Chapter 596: Refining a Deity

Chapter 596: Refining a Deity

Li Wei seized Lolth and dragged her into the Astral Plane.

Li Wei had premeditated this for a very long time.

In an instant, he burned one-tenth of his divine power, unleashing a burst of strength far exceeding Lolth's expectations.

So much so that Lolth failed to react before she was forcibly pulled into the portal by Li Wei.

Before Li Wei made his move, she was still under the impression that Li Wei was trapped by her Spider Deity Domain.

She completely failed to expect that Li Wei would break free from the Spider Deity Domain in an instant.

Even less did she expect that Li Wei would actually take her away from the Underdark.

Only after entering the portal did Lolth react, fighting back with all her might.

The power of their clash shattered the spatial teleportation tunnel.

Yet she was still dragged into the Astral Plane by Li Wei at the final moment.

Lolth gazed at the nearby star emitting ten colors of light, her face betraying her astonishment.

She had just seen this sun behind Li Wei's back.

She had thought it was merely a phenomenon generated by Li Wei's own power.

She never expected it to be a real, existing sun.

A ten-colored sun was something Lolth was seeing for the very first time.

"Did you not want to know my secret? I have brought you to it."

Li Wei transformed into a meteor and slammed into Lolth, cutting through the astral void and pushing her toward the colored star.

Lolth's spider legs danced frantically, shooting out strands of silk to anchor themselves in the surrounding void, trying to halt her continuously receding body.

Snap, snap, snap.

All the spider silk snapped, unable to slow the speed of her descent in the slightest.

Boom!

The meteor and Lolth crashed into the sun together.

Sizzle, sizzle, sizzle!

The ten-colored divine fire burned Lolth's divine body, making a sharp sound.

Lolth felt agony and the rapid draining of her divine power.

After Li Wei's divine fire burned the abomination, the ten-colored divine fire it mutated into seemed to possess the exact same power as an abomination.

It was capable of devouring divine power.

An abomination devoured divine power.

Li Wei's ten-colored divine fire burned divine power.

The burned divine power would be converted into Li Wei's own divine power.

Weakening the enemy to strengthen himself.

This was also a form of devouring in disguise.

Lolth showed a look of alarm and quickly waved her spider legs, wanting to shake off the ten-colored divine fire on her body.

The moment she came into contact with the divine fire, she knew exactly what it was.

However, a divine fire of ten colors was still something she was seeing for the first time.

A divine fire capable of burning another's divine power was something she had never encountered before.

The ten-colored divine fire was like maggots clinging to bones; no matter how hard Lolth tried, she could not shake it off.

Lolth had a sudden thought: Li Wei was still only a demigod, so as long as she extinguished his divine fire, he would surely die.

In an instant, a sense of joy bubbled up in her heart.

She had previously been vexed because she could not find Li Wei's weakness.

She never expected that Li Wei would actively expose his weakness himself.

Lolth used the power of laws to tear apart the surrounding divine fire, her face lighting up with joy.

A divine fire was far too fragile.

For Li Wei to actually use divine fire to deal with her was simply courting death.

As she raised her head, all of her spider eyes shrank to the size of pinpricks, utterly shocked by the sight before her.

The earth, the mountains, the magma, and the sky were all burning with the ten-colored divine fire.

The entire star was burning with the ten-colored divine fire.

What she had wanted to do just now was to extinguish the flames of an entire star.

Once Lolth realized this, she was completely dumbfounded.

"Damn it, what on earth is wrong with this human? Why does he possess a ten-colored divine fire?"

Lolth was already afraid.

She wanted to flee.

Spider silk wove a path leading toward the sky.

Lolth climbed up the silk toward the heavens, fleeing the sun.

Suddenly, the earth stood upright, turning into two walls connecting to the sky.

The burning earth gathered overhead, turning into a torrential waterfall of magma powerful enough to destroy a continent as it crashed down.

It washed Lolth down into the deepest depths of the earth.

At this moment, the enemy she faced was the entire sun.

Li Wei had already merged into one with the sun.

Turning the entire sun into a furnace to refine a deity.

This was precisely Li Wei's purpose in bringing Lolth to the Astral Plane.

He did not merely want to kill Lolth.

He also wanted to burn everything that Lolth was to serve as his own nourishment.

Since abominations could be burned, and godheads could be burned.

Then a deity could also be burned as nourishment!

Lolth felt her own divine power continuously weakening under the burning of the ten-colored divine fire.

Terrified, she waved her spider legs and crawled toward the outside, desperate to escape this place.

Yet everything around her was frantically swallowing her down.

Overhead, the magma waterfall poured backward, the mountains toppled, and the burning sky collapsed.

The earth beneath her feet cracked open, generating an immensely powerful force that pulled at her figure, dragging her downward into the chasm.

Rose tore through space in an attempt to flee.

Just as she entered the spatial rift, the next moment saw the entire expanse consumed by flames.

