In the Time Domain—a special space where different timelines intertwined between reality and illusion—Rosen had once been unable to sustain permanent residence in his own constructed domains. But after obtaining the Time Seed, these domains underwent a qualitative transformation, becoming indistinguishable from the real world. This enhancement extended to all time-related abilities, though Rosen still hadn't fully mastered the Time Seed's power.
Yet despite this, the World Tree had somehow locked onto him and tracked him across a timeline hundreds of thousands of years in the past. Unless the World Tree also possessed the Time Seed, this should have been impossible. Since Rosen held the Time Seed, the only explanation was that the World Tree wielded a top-tier time-related Eternal Sacred Artifact—or even a Primordial-grade treasure.
With a thought, Rosen reshaped the barren time domain. Using the Dream Seed, he projected his mental imagery onto the Canvas of the Heart, then materialized a divine palace complex at the True God level. Celestial maids prepared tea and refreshments by the lakeside pavilion as the World Tree emerged from the temporal mist and took a seat opposite him.
"You all put on quite the act," Rosen said bluntly, his hostility undisguised.
"At this point, you're qualified to know the truth," the World Tree replied with a faint smile before revealing their real plan.
Fragments of Seeds could never elevate an Immortal Godfiend to Eternal Lifeform status—a lie that had only worked on Immortal Dawn and the then-ignorant Rosen. While seizing the Plunder Seed was real, splitting it was a ruse. If successful, the World Tree could have used it to reclaim its stolen Compatibility Seed from the Ancient God.
Now that the Ancient God and the Sacred God Temple were at odds, the Temple would help the World Tree regain its peak strength. But this hinged on killing the avatar—failure meant switching to Plan B. Through a secret technique, the World Tree had fused its Eternal Will with the World Will, a deception so flawless it fooled even the briefly awakened true form of the Ancient God.
The current World Will was still the one Rosen knew. Their scheme wasn't just about survival—they had also lured an Eternal Lifeform from the Sacred God Temple into the conflict. For eons, the Ancient God and the Temple had been locked in stalemate, but the World Tree's manipulation shattered this balance when it orchestrated an Eternal's death in the Ancient God's World.
Originally, the World Tree planned to escalate conflicts between the avatar and the Temple. But Rosen's theft of the Time Seed from Blue Star and the Immortal Star God's resonance with it fully awakened the Ancient God. Though chaotic, the outcome was favorable—the Ancient God ordered the avatar to destroy the Blazing Heaven Creation Crucible, intensifying tensions.
Through the Old Fisherman, the World Tree learned of Rosen's Time and Space Seeds—and about Blue Star, a secret it had kept even from the World Will. Once aware of Rosen's control over space-time, the World Tree had lain in wait for his return, recognizing him as the more valuable ally now.
"So you just dumped the World Will and the others?" Rosen mocked.
"Isn't that what allies are for—to be betrayed?" The Will of the World replied with pride rather than shame.
"Well said. Here's to a successful partnership."
Rosen immediately raised his teacup, as if switching faces, and agreed with the Will of the World.
Why did they choose to form an alliance? The fundamental reason was that the Old Gods were too powerful, and they were too weak.
Forming an alliance was not only about sharing risks but also about striving for the greatest benefits.
But throughout history and the universe, as long as allies stayed alive, hardship was easy to share—wealth, not so much.
Everyone wanted to maximize their own gains. But with only so much cake to go around, if one ate more, another had to eat less.
So no matter how close the alliance, it was destined to end in betrayal.
This was why there had never been eternal allies since the beginning of time.
The World Tree's decision to abandon the Wills of the World was simply because he, as the one who now held the Seed of Time and Space, was the more suitable ally. If someone even more suitable appeared, or if the Old Gods fell, allies could turn into enemies in an instant.
"To a successful partnership."
The Will of the World raised its teacup in satisfaction, clinking it with Rosen's as they drank together.
"Since we're forming an alliance and we already have a common enemy, where's our shared interest?"
Rosen set his teacup down and asked solemnly.
The Will of the World was clearly well-prepared and directly handed Rosen a stone tablet made of Eternal Origin Stone.
Obviously, this shared interest could not be openly discussed in the world of the Old Gods.
Rosen picked up the tablet and examined it closely. The mutual interest between him and the Will of the World was divided into three parts.
The first was the Old Gods' legacy, but this was actually the smallest benefit.
Because not only was eliminating the Old Gods extremely difficult, even if they were killed, the inheritance left behind likely wouldn't be as abundant as imagined.
The reason was simple—war didn't always result in massive gains for the victor.
Most wars ended in mutual destruction. If the Old Gods were truly driven to the brink, they would rather destroy everything than leave any inheritance for their enemies. In the end, whatever could be obtained would be limited, and this benefit alone wasn't enough to secure an alliance.
Although all allies eventually turned against each other, that was only after they had gone through hardships together.
