Against the Gods

Chapter 2096 - The Divine Regent Who Hates It All

“Absolute mastery over life and death could, to a certain extent, exchange ‘absolute’ loyalty.” Yun Che remarked. “However, no successful ruler would ever do such a thing. After all, such measures may garner enforced loyalty from her subjects, but never true faith.”

“So,” Yun Che asked curiously, “what happened to Shenwu Yanye that she is twisted so despite being a Divine Regent?”

Inside, Meng Jianxi was surprised. He thought for sure that Yun Che would have heard of the story. In any case, he began his explanation. “The Lightless Divine Regent’s true name is Shenwu Xihua. Despite hailing from a collateral branch of the Shenwu clan, she was the most talented profound practitioner of her generation. It was said that her talent was second only to the Sword Fairy, Hua Qingying at the time.”

This was a scary evaluation considering that every current Divine Regent had lost at least once to Hua Qingying before they ascended.

“For the same reason, Shenwu Xihua was a natural candidate to be a Divine Consort.”

Meng Jianxi took a longer pause this time before continuing, “Back then, I believe that the Eternal Night Divine Son was called Shenwu Xueyan... I have not lived through that generation, and Father was never very willing to speak of the Eternal Night Kingdom of God, so forgive me if I am unable to provide you with the details.”

“All I know is that... Shenwu Xihua was extremely devoted to Shenwu Xueyan. For starters, she gave almost all of her resources to Shenwu Xueyan. Once, Shenwu Xueyan was stuck on the brink of Divine Extinction Realm for three hundred years. To help him, the Lightless Divine Regent—er, I mean Shenwu Xihua ventured into the Endless Fog over seventy times just to find a mutated abyssal crystal that would help break through his bottleneck. She did not utter a word of complaint despite bearing countless wounds when she returned.”

“Finally, on the seventy-seventh hunt, after she hunted a Divine Extinction Realm abyssal beast on the same cultivation level as her alone, she finally found the mutated abyssal crystal that Shenwu Xueyan needed the most. The next year, Shenwu Xueyan finally broke through to the Divine Extinction Realm and won the cheers of the entire kingdom.”

“Father had let out a long sigh when he spoke to me about this incident.” Meng Jianxi copied Meng Kongchan’s sigh and repeated what he said in a similar tone, “There was no one who wasn’t moved by her devotion. No one... except Shenwu Xueyan himself.”

“So, Shenwu Xueyan fell out of love?” Yun Che could more or less guess what was going to happen after that.

“Rather than falling out of love with Shenwu Xihua, Shenwu Xueyan had never liked her in the first place,” Meng Jianxi answered. “That's what Father told me back then.”

“Less than ten years after Shenwu Xueyan successfully entered the Divine Extinction Realm, Shenwu Xueyan announced a new Divine Consort... and this Divine Consort wasn’t Shenwu Xihua.”

Yun Che interrupted, “This Divine Consort he chose must not have reached the Divine Extinction Realm yet. She must have been sweet-tempered and gentle like water, and she might even have been a delicate and timid flower used to relying on others.”

Meng Jianxi nodded immediately. “That’s right. So, you have heard the rumors?”

“Not at all.” Yun Che explained, “From what you described, Shenwu Xihua was a woman who could kill a Divine Extinction abyssal beast at the same level as her before Shenwu Xueyan could complete his breakthrough to Divine Extinction Realm. For her beloved, Shenwu Xihua could give up everything and do anything including venturing over seventy times into the Endless Fog. It is clear that she is a stalwart, unwavering, maybe even ruthless woman.”

“What I’m saying is that Shenwu Xihua was far above Shenwu Xueyan in every way, be it in terms of talent, cultivation, personality, willpower, and mobility. On the other hand, Shenwu Xueyan only has two advantages: his background and his divine essence. Some men would be beyond thankful to have a woman like her and willingly drown in her devotion like a baby, but there are also some men... who would feel only suffocation and loss of dignity from it. This is especially likely if the man is of high birth.”

“Take her seventy seven excursions into the Endless Fog to aid him in becoming a Half-God for example. Everyone around them thought it was a beautiful tale of love, but to a Divine Son like Shenwu Xueyan, there could only be two outcomes. He would either be so grateful to her that he swore to never betray her love for eternity... or he would view it as the greatest shame of his life and loathe it like it was poison. Clearly, Shenwu Xueyan was the latter.

“Knowing this, the Divine Consort he chose to favor must be the opposite of Shenwu Xihua in every way. She would be a woman who could draw out his protectiveness at first glance and was dependent on him in every aspect. That's why I said what I did earlier.”

“I see.” Meng Jianxi nodded in understanding. “It is exactly as you predicted, Brother Yuan. The new Divine Consort hailed from a collateral branch even more distant than Shenwu Xihua. If we look at her background alone, one must squint real hard to say that she was qualified to be a Divine Consort.”

