"Is this enough?" she turned and asked the witch.
The witch looked at her palm, a strange smile crossing her face. "Yes, of course it is."
Luo Wei sensed something was wrong and tried to withdraw her hand, but the stone door beneath her palm suddenly trembled, emitting a thunderous rumble.
Rocks and dust rained down continuously from above, falling around her like collapsing sand dunes. The flying debris stung her eyes, forcing them shut.
As Luo Wei tried to retreat with closed eyes, the towering stone door suddenly collapsed. A dazzling white light poured forth, instantly engulfing her.
A fierce wind appeared from nowhere, turning her body into a drifting leaf, carrying her through the doorway and throwing her into the heart of the white light.
Luo Wei landed on a warm stone platform. The whistling wind in her ears suddenly ceased, and everything around her became as quiet as if she had entered another world.
She opened her eyes and saw a soft, greenish light floating in the darkness. Looking closer, she realized it was two glowing green leaves, like a newly sprouted seedling, its tender leaves swaying gently in the breeze.
"God of the Dead?" she called out, but received no answer.
Luo Wei looked around, but the surrounding darkness was impenetrable.
She felt her right arm and was shocked to discover that her magic wand hidden in her sleeve had vanished!
Had she dropped it when entering just now?
Luo Wei furrowed her brows and turned to look at the small glowing green thing.
This object looked like some kind of luminous magical plant - surely it couldn't be the sleeping form of the God of the Dead?
She reached out and tentatively touched the two tender leaves. The next second, a pillar of light shot up, and the two green leaves, as if possessed by spirits, whooshed straight into her forehead.
Startled, Luo Wei instinctively touched her forehead, only to feel a hard gemstone.
Though no one spoke to her, she mysteriously knew what this object was.
It was the green gemstone embedded in the Vine Crown, containing immense power of eternal life - the heart of the Life Goddess.
And this crown had an even more enticing name - the Divine Authority.
The Divine Authority represented a god's status, the source of their power, the identity and position bestowed upon deities by universal consciousness.
Whoever possessed it could become a god.
Luo Wei's mind reeled, and an intense sense of crisis swept through her entire body. She immediately tried to remove the crown from her head, but she was already too late.
Her body became as light as gas, floating upward uncontrollably, passing through thick layers of earth and soft clouds until she reached a place bathed in golden light. In the high heavenly realm, she saw an enormous divine throne under the radiant light, majestic and imposing, inscribed with the most powerful divine marks from the beginning of the world and the mysterious laws governing all things.
This was the throne of the Life Goddess.
The Divine Authority was being drawn to the throne.
But the throne was not empty - it had already been occupied by another deity's consciousness.
Freya, the Goddess of Love whose beauty outshone the sun, had placed a fragment of Herself upon the throne. Her fragment held half of the broken scepter of the Life Goddess, absorbing the laws within it.
Behind Her stood the projections of two giant gods - the Sun God and Moon God cast Their gazes from beyond the heavens, like blood-sucking straws entangled around the Life Goddess's throne.
Their bodies were too vast to be seen in a single glance. All Luo Wei could see was a small pattern on the hem of the Love Goddess's dress that hung beneath the throne.
Her face appeared in Luo Wei's mind but could not be seen by her eyes.
What her mortal eyes could see was so limited - her body was like a grain of sand on the Love Goddess's dress hem, though her soul was inflated to enormous proportions by the Vine Crown.
Yet she was still too weak - her soul, which seemed vast to her, was barely larger than the Love Goddess's fist.
How could someone like her possibly contend with gods for power?
Luo Wei spread her white wings, intending to fly back to the ground with the Divine Authority. She didn't want to disturb these three deities and hoped They would ignore her, but this was merely wishful thinking.
From the moment the Divine Authority emerged, the throne had reacted strongly, emitting green divine light, welcoming its master's return with all its might.
How could the Love Goddess seated on the throne not notice all this? She had long seen that grain of sand flying up from the dust - how dare a tiny human covet the noble Divine Authority? Preposterous!
The Love Goddess's golden hair blazed with angry light. Her fragment wielded the broken scepter, and invisible fingers grabbed Luo Wei as easily as picking up an ant.
The thunderous roar of the heavenly gods echoed above the sea of clouds. The intense sound waves pierced Luo Wei's eardrums, causing warm blood to flow from her ears and drip down her ear lobes.
Her brain felt like it was being stabbed by countless needles. Luo Wei coughed up blood, her weakened soul falling beside the Love Goddess's enormous feet.
The radiance of sun and moon shone upon her soul, the light transforming into ropes that bound her and dragged her into the void.
Luo Wei swallowed the blood in her throat and opened her pure black eyes, only to be instantly blinded by two golden lights.
Mortals must not gaze upon gods!
How dare a lowly insect attempt to glimpse the true face of deities!
Divine might crushed her broken body. Her chest felt like it was being carved by knives. Luo Wei could no longer hold back and vomited thick blood.
Chunks of internal organs mixed with blood gushed out in great quantities, soaking her clothes.
But in that brief glance earlier, she had seen it - two enormous golden eyes floating in the void, without eyelids, revealing perfectly round eyeballs and golden irises, with pupil centers black as holes. These were the true forms of the Sun and Moon Gods - two eyes.
From the distant heavens came divine intimidation. Clouds churned and thunder roared continuously. Lightning charged with terrifying power hunted through the mists.
The Love Goddess looked down at Luo Wei and slightly raised a finger. An angel flew above Luo Wei.
"Human, surrender the Divine Authority." The angel's sword hung above her head.
Luo Wei looked at the crown that seemed to have grown onto her hand and sneered inwardly.
If they wanted the Divine Authority, why didn't they just take it themselves?
Was it because this didn't belong to them, so they couldn't seize it?
"Cough, cough," she coughed up more blood and raised her head, "If I surrender the Divine Authority, I'll die, won't I?"
The angel listened to the Love Goddess's divine decree and said majestically: "Surrender the Divine Authority, and your life will be spared."
"What if, cough cough, I refuse?"
"You will be imprisoned in the void until your body dies and your soul dissipates, and the Divine Authority falls off on its own."
Luo Wei lowered her eyes. With her current strength, she couldn't even withstand one strike from this angel before her, let alone protect the Divine Authority.
She called out to the God of the Dead in her heart but received no response. Was she really going to be trapped in the void until she dissipated?
"Cough, if I surrender the Divine Authority," Luo Wei coughed for a while before asking with difficulty, "will the gods spare me from now on, and can I return safely and healthily to the mortal realm?"
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