The Bright Main World and the Dark Main World

"Too powerful, so even its attributes are difficult to discern..."

Rosen looked at the Miracle Stone Golem before him with a complex expression.

This miracle lifeform was not a Great True God, at most a True God, as it contained spiritual energy rather than divine energy or a True God's will. However, this True God-level stone golem, as long as it could complete the qualitative transformation of its spiritual energy, could easily become a Great True God.

The Miracle Stone Golem's vague memories and simplicity were partly due to its spiritual energy having quantity but lacking quality.

It was like stuffing a child's soul into a giant's body. Being able to control the body's movements was already impressive; developing great intelligence was much harder. The child's soul would struggle to operate the body, leaving no room for additional memories, let alone developing great intelligence.

However, this was also a good thing. Otherwise, Rosen wouldn't have trusted this Miracle Stone Golem.

Rosen continued to study the small World Tree stone carving. The carving itself was nothing special, made of True God-level stone material.

It was likely the work of the Miracle Stone Golem. However, within the spirit realm inside the carving, the small World Tree, worshiped by hundreds of thousands of stone golems kneeling on one knee, was made of stone material that far surpassed True God-level. It was likely crafted from Great True God-level stone material.

Judging by the traces of time, it was probably not the work of the stone golems but of Shi Yan, which was why the stone golems revered it as a sacred relic.

Rosen tried to snap off a branch of the stone tree but found it impossible to break, let alone shatter.

However, he soon discovered a new clue behind the stone book: a migration map left by the hundreds of thousands of stone golems over countless years. This map could pinpoint all the ruins they left behind, each containing discarded spirit realm stone carvings made of remaining True God-level stone material.

If he could collect all of these, it wouldn't be difficult to grow the small World Tree to 100%.

However, these items could be retrieved at any time. What interested Rosen more now was studying the Miracle Stone Golem.

Although its attributes were difficult to discern, Rosen quickly figured out the Miracle Stone Golem's abilities.

First, the Miracle Stone Golem could carve, and its carving skill surpassed that of a Sequence 0 sculptor.

Second, it possessed terrifying mining abilities, which was how it had nearly reached the top of the Sky-Piercing Pillar single-handedly.

Third, it had immense defensive power, making it difficult even for True Gods to harm it.

Finally, the Miracle Stone Golem could not fight. The hundreds of thousands of stone golems were created by Shi Yan using the Ancient God's Stone Chisel, and since there were no enemies within the Sky-Piercing Pillar, these stone golems had never developed combat skills. Thus, the Miracle Stone Golem would struggle to defeat even an ordinary deity.

Rosen activated his World Domain and temporarily placed the Miracle Stone Golem within his divine territory.

As for the small World Tree stone carving in the basket, he also attempted to store it in his divine territory to see if it could block the darkness corroding the spirit realm inside the carving. Sure enough, the darkness outside the spirit realm disappeared, but the spirit realm inside continued to collapse.

Clearly, the Miracle Stone Golem was not skilled in world creation.

Rosen also collected the numerous imitations of the Ancient God's Stone Chisel made from the stone golem's heart. Without these suppressing the mining tunnels, the stone walls immediately began to grow. He carefully observed the growth of the rocks, left behind a Death God avatar, and then merged into the rocks to retrace his path.

The journey here had taken over half a year, but the return trip took a full year.

Because he had to follow the map to locate the stone men's abandoned ruins and collect all the divine-rank stone sculptures, it took him longer than expected. 

Among the treasures gathered by the miraculous stone man, there were quite a few pieces of divine-rank stone. However, when Rosen tested them, he found that the powdered form of these stones held no appeal to the Little World Tree. Clearly, they did not contain any traces of the World Tree's essence. 

This meant that divine-rank stone could only accumulate the World Tree's essence after being sculpted into statues. Rosen speculated that the central part of the Sky-Piercing Pillar had continuously grown, enveloping these ancient stone carvings over countless years, allowing them to gradually absorb fragments of the World Tree's essence. Ordinary divine-rank stone, on its own, simply lacked this ability. 

If extracting the essence were that easy, then the one overseeing the Suspended Empire wouldn't be just a mere True God—it would be a Great True God. 

