Chapter 1026: A Meeting Like No Other

Times had changed.

For a “divine fragment” that had separated from its original form during the era of the Reverse Tide Civilization, only to be sealed away deep beneath the earth alongside an ancient energy-binding device, its era had shifted long ago—millions of years in the past.

Yet it had never known any of this. The stagnant force fields imprisoning it, the distorted timeline, the incomplete information from the outside world, and a family’s two centuries of painstakingly woven “stagecraft” had all wrapped around it like layers of a cage.

Until just an hour ago, it still believed this era was some segment of the Reverse Tide Civilization’s reign. It thought the strange humans and their myriad kingdoms were mutated survivors left behind after the empire’s collapse.

“You awoke deep beneath Orlandale, surrounded only by a group of dark cultists—confused, extreme in their actions, and utterly incapable of communicating with you, never even realizing your true nature. Then, during the Great Explosion and the Great Collapse, you broke free from your bonds. Weak and desperate, you sought a mortal mind to parasitize, and so you found my ancestors. You hid within the collective dreams of a family, biding your time, using your power to erode and seduce one member after another into becoming your nourishment, waiting for your strength to return so you could reclaim the divine realm…”

Rosetta’s gaze was calm as he stared at the hollow eye floating before him, seemingly unaffected by the immense pressure the entity was exerting. His words came slowly, each syllable clear and deliberate—

“You seem very confident in yourself, as if the mortals you parasitize are powerless and too afraid to resist. But have you ever considered that my ancestor from two centuries ago—the first to be parasitized, Emperor Augustus—never once yielded to you? Even after his death, even as he became part of the Twilight Palace, his will lived on in the bloodline of his descendants, passed down all the way to today?”

Behind Rosetta, a faint, shadowy figure emerged—the most translucent of all shadows, so blurred that its human form was barely discernible. It stood beside him, its transparent face devoid of features, yet its gaze remained fixed unblinkingly on the divine eye.

“You… you are the mortal emperor from two centuries ago…” The divine eye finally broke its silence in a mixture of shock and rage. As it roared, the starlight within the space pulsed and writhed. “How is this possible?! How could you hide an entire ‘era’ from me right under my gaze?! How could you know so many of my secrets?!”

Rosetta smiled. “What’s impossible about that? Once you chose to parasitize a mortal family, you ceased to be a lofty god and became a pitiful parasite. You can influence our memories and emotions, but we can distort your judgment. The palace of eternal twilight imprisons more than just us—you think you haven’t been trapped in dreams these past two hundred years?”

“Trapped in dreams… trapped in dreams…” The divine eye trembled violently, its edges twisting into impossible, chaotic shapes that stretched uncontrollably in all directions. As its power waned, the entire arcane hall began to shimmer with a transparent, distorted, layered illusion. “I see now… I see now… No wonder I never noticed so many obvious traces all this time… Well done. You’ve done very well!”

Suddenly, an invisible shockwave burst outward from the divine eye. Its furious words turned into an unintelligible, chaotic roar beyond human comprehension. The starry sky reflected in the hall twisted and spun, the starlight transforming into malevolent lines and phantasms. Layer upon layer of howls and oppressive force surged toward Rosetta Augustus. Amid the cacophony, one voice barely discernible said, “Your petty tricks are meaningless! Mortal minds cannot withstand divine power—I will parasitize you all again, just like two centuries ago. And this time, you won’t keep any freedom of thought!”

Rosetta faced the oncoming malice and pressure head-on. He instinctively stepped back two paces but quickly regained his footing. Facing the enraged divine eye, he even smiled. “You can try—but are you sure you still have the ability to parasitize minds?”

“That’s easy for me—” The divine eye began, but then abruptly cried out in shock, “How is this possible…”

“After absorbing so much power from the God of War and being deeply corrupted by chaotic divine thoughts, you still think you’re the ‘God of Dreams’?” Rosetta’s face paled slightly, but his eyes shone brighter than ever. “We spent two hundred years stealing that knowledge from you, yet you forgot it all at the crucial moment. But that’s understandable—you’re not the complete God of Dreams. You’re just one of His fragments, an eye separated from the whole. Without the support of the original body and the power of faith, you can’t even survive alone in the real world. A pitiful shard.”

“How dare you speak to me like that?!” The divine eye raged, countless twisted, malevolent starlights from distant dimensions pouring into the hall. Though these lights rapidly weakened and faded, their lingering power seemed enough to destroy everything inside—including Rosetta Augustus and the shadowy souls behind him who had played along with the divine eye for two centuries in the Twilight Palace.

“You mortals, so arrogantly self-satisfied, disgust me. Erasing you from this world is my final duty—consider it an honor that you get to perish alongside the Eye of God!”

The maddened roar once again became an incomprehensible, chaotic noise. The surrounding starlight thickened with a scorching heat that could tear through both matter and mind. Death was imminent. Yet Rosetta Augustus grew calmer than ever. A faint smile appeared on his lips as he looked steadily—almost mockingly—at the divine eye, now visibly weakening, its surrounding lines growing more transparent and illusory. He spread his arms, ready to face the distant starlight’s illumination.

