101: Chapter 101 True Identity

"Format, initiate."

Lin Chen's cold voice sounded like a final judgment.

The moment his phantom grip tightened, the Lord of the Ultimate End's massive eyeball—frozen in time, its energy locked, and its consciousness isolated—became like a precision instrument tossed into an invisible shredder. At the level of its most minute regulatory structures, an irreversible disintegration began.

The concept of 'The End' that constituted its existence was forcibly dismantled and stripped away by the higher authority of the Netherworld.

The scenes of dying stars reflected in its pupils peeled away in patches, as if erased by a rubber.

The shadow tentacles coiled around its massive body, teeming with countless grudges, dissolved silently into basic energy particles and returned to nothingness, like a sand sculpture blown apart by the wind.

Its three cores, which were on the verge of self-destructing, became like bombs with their fuses pulled. Their light rapidly dimmed and died out, finally solidifying into three massive, cracked, black crystal-like wrecks devoid of all vitality, suspended in the void.

The entire process was silent.

Yet, it was more spine-chilling than any earth-shattering explosion.

A world-ending existence, a terrifying concept symbolizing the end of all things, had been silently... 'deleted' under the power of absolute rules.

On the battlefield, the suffocating pressure of destruction receded like a tide.

The massive rift torn into the sky began to slowly squirm and mend itself. Even that eternal blood moon seemed to dim slightly.

silence.

A deathly silence enveloped the broken Fortress and the wilderness.

Everyone stared blankly at the sky, at that empty region where only three massive black core wrecks remained, as if they hadn't yet processed this extreme reversal.

Did we win?

Just like that... we won?

That insufferably arrogant Lord of the Ultimate End, who had destroyed half the Fortress in the blink of an eye and forced everyone into a desperate fight to the death, was just... gone?

A massive, near-collapsing sense of dazed bewilderment swept through the heart of every survivor.

Su Qingyu sat slumped amidst the ruins of the command center. Watching the terrifying energy signal representing the Lord of the Ultimate End completely vanish from the main screen, tears fell silently. This time, it was the joy of surviving a catastrophe, coupled with an indescribable sense of emptiness.

The solar flares embodied by Bai Qi, Xing Tian, and Ying Bu also slowly retracted their light. The solid figures of the three Ghost Generals appeared. They looked at the three core wrecks, then down at the figure floating in the air, their gazes complex and tinged with an imperceptible trace of awe.

At this moment, Lin Chen remained in that state of absolute rational coldness. He didn't even glance at the three core wrecks that represented the spoils of victory, as if they were merely inconsequential trash. His attention was entirely focused on the [Pawn Agreement] interface still present on his watch's light screen, and... the Netherworld authority within him that had suddenly expanded, feeling infinite after 'purchasing' the Lord of the Ultimate End.

[Asset transfer complete.]

[Congratulations, Contractor 'Lin Chen'. You have successfully acquired the full existence rights of the 'Lord of the Ultimate End'.]

[Detected that you possess high-level Netherworld authority and have successfully contained a final-tier asset. Conditions met...]

[Netherworld Core Architecture—【King of Hells Palace】 permissions are now open to you!]

Hum—!!!

A power far more ancient, majestic, and vast than the previous river of nether talismans suddenly erupted from the 'nothingness' behind Lin Chen!

The void trembled, and the laws roared!

The phantom of a palace manifested from nothing, turning from ethereal to solid. Slowly, yet with irresistible majesty, it descended upon the world!

That palace defied any mortal description of grandeur and austerity. It seemed woven from endless darkness and order. Nether dragon reliefs coiled around the pillars, and the palace doors were tightly shut, inscribed with ancient contract scripts governing life, death, and reincarnation. The mere aura emitted by its phantom caused the whispers of the dead across the battlefield to fall completely silent, making every living being feel their own insignificance and awe from the depths of their souls!

The King of Hells Palace!

The legendary core that wielded the authority of the Netherworld! It had actually... opened its doors to Lin Chen because he 'purchased' the Lord of the Ultimate End?!

