Rosen opened his eyes in a daze, gazing at the familiar surroundings.
He was extremely familiar with the world before him—this was clearly the spiritual world revealed by the Natural Compassion Movement.
It was the primal universe heading toward destruction. In the depths of the sky of this heaven-and-earth-structured primal cosmos, a moon bathed in red light extended tendrils of crimson radiance, entangling with the blackened dark sun. Countless Nightfall Parasitic Flowers were rooted on the surface of the dark sun.
And on the vast land in every direction, indistinct primal beings were engaged in a brutal battle.
Rosen felt danger lurking everywhere, especially from the two primal beings a few light-years away and rapidly approaching.
But he feared there was no escaping them. At this moment, he could only wield the power of Eternal Will—all other forces were unusable.
As the two primal beings drew near, Rosen instinctively wanted to flee, but just as instinctively, he stopped himself.
Because he had a sense—he likely couldn't escape at all.
Moreover, everything he saw before him gave him an uncanny sense of déjà vu.
Rosen instinctively felt something was wrong and racked his brain to find every possible means of saving himself.
He carefully checked every item he carried. He hadn't brought the Sea of Miraculous Stars, but the Moonlit Splendor, the Bronze Book of Fate, and various miraculous treasures of the Miracle Sequence were all present—yet all sealed within his body, inaccessible.
Halfway through his inspection, Rosen suddenly noticed a broken ring on his finger.
Having been researching the memory world behind the Nightfall Society lately, he naturally hadn't neglected to study the Nightfall Parasitic Flowers.
He didn't have a complete flower, but he had some powdered remnants obtained after they had withered.
After studying the powder for a while and finding no connection to the memory world, he casually compressed it into a ring and wore it.
Rosen remembered very clearly that the makeshift ring he wore had been shaped from powder representing a blooming Nightfall Parasitic Flower. But now, the petals were damaged and incomplete—part of the powdered material that composed the ring had disappeared.
Combined with the inexplicable sense of familiarity and the missing portion of the ring—
Rosen instantly realized he might have fallen into a loop on the level of memory and cognition.
He had experienced similar loops before within the Natural Compassion Movement, but this time it was likely a memory loop.
For now, he didn't know what triggered the memory loop.
The only thing he had discovered was that the ring compressed from Nightfall Parasitic Flower powder might allow him to evade the memory loop in this world. That could be his only lifeline—but judging from the amount of powder already gone, he likely had no more than five chances left.
Rosen didn't attempt any of the methods he had already mastered, because he understood—he had surely tried them in the previous loop.
If they had worked, things wouldn't have reached this point.
Any means he currently possessed was likely ineffective against the current situation.
However, Rosen firmly believed that this memory world was not a dead end.
The trigger condition to enter was far too simple. As long as one knew about this memory world, unless they possessed a danger-sensing ability as strong as his own, the odds of unintentionally triggering entry were very high.
No one knew him better than he knew himself. Rosen was well aware of what his avatar would do.
Without a doubt, his avatar would drag all Eternal Lives into this.
He didn't believe that the Chaos Holy God hadn't considered this possibility. Though that god wanted to eliminate him, if the cost was all Eternal Lives falling into the memory world, thereby completely disrupting the balance of the cosmic destruction process, that was definitely not something the Chaos Holy God would allow.
So although this memory world was dangerous, there must be a path of survival—one that most Eternal Lives could follow to escape.
However, that path would almost certainly be suited for Eternal Lives—not for him.
The biggest difference between him and other Eternal Lives was that he possessed the Cosmic Seed and the Natural Joy Movement.
At that thought, Rosen shook the void with his Eternal Will, using it as an instrument to perform the Natural Joy Movement. But the memory world did not change. He then switched to the Natural Compassion Movement—still no change.
As the two battling primal beings drew near, Rosen engraved the failed method as a warning on the ring.
Then, as he was inevitably drawn into their fight, Rosen perished once again, losing all consciousness.
...
Rosen opened his eyes for the third time, staring at the familiar yet unfamiliar world, and quickly noticed the ring on his hand.
Seeing the message he had left on it, he instantly understood his current predicament.
