Chapter 182 – History Fixation

While the remaining Galaxy Guild on Earth waged war against the Hounds of Void, ultimately buying time through the Eternal Epoch’s Regression.

Lee Hanseong, at the Crossroads of Ascension, was aware of all the struggles of those left on Earth.

‘The time difference keeps widening…’

Thanks to this, he also realized that as the dimensional distance between the Crossroads of Ascension and Earth grew, the time difference was gradually increasing.

On Earth, several hours had already passed, yet only a few seconds had flowed for the true bodies of the Twelve Constellations trapped at the Crossroads of Ascension.

“This might throw off the calculations a bit.”

—It will be difficult to help through this body’s true form as well. The true body of the Chaos Constellation can only block the intervention of the Outer Gods.

Even the members of the Chaos Constellation, including Mirinae, were in a situation where they couldn’t help Earth.

The only relief was that those on Earth were managing to seek help from the existence of Infinity on their own.

But in this situation, maintaining the status quo was ultimately the best option.

“Should I have requested a forfeit instead…?”

He wondered if he had pointlessly proceeded with the Apostle Duel among allies.

If they had quickly ended the Apostle Duel with a forfeit, they could have at least sent back their comrades, who would no longer be Apostles, to Earth.

—There’s no need to regret it. The Steward’s choice was the best.

Mirinae explained, as if comforting him.

If Seras or Asta and others had exercised their Apostle authority to create a forfeit victory, the Apostle Duel would have ended quickly, but they wouldn’t have been able to fully grasp the Constellation, she said.

—The fastest way to gain recognition from the Constellation’s will is to face the existing Apostle head-on with full strength and win. Don’t be too impatient.

“But… the Wheel of Tribulation Escape Net won’t buy enough time.”

Currently, An Gyeongseok was buying time through Alter’s Wheel of Tribulation Escape Net’s infinite loop, but as the number of repetitions increased, the Outer God’s Apostle would experience déjà vu.

And eventually, they would break the loop itself.

That much was possible for an Apostle.

If time had flowed the same between Earth and the Crossroads of Ascension, the Apostle Duel would have ended before the loop broke.

But seeing the current situation where the time difference keeps widening, the loop will break before the Apostle Duel ends.

“So I can’t just wait idly.”

—Do you have some clever plan?

“I plan to use Historical Alteration.”

However, it wasn’t ordinary Historical Alteration.

No matter how much Historical Alteration is a Stigma that became the material for [Primordial Chaos], the limitation of being a myth is unavoidable.

At the level of an 11th Star True God, like the Dragon Slayer Emperor, one could passively resist Historical Alteration.

And for a 12-Star Main God-level Apostle, active intervention in history was possible.

Ordinary Historical Alteration was meaningless against those engaged in the Apostle Duel.

Even if history was changed through Historical Alteration, the Apostle could change it back to its original state.

This was separate from the fact that during the Apostle Duel, the Apostle’s power was lowered to the 11th Star level, same as the challenger.

Because the Apostle Duel itself is the process of grasping the Constellation Authority.

Both participants in the duel could be considered quasi-Apostles.

Naturally, even while the duel was ongoing, they could intervene in Historical Alteration occurring in their past as much as they wanted.

‘No, on the contrary, if they secure enough share through the duel, they might even attack by altering our history.’

—You don’t need to worry about that. The history the Steward changed has already been fixed.

Fortunately, there was no worry that their history would be changed by the opponent.

Reversing Historical Alteration results in 《History Fixation》.

The records Lee Hanseong previously changed through Historical Alteration were already protected by Mirinae’s History Fixation, so even an Apostle couldn’t touch them.

The problem was that the history of the Divine Spirits he contracted with wasn’t entirely in a fixed state.

“The period from after the sixth Historical Alteration ended until before they contracted with me will be the issue.”

If it’s a blank history that neither side has intervened in yet, the Apostle could sufficiently interfere, so the remaining history also needed protection through History Fixation.

To do that, first, the blank period between 6-Star and 11-Star that his Divine Spirits skipped through Infinity needed to be filled with plausible history.

However, if he attempted ordinary Historical Alteration during the Apostle Duel, the opponent would also perceive him and try to interfere.

He planned to expand the limits of Historical Alteration through Infinity.

“If I add my Infinity, the Stigma of Historical Alteration should also rise to the level of Authority, so even if the Apostle tries to block it, they won’t be able to.”

—Indeed, that should work.

“If Mirinae also sees no problem, let’s start right away.”

Once the method was decided, Lee Hanseong immediately initiated the seventh Historical Alteration.

