Chapter 205: Dream's Astonishment
"An external concept entering our world as a projection is a completely different matter from a native being, fully integrated into this world, trying to break free in its complete form."
Desaad lowered his head and calculated for a while before looking up. "We know too little about The Presence. We don't understand what kind of deity this is, and we can't even confirm the form in which this being disseminates its power. If Ghost can cross the Source Wall, it means that many of the beings in Heaven and Hell actually possessed the ability to cross the Source Wall from the very beginning."
To be honest, this subverted their long-held beliefs. It was also the ultimate mockery and humiliation of the epic feat performed by generations of gods who had relayed each other to ascend the wall over the past three generations.
Darkseid was silent for a rare moment. For a being of his multiversal standing, his computational power was massive and his logic was immeasurable. Even so, Darkseid needed to think.
His gaze turned toward the Domain of the Gods, toward the edge of the world, at the all-devouring Source Wall. He also located the traces of Ghost in a certain universe.
"This 'Wrath of God' has a strength that fluctuates wildly, making it difficult to grasp. Setting that aside, I suspect He might be even harder to kill than a high-level concept god like those from the Endless Family."
Darkseid mulled it over. How could he imprison the wrath of an unknown deity?
Even if he successfully dealt with Ghost, what would the gods in Heaven think?
The Eye of God, the Voice of God...
If a Hand of God, Foot of God, or heart, liver, and lungs were to appear, Darkseid wouldn't be surprised in the slightest. He just thought that this particular entity had a strange hobby of dismembering itself.
Could it be that, like him, Darkseid, its Divine Authority had also been shattered?
For the first time, Darkseid began to seriously evaluate Heaven and Hell, these two top-tier worlds that were intermittently at war.
"What about that avatar of yours that Ghost tampered with? How will you handle it? With your strength, can you control it?" Desaad asked in a low voice. "As long as you capture it and bring it into the Domain of the Gods and absorb its Divine Authority, the truth will be revealed. The worst-case scenario is merely angering Ghost and fighting a battle with Him."
Would the gods of Apokolips fear the Wrath of God? Impossible. That would be underestimating the New Gods.
Darkseid shook his head.
His avatars were different from the avatars that gods like Steppenwolf and Desaad deployed into the multiverse; they were all relatively independent individuals.
To put it bluntly, his main body, which stood guard in the Domain of the Gods, was merely a larger avatar that possessed the largest share of the Divine Authority Fragments. It could rely on the sheer mass brought by its greater share of Divine Authority to forcibly transmit messages to the Divine Authority Fragments across the multiverse, but it couldn't be called "control."
This was why when Darkseid's avatars from different universes met, they each had their own plans of action. There wouldn't be any boring theatrics like a powerful avatar avenging a weaker, humiliated one.
A typical example was when an adult Darkseid avatar met the infant Darkseid. It was like two familiar strangers meeting for the first time. He made no significant comment about the Justice League of the New 52 Universe using his infant self as a tool.
"No matter what secrets there are, they cease to be secrets in the face of absolute strength. There is only one thing I must do: find the Anti-Life Equation, completely perfect the Omega Effect, and become an even more powerful deity. At the very least, I must surpass my father."
Yuga Khan was the top dog in the New God system, yet even he had failed. This meant that if Darkseid wanted to break through the Source Wall, he needed to possess power even greater than Yuga Khan's.
He already possessed the power of the Omega Effect. To explosively increase his own strength, the most reliable method was to find the Anti-Life Equation.
Different multiversal-level energies might not be compatible and could even conflict with each other, but Darkseid keenly sensed that the Omega Effect was incomplete. The missing part was, in all likelihood, the Anti-Life Equation.
If these two at-least-multiversal-level energies could be completed, how strong would Darkseid become?
It was incalculable. Darkseid himself didn't know what it would be like.
Although the gods in the Domain of the Gods generally believed that something like the Anti-Life Equation did not exist in the world and that Darkseid's search was doomed to be fruitless.
Desaad quietly withdrew. No one knew what this second or third-in-command of Apokolips was scheming.