At that moment, a strange female voice suddenly echoed inside his mind—

“Is that all the descendants of Roland can do? Just wait to die?”

Startled, Rosetta opened his eyes. Just as he was about to search for the source of the voice, a tremendous explosion shattered a nearby wall. The surrounding starlight illusions tore open a massive rift, and the hall’s original walls and ceiling quickly reappeared.

A large window on the castle’s west side, along with part of the wall, had been blasted open. A howling cold wind rushed in through the gap. A bizarrely shaped Cecil aircraft crashed directly through the breach, its metal hull, wing plates, and the base of its inverted cone sparking as they scraped the floor and walls. Like a rampaging beast, it came to a halt before Rosetta, who stood there dumbfounded.

Then he finally noticed the astonishing detail of the strange Cecil craft: mounted on the base of the inverted cone was a container over two meters in diameter, inside which floated a living brain. In that brief moment, their eyes met—a chilling, even terrifying sight for most, but Rosetta felt an inexplicable, almost blood-bound connection surge from somewhere deep within.

The aircraft emitted a strange buzzing from within. Runes glowed on the brain’s surface and on parts of the machine. An invisible psychic field unfolded, and a long, spider-like limb materialized from thin air, swiftly lunging toward the rapidly dissipating divine eye.

Rosetta instinctively looked toward the limb’s direction, but before he could see what happened next, a dazzling white light flooded his vision.

A brief, intense dizziness overwhelmed him. He realized his mind was being invaded—but this intrusion brought no sense of danger. Quickly adapting to the disorienting spatial shift, the scene before him stabilized. He found himself in an extraordinarily vast space.

An endless expanse of water stretched out like a mirror. The sky was clear and blue, dotted with wispy clouds. Between the clouds, countless symbols, formulas, and mechanical parts spun and reassembled endlessly. Various platforms of unknown purpose floated on the distant water, shrouded in a blurry barrier that obscured their details.

This was the scene Rosetta saw upon opening his eyes.

After a moment, he snapped out of his surprise and noticed a round table had appeared before him. Around it were several simple yet elegantly designed high-backed white chairs. Two figures stood by the table, seemingly waiting for him.

Upon recognizing one of them, Rosetta’s pupils contracted reflexively, but then his expression relaxed—more so than before.

Gawain Cecil. No surprise there.

Rosetta stepped forward, his feet touching the water’s surface without sinking. He sized up Gawain briefly, then glanced around before smiling faintly and lowering his gaze.

“So, should I call you Gawain Cecil here, or the Outlander?”

Gawain smiled and gestured to an empty seat at the table. “Looks like the Sleeper cultists you recruited have shared some useful intel. Sit down—everyone who comes here has a place.”

“Thank you.” Rosetta nodded and sat casually. Delicate tea and snacks appeared before him, and a cup filled itself.

Gawain looked at him with mild surprise. “You don’t seem very shocked.”

“This war against the gods has unfolded with far more surprises than I expected,” Rosetta said calmly. “Compared to that, the ‘Outlander’ is at least someone I’ve seen in the intelligence reports.”

No sooner had he finished speaking than a woman’s voice came from another seat around the round table. “I thought you’d greet me first—has the Augustus family’s sense of etiquette really declined so much in your generation?”

The speaker was the figure who had been standing beside Gawain since earlier.

Rosetta had been so focused on Gawain—the wary “Outlander”—that he hadn’t immediately registered who the other person at the table was. At first, he couldn’t place the unfamiliar face with anyone he knew. But when the woman spoke, recognition suddenly struck him: this was the same unfamiliar female voice he had heard when facing the Vision. Surprised, he turned to look directly at her.

He saw a graceful, dignified woman dressed in a pale green gown. He tried to recall if he knew her, but no name came to mind. Yet something about her face stirred a vague sense of familiarity—he had seen it somewhere before…

The woman in the green dress furrowed her brow slightly. “What’s the matter? Have you already burned all my portraits?”

At last, Rosetta Augustus realized where the familiarity came from. Her features matched certain images stored in his memory. His eyes widened in shock. “You… you are—”

“See? There are still some surprises left for you,” Gawain said with a casual laugh, as if chatting about the weather. “Here, have some tea.”

But Rosetta ignored Gawain’s words and the tea set placed before him. Instead, he stared intently at the woman across from him, his brow knitting tighter. “You’re Beltira Augustus?”

“You should show a little respect,” the woman said coolly. “At least I’m not asking you to bow here.”

“Very well, perhaps I should say ‘you’ then,” Rosetta replied calmly. “So, you’ve somehow lived on until now?”

Beltira caught the key word in his tone. “‘Somehow’… Looks like you know more than you’re letting on.”

“…The royal family keeps many ancient records, along with scattered investigations into those relatives who mysteriously vanished from history,” Rosetta hesitated, then added, “Besides that, I have some… personal sources.”

“Not bad,” Beltira said, “but this isn’t exactly a pleasant topic for me.” She thought of the now-destroyed Cult of the End of All Things, and the dark cultists who once roamed the world—some of whom even she found repulsive. She shook her head. “Let’s leave the friendly family chat here. It’s time we discussed more serious matters.”

(End of chapter)