Even while he was pondering like this, the loop of the Wheel of Tribulation Escape Net repeating on Earth had already surpassed dozens of times.

Ziiiiing—

Perhaps because he expanded the limits through Infinity.

He could feel even the higher-dimensional time, which originally couldn’t be stopped, coming to a halt.

Moreover, thanks to being closely connected to the true body of the Chaos Constellation through Infinity, Earth’s time was also stopped.

Only the true bodies of the Outer God and the Chaos Constellation continued their power struggle within the stopped time.

Blink.

A part of Lee Hanseong’s consciousness, moving the Chaos Constellation, possessed the 6-Star Utangka right after the sixth Historical Alteration ended.

It was the beginning of the seventh Historical Alteration.

* * *

‘Not a True God, but 6-Star.’

Although in the present, Utangka was a True God who had completed Divinity and Bloomed his Authority, such changes weren’t fully applied to Utangka yet.

To be precise, it seemed that Lee Hanseong had possessed the 6-Star Utangka along with the records of the 11-Star Utangka.

It was as if the past Utangka, who still had a physical body, and the future Utangka, who became a Divine Spirit, hadn’t merged and were separated.

Perhaps this Historical Alteration would proceed by narrowing the gap between past and future.

The problem was.

Grrrrrrrr!

[So you’ve deviated from the beginning I arranged after all.]

That at this point, Utangka was already in a hostile state with Prometheus.

As Utangka broke away from the myth where he realized the Great Void and Prometheus gifted him fire, Prometheus personally revealed himself before Utangka.

[Huh, it seems you’ve risen to True God in the future. Indeed, I should kill you here.]

Prometheus, who seemed to have read the records of the True God Utangka dwelling within Utangka, hardened his gaze coldly and raised killing intent.

Cracklecracklecrackle!

The Spirit Fortress of the Primal Gods protecting Utangka crumbled under the Apostle’s killing intent.

If it were the Utangka from his 6-Star days, he would have died the moment the Spirit Fortress was breached, unable to withstand the Apostle’s killing intent.

But now, he had the records of his future self who became a True God and Lee Hanseong’s consciousness, which was no different from a Fragment of Infinity.

[“No, you cannot kill me here.”]

Stigma 《Primordial Heavenly Lord》.

Spreading the Domain of the Primordial Heaven filled with the Great Void, he momentarily disrupted the Apostle authority of the Epicenter Throne held by Prometheus.

Due to the nature of the Epicenter Throne, which governs the first and the beginning, the closer one is to the primordial, the more one receives the Epicenter’s Blessing.

Thanks to Utangka, the Primordial Heavenly Lord, being more suited to the Epicenter than Prometheus, the progenitor of vampires, such resistance was possible.

Of course, considering causality, it was precisely because such resistance was possible that Prometheus was trying to kill him.

But it was a trial Utangka ultimately had to endure if he were to become the Apostle of the Epicenter.

[“Sleep for a while.”]

Towards Prometheus, whose Apostle authority was disrupted, revealing an opening, he unfolded his next move.

Stigma 《Great Void Heavenly Tribulation》.

The Great Void Heavenly Tribulation, which could become any attribute, contained the spacetime attribute and descended upon Prometheus.

Namely, the Sealing Time Heavenly Tribulation!

A heavenly tribulation that imprisons the target undergoing it within an isolated spacetime.

Since he couldn’t kill Prometheus at this point due to the history fixed at a future point, sealing was the best option.

“I’ve roughly bought time with this… but the future is the problem.”

For Utangka to reach the point of Rian’s records, the furthest future point, tens of thousands of years were still needed.

Naturally, during that time, Prometheus would break free from the Sealing Time Heavenly Tribulation multiple times.

Moreover, for a plausible connection to be formed with the fixed histories of Rough or Henrietta, Utangka’s kingdom ultimately had to disappear.

In a future where the vampire Nosferatu became the mainstream of the Arpelgia Continent, and only a minority of humans lived like toys of the fairies inside the Path of the Fairies, Utangka’s human kingdom couldn’t exist.

“…But absence doesn’t necessarily mean destruction.”

Still, Lee Hanseong had no intention of abandoning Utangka’s kingdom.

Through the baptism of Lightning Fire, the lives of the people who became the Mediums of the Great Void Clone were still vividly felt.

Because the Thunderfire Clone had transformed into the Great Void Clone, unlike before when they were unified with lightning and fire, each bloomed with suitable attributes, and the powers they wielded became diverse.

Simultaneously, each of them was an anchor holding Utangka to reality.

