The Past That Must Be Strengthened
The Magic God of Dimensions had confidently assured his past self that he could achieve perfect success, but that was a lie. The probability that the Black Flame Absolute would fall for the bait is less than half, and even if he does, the chance of landing any meaningful damage is under ten percent. No matter what preparations the current Magic God of Dimensions made, the highest-ranking Black Flame clansman with five trillion divine power that he had once defeated and the Black Flame Absolute with one thousand trillion operated on entirely different scales of power. The very completion of their authorities stood worlds apart.
Even though the Black Flame Absolute had once fought with full release as an Absolute bearing that title in the past, he had failed to prove complete victory and was dragged off to the Wind Star as a bug. Yet he had originally been the greatest sage and strongest being in the Absolute Realm, existing on a completely different plane from the current Magic God of Dimensions. If that man takes even one more step forward after his long training, he will become a flawless Black Flame Absolute. The gap between him and my past self—who arrogantly boasted about becoming gray without knowing his own limits—is simply too vast. And against the Black Flame Absolute, there is neither time nor vitality to prepare properly.
Digging a trap effective against the Black Flame Absolute would require an unpredictable amount of time and vitality. Even with his dimensional authority specialized in time manipulation, there were limits. The greatest problem was vitality itself. It was something that could never be handled without the Wind Star, and the Wind Star should have been granted to the gray in the first place. But this damn past self of his, unwilling to lose the gray’s Wind Star, had handed it over to Seongmyeol, the Creator Great God of the Substitute Gods that he had manufactured as another main body.
To separate it now, I would need to refine everything again, which would consume an insane amount of time and vitality. Without the Wind Star’s support it would be impossible, yet the other 10 Mainstays would never permit it. That is why the original plan to inflict a fatal wound and completely remove him from the ranking war had to be downgraded to merely injuring him.
In a battle between similarly capable beings, even a minor injury could prove decisive. That much should allow Yuil Yongsinje to handle the rest. The Wind Family seemed to share that assessment and found it acceptable. Or rather, their attitude felt closer to It looks like it’ll be fun, so go ahead and try.
Although I received various things in advance, none of this would have been possible without the Origin of the Mage God’s guarantee. Above all, only after becoming gray did I truly understand how sloppy and weak my past self was. His personality was unstable, and his authorities seemed to be missing several screws. The highest-ranking Creator Godhood he possessed, the ruling race he commanded—everything was a mess. And the Divine Realm? There was no way the Creation Realm would tolerate having such raw ruffians serving as its Divine Realm Management Main God.
Thanks to the enormous vitality his past self had poured in, the Divine Realm’s evaluation had risen from complete disaster to total chaos, yet the gods still refused to obey properly. That was the greater humiliation. Among the 10 Mainstays he ranked at the bottom, yet the authority of gray—whose past looked like this—stood above even the Creators, the Eternal Beings. There was no greater shame. What is even more absurd is that this is not the bottom. The fall is still in progress.
His past self was broadcasting his glorious—no, his utterly messed-up—life in real time. There was no greater absurdity. If the other 10 Mainstays learned of this, the contempt he already faced would escalate to outright dismissal. Although it was a fate that would vanish if the Origin of the Mage God canceled the implementation, at minimum his past self had to reach one thousand trillion in innate divine power and become gray. That was the term of his contract with Truth. In conclusion, if my past self is erased, I will have to live as gray permanently.
There was no joy in being allowed to live again. He had already experienced the worst, given up on life, been erased, and then re-implemented. He held no attachment to this existence whatsoever. Yet no matter how he looked at it, the Magic God of Dimensions seemed destined for erasure. The flow of fate could not be changed under any circumstances. Because it is decided by one’s own essence and the surrounding environment. Even the absolute Magic God of Dimensions and the Origin who deny reality can only weaken it at best.
The reason lay with the Magic God of Dimensions himself—the very party of that fate—who refused to accept it and continued resisting to the bitter end. He had been given every hint that this was a path to death, yet he stubbornly persisted.
