One's body was the carrier of the soul, while the soul was the carrier of the consciousness. If one's
body was destroyed, his or her fragile soul would then be exposed to enemy attacks, leading to his or
her immediate annihilation. As the soul vanished, so would the consciousness contained in it.
Even if one reached the Holy Soul Realm, the Eternal Realm, or even if they became creatures of the
higher-grade worlds, this rule would still apply.
Throughout the entire world, Clarence and Mastema were the only ones who escaped this restriction.
Even if their bodies and souls were damaged, their consciousness remained intact. However, right now,
Zen and the Evil God had also reached their status and became their equals.
All of them were now at the point of origin, where the concept of space and time did not exist.
Everything had been compressed into an infinitely small point. The pressure was crushing, and no
living beings could possibly survive under such harsh circumstances. However, the downgrader was
surprised as he discovered that his consciousness still remained.
"Ha-ha!
I did it! I survived it all!
Now, I am the ultimate winner and the only ruler of this world!"
For a while, the downgrader thought that he was the only one who survived.
He was ecstatic as he assumed that he had finally achieved his ultimate goal. He had downgraded the
entire world to the World of Nothingness but his consciousness carried on.
With that, he thought that the world was now his belonging, including all substances and energy within
it.
At this infinitesimal point, everything felt so crowded, including his own consciousness. He tried to
sense his surrounding environment, although technically, the concept of "surroundings" did not exist at
the point of origin because everything had been integrated into a single point.
But the moment he sensed his surroundings, he immediately realized that there was a familiar aura
near him. In fact, it was attached to him.
"Clarence!
Why are you still alive?"
The downgrader was extremely shocked as he recognized that he wasn't alone.
"Why are you so surprised?" Clarence asked calmly as if he already knew all along.
"What?"
The downgrader couldn't be more astonished at this turn of events. All this time, he thought that he was
the only existence at this narrow point of origin, but it turned out that Clarence had also survived along
with him. Moreover, it was as if the two of them had become a part of a whole.
Furthermore, as the downgrader was still recovering from the shock of finding out that he was actually
with Clarence, he suddenly discovered that there were two more auras around them. After carefully
sensing where these auras belonged to, he was even more flabbergasted.
"What the hell?! How could this be? Why didn't you die?!"
Zen and the Evil God didn't respond as the downgrader addressed them.
At this point, all four of them had clearly sensed each other's aura.
They found out that the four of them co-existed in this cramped point — the downgrader, Clarence, the
Evil God, and Zen.
This was actually a rather abnormal and extremely dangerous situation. All of them, except the
downgrader, had partially realized their co-existence much earlier, but they didn't utter a word. Then,
soon after, the downgrader finally recognized the situation they were in.
Clarence had kept quiet for a reason. It was because he began to merge with the downgrader. To be
exact, he began to devour the downgrader's consciousness without him realizing it.
The existence of the Source Light in the higher-grade worlds had made it impossible for Clarence to
subdue Mastema. However, now that the Source Light had dissipated since everything was reduced to
the point of origin, Mastema had just lost his life-saving straw.
The moment Clarence made his move earlier, Zen and the Evil God also followed suit.
They had been on full alert against each other since the beginning. At this infinitesimal point of origin,
nobody had any room for retreat. They had no other option but to merge and devour each other in
order to prevail. It was crucially important for each of them to dominate this process.
Swoosh!
The moment Zen started merging with the Evil God's consciousness, a broad world of memories
unfolded in his mind. All of the past memories of the Evil God were completely revealed to him.
From the Evil God's birth in his inner world, to his journey in the Source World, his acquaintance with
Shera, his involvement with the Black Ship, and his cruel slaughter on the Other Shore. No detail was
spared and nothing remained a secret.
On the other hand, the same thing happened as the Evil God attempted to merge with Zen's
consciousness. All of Zen's past experiences were displayed before the Evil God's eyes. The entirety of
his long journey from the Eastern Region to the Source World played out like a tremendously long film.
'Damn! There's too many. If I want to fuse with Zen's consciousness and absorb him, I have to take in
all of his memories!' the Evil God thought as he began to panic.
'He's also taking in all of my memories.
If he finished more quickly, I would be replaced by him instead!'
Deeming a strong sense of urgency within the Evil God's consciousness, he began to go through Zen's
memories like crazy.