After collecting every stone sculpture marked on the map, he ended up with a staggering total of over ten thousand. 

This was an enormous fortune. The World Government had spent years excavating the first three hundred thousand vertical miles of the stone men's ruins. In contrast, in just a single year, Rosen had unearthed everything from the remaining nine hundred thousand miles. The sheer value of these sculptures was unimaginable. 

However, such treasures could not be openly displayed—at least, not under his real identity. 

Rosen entered the Mysterious Study Room, then connected with the Death God clone he had left in the upper layers. Before long, the clone adjusted the spatial anchor within the Mysterious Study Room, and as Rosen stepped out, he found himself back in the mine. 

After a year of growth, the surrounding rock had nearly sealed off the entire mine tunnel. 

Once again, Rosen materialized the painted replica of the Ancient God's Stone Chisel, then phased into the rock, ascending in a straight line. 

He wanted to see for himself—what lay at the very top of the Sky-Piercing Pillar? 

And why was the rock near the top still growing, while the rock at the bottom had lost that ability? 

Half a month later, he finally neared the pinnacle of the Sky-Piercing Pillar. 

Just a few dozen miles more, and he would be able to step out onto the top surface. 

However, beyond that point lay an endless darkness—he wasn't reckless enough to charge in blindly. 

The stone men had spent countless ages trying to reach the top of the pillar, and it was unlikely they were doing so simply to find a better place to live. 

To be safe, Rosen didn't use his Self-Portrait Clone to explore. 

Some injuries could transfer directly from a clone back to the main body. 

Instead, he flipped open his Void Sketchbook and materialized a single angel and a shadow fiend—both beings created from his sequence-3 spiritual paintings. With the power of the Ancient God's Stone Chisel surrounding them, the two test subjects crossed the final stretch of rock and stepped onto the summit of the Sky-Piercing Pillar. 

For half a day, nothing unusual happened. The angel then took flight, soaring into the darkness. 

At first, Rosen could still sense its position. But then, all of a sudden, the connection was severed. The feedback from that moment wasn't like a normal death—it felt more like a spatial shift, as though the angel had been teleported away. 

Rosen ran multiple tests, but every attempt yielded the same result. 

Regardless of how far a subject traveled into the darkness, after exactly fifteen minutes, they would suddenly vanish. This time limit never changed. However, if they turned back and re-entered the pillar before the fifteen-minute mark, they would remain unaffected. 

Now it was time for a real experiment. Rosen set the Mysterious Study Room's anchor to a sequence-2 shadow fiend's dark world. 

Then, he let the shadow fiend remain in the darkness for the full fifteen minutes. 

From within the Mysterious Study Room, Rosen's Bronze Dragon clone observed through the World Window, seeing everything through the shadow fiend's vision. 

The moment the time limit expired, the surrounding darkness seemed to come alive, engulfing the shadow fiend. 

A moment later, the darkness dissipated. 

The shadow fiend found itself standing in the middle of a vast forest. 

Even more surprising—his previously vanished angels and shadow fiends had all reestablished their connection with him.

The farthest apart were several thousand miles, while the closest were less than a thousand meters away.

It seemed that the darkness's teleportation randomly placed the scouts within a certain range.

Rosen sensed the external environment through the shadow demon, and his first impression was that this unknown world was full of problems.

First, the laws distributed throughout the world were clearly different from those of the main world.

The authority over rules he had mastered here would likely function at less than 10% effectiveness.

However, not all were useless. The laws of flesh, life, and death could function at 100% power here. These three laws shared a commonality: they were all old laws from the previous Ancient God Era.

Rosen immediately thought of a possibility: could this be the main world of the previous Ancient God Era?

Although it was said that the main world of the previous Ancient God Era had vanished, leading to the birth of the current main world in this Ancient God Era,

nothing is absolute. Perhaps a part of the previous main world had remained.

Whether this assumption was correct or not could be determined by thoroughly exploring this world.

Rosen directly released a group of shadow demons, beginning a carpet search of the area within a radius of ten thousand miles.

