At the bottom of the trench, Levi stood at the edge of a freshly torn spatial rift.
The edges of the rift trembled slightly, like the wound of a living creature. From below came waves of cold air—the scent of death itself.
He didn't rush in.
Although the earlier feeling of being watched had disappeared, Levi knew the other party was still nearby. Most likely, they were already gathering forces, preparing to come and cause trouble.
It didn't matter. By the time they arrived, he would have already taken the trident and left.
Levi leapt into the rift.
The sensation of falling was strange. It wasn't ordinary free fall—it felt more like an invisible force dragging him downward. Space twisted and folded around him as he passed through an endless, unseen tunnel filled with chaotic gray mist.
Three seconds later, his feet finally touched solid ground.
When he opened his eyes, everything had changed.
This was not the seafloor.
Beneath his feet was dry black rock. Above him, there was no seawater—only a darkness so thick it felt tangible. Towering stone pillars surrounded him, each over ten meters in diameter, stretching upward into the unseen heights of the void.
The surfaces of the pillars were covered in strange patterns—like ancient script, or perhaps blood vessels. A dim crimson glow pulsed through them, giving the entire space an eerie, sinister atmosphere.
The air reeked of blood and rot.
Levi scanned his surroundings and quickly reached a conclusion.
This was an independent space, forcibly peeled away from the seabed by someone with extraordinary skill. The space itself was extremely stable—none of the fragility typical of ordinary pocket dimensions.
Whoever created this place was no weakling.
At the very least, they were at the peak of the Skyfather level, possibly even brushing against the threshold of a single-universe level.
Levi stepped forward.
His footsteps echoed through the hollow expanse, overlapping into an eerie reverberation. Between the pillars, there was nothing. The ground was bare—not even a pebble in sight, as if it had been deliberately cleared.
After walking about fifty meters, a structure appeared ahead.
An altar.
It was circular, roughly twenty meters in diameter, built from black stone.
Thirteen steps led up to it, each carved with lifelike skull reliefs.
The skulls had hollow eye sockets and wide-open jaws, as if frozen in silent screams.
At the top of the altar, a trident was embedded.
That was it.
The trident was pitch black, wrapped in faint wisps of dark mist. Its three prongs pointed straight upward, each tip flickering with dim black flames.
Levi could clearly sense the energy emanating from it—it had indeed reached the peak of the Skyfather level. More importantly, its nature was unusual. It wasn't purely offensive energy, but rather the manifestation of an abstract concept.
Death.
The core concept embodied by this trident was death itself.
Levi stepped forward, preparing to ascend the altar.
The moment his foot touched the first step—
The entire altar began to tremble violently.
No—not just the altar. The entire space was shaking.
The red patterns on the stone pillars suddenly brightened, like ignited fuses. The light surged upward along the pillars before converging at the base of the altar.
A voice echoed through the space.
Low and hoarse, as if squeezed from the depths of a decaying throat.
"Living beings… how many years has it been… and yet a living being dares to step into the domain of the Lord of the Abyss…"
Levi stopped and turned toward the source of the voice.
The black stone at the base of the altar began to move.
Not melting—twisting and swelling in a way that defied physical laws. The rock seemed to come alive, gradually forming the outline of a humanoid figure.
The shape grew clearer.
Until it became a towering figure nearly three meters tall.
The being was wrapped in a tattered black robe. Its face was hidden, with only two crimson points glowing beneath the hood—its eyes.
In its hand was a bizarre scythe, its crescent blade covered in dense, twisted runes.
"Who are you?" Levi asked calmly.
The robed figure did not answer immediately. It studied him, confusion flickering in its crimson gaze.
"You… carry many powers… space, strength, time… and… life?"
Its voice suddenly sharpened, like nails scraping glass.
"Impossible! Life and death are opposing laws! How can you wield both at once?!"
Levi said nothing.
He hadn't comprehended the Law of Life directly, but when he copied Ego's lifeform, he had sensed a strange fluctuation—likely the Life Law.
By now, he was long accustomed to such "impossibilities." The Superpower Copier itself defied all rules, allowing him to replicate and fuse different laws endlessly.