As long as the Old Gods weren't dead, and unless a better ally appeared, betraying an ally recklessly was sheer stupidity.
Even if shared benefits were only a pie in the sky, they still played a crucial role in solidifying the alliance.
Rosen turned to the second part of their mutual interest—and was surprised to see it was Blue Star.
Though he had obtained the Seed of Time and one Seed of Space, the Old Gods still had nine more. These could be distributed, but in the eyes of the World Tree, the true value of Blue Star wasn't its Seeds of Time and Space. The most valuable thing was Blue Star itself.
Because the cycle of time and space on Blue Star, though it originated from the Seed of Time, had long since transcended it.
This became clear when, even after the Seed of Time had been removed, the cycle shared by the Immortal Star Gods remained unbroken—and even the time-space cycle created by the Seeds couldn't override or dismantle it. At that point, Rosen realized that Blue Star's hidden value far exceeded what he had imagined.
Finally, Rosen looked at the third part of their mutual interest and raised his head in disbelief to stare at the World Tree.
The World Tree had hidden a treasure of primordial-level deep in the universe.
And he was willing to share it with Rosen.
He hadn't shared it with the Old Fisherman and the others—not because he didn't trust them, but simply because they lacked the ability to retrieve it.
Since Rosen held the Seed of Time and Space, he had a high chance of success in finding the treasure.
The World Tree wasn't worried Rosen would betray him and take it for himself, because the treasure was intimately tied to the World Tree. As long as it was on Rosen's person, no matter how he tried to hide it, the World Tree would sense it. If Rosen dared to turn on him, the World Tree would immediately awaken the Old Gods to die together with him.
"The details of the treasure?"
Rosen stored the tablet and asked with anticipation.
It was easy to imagine that a treasure the World Tree had hidden during its peak, as a contingency, would be anything but ordinary.
Because it had nothing to do with the Old Gods and wouldn't directly harm them, it could be spoken of freely in the world of the Old Gods.
Under the World Tree's careful explanation, Rosen quickly understood why the Old Fisherman and the others had been unable to retrieve the treasure.
The universe during the birth of Eternal Life wasn't like it was now. Even though the universe at that time was already crumbling from within, the Primordial Beings still tried their best to heal it in order to give rise to Eternal Life, compressing the entire universe back into its origin sea.
So the current starry sky was something that began re-expanding only after the birth of Eternal Life.
Back then, the origin sea of the universe was like a pitch-black deep ocean, and Eternal Life forms were at most whales in that sea.
Their understanding of the deep sea was no better than a whale's understanding of the ocean.
That was why it took an encounter between the World Tree and the Old Gods for them to truly ignite the spark of wisdom through mutual exchange.
During this time, the first-tier Eternal Life forms led the way in exploring the origin sea of the universe without a doubt.
And the World Tree was head and shoulders above the rest. Because it possessed a seed of compatibility, it could perfectly blend into any environment. It could easily assimilate parts of the origin sea, and in doing so, had obtained many items left behind by the Primordial Beings.
Some of those items had been used, while others were kept by the World Tree.
Among them were things the World Tree still didn't understand the purpose of even now.
Seizing this rare chance for a genuine alliance based on mutual interest, Rosen took the opportunity to learn everything he could from the World Tree about Eternal Life. Though he could also learn some of it through the Book of Fate and Creation, nothing could compare to being guided personally by the World Tree.
Rosen knew that Eternal Lives varied in strength, and he had even classified them into tiers based on the strength of their source seeds.
But in truth, this was a flawed classification, because the innate strength of a source seed was only one of the core factors that determined power.
The true measure of an Eternal Life's strength came from a combination of three factors.
The first was the source seed itself—clearly, a source seed split into nine was far superior to one split into six.
Moreover, many source seeds had inherent relationships of mutual reinforcement or restraint. For instance, a Stellar source seed would naturally suppress a Dawn source seed.
The second factor came from the Eternal Relic. The strength of one's Eternal Relic was a central component of an Eternal Life's power.
The destructive might of the Old Gods was largely due to their control over the Heaven-Opening Divine Axe.
The third factor stemmed from the Primordial Power that an Eternal Life had mastered.
If Immortal Gods and Demons could wield the Eternal Will and source seeds of Eternal Lives, then could Eternal Lives only differ from them in scale but not in essence? Of course not. In truth, only those Eternal Lives who had mastered Primordial Power were worthy of the name.
Rosen had long known that the World Tree wasn't a tree made of wood—it was a tree made of stone.
What the World Tree wielded was not the power of worlds, but the power of the Stone Realm, composed entirely of stone.
This power of the Stone Realm, forged from stone itself, was the Primordial Power that the World Tree controlled.
In the universe, there were source seeds and laws, but these were products jointly created by the primordial beings and the universe itself.
When the universe first gave birth to primordial beings, there were no source seeds, let alone laws.