Since performing the Natural Movements couldn't free him, his next attempt would be to use the Cosmic Seed.
Though this world only allowed him to wield Eternal Will and not the Seed, not all transcendental powers depended on origin or Seeds—Eternal Will itself held immense power. He began to forcefully channel the laws and energies of heaven and earth using that Will.
It was exceedingly difficult, because this memory world was a replica of the primal universe.
During the primal era, only beings like the Cosmic Will or primal lifeforms had the qualifications to manipulate cosmic laws.
As for the Eternal Will of Eternal Lives—beings of that level didn't even exist during the primal universe.
So Rosen compressed his Eternal Will over and over again, and in the end, only barely managed to mobilize a tiny fraction of the universe's laws. He then attempted to use this sliver of law to communicate with the sealed Cosmic Seed within him—but nothing changed at all.
Rosen was once again obliterated by the aftermath of the clash between the two Primordial Lives, entering his fourth memory cycle.
Faced with the hint on the fragmented ring this time, he felt a wave of despair.
That was because he had already tried every method he could think of. The only possible way out he could conceive was for his Eternal Will to undergo a transformation into Immortal Will. Only then could he gain control over the laws and energy of the Primordial Universe and survive.
He had been tricked into this by the Holy God of Chaos, who had also fulfilled the conditions to be drawn into the world of memory.
There was no way the Holy God of Chaos would knowingly seek death; He must be absolutely certain He could escape.
The biggest difference between the Holy God of Chaos and himself was that the former had once been a Primordial Lifeform, a true wielder of Immortal Will. Rosen, on the other hand, had only managed to grasp a portion of it through the Root of Myriad Transformations.
Although Rosen had thought of a way to survive, actually achieving it was near impossible.
Because he had no idea how Eternal Will could evolve into Immortal Will.
He began frantically trying every conceivable method, exhausting all techniques that targeted the Eternal Will.
But when the two Primordial Lives brushed past each other once again, he lost everything in yet another memory cycle.
Looking at the thin layer of ring on his finger, Rosen realized that perhaps in the next cycle, he could rely on the last speck of Night Parasitic Flower powder to retain some familiarity with his previous memories. However, with the ring now vanished, it was no longer possible to preserve any information.
So this was his final chance. If he missed it, he might truly die here.
Even if he could be resurrected through a clone, he didn't believe that would still be "him."
Because not a single one of his clones possessed his complete memory.
Rosen was very aware that all conventional methods of enhancing the Eternal Will had already been tried last time.
Now, only one possible route remained—the simplest and most primitive method of compression and sublimation.
No matter what it was, if quantity changed enough and was compressed, it could lead to a qualitative change.
So as long as the Eternal Will was infinitely compressed, theoretically it could be sublimated into Immortal Will.
Rosen did have a few ideas on how to compress the Eternal Will.
But whether the idea was correct, and whether it would succeed—he had no certainty.
Still, things had reached this point; he had no choice but to take the risk.
The Eternal Will originated from divine essence, formed by the fusion of divine power and memory into self-awareness. As this awareness gradually refined and strengthened, it eventually gave rise to the Eternal Will. The strength of the Eternal Will depended on the power of the divine essence and the clarity of self-awareness.
Now, Rosen intended to reverse this process—he would actively erase his own self-awareness.
For at the core of self-awareness was memory. A being's memories determined the path of their life and the shape of their identity.
More memories and life experiences encouraged the growth of self-awareness.
At first glance, it seemed the stronger the self-awareness, the stronger the Eternal Will should be. But the more one experienced and learned, the more complicated one's thoughts became. It wasn't that overthinking was inherently bad—it was just that overly complex thoughts led to a less pure will.
Rosen had once conducted an experiment. He infused two clones with equal amounts of Eternal Will.
The first clone's Eternal Will was continually expanded by injecting more memories, strengthening its self-awareness to enhance the Eternal Will.
The second clone had its memories continually erased, weakening both self-awareness and Eternal Will in the process.
When the second clone's Eternal Will was weakened to the brink of falling back to Immortal Will, Rosen discovered a stark difference between the two: the first clone's Eternal Will had much greater quantity, but the second clone's Eternal Will had far greater quality.
