The sphere of darkness was no mere shadow; it was a cosmic cancer. Stretching across trillions of light-years, it moved through the void with a predatory intelligence, unmaking the laws of every multiverse it touched.

This was the domain of a Beyonder, a plague currently inflicting irreversible harm upon the inner world of Lady Sansa.

It moved not like a storm, but like an ink blot on parchment, erasing multiverses, civilizations, and even the fundamental constants of physics.

Where it passed, the vacuum didn’t just go dark, it ceased to exist.

In the Real Void, the transcendent plane that served as the foundation for all existence, the High Court of the Nihilium was locked in a debate that threatened to crack the very pillars of the reality.

The air was thick with the pressure of ancient power. Here, the beings didn’t just inhabit space; they defined it.

“I can assist her,” Verion stated, his voice a calm, serene melody that masked a serrated ambition.

His physical form was a masterpiece of cosmic proportion. Though he appeared human at first glance, a second look revealed the terrifying truth: his skin held the texture of a swirling nebula, the deep violets and golds of his Royal Nihilium bloodline shimmering beneath the surface like trapped lightning.

He was a figure of terrifying legacy, the true architect of the Demon Lords and the secret patron of Lom, one of the chosen one he had planted in the bubble to harvest its potential while the other royals were distracted.

Now, his gaze was fixed on the crisis unfolding within Sansa’s domain, his eyes reflecting a hunger that had nothing to do with heroism.

“I am still quite capable of protecting my own daughter, Verion,” Samson replied, his voice a deep, resonant rumble that shook the floor and rattled the massive chandeliers of void-diamond hanging above.

Samson, the father of Sansa, was a vision of ancestral power. While most Nihilium royals shared similar cosmic features, Samson was distinguished by a magnificent mustache and beard that glowed with a pure, white radiance, the mark of a High Elder in the royal hierarchy.

He was the maternal grandfather of Cosmos, though he remained tragically unaware of the boy’s existence. Following the sudden disappearance of his eldest daughter during her pregnancy and the subsequent shattering of her life-stone, he had long believed his grandson dead.

Only Sansa and her trusted maid knew the truth: that her sister had fled to protect the child from Verion’s reach, naming the boy Cosmos, the one destined to achieve everything reality had to offer.

“Let us not waste time with petty posturing,” an elderly man said, rising from the head of the long table. His voice was thin but carried the weight of a dying star.

“The Beyonder must be purged before it corrupts Child Sansa’s inner world. As her father, Samson has the right of intervention. However, Verion is her betrothed. It is only natural for him to show concern. As Head Elder, I cast my vote: both shall enter the bubble to solve this together.”

Slowly, the remaining elders of the court raised their hands, their eyes glowing with communal consent.

Verion clicked his tongue in a rare show of irritation, a brief flicker of a snarl crossing his handsome face before he smoothed it back into a charming bow toward the Head Elder.

Samson could only nod in grim silence; in the Real Void, the decision of the Courtroom was supreme. It was a decree that could only be overturned by the Void Emperor himself, a being who had not been seen in the halls for an age.

One by one, the elders of the courtroom vanished into thin air, leaving no traces that they were ever there. Only the two titans remained standing in the vast, hollow chamber.

“Verion, you know as well as I do that a inner world cannot handle the weight of two High Nihilium royals,” Samson warned, his eyes boring into the younger man. “It will fracture before we can even strike the Beyonder. The spatial dimension of the bubble is like wet clay to us.”

“Then perhaps you should stay behind, Father-in-law,” Verion countered, a smirk etching across his face. “You were always more of a diplomat than a combatant anyway. Let me handle this by myself. I will take excellent care of my fiancee and defeat the Beyonder before it can corrupt her even more. Besides, I am much faster than you in the lower worlds.”

He began to walk away, his hands clasped behind his back in a gesture of casual arrogance. “But the decision is already made. The sky would have to split for the Court to rescind its order. I believe Sansa is strong enough to carry the burden of us both. Let us go, Father-in-law… she is waiting for our help.”

With a sudden, violent fold in space, Verion vanished into nothingness, leaving Samson to follow with a heavy heart and a tightening grip on his white-glow staff.

Back in the private sanctuary of her palace, Sansa peered into the swirling vortex of her own inner world and let out a heavy, ragged sigh. Her eyes were red-rimmed from the strain of trying to enter her inner world.

“I am locked out,” she whispered, her fingers tracing the shimmering, cracking barrier of her inner world.

“The Beyonder is consuming my multiverses at a speed I cannot calculate. It’s like a fire in a library. And Cosmos… he is already inside it’s domain. Even the reincarnations of the Old Gods have been drawn into the center. This is no coincidence.”

“My Lady,” her maid whispered, her knuckles white as she gripped the hem of her apron. “To have a Beyonder strike with such surgical precision… someone guided it here. They knew exactly where the dimensional barrier were weakest.”

The maid’s ears suddenly twitched, catching a frequency of arrival that made her soul shiver. She bowed low, her voice dropping to a panicked breath. “Mistress, he is in the palace. That Guy has arrived, and he is waiting for you in the Grand Hall. Your father is not far behind.”

“I guess my father couldn’t stop the Courtroom,” Sansa said, her eyes flashing with a mix of dread and resolve. She snapped her fingers, and in an eye-blink, the lush garden vanished, replaced by the cold marble of her palace.

“I can only pray that my father keeps Verion’s hands busy. I know his true goal isn’t the Beyonder; he wants to abduct Cosmos, or end him to clear the way for his pet, Lom.”

While the gods of the Real Void moved their pieces, Sunny, known to them as Cosmos, remained blissfully unaware of the cosmic hierarchy descending upon him.

He was standing in the heart of the negation, facing a Beyonder, a race of entities so potent that they were the reason behind the wounds on the Void Emperor, the reason why the void created his chosen ones for balance of the world.

But the situation was even more dire than he realized. He was at the center of a cosmic pincer movement.

Deimos, the Lord of Discord, was closing in with a heart full of murder.

And now Verion, the very creator of the demons Sunny fought, was entering the bubble with the intent of erasing him from existence.

Sunny stood in the absolute darkness, a cold sweat breaking across his brow. He noticed something that chilled him more than the cold of the darkness. He tried to trigger a flash of insight, to feel the ripple of the future that always guided his steps.

“It’s too quiet,” Sunny whispered into the void. “My divine Intuition talent… it’s silent. It’s not just muffled; it’s dead.”

A spike of genuine fear, a sensation he hadn’t felt since his days as a mortal, raced through him. “Wait… how did I sense the presence of the Old Gods earlier if my intuition is dead in this domain? How did I feel their essence when I was outside the sphere?”

The realization hit him like a physical blow. The scent of the Old Gods hadn’t been a discovery; it had been a lure.

“Was I baited here?” Sunny said aloud, his voice swallowed by the oppressive dark. “Did someone or something controlled what i could sense from this realm….. just to pull me into this zone of negation?”

For the first time since his journey began, the Sovereign felt the cold, sharp breath of the Reaper on his neck.

He wasn’t the hunter anymore. He was the prey, caught in a trap designed to kill a God. He tried to summon his mana, but it felt like trying to light a match in a vacuum.

Every time he gathered a spark, the darkness sucked it away, feeding on his very intent.

The physics of the area were breaking down. The mana density had dropped to zero, causing his spells to dissipate before they could even form.

Even the physical movement felt sluggish, as if the darkness had turned the vacuum into thick, viscous syrup.

“I have walked into a graveyard,” Sunny realized, his hands twitching with fear. “And the funeral is for me. If I can’t find a way to exit this domain, I will really die this time.”

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep