In the Gourd World, the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor had already been torn apart alive by the Eternal Immortal Vine.
More precisely, when the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor resisted, he ended up tearing his own body to shreds.
Even so, he couldn't escape. Many of the sealing skills layered on the Eternal Immortal Vine specifically targeted the soul and divine essence, so even the Immortal Soul of the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor was sealed. No matter how he struggled, he couldn't break free.
All he could do was watch helplessly as thread-like worms, visible to the naked eye, burrowed into his body.
Then, in the blink of an eye, his Immortal Soul's stomach began to swell.
At the same time, he grew weaker and weaker. His essence was being continuously drained by the fetus growing inside.
Only when the Immortal Soul was on the verge of collapse did the coiled gourd vine finally use its leaves to slice open his abdomen and extract a serpent egg.
The Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor clearly sensed a soul-level connection between himself and this egg.
With a crack, a tiny hand punched through the hard shell of the Immortal Soul egg from the inside.
Then, crawling out of the egg, came a snake-human hybrid with a human upper body, a serpent tail, and a flicking snake tongue.
Though just born, it already possessed an immortal-grade soul.
Ordinary Immortal Souls were simple—formed by fusing the soul with the source of spirituality and the laws of nature. Once perfectly fused, one could attain an Immortal Soul.
But to further develop an Immortal Soul, it had to merge with the heavens and earth, growing alongside the world itself.
In the beginning, the Eternal Dream Realm had no Immortal World. It was the original Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor who created the Immortal Soul system, carved out a small world, and constantly plundered the Eternal Dream Realm's essence. Bit by bit, it grew, and ultimately, with the combined efforts of the five great Immortal Emperors, the Immortal World was born.
If the Immortal World could one day fully consume the Eternal Dream Realm, then it would inherit some of the properties of an eternal world.
The Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor himself had long lost count of how many eras he spent cultivating and expanding the Immortal World, just to grant his Immortal Soul a trace of immortality.
Yet the monstrous creature he had just given birth to was born with an immortal-grade soul.
Sensing the hostility from the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor, the snake-human hybrid instinctively pounced at him. Sealed by the Eternal Immortal Vine and unable to resist, the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor could only watch as his Immortal Soul was slowly torn apart and devoured.
The moment the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor fell, one-fifth of the Immortal World nearly collapsed.
Not only were the remaining Immortal Emperors terrified—Rosen was also shaken.
Though Immortal Emperors were considered weaker among the undying godfiends, even the weakest of them possessed eternal will. They were not easy to defeat, let alone truly kill.
Rosen had only intended to heavily wound and seal the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor; he had never expected him to die so quickly.
Now it was clear—he had underestimated the Snake Mother Gourd, a genuine Eternal Relic.
Eternal Birth, when amplified by the Snake Mother Gourd, was so powerful that even undying godfiends could hardly resist it.
Moreover, the snake-human born from it naturally inherited a portion of the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor's power, forming an innate counter to him. Otherwise, how could the core eternal will within his Immortal Soul have been erased so quickly?
Rosen had considered using the same method on the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor, but after doing the calculations, he abandoned the idea.
The essence used for Eternal Birth wasn't infinite. The transformation of Source Seeds into essence required time. Nearly all the Eternal Birth essence he'd accumulated over the years had been used on the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor. What remained wasn't enough to deal with the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor.
So if he wanted to kill the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor, he'd have to rely on other means.
In any case, that one was already a trapped beast. The power of Eternal Fall would gradually erode the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor's ability to resist.
Thanks to the death of the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor, Rosen's energy consumption had dropped significantly.
The Doomsday Ark no longer focused solely on evading the pursuit of the three Immortal Emperors. Instead, it began counterattacking occasionally with Judgement Thunder Strikes.
Rosen himself stood at the stern, launching the occasional Revelation Bone Arrow.
Seeing that they couldn't subdue the invader, the pursuit from the three Immortal Emperors—led by the Origin Spirit Immortal Emperor—began to ease.
Rosen thought they were trying to retreat, but he quickly realized they hadn't surrendered yet.
Because the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor who had died actually revived in the Immortal World, Rosen realized that truly eradicating an Immortal Emperor in the Eternal Dream Realm might not be so simple. Although he returned far weaker—and the Primordial Spirit's Golden Lamp remained sealed in the Imperial Treasury and had not reappeared—the fact remained: he had died and come back to life.