The experiment ultimately proved that while a strong self-awareness could increase the quantity of Eternal Will, it was the quality that improved when self-awareness was reduced.
That was the initial result of the experiment. Later, Rosen found that even this conclusion wasn't absolute.
If large volumes of memory injected into the first clone were aimless or indulgent in nature, then although the Eternal Will's quantity would grow, its quality would decline sharply.
On the other hand, if the memories focused intensely on specific extremes—like hedonism, slaughter, or pain—then the quality of the resulting Eternal Will would significantly improve.
Rosen finally concluded: the quality of Eternal Will was influenced by self-awareness, and the purer the memories that formed that self-awareness, the higher the quality of the Eternal Will.
And what he needed to do now was purify his self-awareness to the utmost.
At the fastest possible speed, he split his Eternal Will into two parts—one large, one tiny.
The tiny portion accounted for just one-billionth of the whole. He began transferring and compressing all the memories carried by his Eternal Will into this minuscule sliver, leaving the rest completely purged of memory.
While purging that larger part of memory, he also left behind a singular command: to keep compressing itself and sublimating to the limit.
Without the interference of a vast and complex self-awareness, only an instinctive obsession remained. As the Eternal Will continued to compress and fuse, its quality slowly began to rise—but once it hit the extreme limit, it could no longer grow even a little more.
Rosen felt he was just a hair's breadth away from success—his Eternal Will was on the verge of transforming into Immortal Will.
But no matter what he tried, he couldn't cross that final line.
Watching the two Primordial Lives draw closer, he knew he had no more time.
Without hesitation, he wiped all memory from that preserved one-billionth Eternal Will and fused the two halves of himself together. In that instant, stripped of all memory, his Eternal Will became as pure and untainted as a newborn child.
His immense Eternal Will rapidly compressed into a single point, beginning to transform into Immortal Will that fused into his essence.
Though the Eternal Will, upon compression and sublimation, had greatly improved in quality, its quantity had been reduced to a bare minimum.
The newborn Immortal Will that Rosen now possessed might not even match the Immortal Will of a newly ascended god or demon in terms of strength.
But however faint the Immortal Will, all of its defining traits were still present.
Rosen's Immortal Will had fused with a trace of divine essence and a hint of life essence. It had already reached saturation and could not absorb any more. Yet even with this tiny sliver of divine essence, it already possessed the same undying, indestructible nature as those of the Sinful Lives.
The two Primordial beings rapidly approached and passed by, and the aftermath of their battle shredded Rosen's Eternal Holy Body and his source of divinity into pieces.
However, a fragment of undying will remained eternal and indestructible, caught up in the battle of the two Primordial beings and dragged along with them.
The memory world did not enter a new cycle. After countless years of fierce combat, the two Primordial beings finally determined a victor.
The winner devoured the corpse of the defeated and even erased the memories contained within the loser's undying will.
Although undying will could remain eternal and indestructible, if all memories within it were completely erased, the result was nothing more than a hollow shell without a shred of self. In the end, even the sliver of undying will that once belonged to Rosen would become a drifting shell, floating slowly through the heavens and earth.
No one knew how much time had passed before Rosen's undying will absorbed the energy of heaven and earth and regenerated a human form.
He was resurrected—because his undying will was weak enough.
In contrast, the slain Primordial being was so powerful that, even though its undying will remained eternal, the astronomical energy required to regenerate its colossal body meant that reformation was a distant dream.
Without memory or self-awareness, Rosen wandered the world like a puppet, eyes empty and lifeless.
Because he now possessed undying will, the memory world's seal on transcendent powers had been lifted.
Powers like Source Seeds, which had previously been unusable, could now be wielded through the undying will.
Driven by the instinct of life, the Source Seeds Rosen had mastered began to merge constantly with the undying will.
When one of the special memory Source Seeds merged with the undying will, the memories Rosen had backed up within that Source Seed began to blend in as well. His self-awareness grew stronger and stronger, until he gradually regained his sense of self.
Rosen, still haunted by lingering fear, examined his own condition—he felt as weak as if he had fallen from eternity.
