Chapter 1548: The Assembly of Stars

After the secret council between the earthly kings and the gods concluded, those towering figures began to depart one by one, just as they had arrived—each stepping toward the dark depths at the edge of the wasteland. The swirling, rolling mists of chaos stretched endlessly like a boundless sea of darkness, and beyond that sea lay the realm of the gods. Gawain watched their massive backs recede, as if observing a group of prisoners slowly returning to their cells.

Though their chains had been removed, these prisoners still had to endure some time within their cage before the world itself could be freed. The good news was that the day of ultimate liberation was drawing near—the twilight of the gods had already begun, and the dawn of the mortal world was just beyond the horizon.

One by one, the gods left, and the vast assembly hall quickly grew quiet. Only the figure of Baofar, the god of commerce, remained. He seemed ready to leave as well, but just before departing, he suddenly paused and turned to look in Gawain’s direction.

Gawain regarded the giant-like, robed middle-aged deity with curiosity. “Is there something else you need?”

“I have some questions for you,” Baofar said candidly. Then, taking two strides forward, he casually sat cross-legged on the ground before Gawain, placing the large book he’d been holding onto a nearby stone. The unceremonious gesture was hardly godly, yet somehow fitting for a god. “These things have been troubling me for a long time.”

The heavy tome thudded against the stone as Baofar settled down, causing the earth to tremble slightly beneath them. Gawain felt the vibration ripple through him. His gaze then fell on the book’s cover—and his eyes widened in surprise. Bold letters spelled out: The Basic Principles of Modern Economics.

Gawain blinked. “…Why are you reading this?”

“Before the Lady of Night found me, I was already studying this,” Baofar replied earnestly. “It’s one of the few freedoms I’ve had since being bound to the divine throne.”

Gawain studied the hefty volume thoughtfully. After a moment’s pause, he asked, “Are you trying to use this to ‘break free’?”

“Not necessarily to break free,” Baofar smiled. “Maybe just to keep pace with you all, even if I know it’s mostly futile. The chains binding me come from the prevailing currents of thought, and my own understanding barely influences those currents. But if I can keep up even a little… Well, I suppose I don’t need to do this anymore now. Still, I find these things you bring quite fascinating.”

Gawain was momentarily taken aback. For some reason, he thought of the three fertile sisters who had told him about farming with Amorn. Suddenly, he realized something—gods, or rather the “humanity” of gods, possess curiosity just like mortals.

So, a “divine humanity” that is curious, capable of learning, and subject to emotions like joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness… should such a being be considered mortal or divine?

These fleeting thoughts passed through Gawain’s mind without troubling him. Instead, he suddenly smiled and pointed at the book. “Ask away. I might not have all the answers, but I’ll tell you whatever I know.”

…

“It’s not only the gods of nature and magic who have sought solutions proactively. Even before I approached them, many gods of this current civilization had already sensed the dangers within the prevailing currents of thought and began seeking ways to escape within their means.”

From the center of the endless gray-white desert, the Lady of Night’s voice echoed from above her majestic throne, calm as if chatting with an old friend.

“It’s a fascinating phenomenon,” she continued. “Over the past million years, civilizations have risen and fallen in cycles on this planet. Yet, no matter the era, the gods behind them were always the slowest to react, the most passive—exactly as the ‘chains of thought’ dictate. But this time, things have changed. The gods of this civilization are active, alert, curious, and even under divine constraints, they show remarkable initiative.

“The gods of nature and magic, who have successfully ‘broken free,’ are prime examples. Beyond them, there’s the god of holy light who actively broke through divine bonds, the war god who descended early to seek death, and the god of commerce who tried to break the ‘information loop’ by reaching out to new realms of knowledge… That last one left the deepest impression on me.”

From the stone pillar before the throne, Wilde’s voice finally spoke up. “You never mentioned this when you returned before.”

“Oh? Didn’t I? Must have forgotten,” the Lady of Night chuckled. “It was quite a scene. When I knocked on the door of the Temple of Wealth, I found Baofar sitting on the floor, poring over The Basic Principles of Modern Economics—a book his followers had offered as tribute. Around him were piles of economic treatises, all sent down by his divine edicts at irregular intervals. I’ve never seen a god so diligently study mortal knowledge. It seemed he was trying to prevent himself from losing control, or at least delay it… It moved me deeply.”

Wilde pressed on, “And then?”

“Though I was moved, I still had to give him a shove—turned him into ‘him,’” the Lady of Night sighed. “If he’d started studying ten years earlier, maybe it would have worked. But with only a year left before ‘graduation,’ there was no time to master modern economics from scratch. So I had to graduate him early. Now that I think about it, Baofar was probably spurred on by the war god’s fall to try changing his fate through knowledge…”

Wilde was silent for a moment, then blurted out, “Can knowledge really change fate like that?”

“More or less,” the Lady of Night replied nonchalantly. Then, with a smile, she added, “And it’s not just Baofar. I found a whole set of Modern Contract Theory behind the Blood God’s throne, and Nafali’s temple is stuffed with Cecil’s Philm Weekly and Idol Beat. You have no idea how shocked I was when I saw those—like a flood of memories about the Old Dumpling suddenly rushing through my mind…”

Wilde looked a bit bewildered by her words. After nearly half a minute of silence, he finally asked, “But why this change? Why are the gods of this civilization so different from those of the past million years? Could it be… because of the order Gawain Cecil established after his resurrection?”

The Lady of Night pondered for a few seconds, then shook her head gently. “No. While I admit that the changes brought by the Old Dumpling’s resurrection have profoundly affected this world and will shape its future trajectory, those changes only influence what lies ahead. The many traits of the gods themselves are determined by the past—by the many factors at play during their birth.”