“So...” Yun Che asked, “How did Shenwu Xihua react?”

Meng Jianxi answered, “Well... it was said she suffered a mental breakdown and wept uncontrollably... but Shenwu Xueyan was unmoved. In fact, the Divine Regent blasted her off stage for fear that she would do something extreme during her loss of composure.”

“Later, Shenwu Xihua accepted the marriage and remained as devoted to Shenwu Xueyan as ever. She remained willing to give him everything and even treated the new Divine Consort very well. She said that she was fine not being Shenwu Xueyan’s wife or even his concubine. All she asked was that Shenwu Xueyan not push her away.”

What a terrifying woman... Yun Che thought inside his head.

To his surprise, Li Suo immediately responded with a thoughtless outburst, “You of all people have no right to say that, ladykiller.”

“...” Try as he might, Yun Che could not mount a retort.

Unaware of the inner dialogue, Meng Jianxi continued, “Shenwu Xueyan was aware that he was in the wrong in this matter. Although he still wasn’t willing to anoint Shenwu Xihua as his Divine Consort, he treated her much better than he used to. Combined with the fact that Shenwu Xihua’s devotion had seemingly never changed, she, in a sense, was the person both Shenwu Xueyan and the former Divine Regent trusted the most.”

There was no longer any need to listen to the tale. Yun Che interrupted, “Long story short, Shenwu Xihua intercepted the divine origin while Shenwu Xueyan was in the process of accepting the True God inheritance, am I right?”

“That’s correct.” Meng Jianxi sighed deeply. “At the time, Shenwu Xihua was easily Shenwu Xueyan’s strongest and most trusted profound practitioner. Naturally, she was selected to be his most important protector. Shenwu Xihua had loved Shenwu Xueyan since they were children. Not only that, she had risked her life countless times for Shenwu Xueyan and even abandoned her right to have an official status with him. In everyone's opinion, she was the last possible person to hurt and betray him.”

Yun Che scoffed on the inside. Once you had hurt someone deeply, you could accept his hatred, but never his show of goodwill whether it was real or not.

“I don’t think anyone outside the Eternal Night Kingdom of God knew what happened during the inheritance ceremony. Only the final outcome was known. Shenwu Xihua intercepted the divine origin and artifact of inheritance and forced the divine origin into herself.”

“Father guessed that she originally intended to destroy Shenwu Xueyan’s inheritance ceremony and turn her blood into his eternal shadow, but to everyone’s surprise, the divine origin did not take her life. In fact, it was astoundingly compatible with her even though she only had seventy percent divine essence. Still, it came at a price. Her lifespan is much shorter than normal, and her eyesight was permanently lost.”

“Not long after that, Shenwu Xihua became the Divine Regent and changed the kingdom’s name to Eternal Night Kingdom of God. She herself changed her name to Shenwu Yanye (Loathing The Night).”

Although she had only just inherited the divine origin, although she was nowhere close to subsuming the divine origin at the time, no one in the entire Eternal Night Kingdom of God could suppress Shenwu Xihua.

Such was the power of a True God.

“Shenwu Xueyan’s downfall must be quite something, wasn’t it?” Yun Che remarked sympathetically.

“Indeed,” Meng Jianxi answered. “It was said that Shenwu Xueyan’s immediate relatives were either dead or crippled. Looking at the results alone, those who were dead got very lucky. It was because Shenwu Yanye later announced that all men are slaves, and no men, no matter who they were before her ascension, had any dignity since.”

“They couldn’t even run away because anyone above the Divine Extinction Realm would be planted with the Eternal Night Death Wishing Mark. Anyone who dared to rebel or escape would suffer a fate worse than death.”

A man had hurt her so badly that her heart and soul were torn asunder. So, her hate encompassed all men under the heavens.

She buried her hatred deep within her heart until she finally dealt a fatal blow to those who trusted her the most. That was why she no longer believed in loyalty.

Her personality had long since been warped by absolute hatred, and perhaps forcing her unworthy self to bear the power of a True God had further warped her. As a result, the Lightless Divine Regent became an exceedingly tyrannical and violent existence in the Eternal Night Kingdom of God.

In fact, it looked like becoming the Divine Daughter of the Eternal Night Kingdom of God was unlike any other Kingdom. The absolute opposite.

Yun Che asked suddenly, “Say, do you think that Shenwu Xueyan is still alive?”

Meng Jianxi thought for a moment before answering, “It was rumored that he died several thousand years ago; his ashes scattered to the wind. But... I personally believe that he is still alive.”