Undying will was indeed powerful, but quality alone was not enough without quantity.
Rosen had a feeling that, now that he had grasped the undying will, he could instantly leave this memory world.
However, the memory world he had once desperately wanted to escape no longer seemed so unappealing now that he had a way out.
After all, he had suffered grievous losses at the level of his origin. Although he could rapidly recover after returning to the universe by relying on the True Realm of the Old Gods and the Miracle Star Sea, he was never one to take a loss without retaliation. If he didn't recover what he lost here in the memory world, even if he returned, he wouldn't be able to eat or sleep in peace.
Rosen walked across the land of the Primordial Universe. In the distance, other Primordial beings were still locked in combat.
He released his undying will and sensed the world. He discovered that he could slightly influence this world through the cosmic Source Seeds.
Finally, Rosen looked up at the dark sun overhead, covered in Night Veil Parasitic Flowers. This black sun gave him the impression of being the very core of the memory world, and after staring at it for some time, his Dark Sun Heavenly Eye instinctively sensed a threat.
Rosen summoned the Doomsday Ark and took to the skies aboard this Eternal Holy Relic, heading toward the sun.
The gravity of the Primordial Universe was astonishingly strong—and the farther from the ground, the more intense it became. By the time the Doomsday Ark pierced the clouds and reached the edge of the firmament, five full years had passed, and he finally approached close enough to see the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers on the surface of the dark sun.
Rosen, using his undying will to master the laws of space, reinforced by the cosmic Source Seeds, opened a portal through spacetime.
He reached out and plucked a Night Veil Parasitic Flower.
The moment it left the dark sun, the flower withered and died—no cycle of time or space could prevent its destruction. Rosen casually crushed the dried blossom into powder, which surprisingly merged with the thin ring remaining on his finger.
Rosen immediately began harvesting more Night Veil Parasitic Flowers. As he collected more and more, the amount of powder accumulated rapidly.
When the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers covering a small section of the dark sun's surface had been completely harvested, the silent dark sun suddenly came alive. Through this breach, it released an endless surge of Primordial dark sun energy that rushed toward Rosen, who refined it with ease.
Upon further analysis, Rosen found that he could use this Primordial dark sun energy to enhance his Dark Sun Heavenly Eye.
Since he hadn't discovered any adverse effects, he saw no reason to turn down such conveniently delivered benefits.
As the Dark Sun Heavenly Eye absorbed more and more of the Primordial dark sun energy, the dark sun not far away became increasingly linked with him, and his efficiency in harvesting Night Veil Parasitic Flowers improved dramatically.
As the quantity of dried flower powder grew, Rosen began investigating whether it held any additional value.
Through repeated trial and error, he discovered that the powder could be fused into the Miracle Relic known as the Ash Emblem.
The Ash Emblem had already lost most of its value to him, so even if the fusion went wrong, it wouldn't be a significant loss.
This fusion process lasted several decades, until the Ash Emblem had completely lost its original properties.
[Night Veil Emblem: Miracle Sequence][Level: Primordial][Miracle Attribute: The Night Veil Emblem allows free travel in and out of the Night Veil Universe and grants control over the power of the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers][Miracle Trait: Eye of the Night Veil]
Rosen perceived the attributes of the Night Veil Emblem. Now, even without undying will, he could leave this world.
The memory world hidden behind the Night Veil Society's façade should more accurately be called the Night Veil Universe.
Rosen activated the Eye of the Night Veil, and the Night Veil Emblem instantly transformed into an eyeball and merged into the Dark Sun Heavenly Eye on his brow.
In the state of the Eye of the Night Veil, he could clearly see the true form of the Night Veil Universe.
The entire Night Veil Universe was formed from memories. Its core was composed of three parts: the Primordial Dark Sun, the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers, and—most crucially—the memory of the cosmic will. After the cosmic will perished, its memory, combined with the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers, formed this Night Veil Universe.
Although the core was the memory of the cosmic will, the true controller of this world was the Night Veil Parasitic Flowers.
As for the Primordial Dark Sun, it was an invader—likely the only one from the past that had a physical form.
(End of chapter)