Space shattered.

Rose's silhouette reappeared within the sun.

The sensation of standing against the world filled Rose with despair.

Even after becoming a deity, this was the first time she had ever felt so utterly powerless.

For the first time, Rose realized that even gods were insignificantly small before the overwhelming might of the world.

She tried to use the Web Domain to seal away the power of the world.

However, the entire sun had already become Levi’s domain.

Unless she could seal off the whole sun, there would be no way for her to stop Levi from drawing upon its strength.

Clearly, with her current abilities, such a feat was beyond reach.

Within the sun, Rose struggled desperately.

She used the Web Law inversely to seal herself, preventing the Ten-Colored Divine Fire from consuming her divine essence.

But doing so meant she could no longer escape the sun.

After giving up the struggle, Rose continued falling deeper into the heart of the star until she reached its core.

A plan to refine a god using the sun as a furnace had been fulfilled.

All that remained now was the refining process itself.

Levi did not know how long Rose could endure.

He didn't care.

Rose was trapped deep within the stellar depths, unable to escape.

No matter how long it took—he could wait.

Levi left behind a fragment of his consciousness to control the star's power and refine Rose.

His divine essence coalesced once more into physical form and returned to Mapleleaf City.

Whoosh!

Levi appeared atop the walls of Mapleleaf City.

Guthvie sensed his presence and quickly turned to look.

Seeing him return safely, she rushed toward him, overwhelmed with emotion.

Levi embraced Guthvie and smiled as he said, “I’m fine.”

Guthvie had witnessed their battle firsthand.

Their fight occurred near the spatial rift connected to Dragonfall Slope.

Especially when Levi transformed into a towering flame giant hundreds of meters tall and Rose shifted into a colossal spider.

Their titanic forms cast shadows across the skies above Mapleleaf City, shocking countless onlookers.

Guards and citizens alike within the city now regarded him as a god.

Particularly after learning that Levi himself was the divine being who saved Mapleleaf City from ruin.

Countless individuals eagerly offered up their devout faith to him.

Unfortunately, Levi had yet to forge a divine core or ascend to true godhood.

Thus, he couldn’t connect with their belief, gather faith energy, or manifest faith material.

Guthvie held tightly onto Levi, indifferent to all else.

Whether or not Levi was truly a god mattered little to her—she only wished for his safety.

In fact, selfishly, she thought about fleeing Mapleleaf City together with him.

She never wanted to live in fear again.

At the moment she embraced him,

Guthvie hoped everything would simply end here.

She no longer desired to be a legendary mage burdened with saving everyone.

All she wanted was to stay beside Levi.

Sensing that she had much to say, Levi gently patted her back in comfort.

“It’s alright. Everything is over now,”

“She won’t appear again.”

Levi and Guthvie embraced each other for a long while.

Standing nearby and having waited patiently for quite some time, Rena cleared her throat lightly and spoke: “Ahem, how much longer are you two going to keep hugging?”

Levi turned his head toward Rena and greeted her with a smile, saying, “Rena, it’s been a while.”

Rena looked at Levi and gave him a bright smile, nodding in response, “Indeed, it has been a while.”

Noticing someone had arrived, Guthvie loosened her arms around Levi.

Rena remarked, “The war is over, but there are still plenty of loose ends to tie up.”

“That Ice Queen over there—you need to deal with your unruly subordinates yourself.”

“And regarding our divine lord here… many people inside Mapleleaf City have gone mad with devotion, causing quite a bit of chaos.”

Levi shook his head and replied, “I am not yet a true god.”

Rena seemed surprised but quickly regained composure and said, “This isn’t the time to discuss such things. Even if you aren’t officially recognized as a god, right now in the eyes of every citizen and guard in Mapleleaf City, you already are one.”

“After all… you defeated a real god!”

Their battle had lasted so long.

Naturally, those aligned with Mapleleaf City also came to understand that their opponent was none other than Rose—the goddess from the Underworld.

Witnessing Levi defeat Rose firsthand,

Everyone naturally viewed him as humanity’s own god.

Looking upward toward the sky, Levi felt a faint, almost imperceptible gaze upon him.

He had already drawn the attention of the gods.

There were indeed beings capable of challenging deities despite possessing merely demigod status.

The Sacred Dragon King was among them.

Yet ultimately, they were few in number.

Across the vast heavens of this world, there couldn’t possibly be more than ten such formidable demigods.

Every single one of them was on the gods' high-priority watch list.

Now, all of a sudden, a demigod of such immense strength had emerged out of nowhere.

Naturally, the gods turned their collective gaze upon him instantly, watching with undivided attention.

Levi raised his eyes to glance upward, paid it no further mind.

Lolth was fundamentally different from the rest of the pantheon.

The gods were far more powerful than Lolth could ever hope to be.

In the eyes of the true gods, the deities of the Underworld were nothing but orphaned strays existing outside the divine pantheon.