He also tested whether his true body, still inside the Sky-Piercing Pillar, could alter the spatial anchor of the Mysterious Study Room. With an escape route secured, he had no worries. Under the reckless exploration of the numerous shadow demons, he soon made quite a few discoveries.

This mountain range was not the first place visitors had come to.

The World Government knew that the upper part of the Sky-Piercing Pillar was enveloped in darkness and must have studied the endless darkness. Many had been sent to scout, but those who entered the darkness disappeared, leaving the World Government unable to determine whether they were alive or dead.

Over time, with no messages returning, the World Government assumed these people had died.

In reality, those sent by the World Government to scout were not dead but had all landed in this nearby mountain range.

These people had no Mysterious Study Room and could not find their way home.

With no other choice, they could only take things one step at a time in this strange world.

Before leaving, they had considered whether the World Government might send more people and eventually find a way home, so they left various directional clues in the mountains.

However, Rosen also noticed one thing: none of the clues left behind had been updated.

This meant that after leaving the mountain range, none of those people had returned to update the clues. They might have died outside, or perhaps this mountain range was a one-way exit with no re-entry.

Regardless of the possibility, following the directional clues was the best option.

Rosen sent shadow demons in all the directions indicated by the clues, while he himself focused on the direction most people had chosen.

After traversing tens of thousands of miles of mountainous terrain, he finally left the mountain range.

Along the way, he stopped and started, constantly discovering new directional clues.

Rosen even sent shadow demons back along the path at intervals. Now that he had finally left the mountain range, the mountains did not prevent the shadow demons from returning. Logically, there should have been clues left at the exit, but after searching the surrounding area, he found none.

Now, having lost his target, Rosen had no choice but to disperse his forces and explore in all directions.

Over the past few days, he had already noticed many anomalies in this world.

First, it was always daytime, and the sun in the sky showed no signs of movement.

Second, every time he looked up at the sun for too long, he felt a sense of impending doom.

Finally, despite the world being full of vitality, he could see no life other than plants.

Not to mention intelligent beings—even ordinary animals, or even bacteria, were completely absent.

For days, Rosen continued sending his shadow fiends aimlessly in all directions.

Then, one day, the sky suddenly went dark.

The sun disappeared, and everything was swallowed by darkness.

But within moments, a distant glow appeared deep within the mountain range.

Rosen immediately commanded the shadow fiends to return to the mountains, retracing their steps.

Along the way, he discovered a stark contrast between the mountains in the daylight and at night.

During the day, the mountains had only plants, with no signs of life.

But at night, all the plants had vanished—replaced by wild beasts roaming the terrain.

He captured a few creatures and read their spiritual memories.

Strangely, their memories only contained darkness. There was no recollection of daylight whatsoever.

Less than half an hour later, a sequence-2 shadow fiend had crossed tens of thousands of miles, reaching the depths of the mountains once more.

Up ahead, where the lights shone, Rosen saw a city—one that had not existed during the day.

Technically speaking, the entire city was the domain of a sequence-2 divine realm.

However, its ruler had long since perished, leaving behind only the lord's castle and the various buildings within the territory.

The city's glow came from a single lighthouse at its center, its light pushing back the surrounding darkness.

At that moment, Rosen understood why there had been no markers at the mountain's exit.

He had used a sequence-2 shadow fiend for scouting while remaining safely inside the Mysterious Study Room, allowing him to move and explore at an extraordinary pace.

It hadn't taken him long to cross tens of thousands of miles.

But those who had come before him hadn't had his advantages.

They had likely advanced cautiously, carefully exploring every step.

And before they could ever leave the mountains… the world had lost its light and fallen into darkness.

Once that happened, the daytime world and the nighttime world became completely separate.

That explained why the beasts had no memories of daylight—because in this realm, there was no such thing as day for them.

Since those explorers never left the mountains before darkness fell, of course, they couldn't have left behind any markers at the exit.

The city wasn't densely populated—only around ten thousand people lived there.

Under the lighthouse's protective glow, the citizens were extremely cautious.

They rushed out of the inner city into the outer farmlands, laboring desperately, as if finishing their work as quickly as possible would somehow reduce their risk.

Suddenly, a beast's roar echoed from the wilderness.

The farmers immediately dropped their tools and sprinted back toward the inner city, panic-stricken.