Darkseid gazed in the direction of the multiverse.
"Hmph, a unique avatar... There's a deviation in your cognitive thinking from my original self, so your actions are also slightly different from my other selves... Interesting. I'll let you be for now. Don't disappoint me when I come to reclaim all the Divine Authority Fragments."
Soon. Darkseid had a premonition. He was getting closer and closer to the Anti-Life Equation, on the verge of pinpointing its location. As long as he could obtain this formula, he could calculate all things. Be it human or god, they were all living and belonged to the category of life, so they would inevitably be completely dominated by the Anti-Life Equation!
...
Darkseid could maintain his patience because he had a grander goal.
But Dream was different. As a concept god who had rapidly expanded to the multiversal level, wherever there was life, his presence could be found.
While using the dream power contributed by all living beings to open up a new world in the Domain of the Gods as his headquarters and create a dream-world linking all life for the DC World, Dream also dispatched a portion of his concept into the multiverse, seeking to adapt and integrate into this vast world as quickly as possible.
"Found it. This is the place... The starting point that slightly accelerated our family's integration. Logically, those 52 universes should have been the first to initiate the Flashpoint resonance, working together to pull us into the multiverse."
Dream entered the DCEU. The other members of his family had no interest in such trivial matters, but the most active among them, Dream, was very interested in the affairs of this universe. He had even discovered a wild concept god here.
"Xenomorph..."
Dream looked at the parasitic race blossoming on various planets and felt a slight stir of interest.
Talk of New Gods or Old Gods, and he found it boring. Talk of things like angels or demons, and he would feel disgusted. But talk of concept gods, and his interest was piqued.
"A brand-new concept god? I just don't know which world it comes from. Is it a god born from a projection of this multiverse, or a god that migrated here with its native world like us?"
Dream naturally believed that this thing called a Xenomorph, which he had never heard of and was clearly a nascent, expanding concept, had probably managed to gain a firm foothold in the DC World only because of the concentrated outbreak of the Flashpoint event.
In other words, it was riding the coattails of the Endless Family.
"This universe hasn't been invaded by those disgusting gods from Hell. It's very clean."
Dream was in an excellent mood. With a natural affinity for the creatures, he casually selected one Xenomorph and entered its dreamscape.
The moment he entered the dream, Dream realized the unique nature of the Xenomorph being in the mental domain.
"It's actually like this? The soul and consciousness of every single Xenomorph is actually a building block for a collective soul-world? To touch the mind of one Xenomorph is to directly face all Xenomorphs?"
A look of astonishment appeared on Dream's face. This was a genius idea. However, for the moment, he couldn't see what foundation the Xenomorph's master had used to support such a unique realm of consciousness.
"What's going on? Someone is actually exploring the soul of a Xenomorph? And it's extremely bizarre, not mind control in the conventional sense."
Du Wa was alerted immediately. If one Xenomorph was compromised, it meant all Xenomorphs were compromised on a spiritual level. No matter how stealthy Dream's actions were, even if he integrated into the Xenomorphs' minds as a part of the dreamscape itself, there was still no way to hide it from Du Wa's monitoring.
Dream had already infiltrated the realm of consciousness, planning to explore the minds of more Xenomorphs, treating it as an engrossing game to uncover the background and origins of this concept god.
"Let's see... This Xenomorph being has such a pure and clean mind? Even in the dreamscape on the surface of its consciousness, it's all the same. Let's see... For Du Wa??"
Dream, of course, knew of a similar slogan. It was the cry of the Parademons Army dispatched by Apokolips in various universes when they invaded planets—For Darkseid!
However, the Darkseid of this universe had already been killed by this concept god, and the Parademons had been largely wiped out. This was good.
Just as Dream was about to probe deeper into its memory, he realized something was wrong. The deeper he dissected the consciousness and explored, the more he discovered the massive, multi-layered logical trap.
The entire realm of consciousness, at first glance, was a picture of thriving prosperity, where living and dead Xenomorphs existed eternally. But in essence, it also existed as a colossal mental abyss.
