Chapter 142: Source Code Refactoring the Laws of Heaven and Earth

Shen Yan’s hand was still raised, the tip of his finger just half an inch away from the rift that was about to close. The black hand reaching out from the abyss was gripping the edge tightly, its knuckles turning white, as if trying to tear the entire world apart and start anew.

The thin, almost invisible golden thread in his chest flickered intermittently, like a frayed network cable, transmitting the final data packets in bursts. His phone had long since exploded into dust, but he knew the program was still running—after all, code doesn’t necessarily need to be written on a screen; as long as the mind hasn’t crashed, it can stubbornly keep typing.

“This seal is too low-level,” he gasped, his voice hoarse like a broken speaker running ten thousand background processes. “This time, I’m going to… upgrade the system.”

As his words fell, he used the last ounce of his strength to trace a rune trajectory in the void. Not drawing talismans, but typing commands—【Protocol Upgrade: From Passive Defense to Active Refactoring】.

The air suddenly trembled, as if heaven and earth were loading a patch. Fine green characters began to appear along the edges of the rift, scrolling line by line like bullet comments, all of them being disassembled Demonic Energy code: “Clearing anomalous processes… releasing memory resources… detected illegal plugin injection, executing decompilation uninstall.”

The black hand convulsed violently, its surface covered with dense error reporting notices, as if infected by the most ruthless antivirus software in the universe.

But Shen Yan’s body was also nearing collapse. His limbs had become so transparent that the data streams within his bones were visible, his entire person seeming ready to blue screen and shut down at any moment. He gritted his teeth and whispered four names.

“Ye Zhao.”

A faint sound came from nearby ice crystal fragments. The Frost Soul Sword trembled slightly, automatically rising upright, its tip pointing skyward. A silver Sword Qi slowly ascended, condensing into a chain-like form that wrapped around Shen Yan’s wrist—that was her verification mechanism, stabilizing his main program to prevent collapse.

“Pei Yue.”

The green-clothed woman lying in Luo Li’s arms stirred slightly, her eyelashes trembling. Even though her cold veins had been severed, medicinal fragrance still seeped from her fingertips, transforming into pale green threads that stitched into the source code cracks in Shen Yan’s chest, one needle and thread at a time. She was fixing bugs, using her life as a patch.

“Luo Li.”

The cat-eared girl’s nine tails gently lifted, purple flames soaring into the air, no longer in an attack form but woven into a three-dimensional protective net that enveloped the entire refactoring field. Amid the flickering Demonic Fire, faintly visible words appeared: “Firewall v2.0”—she had even designed the interface for him.

“Yu Xiaotang.”

The little girl slumped on the ground suddenly grinned, spinning the half-eaten candied hawthorn skewer in her hand. Remaining talisman patterns crawled along the ground toward Shen Yan’s feet, piecing together a crooked encryption protocol: “Highest permission granted to Brother Shen, never revoked.”

Five streams of energy finally reconnected, no longer opposing but merging. They flowed along the nearly severed golden thread within Shen Yan’s body into the void, weaving into a new network of laws above the rift.

This wasn’t a seal; it was reinstalling the operating system.

Every brick of the palace began to glow, the walls revealing flowing rune arrays, as if the entire building had been rebooted at once, transformed into a massive server cabinet. All the Gu Worms, demonic patterns, and restriction seals once hidden in darkness were identified as malicious plugins, each marked for deletion.

The remnants of Xie Wujiu’s Demonic Energy fragments drifted through the air, dissolving into countless green blocks of Code before finally assembling into a line of large characters:

【Warning: Illegal modification of the Heavenly Dao core Detected. Proceed at your own risk.】

Shen Yan smiled. “I told you, I’m not fixing a Bug—I’m… Refactoring the rules.”

He pressed both hands downward sharply, as if hitting the Enter Key.

Boom—!