Rosen scanned the surroundings.

The creatures gathering outside the city were just ordinary wild animals.

Even a mere sequence-9 would have no trouble exterminating them all.

Could it be that this city doesn't have a single transcendent being?

Silently, Rosen sent a shadow fiend to infiltrate the lord's castle.

Sure enough, every single person inside was an ordinary human.

Deeper within the castle, he discovered a sealed-off area.

Effortlessly bypassing its security, he found himself inside the castle's dungeon.

In one cell after another, skeletal remains lay scattered—their bones long since stripped clean.

It was clear that these had once been transcendents.

Most likely, these were the very explorers the World Government had sent here.

And judging by their fate, they had all perished within these cells.

Near the entrance of the dungeon, Rosen discovered a skeleton that had killed itself.

Based on the bone structure, the deceased had once been a sequence-2 transcendent.

A shadow fiend carefully picked up a weathered Eternal Chronicle lying beside the corpse.

Flipping it open, Rosen began to read.

The owner of this book was Morris Turner, a Sequence 2 historian.

Back then, when exploring the mysterious darkness enveloping the upper part of the Sky-Piercing Pillar, Morris was the leader of the expedition.

Due to a terrifying curse he had suffered earlier in life, Morris didn't have many years left to live.

Thus, he volunteered to explore the darkness. If he could return alive, the World Government promised to spare no expense to heal his injuries. With this promise, Morris led a team of extraordinary beings from various sequences, nearly emptying his divine territory and bringing only a few followers into the darkness.

After arriving in this world, Morris quickly realized that it was a remnant of the previous Ancient God Era.

When he found no way out, Morris led his team cautiously out of the mountain range.

Then, like him, they were suddenly pulled into the dark world by the encroaching darkness.

From then on, they never saw daylight again. At this point, divisions began to arise within Morris's team.

Some wanted to leave the mountain range in the darkness and continue exploring outward, while others wanted to stay within the mountains.

At the time, most chose to leave, and Morris was also in favor of leaving.

However, after leaving the mountain range in the darkness, the extraordinary beings in the team began to experience problems one by one.

They started exhibiting strange behaviors, making bizarre gestures, and speaking incomprehensible words. Realizing that their spiritual consciousness might be contaminated by an external force, Morris imprisoned all the extraordinary beings in the lord's castle.

Gradually, Morris himself began to notice that something was wrong with him.

With no other choice, Morris retreated back into the depths of the mountain range.

He then discovered that it didn't matter where they were—as long as they were extraordinary beings, their spiritual consciousness would gradually become contaminated by an unknown force, growing increasingly bizarre. Ordinary humans, however, remained unaffected.

In the end, before completely losing control, Morris solidified his divine territory in the depths of the mountain range.

He then went to the dungeon, desperately killed all the extraordinary beings, and took his own life.

"Darkness contaminates spiritual consciousness..."

Rosen fell into deep thought.

It seemed that his decision not to leave the Mysterious Study Room was the right one. Next, he needed to carefully observe the changes in the angels and shadow demons.

After thoroughly searching the lord's castle, he found a wealth of documents in the study.

Rosen directed the shadow demon to skim through them. It turned out that after Morris's death, his loyal followers had survived and continued to record their research on the darkness, their exploration of this world, population changes, and, most importantly, the passing down of knowledge.

Now, the city's residents were the thousandth-generation descendants of those loyal followers.

The faith of the past had long since vanished. Today, the city's population of over ten thousand was divided into nobles and slaves.

All the nobles possessed the extraordinary artifacts left behind by Morris.

They could wield a bit of extraordinary power, while the slaves had no ability to resist such power.

After the class system was established, the living standards of ordinary people declined significantly.

However, it wasn't to the point where they couldn't survive. With such a small population, even the nobles dared not venture beyond the outer walls of the divine territory. At most, they relied on the inner city walls and used extraordinary artifacts to defend against the beast attacks from outside the city in the darkness.

Rosen clearly couldn't rely on the predecessors and had to explore this dark world on his own.

But before exploring, he needed to figure out how extraordinary beings' spiritual consciousness became contaminated.

(End of Chapter)