“Determined by the past…” Wilde mused. “Then what is it that’s at work? What makes the gods of this civilization so unique?”

The Lady of Night remained silent for a long time. Then, suddenly, she lifted her gaze toward the pale, boundless sky of the Shadow Divine Realm. She remembered that over 1.8 million years ago, beyond that pale sky floated countless terrifying, indescribable things—remnants of ancient gods and echoes of lost civilizations from even earlier times. But even the shadows of gods could not endure forever in the chaotic void beyond the divine realm. Now, those haunting phantoms had vanished long ago.

As the most peculiar of the divine realms, the Shadow Divine Realm had quietly endured in the deepest layers of the Underworld for millions of years. The era the Lady of Night knew had long since been erased by time. Yet she understood that beyond her forgotten kingdom, the cycle of time never ceased. Everything she knew was repeating—around the young gods, beyond their divine barriers, the shattered remnants of fallen gods and the echoes of their civilizations circled like an ancient galaxy. The mournful cries of dying civilizations echoed endlessly through the Underworld.

Those layers of ruins left by extinct ancient civilizations were a curse—a terrifying reality every newborn god had to face upon awakening. Even an ancient god like the Lady of Night had suffered under their weight. But at this moment, she suddenly realized something—the graves of the fallen might not only be a curse, but also a blessing.

After one civilization after another ended in bitter rage, after generation upon generation of gods slowly and passively died, perhaps their lingering echoes in the Underworld had finally begun to exert some influence.

“Maybe… quantitative change has led to qualitative change,” the Lady of Night whispered, as if speaking to herself. “Did the Voyagers have me wait here through the cycles because they foresaw this day would come…?”

“What did you say?” Wilde heard her muttering but couldn’t grasp her meaning. “What do the Voyagers have to do with this?”

The Lady of Night didn’t answer. Instead, she rose from her throne and turned to look at her post of a million years. Her gaze settled on the ancient stone seat, and under her stare, the throne’s backrest suddenly shimmered with points of light. A dazzling star map appeared, with countless stars shining as they moved through the vast cosmos. Many stars were marked and connected by lines.

At the edge of the star map, a fading route could be seen—the direction of the Voyagers’ last transmitted signal. Within the map, many stars bore labels like “Prosperity,” “Decline,” “Emergence,” and “Desolation.” A distinct dark band stretched across the map, covering a region where nearly all stars were marked “Decline” or “Desolation,” as if an invisible abyss was sweeping through the universe, crushing civilizations on those worlds.

At this moment, the dark band’s edge was creeping toward the map’s center. Two closely situated planets marked “Prosperity” were the first to face the abyss, seemingly about to be swallowed.

But the Lady of Night’s gaze did not rest on those two. Instead, she focused on another spot—the lower edge of the dark band, where a star marked “Prosperity” was just touching the boundary of darkness. Though the astronomical scale was compressed into this small image, even she could not tell with the naked eye if the dark boundary was advancing. Yet she seemed to sense something, her eyes fixed on that faint glimmer.

It flickered twice. The label “Prosperity” changed to “Decline,” and almost instantly, it was marked “Desolation.”

It dimmed, sinking into a murky gloom, waiting for the next cycle.

“The ‘Tormer-III’ has gone dark,” Lady Night whispered softly. Then, slowly, She turned around and settled back onto Her throne, just as She had done for millions of years before.

Wilde fell silent. The most breathtaking cosmic tremor among the stars had briefly lifted a small veil from this great adventurer’s eyes, leaving him speechless for an unknown stretch of time. Finally, he spoke up: “What exactly are the Voyagers making You wait for here? Just to see which civilization can survive the maelstroms and divine catastrophes? But from what You described, the Voyagers are fully capable of leaving behind far more powerful defense systems on every planet. If a civilization grows to the ‘Flourishing’ stage, even if the Voyager fleet doesn’t return, their automated machines could protect the newly risen civilization—or even guide them off their homeworld…”

“But even those automated machines cannot run forever—and the civilizations taken away by the Voyager fleet will never become ‘Voyagers’ themselves,” Lady Night said calmly.

…

In the southwestern seas of the Loren Continent, a massive fleet sailed through the vast, tranquil ocean. The mirror-like surface reflected the endless, bright sky above. At the center of this glassy sea stood a towering giant spire, as if holding up the very heavens. Its colossal shadow stretched from one horizon to the other.

On the bow deck of the Imperial Navy’s flagship, the Winter’s Chill, Byron faced the sea breeze, gazing into the distance. The wind stirred the captain’s coat draped over his shoulders, making it billow like the cloak of a knight from a bygone era. Standing beside him, his adjutant cautiously warned, “Sir, your coat is about to be blown away…”

Byron grinned broadly and laughed, “Ha! No worries—I tied it to my arm with a rope.”

The adjutant was speechless.

But Byron didn’t seem to notice the brief, incredulous look his adjutant gave him. His eyes remained fixed on the sea ahead. The towering spire connecting the Sky Station to the planet’s surface grew ever more imposing. Between the spire and the Winter’s Chill, a vast white froth was spreading across the water. A sleek, domed giant ship was surfacing from its submerged state.

It was the Sea Witch’s large submersible transport—the Mighty General of the Calm Seas.

Aboard that ship were thousands of deep-sea engineers and ocean sorceresses preparing to embark on space-bound engineering missions. Meanwhile, on the Winter’s Chill and the dozen or so transport and engineering vessels trailing behind, were ironclad engineers from the Talash Plains, dragonborn and dragon technicians from the two great dragon realms, and a massive cache of engineering components.

Soon, all of this would be lifted into the sky by the colossal elevator left behind by the Voyagers!

(End of chapter)