In the Dream Realm, the cost of resurrection was a thousand times lower than in reality. Reviving the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor here was even easier than the Sky Emperor's rebirth in the King's Game.
Under the pursuit of four Immortal Emperors, the Doomsday Ark's pressure rose again. Rosen picked the softest target: he trained his Revelation Bone Arrows on the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor and kept firing.
Already frail, the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor was repeatedly wounded by arrow after arrow. Helpless, he dare not approach the Ark, and could only hang back to cast auxiliary Immortal Arts for his fellow Origin Spirit Immortal Emperors.
As time passed, the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor in the Fallen Paradise unknowingly drifted into slumber, corrupted by his awakened True Self. At first, he could still fight the Fallen Sovereign and the Golden King to a standstill, but as Eternal Fall stirred his primal True Self, he inevitably succumbed to sleep.
Instinctively, the True Self longed for sleep—dreams were the very essence of dream-born life. Even Rosen, with his eternal will, could not doze off without using Dream-Realm or Slumber Law skills. So it was no wonder the Soul Origin, a being born of dreams, desired slumber and fell under Eternal Fall's sway.
Seizing the opportunity, Rosen deployed countless Primordial Worm Matriarchs to parasitize the Soul Origin's divine body. Although Eternal Birth was fast, it consumed too much essence against undying godfiends; the Worm Matriarchs were harder to implant but barely taxed his reserves.
With leftover strength, he enlisted the Fallen Scholar to transform the Origin Spirit Emperors' resurrection arts into forbidden lore. Once they forgot how to revive one another, no Immortal Emperor reborn could ever rise again. Memories lay buried until needed—so the Scholar's subtle sealing of those resurrection spells would go unnoticed until the moment of rebirth.
Days passed in the Fallen Paradise as time sped up a thousandfold—over a decade in real time. The Worm Matriarchs had begun to assault the Soul Origin's Immortal Soul. Their surface infestation was tolerable, but if they burrowed too deep, they would rouse him—and eternal slumber did not equate to a willing death.
Determined to prolong his dormancy, Rosen marshaled every musician in the Radiant Kingdom for a grand performance of the Eternal Night Lullaby. He then produced the Miracle Vessel and brewed vast quantities of True God–grade Divine Sleep Potion. Although higher-tier formulas no longer had fixed recipes, gathering rare ingredients was harder than crafting the potion itself.
Quantity mattered more than quality—and under the Worm Matriarchs' thrall, the Soul Origin hovered between waking and sleeping.
After several days in reality, Rosen saw the Soul Origin on the brink of full awakening. The Matriarchs had invaded part of his Soul, leaving him critically weakened—killing him now would be easy. Yet Rosen chose another path: he infused the Eternal Spark into the Immortal Soul through the Worm Matriarchs.
Once parasitized, they took root, grew, and split—merging completely with the Soul Origin's essence. Through them, Rosen overlaid his control skills and briefly seized command of the Immortal Soul. He then channeled the Eternal Spark, activated the Miracle trait Savage Will—sacrificing wisdom for a tremendous surge of power to strike all enemies around him.
Rosen used the Creator's Domain to cast the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor out of the Fallen Paradise. When the Soul Origin fully awoke, he had already lost all reason to Savage Will, plunging into a feral, rage-filled frenzy.
Upon spotting his fellow Origin Spirit Immortal Emperors ahead, he lunged at them, and in a blur of claws and fangs they turned on one another in a desperate, life-or-death slaughter.
Intelligent beings almost always retain some vestige of humanity. Though the five Immortal Emperors were allies, they'd never truly trusted one another—each constantly wary of ill intent. No one could guarantee that a moment's malevolence wouldn't arise.
Trapped alone in the Fallen Paradise, the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor felt the chill of isolation even before the battle began. He said nothing, but the threat of death pressed on him like ice.
Still, his wisdom and reason kept those dark instincts in check—until both were stripped away, leaving only raw frenzy. Then the malevolent thoughts long buried by his intellect erupted uncontrollably.
Rosen retracted the Doomsday Ark and stepped through the open Rift Gate, circling behind them.