Life came from Ego.
Death came from Hela.
The robed figure seemed to realize something.
"I see… you are an outsider. One who does not belong to this universe."
It raised its scythe, pointing it at Levi.
"No wonder you dared come here. No wonder you could find the entrance to this space."
"You've come for the Dark Trident."
Levi nodded.
"That's right."
There was no point denying it.
The robed figure let out a low, rumbling laugh, like distant thunder.
"Interesting… truly interesting… It has been ten thousand years. Ten thousand years since any living being dared step into this domain."
"You are the first."
"And you will be the last."
The moment it finished speaking, the robed figure swung its scythe.
There was no flashy technique, no complex fluctuation of laws—just a simple horizontal slash.
But Levi's expression changed.
He could clearly feel that along the path of the scythe, space was silently disappearing. Not cut, not shattered—completely erased.
That section of space vanished from both the material level and the level of laws.
A high-level application of the Death Law—
Existence Erasure.
Levi didn't take it head-on.
Activating the Speed Force, he transformed into a streak of golden-red lightning, slipping out of the attack's range.
In the next instant, he reappeared ten meters behind the robed figure.
Without hesitation, he raised his hand.
The Law of Space activated.
Dozens of spatial rifts appeared around the figure, slicing toward it from every angle. Each carried enough force to cleave a planet in half.
The robed figure didn't even turn its head.
It simply tightened its grip on the scythe.
A black ripple spread outward, like waves across water.
Wherever the ripple passed, Levi's spatial rifts collapsed and dissipated.
"Futile."
The robed figure turned to face him.
"Death is the end of all things. No matter how many laws you wield, before death, everything returns to nothingness."
Levi narrowed his eyes.
Troublesome.
This entity's mastery of the Death Law far surpassed Hela's.
Hela's version leaned toward combat and slaughter, while this one embodied the concept itself—the inevitable end of all things.
If Levi were still at the early Skyfather level, this fight would be difficult.
But things were different now.
He took a deep breath. The energy within him began to surge.
His Kryptonian physiology operated at full power.
The Tesseract's energy was fully unleashed.
The Laws of Strength, Space, Time, Reality, Life…
Dozens of laws activated simultaneously, forming a vast and complex network within his body. Each law was like a thread, weaving together into a net that seemed to cover all existence.
His aura surged past mid-tier Skyfather, approaching the peak.
The robed figure's laughter stopped.
"I see… you don't just wield life and death… you are… a wielder of multiple fused laws?"
"How is this possible?"
For the first time, genuine shock appeared in its voice.
"From the birth of the universe, it has been proven impossible! Different laws repel and annihilate each other! No being can withstand such conflict!"
"What kind of monster are you?!"
Levi didn't answer.
He raised his right hand. A chaotic sphere of energy formed in his palm, swirling with multicolored light—each color representing a different law.
Strength—purple.
Space—blue.
Time—green.
Reality—red.
Life—gold.
Death—black.
Six primary laws, along with dozens of auxiliary abilities, compressed into a single sphere.
"Let's see if you can take this."
He gently pushed the sphere forward.
It didn't move fast—if anything, it was slow. But wherever it passed, space parted, and time seemed to stagnate.
The robed figure didn't dodge.
It raised its scythe, pouring all its Death Law power into it. The black flames surged dozens of times larger, forming a massive beam of darkness that collided with the sphere.
The two forces met midair.
There was no explosion.
No deafening roar.
Only a brief, absolute silence.
Then—
The entire space began to collapse.
Not ordinary destruction, but disintegration at the fundamental level. The very laws sustaining this independent dimension crumbled under the clash.
Levi raised a spatial barrier to shield himself.
The robed figure also retreated, forming a defensive layer of Death Law.
The collapse lasted a full ten seconds.
When everything settled, Levi found himself displaced. Most of the stone pillars had fallen. Cracks split across the altar—but the Dark Trident still stood firmly at its peak.
The robed figure stood on the other side, its robe torn in multiple places.
It stared at Levi, its crimson eyes flickering.
"You've won."
Unexpectedly, it admitted defeat.
"I cannot stop you."
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