
He realized he should have consulted with the world's will more often. It seemed like after gaining eternal omniscience, he had become a bit arrogant.
However, the observations weren't wasted; he had gathered information on the various supernatural systems in this world.
The main god computer was already compiling the knowledge related to these systems and would soon find something useful.
If nothing valuable came up, he would attempt to get close to the five immortal godfiends.
The terrifying computational power of the main god computer soon brought Rosen a pleasant surprise.
The lifeforms in this world also possessed spirituality. As long as they survived for over a month, their spirituality would naturally be born. With this spirituality, they could control dreams, create things out of nothing with their imagination, and even grow their spirituality at an incredibly fast rate during their prime.
Rosen had already realized why the world's will had sent him here.
His eternal avatar had infiltrated many races in the new world, and after walking the night paths for so long, it was inevitable that he would run into ghosts. The world's will must have already known about the existence of his eternal avatar. He could completely replace the native lifeforms of this eternal dream world with his eternal avatars.
Then, during their prime years, these avatars would rapidly grow their spirituality. In their later years, he would retrieve the accumulated spirituality.
Through this method, his divine essence could grow quickly.
Of course, this was not the only method. The eternal dream world surely had its own unique treasures. However, to acquire these treasures, he would have to face the immortal godfiends. All the good things in this world had already fallen into their hands.
But the world's will was behind in its understanding. Rosen had already mastered the root insect mother.
Countless root insect mothers descended from the sky and merged into the countless lifeforms of the eternal dream world, parasitizing and fusing with them.
The root insect mothers would pass down from generation to generation in every household.
Rosen didn't plan on depleting everything; while the root insect mothers absorbed some of the spiritual essence, they would also help the lifeforms in this world better absorb the power of the eternal dream, essentially allowing him to siphon the dream world's power through countless lifeforms.
He couldn't fight all five immortal godfiends at once, but he could use the root insect mothers to drain the eternal dream world.
Once the eternal dream was gone, the five immortal godfiends, who had relied on it for their existence, would undoubtedly lose much of their power. At that point, the world's will would not stand by and watch, and he could use the five immortal godfiends to test the strength of the old fisherman and others.
As time passed, the eternal dream world, which had remained unchanged for millennia, began to show signs of change.
The strange dream monsters born from the night's darkness became fewer and fewer. Without the threat of these monsters, humans no longer needed to make sacrifices to fend them off. Naturally, the period of prime adulthood began to extend.
The subsequent result was that more and more humans began to master supernatural powers.
In time, the humans in the eternal dream world would undoubtedly increase in number.
(End of Chapter)