Having acquired the Great Void Constitution and reached the Primordial Heavenly Lord, Utangka was in a state where he could be pulled back to the moment of Primordial Beginning at any time.

Having gained the myth of preceding all things, his existence living in the present was unstable.

If it weren’t for his people and the Primal Gods protecting the nation, he might have disappeared from the present not long after unfolding the Stigma of the Primordial Heavenly Lord.

“Ah, with this, Transcendence into an Elemental should be no problem either.”

The moment he realized that fact, Utangka’s species Transcendence was already complete.

Not Utangka being pulled to the Primordial Heaven, but through a Unification where the Primordial Heaven was pulled to the era where Utangka existed, he had already been reborn as a 7-Star Great Void Elemental.

He could also perceive how the Reversal of the Stigma would occur.

‘The Reversal of the Great Void Clone is 《Legion Merge》.’

The Great Void Clone, which creates clones using the people who received the Primal God’s baptism as Mediums, Reverses, and the Polarity Reversal where the Elementals they wield gather upon him, leading to Colonization.

The problem was that merging in this way was no different from releasing the anchors holding him to the present.

“I’ll have to seal this for the time being.”

It seemed he could only use Legion Merge after securing something to serve as an anchor in place of his people.

The same went for Primal God Awakening.

Now that he was an Elemental, he was in a state where he could become a Primal God through Primal God Awakening.

But if he became a Great Void Primal God like this, the gravitational pull of the Primordial Heaven would become so strong that the current gravitational pull of his people alone couldn’t withstand it.

It was safer to use Primal God Awakening only after further expanding the nation and increasing the population.

Thus, he postponed abilities he couldn’t use immediately and focused on what he could do right away.

“Prepare for migration! We shall go to a new continent!”

To connect with the history where their kingdom didn’t exist in the future Arpelgia, he prepared for migration to the other three continents.

At this time, Ardenia, Arcadia, and Arthalia would all be in the primitive era.

Given that their kingdom had rapidly built civilization due to the interventions of Prometheus and Lee Hanseong, they could sufficiently establish themselves as the mainstream even on other continents.

Of course, they didn’t have the technological capability to build ships capable of sailing to other continents, but it didn’t matter.

“Spirit Fortress Reversal, 《Spirit Ship》!”

He simply Reversed the Primal Gods’ Spirit Fortress, which was fixed in place forming a fortress, turning it into a moving ship.

The Spirit Ship created this way was no less than an ark.

Vroooooom—!

It didn’t take long for the whale-like Spirit Ship to set sail with a majestic cry.

The Primal Gods protecting the nation divided into three, forming a total of three ships, and sent vanguards aboard each to the Ardenia, Arcadia, and Arthalia continents.

After arriving on the other three continents, the vanguards, based on their technological superiority, absorbed and merged with the primitive people of each continent, expanding their influence.

Of course, there were times when they encountered Phantom Beast Species or Transcendent Species they couldn’t handle alone.

But since the vanguards were all also Mediums of the Great Void Clone, Utangka could step in as a clone and appropriately defuse conflicts.

“You dragon species, your form of specializing in a single attribute is similar to Elementals. If our Primal Gods assist you, you can achieve even faster growth.”

On the Ardenia Continent, they made a promise of mutual cooperation with the dragons, who were the masters of the continent at this time, and founded the Ardenia Empire.

“Giants, if you possess the attribute of the sun, you will gain vitality like vegetation. If you possess the attribute of Radiance, such life will bloom in full.”

“Ooooh!! That sounds good!!”

“If you promise to help us humans, we will help you obtain the attributes of the sun and Radiance.”

“We promise!! Won’t bully tiny humans anymore!!”

On the Arcadia Continent, they deceived five 7-Star giants who enslaved primitive people, guiding them to evolve through the 8-Star tree giant ‘Ent’ into 9-Star ‘Sacred Mountains’.

While their Grade increased, they evolved into mountains that simply remained in place, unable to move.

Thus, through the five Sacred Mountains, they obtained territory friendly only to humans in Arcadia and founded the Sun Kingdom.

“This place already has a distinct difference between Transcendent Species and mortals due to the existence of the Eastern Heaven.”

On the Arthalia Continent, since the order of the Four Divine Beasts was already somewhat established, they settled in the central area not overlapping with their Domains and built a nation.

And at the moment when Utangka’s people spread and prospered across all four continents.

“This much should be sufficient.”

He felt that the gravitational pull of the anchors holding Utangka had grown sufficiently large.

It was time to proceed with his postponed Primal God Awakening.