After the Lord of the Abyss Awakens - Chapter 50.2

The cat instinct immediately took over. Her paws touched the balls and started rolling them around!

Xiu Si noticed the commotion and turned to look, only to see his adorable daughter rolling around with the balls.

He smiled because it was too cute.

Beside his hand, the gray cat was also bewitched by the fur balls, playing non-stop without realizing it.

As for why there were so many fur balls on his table, that was due to Levin who had passed by early in the morning.

Levin was passing by looking for someone, and remembering that Xiu Si loved cats just like him, he stopped by to say hello, which led to their earlier conversation.

“Mr. Yi Xiusi, let me tell you a secret. The empire is about to hold a cat skill competition. It hasn’t been announced yet, but I already have the information. Thinking that you also raise quite a few children, I came to let you know. If you want to participate, you can start training early. The prizes are very generous!”

“A cat skill competition? What does it involve?”

“Haha, the specifics are…cough, I don’t know the specifics, it might be some sports or intelligence games.”

Levin almost let slip the competition items.

It should be known that only the organizers knew about this. If he had said it, wouldn’t it have exposed his identity?

Xiu Si looked curious. “The empire’s cultural activities are truly diverse and colorful.”

Levin smiled, “Isn’t it? More activities mean the citizens’ lives are happier and more peaceful.”

Xiu Si agreed, although there were also those who indulged in pleasure during times of decline, but the king of the Great Oedipus Empire shouldn’t be like that.

In these days of living here, Xiu Si had unconsciously discovered something. Compared to the relatively united Aust Empire, power in the Great Oedipus Empire was not centralized. The king had almost no real power, and the strongest family in the empire was the Jupius family, to which Sword Saint Ferrol belonged.

This family had produced thirty-six Sword Saints and was a world-renowned Sword Saint family, rumored to have the blessing of the Sword God. There was an even more magical saying that they were descendants of the Sword God, and offending them was tantamount to offending the Sword God.

The Sword God would execute all enemies of the Jupius family every ten years.

Back when Xiu Si was still on the continent, he had never heard of any Sword Saint family. His good friend Wang Chang’er was already the strongest Sword Saint in history, so he inevitably had high standards when it came to swordsmanship.

However… Xiu Si recalled the rumors that Sword Saint Ferrol had lost an arm at the border.

One could easily lose their original feeling. For a Sword Saint, losing an arm was not something easy to overcome. Once the feeling was gone, it was hard to get back.

Xiu Si thought for a moment, then suddenly sighed, “Peace and tranquility require strength.”

Levin was slightly startled, almost thinking that Xiu Si had seen through something.

In fact, he had exaggerated. The empire was not peaceful. The internal peace was an illusion of balanced power struggles, and externally it could hardly be called peaceful. Sword Saint Ferrol had more than once expressed ideas about conquering the continent, ambitious and demanding national support. Perhaps this recent danger would make Ferrol lie low for a while, but someone like Ferrol was a born ambitious person. He wouldn’t give up his ambitions just because of an injury; it might even make them grow.

Combat-class professionals tended to be more prone to extremism than others. Levin felt this deeply, as all his brothers were combat-class. As they fought, they became increasingly frenzied, none willing to yield, until they all perished, leaving only him.

To put it bluntly, Levin had stumbled into his position as king. He had no backers, ascending solely due to bloodline. It was already merciful that the various factions hadn’t killed him outright. His efforts to accomplish something were essentially accelerating his suicide.

But thinking of this, Levin’s gaze darkened. He thought, who would want to spend their entire life caught between power struggles, swaying with the winds, powerless to control their own fate?

He wanted to change this situation, even if it cost him everything.

His eyes gradually showed determination, and his tone became solemn. He couldn’t help but say to Xiu Si, “This competition is very important to me. I must complete that task.” To seize control of my own destiny!

At this moment, Levin didn’t know that this spontaneous invitation would soon lead to unforeseen consequences.

Xiu Si was a bit surprised. He hadn’t expected Levin to take a cat skill competition so seriously, even showing… a resolute look.

But not understanding was one thing; what could he say about something someone else was so persistent about? He could only agree.

Xiu Si smiled faintly, “By the way, I haven’t seen Mr. Levin’s children yet. If there’s a chance, I’ll bring my children over to visit. Let the kids get to know each other.”

Before he finished speaking, both cats on the table widened their eyes simultaneously.

Hearing this, Levin smiled and nodded, “Alright then, we’ll see each other at the competition, haha.”

As he spoke, he suddenly remembered something and took out a large bag from under the table, then pulled out a bunch of cat toys from it.

The first thing he took out was a cat teaser stick.

Little ragdoll’s eyes went wide, almost wanting to curse at how humans could bring out such a thing.