"One hundred seventy million linear logic threads are in constant contact, and three hundred ten million self-verifications. If even one of them produces an error, it means an invasion has occurred..."
Dream frowned. How had the being who constructed and bore this kind of collective consciousness not gone mad?
"Are you surprised? For you, bypassing a defense of this degree is just a matter of time. Of course, that would require you to focus all your power on me. It's impossible to breach my system of consciousness by using only a fragment of your concept."
As the entire realm of consciousness came to an abrupt halt, innumerable particles of consciousness converged to form Du Wa's figure. As the collective consciousness of countless beings, he appeared here, facing Dream directly.
Seeing the gothic-styled individual before him, Du Wa knew who he was.
This was troublesome. He had been trying to avoid contact with other concept gods. The clash of concepts was extremely difficult and would only lead to a series of thankless results.
But this guy had actually come knocking on his door?
Du Wa frowned as he sized up Dream. "You'd better leave on your own. Or should I interpret this as a declaration of war?"
"A declaration of war...? I don't believe that you, a god who killed Darkseid and is expanding your concept in a universe that triggered a multiversal event, are an ignorant god. Is that to say you're confident you can defeat me?" Dream was very interested.
"I can't win, but you can't kill me either."
"It seems you've hidden a great deal of crucial information deep within your realm of consciousness. This pertains to your birth and origin, right? Is this the source of your confidence in confronting a multiversal concept god?"
Dream was somewhat surprised.
If a Darkseid avatar had berated him like this, he wouldn't have said much. But for a single-entity concept god like Du Wa to say it, the statement was worth pondering.
Du Wa was indeed not afraid of these beings, because his base of operations was in another multiverse—at least for now.
To put it harshly, even if he were to be severely beaten now, targeted by a multiversal god, and ultimately defeated, to Du Wa, such a loss would be worthless.
Whenever he wanted, he could use Universe 9602 as a springboard to jump from the Marvel Multiverse to the DC Multiverse.
Could a multiversal god from DC cross over to the Marvel Universe to kill a concept god there?
Only someone like Ghost, with a noble origin, whose raw power was difficult to gauge and constantly fluctuating, but whose level of existence was extremely high, would have a chance to make contact with the Marvel Multiverse and give Du Wa pause.
But Dream? Even Destiny and Death from the Endless Family? Forget it. The Marvel side had similar gods. It didn't matter if they couldn't compare to the future peak strength of Destiny and Death. If Destiny and Death truly dared to enter the Marvel Multiverse, the super-great and omnipotent gods on the Marvel side wouldn't just stand by and watch.
Du Wa could fail countless times in DC and make a comeback countless times.
"Bringing your entire native world and bypassing the Source Wall by means of a concept, creating such a grand world, is indeed a brilliant idea. Even the many gods here were willing to pave the way for your arrival."
Du Wa said faintly, "But this also means you must pay a price for your actions, becoming confined to this even larger world."
"I've heard similar words in countless dreams. Many gods have evaluated us this way. So, you're saying you're not confined? That's not logical."
A look of shock appeared on Dream's face. "You still have a part of your concept remaining in your native world? How is that possible? If you're a concept god born from a reflection, you should be an independent, newborn concept adapted to the rules of this multiverse. How would you know about things in your native world? But if you didn't bring your native world to integrate here, then you—"
Isn't that exploiting a bug?
If Du Wa possessed a reliable and stable method of entering this multiverse, wouldn't that mean he was completely unafraid of death?
This was something that even they, the Endless Family, couldn't achieve. If they truly angered the mysterious Lucifer or other genuinely powerful beings, they too would run the risk of being erased.
"So that's how it is. No wonder you went to such insane lengths to reconstruct your own realm of consciousness. It was to hide this secret. But unfortunately for you, I discovered it before you could become stronger."
Dream observed Du Wa's concept. "You should also be aware that as you make contact with more gods and exhibit more of your unique traits, sooner or later, your special nature will drive those gods who dream day and night of breaking through the Source Wall into a frenzy."
(end of chapter)