Thus, Primordial Power naturally transcended both source seeds and laws—it was an innate, overwhelming force possessed by primordial beings from the moment of their birth.
The innate source seeds created by primordial beings had Primordial Power at their core.
Only Eternal Lives who wielded Primordial Power were truly qualified to stand in the top tier of existence.
The World Tree and the Old Gods were the first two Eternal Lives to master Primordial Power.
But now, they were no longer the only ones. Among the hundreds of Eternal Lives who had survived in the Sacred God Palace, many had endured countless life-and-death battles and banded together over the years. It was inevitable that some had succeeded in mastering Primordial Power by now.
Source seeds may be eternal and indestructible—but Primordial Power surpassed even that.
After sending off the World Tree, Rosen immediately relayed all matters of the alliance to his true body.
Although the Old Gods had sealed off their world through time-reversal cycles, severing the connection between Rosen's true body and his countless Eternal Avatars…
They still couldn't sever the direct connection between Rosen and a few of his Avatars. This was because those Avatars had their source seeds strengthened, and because the life source seeds they carried were deeply intertwined with the source seed of his true body.
In an inconspicuous room within the Burning Heavens Star Palace, Rosen's true body opened his eyes inside the Mysterious Study Room.
During these years of seclusion, he had merged the shell of the Tianyin World and the Soul-Binding World within the belly of the Burning Heaven Sacred Serpent into the Mysterious Study Room, which had already fused with his sea of consciousness. In the end, he even went so far as to fully merge the Old God's True Realm into the Mysterious Study Room.
Not only that, he also fused the source seeds of Cause and Effect, Time and Space, and Dreams into the Mysterious Study Room.
Under the triple tempering of the Burning Heaven's Sacred Flame, Soul Flame, and Divine Flame, the Mysterious Study Room had been elevated and transformed into an Eternal World.
[Mysterious Study Room: Miracle World]
[Level: Eternal]
[Miracle Attribute: Can vanish into the void, hidden from cause and effect]
[Miracle Traits: Gate Between Realms of Time and Space, Window of Time and Space, Eternal and Undying, Omniscient Bookshelf, Old God's True Realm]
Now, with the Mysterious Study Room as his refuge, not even other Eternal Lives could detect his presence.
Moreover, the ability of the Gate Between Realms had been greatly enhanced. It was no longer so easy for Eternal Lives to detect its use.
Through the Window of Time and Space, he could easily monitor any corner of the universe.
And the Old God's True Realm—now fused with the Dream source seed and the Soul-Binding World—served as an Eternal World within the Mysterious Study Room. As long as he continued to merge cosmic matter into the Old God's True Realm and expand it, his Eternal Will would grow in step with the world as its World Will.
From now on, the growth of the Old God's True Realm would drive the growth of his divine essence, while the growth of his Immortal Divine Body would drive the growth of his life origin.
Rosen had already laid the most fundamental groundwork for his future ascension to Eternal Life.
After carefully reviewing the information sent by his Root Avatar, he walked to the window and activated the Window of Time and Space.
On the glass, the treasure location designated by the World Tree immediately appeared.
This treasure wasn't in the Cosmic Origin Sea—it was at the edge of the Third Stellar Ring, at the end of the universe.
As the universe continued to expand, the further outward it went, the more diluted the source energy became.
Reaching the First Stellar Ring signaled that the universe had expanded to its limit and could grow no further.
Now, having expanded to the Third Stellar Ring, the universe's starry sky could at most sustain Sequence 7 extraordinary lifeforms. If a Sequence 6 appeared here, it would cause catastrophic collapses in the starry sky. That was how fragile the universe was in this outermost region.
Back then, the World Tree had anchored the treasure at the edge of the universe, allowing it to shift continuously along with cosmic expansion.
The simplest way to open the treasure was for the World Tree to go there personally.
However, the World Tree had been restricted by the Old Gods through some unknown means and could not leave the Old Gods' world even in death.
Under such conditions, the treasure could not be opened by conventional means.
And the World Tree hadn't left behind any sort of key, because it had never intended for anyone else to open the treasure.
Back then, the World Tree had never imagined it would one day fall into hardship.
Now, to forcefully open the treasure, even if a compatible source seed could ease the process, it would still require an immensely powerful force. Yet any power beyond Sequence 7 would collapse the surrounding universe, causing the treasure to fall into the Dark Sea of Origin before it could even be opened.
The resulting disturbance would immediately draw the attention of Eternal Lives in the Cosmic Origin Sea.
So even the likes of the Old Fisherman and the others couldn't open this treasure.
But for Rosen, it wasn't a problem. With his mastery over the Time and Space source seed and the power of Temporal Reincarnation, he could seal and reinforce time and space itself, ensuring that no matter how powerful the eruption, it wouldn't fracture the starry sky or attract attention—nor would the treasure space fall into the Dark Sea of Origin and be discovered by other Eternal Lives.
(End of chapter)