Obviously, Zen had also realized how he could overcome the Evil God. He would have to take all of the
Evil God's memories as his own, as fast as he could. But when he continued to do so, he was briefly
stopped by a surprising fact.
He found out that he already possessed most of the memories from the earlier life of the Evil God.
He even shared some memories of the Evil God exploring the Source World after leaving his inner
world. This was because he had once subdued the Evil God after he rebelled against him.
After all, the Evil God was a creature from his inner world, and he was omniscient in everything when it
came to it.
In fact, he had once invaded the memories of the Evil God's earlier life so that he would be able to deal
with him. Therefore, since he already saw the majority of the Evil God's memories, it didn't take him
much time to completely assimilate all of them.
On the other hand, although the Evil God was trying hard to take in Zen's memories, he fell behind
quickly because he had never pried into Zen's memories before. Besides, even when they shared the
broken Source World as the primitive land, the omniscient power possessed by the Evil God didn't
enable him to probe into Zen's mind.
Soon enough, their gap just grew larger with every passing second.
In fact, when the Evil God took in about half of Zen's memories, Zen had almost completely absorbed
all of the Evil God's memories.
Suddenly, the Evil God felt a sense of loss in his mind. It was as if he began losing his memories.
Slowly but steadily, he could no longer recall his past, his loved ones, his formidable power, and finally,
even his own self.
"No! This can't be! I won't be defeated! Never!"
As the Evil God began to completely lose his self, his consciousness shook intensely.
He never thought that after all that he had been through, he would lose to Zen this way.
However, he had lost the fight of acquiring memories right from the beginning. No matter how intelligent
he was, this was something that he could not overcome by mere strategies.
Anger, resentment, and agony…
These were his remaining emotions as his consciousness fleeted little by little.
Then, after a while, his consciousness just suddenly ended as if it never existed.
At the same time, what emerged in place of it was Zen's consciousness.
Right from this moment, he was Zen and also the Evil God. Under the influence of the Evil God's
memories, Zen's aura had slightly changed. It was laced with a trace of evil. However, his personality
remained the same, it was all Zen.
"Are you done too?" Zen asked Clarence, who was also supposed to be in a battle for memories
against the downgrader.
He knew that Clarence and Mastema had also been aggressively devouring each other's
consciousness. Earlier, he was still a little doubtful of the possible outcome of their battle. However, as
he recalled the process of how he devoured the Evil God's consciousness, he grew confident that
Clarence could clearly handle it with ease.
This was because he knew that Clarence had been living in isolation in the perfect land for countless
years. Clarence's existence was several times longer compared to that of Mastema. Thus, it would be
impossible for Mastema to complete the process before Clarence did.
After a while. Clarence replied in a soft voice, "Mastema, he… He has finally returned to me now.
We've become one again."
"That's good to hear then," Zen said gladly.
"I see that you've also overcome him," Clarence remarked as he sensed a trace of the Evil God from
Zen's aura.
"Yes. So, what now? Is it necessary for us to merge ourselves too?" Zen asked with a hint of hesitation.
He clearly knew that if they tried to devour each other's consciousness, then he would definitely lose.
Compared to Clarence's seemingly infinite span of life, Zen's would look like just a second.
"If I wanted to merge with you, then why would I have to make the perfect land like this?" Clarence said
with a positive tone.
He regarded Zen as a solver, thus it was meaningless for him to devour Zen.
"What happens after this?" Zen asked out of curiosity.
"Well, just wait for a while," Clarence replied.
However, at this point, there was no light, no space, nor distance at the point of origin. There was also
no concept of time.
So, Zen just fell silent and waited just as Clarence told him.
Since time didn't exist, it was hard to grasp if a lot of time had already passed or if it was just a few
seconds.
As they fell silent, it felt like a short moment had passed, but it also felt like it had already been several
years.
Then, all of a sudden, Zen sensed a gap appearing before him.
He thought that it should be just an illusion since neither physical body nor soul existed here. Their
consciousness was the only thing left. Thus, how could he be physically aware of this gap?
For him, it was such an incredible sensation.
"Did you feel it?" This time, he heard that it was Clarence's physical voice that was asking.
"Yes! What is this?" Zen replied.
"It's the point of origin. It is beginning to split," Clarence answered in what seemed like a riddle to
Zen.
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