Myth: The Ruler of Spirituality

...

The hustle and bustle belong to the living, and have nothing to do with the dead, at least for Nuo at present. Although many matters related to him were still ongoing, they were no longer of any consequence to him.

Perhaps with the coming of the Third Era, some souls with strong obsessions from their lives could linger in the Mortal Realm after death, transforming into a different kind of life. But fundamentally, this was not a continuation of their lifespan.

Without the balance of a physical body, the characteristics of the spirit were manifested a thousandfold. Those souls that stayed due to extreme emotions were naturally influenced by said emotions, and before long, they could be considered a different entity with the same memories.

Clearly, Nuo was not among them as he harbored no intense reluctance, resentment, or regret, so like a soul as ordinary as any other, he was drawn by some invisible guiding force to the Underworld and then fell into the waters of the River of Oblivion.

The icy waters rushed over his soul, and the current that should have gradually sapped his memories was suddenly blocked. Traces of Sacred Power surged from Nuo’s soul and easily isolated that force. But under the chill stimulation, the originally transparent soul-body quivered slightly.

Memories were awakened, just like a cool handful of water wiping one’s face in the morning, instantly causing his previously sluggish thoughts to spring back into action.

"Is this... the Underworld?"

With a perplexed expression, Nuo shook his head.

In the past, he had heard of the Underworld more than once, and even when Bronze Humanity was still around, there were rumors that the plagues and diseases in the Mortal Realm, though released by Pandora, had their origin in the gods of the Underworld.

Therefore, Hades was viewed by mortals as a deity leaning towards the malevolent side. Even in human city-states that revered the Olympian Gods, the existence of Hades was deliberately ignored. No one would carve his statue, as it was considered an ominous symbol.

But this had nothing to do with Nuo, who just looked up at the Nether Moon in the Sky over the surging currents of the Styx River. He had not seen the archangel before, but he had certainly heard her name more than once.

The River of Oblivion rushed forward, and scenes that existed only in legend flashed before Nuo’s eyes.

The River of Vows, a fluid made of molten lava, corpses with life that could move. Until at a certain moment, as if passing through an invisible barrier, everything in the Underworld was left behind. The surroundings changed abruptly, and what appeared before Nuo was a new world.

Four moons of different colors hung in the Sky, two of which gave him a familiar feeling; other tributaries of the Styx converged here, and wherever he looked, there were soul-bodies.

At the edge of the horizon, seemingly in the center of the world, two-colored lights pierced through heaven and earth. They rotated slowly, influencing each other as if elucidating the ultimate principles of the universe.

All of this was new to Nuo, but his mood was exceedingly calm. He had asked the Angel for an utterly ordinary death, so he was prepared— to be judged at the end of the River of Oblivion for his deeds in life and then cast into the Well of Reincarnation to begin a new life, or perhaps kept here due to his exceptionally good deeds, doing his best in a new position.

But reality did not proceed as he thought it would. As the River of Oblivion flowed, Nuo suddenly found at a certain moment, the souls that had been traveling with him had vanished, and his location had changed.

The river that originated from the All-Spirit Realm seemed to have been diverted by some force, bringing him to a place dark and immeasurable.

"Is this..."

Chaos intertwined here, and space-time twisted against each other. The moment he arrived here, as the first mortal to reach the fifth level of the Spirit Realm, Nuo felt as if millions of lives were speaking in his ears, and endless shadows of light flickered past.

In a blur, he seemed to see the earth divide into four, countless things emerging from the ground; he saw shadows streak across the sky, the Sun splitting into two, then merging back into one.

Everything trembled, two indescribable entities confronted each other in the void, past and future were inverted, reality and illusion blurred... But all these visions were just a trance, and when Nuo woke from the illusions, he had truly set foot in the fifth layer of the Spirit Realm.

He did not know what he had just seen, but he soon had no more time to think about it. For right in front of him, he saw the figure he had only met once before. An eternal radiance shone upon It, and the world flowed with Its breath.

Unbeknownst to Nuo, Laine’s power was being unleashed without restraint into space-time to maintain the stability of negative energy, resonating with the entire Spirit Realm’s power. At this moment, Nuo felt as if he was witnessing the beginning of all things, the ultimate truth, as though time itself wanted to halt before the will of the deity.

He bowed his head because even the remnants of the same-source sacred power in his soul were straining to protect his existence, and he felt that just one more glance would cause him to completely vanish into nothingness due to his inability to comprehend this supreme Law.

Nuo was not afraid of death, but that did not mean he wanted to die in such a ridiculous manner before the throne of a deity.

"Great Lord of All Spirits, Source of Time and Space, Your faithful follower presents himself to You!"

"Your incarnation in the Mortal Realm guided humanity away from Destined Destruction, and now I have finally fulfilled the mission You entrusted to me, sustaining the spark of civilization in the Mortal Realm."

"Now, I have once again come before You."

Laine bowed his head, looking at the person prostrated in the void. Just like hundreds of years ago, he could still see that kindness in the other person.

But contrary to what the other person believed, he actually did not care about all that he had done in the Mortal Realm, whether it was leading humans away from disaster or establishing Silver Moon City; he had not paid much attention to it.

What he truly cared about was that Nuo, after having seen it all, after witnessing the near-worshipful reverence some people of Silver Moon City held for him, still retained his unchanged faith.

Laine himself had never been a devout person, neither in the past nor now; he had never had a firm faith in anything, existent or nonexistent. He had once thought that devout faith came from backwardness, from a lack of knowledge, from ignorance and fear, but reality had proved otherwise.

Even Cohen would begin to question the gods as the years passed... Why hadn’t Nuo? That’s what he thought, so he asked. The reason he had summoned Nuo here was just for this question.

"Why do you have faith in me?" the deity asked. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Nuo was slightly taken aback; he had never thought about this question. But in this moment, feeling the breath that seemed like all truths, he believed he should have an answer.

"Because I think all life in this world needs beliefs to survive, whatever those beliefs may be."

"It can be the will to live, it can be greed, it can be the good will to help others, or it can be the evil to destroy everything."

"Nothing in this world can encompass all of these at the same time, except for the world itself."

With a slight smile, Laine didn’t know if he was satisfied with the answer. He simply raised his hand lightly, granting the response its deserved reward.