Didn’t this fellow know about the irresistible allure of a cat teaser to cats? Meow meow, take it away quickly!

But She hadn’t taken a few steps before tripping over a furball. Curse that human king, he had actually set a trap!

Levin lowered his gaze to notice the little ragdoll’s movements. If he wasn’t being glared at so sharply, he might have been unable to resist exclaiming how cute it was.

Mr. Yi Xiusi’s children were truly adorable, both beautiful and clever. Where could one find such wonderful cats?

“These are some spare items I have. Would you like to see if you need any of them, Mr. Yi Xiusi?”

“Thank you.”

Xiu Si could tell what they liked just by looking at the children’s reactions.

Levin suddenly remembered something and asked curiously, “By the way, Mr. Yi Xiusi, you said you’ve raised many children. How many exactly?”

Xiu Si pondered, “Originally it was twenty-four, recently three more were added, so twenty-seven in total, I suppose.”

“That’s quite a large family.”

Levin was surprised when he heard this. As a king, he considered raising six or seven to be a lot. He never expected Mr. Yi Xiusi to be so unassuming, actually raising twenty-seven. If it were him, he probably wouldn’t even be able to remember all their names.

But wait a moment.

Levin asked curiously, “However, I seem to have only seen two. Where are the others?”

Xiu Si was silent for a moment, his eyes filled with longing, “I accidentally got separated from them earlier. I’m in the process of finding them one by one.”

Levin was even more astounded. With so many cats, it seemed impossible to keep track of them all. It wasn’t surprising that they got separated.

“You’ll find them all eventually.”

Xiu Si smiled and said, “I believe so too.”

The two cats on the table were stroking the furball while watching them talk, their emerald eyes gleaming brightly, their thoughts unknown.

Levin would probably never know that at this very moment, he was being watched by five god-level beings.

Even the two birds in the system box were staring at him, occasionally chirping, causing Levin to think he was hearing things.

But looking left and right and all around, he couldn’t find any birds anywhere. “How strange, there are no birds here. Why am I hearing bird sounds?”

Xiu Si was slightly taken aback, feeling a bit embarrassed, but didn’t say anything more.

After a while, Levin left in a hurry, and the bookstore returned to silence.

The little ragdoll stuck out its tongue at Levin’s retreating back, its thoughts clearly visible. “Nasty human, what’s wrong with my father having many mouths to feed? You can’t remember, but my father can!”

Though the little ragdoll said this, it initially couldn’t remember its siblings’ names either, and had been smacked on the head more than a few times for calling its older siblings by the wrong names.

At this moment, the gray cat was pondering about the “Cat Skills Competition”. It wasn’t a cat, so why participate in this? Father must have just mentioned it casually, right?

The gray cat looked towards Xiu Si, only to see him seemingly deep in thought, habitually squinting his eyes slightly.

Hmm? What was Father thinking about?

Xiu Si suddenly said, “I told the memory beasts before that I would help them find their lost companions, but a long time has passed without any clues. It seems I might not be able to fulfill this promise.”

The gray cat paused, and the little ragdoll turned its head back. In their minds, they said in unison, “Oh, was that still a thing? We almost forgot about it.”

Beelzebub was investigating this specific situation. They had already synchronized the intelligence yesterday. Beelzebub would know what to do.

But the difficulty of this matter lay in how well the mastermind could hide.

When their power was not yet sufficient, the mastermind designed everything. After they became powerful, the mastermind completely concealed themselves.

The biggest obstacle in finding the mastermind was actually not the lack of clues, but that the world was too vast, making the search too troublesome. In a game of hide-and-seek, one would at least define the hiding area, but the mastermind could hide at the edge of the universe. As long as they could endure, they could hide almost forever.

Was it troublesome?

That fellow had been a bit hasty lately, and in their haste, they made mistakes, which led to the exposure of the memory beast incident. So if they followed the clues, they might be able to catch that rat in the gutter and end this long and boring game of hide-and-seek.

Inpos was very confident about this. Not for any other reason, but because Father had returned!

With their beloved Father here, they would certainly be unstoppable!

Perhaps His gaze was too intense.

Xiu Si lowered his head and met His gaze, then slowly said, “The memory beasts must also want to reunite with their kin quickly. Do we have any methods?”

He knew his children were very clever and might know how to solve this.

In response, the two cats exchanged glances and nodded to Xiu Si simultaneously.

The little ragdoll meowed: Father, don’t worry, it will be solved quickly!

It was on the same day.

Beelzebub held a dagger, his gaze sweeping across the underground space.

His dagger came from the fake hero Mingjie, which contained information about the memory beasts.

He analyzed the information, followed the clues, and found this place.

The memory beasts had already been abandoned, and the mastermind had cut off all information and fled.