Behind Lin Chen, the towering phantom of the King of Hells Palace solidified. The palace doors swung open with a boom, revealing a bottomless gloom behind them that seemed to contain the mysteries of the universe's birth and death. An indescribable attraction emanated from within the hall, as if summoning its master.

Simultaneously, an unimaginably vast flow of information, interspersed with countless ancient memory fragments, flooded into Lin Chen's consciousness, which was currently in a state of absolute rationality.

The torrent of information broke through the dams of his cognition.

He saw... the original state of the Netherworld: orderly, with reincarnation cycling and all souls following their paths.

He saw... an indescribable disaster or war that seemed to originate from a higher dimension. Countless rules collapsed, the Netherworld core shattered, reincarnation stalled, and souls wailed.

He saw... a figure who looked seventy to eighty percent like him, yet was more majestic, with eyes full of endless vicissitudes and exhaustion, sitting upon the throne of the King of Hells Palace. At the final moment before the Netherworld completely disintegrated, that figure made a decision—to strip away his own source power and a fragment of consciousness carrying the hope of 'change,' casting them into the endless cycle of reincarnation in the hope of finding a sliver of life at some point in the future. Meanwhile, the majority of His power and duties were forced into the deepest slumber, maintaining the Netherworld at the lowest energy consumption to prevent its total collapse...

That figure... was the previous King of Hells?!

And he himself... Lin Chen... was the reincarnation of that source power and consciousness fragment cast into the cycle?! His so-called [nether domain asset system] was actually another form of manifestation and guidance for his past life's power and authority. It was designed to let him regrow in a way better suited for the new era (or rather, a more 'pay-to-win' way) and ultimately... reclaim his scattered authority and retake control of the Netherworld?!

All the coincidences, all the 'getting stronger by spending money'—this was the truth hidden behind it all?!

He wasn't some lucky guy; he was... the King who had returned?!

At this shocking moment of memory fusion and revelation—

"Have you played enough?"

A voice carrying infinite majesty, yet tinged with an indescribable exhaustion and indifference, rang out like a great bell from the depths of the King of Hells Palace, echoing through Lin Chen's sea of consciousness!

That voice overlapped perfectly with the figure of the King of Hells in the memory fragments!

"It's time to come back... to work."

The moment the voice fell, the gloom within the open doors of the King of Hells Palace surged violently, and a highly solidified phantom of the King of Hells stepped out!

His gaze crossed space and landed directly on Lin Chen, carrying an unquestionable tone of... command, like a boss looking at an employee who had skipped work.

A massive pressure, belonging to the true original King of Hells, bore down on Lin Chen like the weight of the entire Netherworld! This pressure wasn't meant to destroy him, but to forcibly reclaim his 'reincarnated' consciousness and power into the King of Hells Palace, merging them with the dormant original body to resume the eternal duty of governing reincarnation, maintaining the order of the Netherworld, and dealing with the accumulated problems of countless eons!

Was this the final reversal?!

He had defeated the Lord of the Ultimate End and unraveled the mystery of his birth, only to lose the independent consciousness and freedom he had gained through so much hardship at this very moment, turning back into that cold 'King of Hells' tool bound by heavy duties?!

Everyone who saw the phantom of the King of Hells—whether it was Su Qingyu, the three Ghost Generals, or the survivors below—felt that despairing, irresistible sense of summons and oppression! It was as if Lin Chen's departure to return to that cold throne was already an unchangeable fate!

Su Qingyu looked at Lin Chen's profile, which remained cold as if resisting something, her heart aching so much she could barely breathe.

However, facing this summons from the 'Original Self,' facing the King of Hells' pressure that could make any living being kneel in submission, Lin Chen—who was in a state of absolute rationality and had just understood his 'factory settings'—did not show submission or struggle on his frozen face. Instead... he revealed a very subtle hint of... mockery, as if he had seen the optimal solution.

He slowly raised his head, his cold, rational eyes piercing through the pressure of the King of Hells' phantom to look directly at the deep palace doors and the looming, dormant consciousness of the original King of Hells behind them.

In a voice devoid of any emotion, as if conducting a business negotiation, he said clearly:

"I refuse."