291: The True Face of the Judge

“You have dirtied my chessboard.”

The voice did not come from any corner of the temple, but exploded directly in the depths of Li Dong's Divine Soul.

There was no angry roar, only the cold disgust of a severe obsession with cleanliness being deeply offended, as if an indelible filth had been splashed onto a perfect work of art.

Rumble—

The starry river chessboard beneath his feet shattered instantly.

But it was not an explosion; it was “disintegration.”

Every star and every world that made up the chessboard lost its definition of existence in an instant, collapsing from “being” into “nothingness,” turning into the purest points of light, which were then reclaimed and formatted by an invisible force.

The projection of the Adjudicator, that blurry figure made of starlight, flickered and twisted amidst a chaotic roar of logic, and finally vanished into thin air like a deleted frame of erroneous data.

In the center of the temple, where the chessboard had disappeared, the space did not heal; instead, like a punctured canvas, it left behind a bottomless hole.

There was neither light nor darkness in that hole, only a kind of “absolute nothingness.” Any concept that extended into it would be instantly devoured, analyzed, and reduced to the most basic parameters.

A dimension that made even Li Dong feel palpitations was coldly watching from the other side of the rift.

Immediately after, a “hand” reached out from the rift.

It was not a body of flesh and blood, nor was it even an energy entity. It was composed of countless silver, absolutely smooth geometric lines, combined in a way that defied the principles of the visual nerves. Merely glancing at it caused the brain to develop an urge to format its own logic.

This hand pressed against the edge of the rift, and the physical Laws of the entire temple were instantly rewritten.

Walls, stone pillars, domes—all matter lost its random texture and was forcibly “corrected” into perfect mirrors, reflecting maddening, absolutely symmetrical images.

A behemoth squeezed out from that dimensional rift, bit by bit.

It had no fixed form. Or rather, its form was “Order” itself.

Countless silver logical chains coiled like giant pythons, forming a silver vortex that constantly calculated and corrected itself.

It was not a life form; it was more like a living “Universe System” with its own will.

The Dimensional Adjudicator.

Its true form had descended.

Hum!

A pressure that could not be described in words descended upon him. It was not the oppression of power, but the proclamation of “Truth.”

[Axiom One: Variables are System errors.]

[Axiom Two: Errors must be corrected.]

[Axiom Three: Correction is the only meaning of existence.]

Three cold, unquestionable iron Laws of the Universe, like three red-hot branding irons, seared fiercely into Li Dong's Soul, attempting to define his existence as an “error” at the root.

Li Dong let out a muffled groan, his Divine Soul shaking violently. This pressure was thousands of times more terrifying than the “absolute stillness” imitated by the Lord of Equilibrium.

This was an overriding and deletion carried out from the underlying logic.

If he accepted these three axioms, he would self-destruct in the next second, willingly turning into cosmic dust.

“Bullshit axioms!”

With a thought from Li Dong, the [ancient stone slab] bloomed with a warm glow within his Divine Soul, acting like a firewall that temporarily isolated the invasion of those three “axioms.”

He raised his head and stared directly at the silver vortex that was constantly calculating.

“Your existence is the greatest error in the Universe.”

The Adjudicator did not respond. To an operating System, conversing with a “bug” was meaningless.

It chose the most direct method—executing an “antivirus” program.

There was no light, no shockwave.

The Adjudicator simply issued a command within its own logical core.

[Definition: Li Dong = Variable.]

[Execution: Erase (Variable).]

In an instant, the space around Li Dong began to “disappear.” It was not destroyed, but rather like a piece erased by an eraser tool in photo editing software; even the edges of Li Dong's body began to become blurry and transparent, as if he were being erased bit by bit from the canvas of “reality.”

This was the Adjudicator's attack—intangible and formless, impossible to defend against, because it was not attacking a physical entity, but the very concept of “existence” itself.

“Want to erase me?” Li Dong's eyes turned cold. Instead of retreating, he took a step forward.

He did not try to repair the erased space; that was meaningless. He went straight to the root of the problem, aiming at the Adjudicator's core logic, and played his own card.

[Attunement]!

A completely different power of Law spread out. If the Adjudicator's Law was a cold compiler, then Li Dong's Law was a nimble artist.