They sat at the absolute bottom of the divine hierarchy.

The gods cared less for these external deities than they did for mighty demigods like the Holy Dragon King or the Demon Dragon King.

The potential of an external god was fundamentally limited.

Incapable of entering the true pantheon, they were doomed to remain lesser deities, the lowest of the divine ranks.

In contrast, figures like the Holy Dragon King and the Demon Dragon King possessed the rare power to slay gods as demigods before even ascending.

Should they ascend, they would immediately become formidable deities, commanding powerful laws.

To the pantheon, they posed a significant threat.

Levi looked down upon Maple Leaf City, where countless people were spontaneously kneeling in prayer along the streets.

He had no desire for any of this.

Therefore, Levi chose not to show himself.

He looked toward Gusevey and Reina, saying, "I leave the rest to you. If there is any trouble, find me."

Hearing his words, Gusevey swallowed the many things she wanted to say, nodding in agreement, "Alright, understood."

Reina stared at Levi and asked, "Our dear god, where are you off to now?"

Levi replied, "Lolth is not yet dead, and I cannot afford any distractions for the time being."

Reina was visibly startled by his response, "You intend to kill Lolth, the Spider Goddess?"

Levi replied, "I am only trying, I have not achieved it yet."

Levi's admission that he was attempting to slay a deity left Reina entirely shaken.

Reina had never even heard of a god falling.

Though she was a Legendary War Knight, she had not yet reached that level of existence.

Forget about true gods, she had barely ever encountered a demigod-level powerhouse.

She had only heard whispers that certain great figures possessed demigod strength.

Legends, demigods, and gods occupied three entirely different realms.

The gap between each realm was like an impassable chasm.

Only when a Legendary practitioner reached the absolute end of their path could they glimpse the demigod realm and learn its secrets.

It was only by chance, having obtained the divine fire of a Void Demon demigod, that Levi knew these secrets ahead of time.

The divide between a demigod and a true god was wider still.

Many demigods spent their entire lives without ever finding a chance to ascend.

The Nine-Colored Divine Fire was the very chasm that trapped countless demigods.

Merely igniting the Nine-Colored Divine Fire was an arduous task, as difficult as ascending the heavens.

Only by surrendering their faith and relying on a patron god did they stand a sliver of a chance to ignite it.

A demigod who could ignite the Nine-Colored Divine Fire without divine backing was one in ten thousand.

Comprehending the laws was yet another barrier, equally impossible.

Having survived the invasion of the Underworld, Maple Leaf City was severely weakened, requiring a vast amount of time to recover.

Reina remained in the city, temporarily taking Orne's place to command the military and maintain postwar order.

Orne had sustained several injuries during the fierce battle, yet he had also grasped a fleeting opportunity to break through to the Legendary rank.

Unlike Reina, whose prodigious knightly talent made her ascension to a Legendary War Knight smooth and entirely barrier-free.

Orne had risen from a fourth-tier War Knight all the way to a sixth-tier War Knight purely by dint of his own formidable perseverance and willpower.

Now, he had finally seized a rare, elusive chance at a breakthrough.

Naturally, Orne cast aside all worldly matters, dedicating his entire being to breaking through to the Legendary rank.

If he failed to break through and extend his lifespan, he would not have many years left to live.

The old injuries left behind by years of warfare had taken a severe toll on his body.

Should he miss this opportunity, there would likely never be a second chance to break through.

Inside the Mage Tower of Maple Leaf City.

Oates met with Gusevey, expressing his wish to request an audience with Levi.

After witnessing Levi's immense, god-like power.

Oates was profoundly shaken as well.

An idea had formed in his mind; he wished to win Levi over to their side.

He was willing to establish Levi as the orthodox deity of the Northern Xuan Kingdom.

Unfortunately, Levi could not care less about such things.

Ordinary gods needed to harvest the power of faith to condense divine energy.

Levi had no need for the power of faith.

He was never lacking in divine energy.

Burning faith was far less convenient than burning a star.

Gusevey deflected Oates's visit by claiming Levi was not present in the Mage Tower.

This was also Levi's intention.

He had no desire to see any visitors.

If he wished to see someone, he would naturally seek them out himself.

Levi remained inside the Mage Tower, comprehending the elementary laws of nature and perfecting the fragmented natural laws.

For the moment, he had no intention of condensing a godhead.

According to the Holy Dragon King, once he condensed a godhead, he would likely trigger the restrictions of the gods and face absolute destruction.

Furthermore, Levi had no intention of using the law of strength as the core of his godhead.

The law of strength was by no means his first choice.

Levi continued to utilize the time acceleration of the dream world to comprehend and perfect the laws of nature.

Meanwhile, with half his attention fixed on the stellar forge of the Star Realm as it refined Rose,

a month passed in the blink of an eye.

Rose was growing increasingly restless.

"Let me leave this place. What is it you want? I can give you anything."

(End of Chapter)