“Love and hatred are two sides of the same coin. If Shenwu Xueyan died, then Shenwu Yanye’s fervor, while impossibly fierce, would have burned out eventually. Therefore, I am inclined to believe that Shenwu Yanye hasn’t killed him. In fact, she would shut off any avenue for him to commit suicide and do everything in her power to keep him alive. Only then could she torment him for eternity.”

“Yes,” Yun Che nodded, “I agree. That is why women are much scarier than men when they go crazy.”

For an instant, he could not help but think of Hua Caili.

His expression froze for a moment, but he pressed on, “Considering how much Shenwu Yanye loathed men, it seems unlikely that she would accept male consorts. How is she planning to handle the Eternal Night Kingdom of God’s inheritance?”

Hua Caili once said that it took both a sufficient amount of divine essence, a Divine Extinction Realm cultivation at the minimum, and a corresponding bloodline for one to accept the inheritance of a True God.

The Nine Profound Exquisite Body was an exception.

Meng Jianxi answered, “You are right. The Lightless Divine Regent has never allowed a man to approach her, much less anoint a male consort. In fact, this generation’s Godbearer was found while scouring the Shewu lineage. The previous Divine Daughter, Shenwu Qing was found from the direct descent of the Shenwu lineage. She was born with eighty percent divine essence, and she was brought before Shenwu Yanye not long before she was born.”

“Shenwu Qing was a silent, rule-abiding woman who rarely showed herself before anyone. However, she later violated a taboo of the Lightless Divine Regent... She fell in love with the previous Divine Son of the Owl Butterfly Kingdom of God, Pan Buwang. She was locked up by the Lightless Divine Regent as a result.”

“During this time, the Lightless Divine Regent found a second Divine Daughter named Shenwu Yi, the current Eternal Night Divine Daughter.”

“It was said that Shenwu Yi hailed from an extremely distant collateral branch of the Shenwu lineage, but no one knew exactly which branch she was from. In any case, the Lightless Divine Regent immediately abolished Shenwu Qing’s title after Shenwu Yi appeared.”

Yun Che said, “Considering the urgency of the decision, this Shenwu Yi is probably a ninety percent Godbearer at least.”

“I think so too. After that... it was rumored that Shenwu Qing was executed for violating the taboo last year, and the executioner was none other than the newly anointed Divine Daughter, Shenwu Yi herself.”

Meng Jianxi sighed. “Shenwu Qing and Pan Buwang. Both of them were abolished. One of them was cruelly executed, and the other fell into such despair that he would rather choose to fall into Sinking Dream. It’s a good thing you sent him away... what a pitiful pair of lovebirds they were.”

“Is there really nothing else about Shenwu Yi?” Yun Che asked.

Meng Jianxi thought. “There is a strange rumor that I believe is one hundred percent false.”

“Tell me anyway.”

Meng Jianxi answered, “The rumor claimed that Shenwu Yi was only a peak Divine Master when she was taken in by the Lightless Divine Regent. However, just twenty years later today, she is already a level five Divine Extinction Realm profound practitioner.”

Yun Che: “...”

Meng Jianxi shook his head smilingly. “This is impossible, of course. The Boundless Divine Son, Dian Jiuzhi, took two thousand and four hundred years to ascend seven minor levels in the Divine Extinction Realm. Today, he is the undisputed greatest Divine Son of the current generation.”

“In the previous generation, the Sword Fairy Hua Qingying spent only a thousand years to complete the Divine Extinction Realm and enter Divine Limit Realm. Such was her talent that even the Pure Land said this: if there is anyone in this world who may transcend mortality to become a True God, it can only be Hua Qingying.”

“With that in mind, to say that anyone can go from peak Divine Master to the middle-stage of the Divine Extinction Realm in just twenty years...” Meng Jianxi felt like every breath he spent talking about this rumor was an offense in itself. “There’s just no way such a monster could possibly exist. I do not know where the Xuanji Hall obtained this rumor, or why they decided it was worth keeping.”

Yun Che thought for a long time before changing the subject, “Does the Xuanji Hall collect information regarding the dragons as well?”

Meng Jianxi was puzzled, but he didn’t ask why Yun Che wanted to know. He simply answered, “Abyssal dust eats away at the Beasts far more than us humans. The fact that the dragons aren’t extinct yet is a testament to their strength. Even so, survival is all they can focus on. That is why we rarely pay attention to them; as such, the information we collected about them is mostly repetitive and useless.”

Yun Che asked, “There is a woman named ‘Long Jiang’ among the dragons. Does that remind you of someone?”

“Long Jiang?” Meng Jianxi thought for a moment before exclaiming in realization, “You mean the ‘Scarfaced Dragon Girl’ Long Xi? In fact, I do remember a report stating that she addressed herself as ‘Long Jiang’ during one of her excursions.”

“Scarfaced Dragon Girl...” Yun Che lowered his gaze and inhaled slightly.