“Your definition is too narrow.” Li Dong's intent was like a scalpel, precisely cutting into the opponent's chain of Laws. “Let me redefine it for you.”

[Correction Command: Erase = Transform.]

Hum!

The Laws were forcibly tampered with. The nature of the “eraser” force that was erasing Li Dong's existence suddenly changed. The erased matter and space did not return to nothingness, but instead turned into the purest life energy, flooding back into the temple like a burst dam.

Crack... Boom!

On the ruined ground of the temple, those mirror-like stone slabs that had been “absolutely ordered” by the Adjudicator burst one after another under the irrigation of life energy. Emerging from the cracks were not weeds, but strange plants made of pure concepts, shimmering with starlight. They grew, bloomed, and bore fruit at a speed visible to the naked eye. In every fruit, a brand-new, prototype world full of possibilities was gestating.

The dead-silent temple instantly turned into a vibrant garden of creation.

“...”

The silver vortex's eternal, unchanging calculation core experienced a microscopic, imperceptible stutter for the first time.

It could not understand.

In its logic library, “erasure” was the end point, the inevitable outcome of entropy increase. Yet the opponent had forcibly twisted this end point into a new “starting point.” This was a desecration and provocation of the Foundation of its existence!

[Logic conflict. Activating Advanced permissions.]

[Command: Dimension Return to Zero.]

A will, thousands of times more terrifying than before, erupted from the core of the vortex. This time, it was not targeting Li Dong alone, but intended to bundle up this entire “polluted” world, along with the temple, Li Dong, Mo Chen, and all the awakened living beings, drag them into the recycle bin, and completely format them!

“Finally willing to use this move?” Li Dong smiled, but the smile was cold and bone-chilling. “Unfortunately, your ‘Return to Zero’ is just crude deletion. And my ‘Return to Zero’...”

He slowly raised his right hand, and the phantom of the [Blade of Judgment] condensed in his palm. It was not a sword, but more like a “mouse cursor” with highest permissions in the hands of a programmer.

“...is restoration!”

He did not try to block the sweeping power of “Dimension Return to Zero.” Instead, at the moment that force touched him, he injected his ultimate understanding of “Return to Zero” into the Adjudicator's core System through the port of the [Blade of Judgment]!

[Keyword found: “Return to Zero”]

[Replace definition: “Return to Zero” = “Singularity Restoration”]

Outside the temple, Mo Chen and all the people who had been reborn were looking at the sky in terror. The entire world was trembling violently. Above the firmament, silver cracks spread like a spider web, as if the whole world would shatter like glass at any moment. An ultimate fear of being completely erased gripped everyone's throats.

“Mr. Li Dong...” Mo Chen clenched his fists. He did not know what was happening inside, but he could feel that unyielding will. He suddenly picked up his paintbrush, aimed it at the sky, at all the desperate people, and shouted with all his might: “Do not give up! We are the ‘Variables’! We have existed, and no one can erase us!”

His voice awakened the fire in everyone's hearts. Streams of will, some strong and some weak, but all equally full of “possibilities,” converged into a torrent, piercing through the barriers of the temple and resonating with Li Dong's Divine Soul.

Inside the temple, the tampering with the Laws was complete.

The Adjudicator's “Dimension Return to Zero” command had already begun to execute. But the tampered command did not bring destruction; instead, it brought an unprecedented logical storm that engulfed the Adjudicator itself.

It tried to delete the world, but the result was initiating the world's “Origin Restoration” program.

It tried to erase Li Dong, but the result was using Li Dong's will, full of “Variables,” as a “restoration template” and crazily copying it within its own System!

“Warning... Warning... Core logic conflict...”

“Definition... Error... Variable... Unable... to delete...”

The silver vortex began to flicker and twitch violently, like a patient with epilepsy. On its perfect geometric structure, glaring cracks appeared. What leaked out from the cracks was no longer pure light of Order, but countless chaotic, contradictory, and painful, struggling remnants of worlds.

Those were the civilizations it had “deleted.”

At this moment, under the stimulation of Li Dong's “Restoration” Law, they were awakening inside the Adjudicator!

“Ah——No!!”

The Adjudicator let out a roar filled with pain and fear for the first time.