Like a lizard shedding its tail or a cicada molting its shell, it was the same old pattern.

Being so good at hiding, could it be the deification of the concept of concealment – the God of Concealment?

Beelzebub freed the memory beasts with the hero’s face and threw them back into the dream realm, while repeatedly thinking and silently muttering to himself.

“It can’t be the God of Concealment. Before we were born, this god had already died, and was devoured. Although the concept still exists, it’s impossible for there to be a god’s consciousness anymore.”

Beelzebub raised his hand to press against his temple, as if resisting the forgetfulness curse of the Goddess of Fortune.

It seemed he had thought about this before, but always returned to it.

And this time, of course, he wanted to continue thinking.

“The mastermind could be the god who devoured His divinity.”

“But the war of the gods back then was too fierce. Six ultimate beings perished, including even the Elven Progenitor God, one of the most ancient deities.”

“Gods eating gods, devouring each other, divine natures mixed and confused. Who knows where the divinity of the God of Concealment ended up.”

In the era of the gods, each divine kingdom had its own history, yet there was almost no history to speak of. They were all information cocoons, different from each other, turning their backs on one another. The same historical event could have two completely different records and explanations. Not only were they heavily biased, but those taken-for-granted fabrications and alterations also declared that they had no basic meaning as historical materials.

Several thoughts flashed through Beelzebub’s mind as he continued to mutter. “The mastermind is a god hidden behind the other gods, always watching them, weak yet powerful, waiting for an opportunity. Initially, killing Father wasn’t taken seriously. Upon learning that Father was still alive, He made another attempt, this time striving for absolute certainty. Thinking He had succeeded then, knowing that the hero’s creations would disappear with the hero’s death, He no longer paid attention. But in His midnight dreams,He suddenly realized Father wasn’t dead yet.”

“He believed Father was the only human He had failed to kill. He suspected Father knew something, especially information about His identity, so He used the identity of Priest Xilin to probe indirectly, wanting to know if Father remembered. Father’s answer was that he didn’t know, believing it was purely an accident, but He was still not at ease.”

“He still felt He had to kill Father, but the development of events exceeded His expectations, because Aelioge suddenly appeared, followed by Inpos, Morax, and even Vassago. He panicked and went to question again. Father still said it was an accident, but He remained anxious, believing He could no longer let things be, so He started the memory beast affair.”

The above story was built on an unconfirmed premise, namely that for over eight thousand years, the mastermind didn’t know that the Abyss Lord was a creation of the hero He had tried to kill back then.

Thinking of this, Beelzebub still found it amazing, feeling he was just one step away from the key.

Suddenly, His eyes changed, associating it with the subsequent disappearances of heroes one by one.

“That’s it.”

Beelzebub’s lips curved upwards, his expression cold, “The mastermind killed Father because of Father’s hero identity.”

“His purpose was to kill all heroes, to accomplish something He had long dreamed of.”

“The hero summoning magic is also the hero sacrificial magic. The mastermind is one of the gods who facilitated the hero summoning!”

Beelzebub approached the truth step by step, unconsciously releasing magic power that burned down the entire Church of Dawn.

At the same time, ten thousand meters above the Imperial City of the Great Oedipus Empire, a giant god from the subspace quietly approached. Its enormous eyes, like stars, stared intently at the countless walking humans beneath the sea of clouds.

It was common for subspace giant gods to covet the human world, but this time, the situation had changed.

As the giant god attempted to invade the mortal world, suddenly, an incredibly intense light flashed across the universe, and the Otherworld God Number 007, the father of Little Light Body, unexpectedly appeared.

Immediately after, the giant god was caught off guard by a terrifying divine pressure. Just as it was about to struggle, it was annihilated by a single thought from the otherworld god. Its enormous body folded geometrically like paper until it completely disappeared.

The otherworld god lowered his gaze, looking down at a bookstore in the Imperial City, as if everything he had just done was merely to avoid disturbing that person.

At this moment, in the bookstore.

Xiu Si was building a more intricate model for the Little Light Body.

His eyes were focused, his concentration complete.

Half an hour later, he successfully built a model that he was quite satisfied with.

But it wasn’t complete yet. He needed to continue working on the physics and settings.

The little ragdoll had been waiting for a long time and started chatting with the gray cat next door.

“Are you participating in the skills competition?”

“Huh? Why participate in a cat competition organized by humans?”

The gray cat turned its head, thinking that his tenth sister might have completely turned into a cat.

“I see, you’re afraid of losing.”

The little ragdoll glanced at the gray cat from the corner of her eye, her gaze contemptuous and provocative.

The gray cat’s competitive spirit suddenly surged. What was there to fear in a mere cat skills competition!

“I won’t lose. Do you dare to compete?”

The little ragdoll confidently raised her head. “Heh, of course I dare.”