A golden light exploded across the entire sky. The bloody dawn was forcibly Formatted, transforming into a clear morning glow. The rhythm of the Spiritual Energy Flow changed—no longer a chaotic, turbulent stream, but a regular ebb and flow, like breathing, like a heartbeat, even more like a perfectly running Loop Function.

The Rift closed completely.

That black hand ultimately failed to tear open the world, leaving only a few charred remnants that crumbled to ash in the wind.

But Shen Yan could no longer stand. His legs gave way, one knee striking the ground with a soft click, as if the Code Module embedded in his joint had finally come loose. His body grew increasingly faint, almost merging with the morning light. Only the golden thread at his chest continued to slowly circulate, proving he was still alive—at least the System hadn’t declared him dead yet.

Ye Zhao’s Sword Qi extinguished first. She fell from midair, landing in a pile of ice shards, her left arm twisted at an angle that made one’s heart ache. Pei Yue lay completely still, only the faint rise and fall of her chest remaining. Luo Li’s tail hung limp, her Demonic Flame entirely extinguished, even her cat ears drooping listlessly. Yu Xiaotang had fallen asleep outright, still clutching that wooden stick in her hand, the corners of her mouth upturned—who knows what delicious thing she was dreaming of.

A gentle breeze swept through the ruins.

Shen Yan wanted to raise a hand to wipe his sweat but found his fingers already half-transparent, every movement feeling like it was loading with Latency. He looked down and saw that a massive Formation Diagram had appeared on the ground beneath his feet, composed of countless tiny Chinese Commands, layered in Nesting and spreading outward.

“Initialization complete.”

“New Heavenly Dao laws Deployed.”

“Permission Allocation: shared among five individuals.”

“System Version: Primordial-alpha1.0”

He stared at those words and suddenly felt a bit amused. In his past life, he wrote Code to meet clients’ changing demands; in this life, he wrote Code to rewrite fate for the entire world. Both were 996, but this time, it was finally worth it.

Footsteps approached from the distance—likely the imperial guards finally daring to come closer. But he couldn’t make out what they were shouting; his ears were filled with the lingering echo of the System’s Notification Tone.

Just as his consciousness was about to sink into darkness, he sensed someone approaching.

It was Ye Zhao.

With strength from who-knows-where, she actually managed to prop herself up with her sword, stood up, and walked step by step to his side, reaching out to support his teetering body. Her palm was cold, yet when it pressed against his back, it felt like a burning flame.

“You…” she began, her voice hoarse beyond recognition, “that string of Commands just now… what did you write at the end?”

Shen Yan blinked, his eyelashes trembling like a malfunctioning circuit board.

“Huh?” He smiled. “Just added a Comment, that’s all.”

“What?”

His lips moved, his voice so soft it was almost inaudible:

“—This life’s Code, only to protect those before my eyes.”

Ye Zhao froze, her pupils trembling slightly. The next second, she suddenly raised her hand and slapped the back of his head.

“Idiot,” she said. “Who told you to modify the core Code without permission! What if it crashed!”

Shen Yan was knocked forward by the slap, nearly toppling over, but he was still smiling.

“It’s fine… look, it ran through.”

After speaking, his body swayed, and finally unable to hold on, he fell backward.

Ye Zhao hurriedly caught him, pulling him heavily into her embrace. His head rested against the hollow of her shoulder, his breathing faint, his body temperature frighteningly low.

The wind swept up the lingering specks of light dust on the ground, leaving the palace ruins in utter silence.

In her dream, Yu Xiaotang mumbled, “Brother Shen… candied hawthorn… don’t snatch it…”

Luo Li gently hooked her tail around Pei Yue’s wrist, ensuring she wouldn’t slip away.

Holding Shen Yan, Ye Zhao watched the sky gradually brighten, saying nothing, only tightly clasping his hand in her palm.

Suddenly, she noticed an extremely fine golden pattern emerging on the inside of his wrist, shaped exactly like a line of miniature code.

She leaned in for a closer look.

It was a string of Chinese comments, just five words:

“Never Uninstall”

(End of Chapter)