Following at a distance—and spared from the internecine carnage—the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor saw Rosen and turned to flee. But he couldn't outpace the unfolding of the Creator's Domain, nor evade his own son, who teleported in from within the domain.
After consuming the Primordial Spirit's Immortal Soul, his son had grown rapidly. Though bodiless, his soul shared the same root, allowing him to inhabit the resurrected shell of the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor.
At the precise moment Rosen's Revelation Bone Arrow pierced the shoulder and shattered the defenses, the half-human, half-serpent Immortal-Soul serpent man slipped into the Primordial Spirit's body. Within the Sea of Consciousness, father and son clashed in a deadly battle of souls.
Already weakened, the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor struggled to fend off the innate counter of his serpent-soul offspring. Outside, Rosen's bone arrows rained down, each one seeking the fleeing soul.
In a matter of heartbeats, the once-resurrected Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor was obliterated again. On the other side, the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor's own onslaught had left him gravely wounded.
Realizing they could not rouse him, and faced with his suicidal assault, the three Origin Spirit Immortal Emperors unleashed everything they had. Together they crushed the Soul Origin Immortal Emperor with the might of their combined powers.
One side fell, and then the other. As the Primordial Spirit Immortal Emperor was slain a second time, the Origin Spirit Emperors used their Sacred Soul Pagoda to obliterate the wounded Soul Origin Immortal Emperor.
Fleeing back through the Rift Gate to the Immortal World, the three regrouped—planning to resurrect their fallen allies before mounting another defense. Yet when they prepared the resurrection rites, they found themselves at a loss. Unbeknownst to them, Rosen had converted those very spells into forbidden lore, and they'd already forgotten the incantations. Without those Arts, they could only rely on the power of the Eternal Dream Realm—and that would take countless ages.
For the first time, the Origin Spirit Immortal Emperors felt genuine fear toward the invader. Rosen had not pursued them into the Immortal World—if he'd driven them into a corner, they might have fought to the last breath. Even if they'd killed him and mortally wounded his forces, the Eternal Dream Realm would still be defended by the Lingjie, and a misstep could awaken an Ancient God.
Now, with mutual dread established, both sides held back.
Meanwhile, Rosen's Primordial Worm Matriarchs had already infested the Immortal World. The longer they remained, the deeper their parasitic hold grew. He pressed on, siphoning the Dream Realm's essence to weaken it further.
Once the Dream Realm's power was sufficiently drained, traversing in and out would be trivial. Then the World Will itself would intervene, and with inside-outside coordination, he could seize the Eternal Dream Realm—and in the meantime, accelerate his own divine-essence growth.
A few months later, the Destroyed Mortal World was reborn. Nearly indistinguishable from its former self, its dynasties remained, its cities stood, and all the sentient lives once lost returned with its reconstruction.
After all, the most likely form of the Eternal Dream Realm is the dream of an eternal life in slumber. Though its Dreamer had been slain by the Ancient God, the Dream-Seed had merged into the Dream Realm. The original Eternal Dream Realm was a looping, cinematic dreamscape.
One day, an Origin Spirit Immortal Emperor had awakened to the truth—that he was trapped in an endless dream. Thus he grew and eventually carved out the Immortal World separate from the Dream Realm.
He realized he alone could not drain the Dream Realm—so the four great Immortal Emperors emerged in succession. This theory, Rosen deduced from the memory fragments in the serpent-soul man—born of the Primordial Spirit's own soul—though they remained tangled and incomplete.
Now, aided by the Main God Computer, Rosen helped the serpent-soul man sort through its chaotic memories.
With the Mortal World restored, Rosen unleashed his Worm Matriarchs once more. He cloaked the Mortal World in the Immortal Realm, using the Miracle Game to craft ever-evolving rules—no longer simple, but growing ever more potent.
Through the Imperial Sacred Sword, he forged new Edicts—each one refined and strengthened over time.
Give him a few years, and the Immortal World would no longer dare threaten the Mortal World's destruction so lightly. Together, they would stand as independent worlds within the Eternal Dream Realm, jointly draining its life force to its eventual end.
Meanwhile, through the Primordial Worm Matriarchs, Rosen continually drew spiritual-essence from all living beings, refining and purifying it as nourishment for the Eternal Root. He then fed those nutrients into the Eternal Root Seed—so it could sprout, bloom, and bear fruit.
(End of chapter)