He had forcibly intervened and twisted fate. But the power of his gray self was real. As the gray, he was the master of Idea, the information planet that controlled and supervised the flow of information throughout the Absolute Realm and all main universes. Even if the Cyber Realm follows the Black Flame instead of me, it makes no difference. The gray is the absolute being and supervisor of the planet where all Cyber Gods reside.
Originally the Cyber Gods were management deities or prisoners defeated in the past Absolute Great War. Truth had entrusted them to him so he could utilize Idea. As a result, the Cyber Gods could only intervene in about forty percent of matters; the remaining sixty percent fell under the gray’s authority. Of course, even as the gray he could not utilize everything alone, but at minimum he could disable danger signals and warning functions. The result had been an unauthorized loan of sixteen trillion vitality, and it had borne beautiful fruit.
Yet the outcome remained unchanged. Even though the environment—the opponent—had been altered and weakened, the actual party involved, his past self, had not changed. A Main God Tournament wagering the seat of Main God Tower? I had only planned to reduce the vitality supply enough to prevent the Sage of Omniscience from joining the subjugation force like last time, adding a few psychological constraints. But this actually turned out better. If things go well, I may be able to keep the position of Main God of the Divine Realm and strengthen my abilities more easily. After all, the authority and rights of the Main God Tower belong to a Creator God. That’s still something, isn’t it?
No, wait. If Almighty Hwi smashes me in the Main God Tournament like before, wouldn’t that be even worse? Instead of being sent to the Spirit Realm, I might face immediate annihilation? No way! After helping this much and adjusting the environment, there’s no way he’d lose… He’ll lose. Most of his authorities are wide-area powers and wide-area support. They don’t work on Almighty Hwi at all. Hooooooock—! This is driving me insane. With both the gray and the Origin of the Mage God from the 10 Mainstays helping at full strength, he still loses to an equal existence from the main universe? The problem is that the dimensional authority is transcendental-grade but can only perform wide-area attacks and support. There’s no fixing it. Argh! What kind of idiot is this? Since every dimensional authority created ends up like this, I can’t even assign key personnel in any field—only peripheral figures! Do I really have to keep watching this?
Simply reviewing the past battle records, the abilities he had provided support for, and the Divine Realm’s assistance made one thing clear: guaranteed defeat. Almighty Hwi, who had mastered up to the second stanza of the Incomprehensible Eight Founders, had grown strong enough in pure combat power to rival a high-ranking Creator God. His past self, even at the most generous estimate, was only mid-ranking Creator God level. Moreover, in a fair one-on-one duel, the Magic God could never defeat the origin of a high-ranking Almighty God.
On top of that, the compatibility between Almighty Hwi—who specialized in close-quarters individual combat—and the Magic God of Dimensions—who specialized in long-range wide-area attacks and support for war—was abysmal. The moment they dueled, it would end exactly as it had in the past. At this rate, he would be destroyed by Almighty Hwi before he could even lure out the Black Flame Absolute.
This won’t do. The biggest problem isn’t the chaotic Divine Realm or the empty shell of a dimensional Creator Godhood. It’s my weak past self. Nothing will work unless I strengthen that fool somehow.
Having reached that conclusion, the gray hurriedly returned to the Divine Realm. The popes and saints who witnessed him suddenly appear, dismantle the heart of the Magic Tower, and cancel the time-bomb-like magic were already far beyond his concern as they stood there bewildered.
The gray—who had once abandoned life only to be re-implemented—was filled solely with thoughts of revenge against those who had killed, annihilated, and erased his past self. The grudge against Gold, who boasted the strongest authority among the eight Absolutes, and Black Flame, who possessed the strongest body, was the root that drove him now. Therefore, even though he knew the Origin of the Mage God had implemented him right before erasure, he accepted it with genuine joy instead. He understood that hatred could drive an individual’s explosive growth far more effectively than happiness ever could. Even now, knowing full well how reckless this is, am I not moving with desperate urgency?
The Main God Temple of the Divine Realm, where he had recovered half his authority and rushed back to, was eerily quiet. To secure even the smallest share in the new Main God Star, all high-ranking gods had left to subjugate monsters, and the remaining management gods and lower gods were frantically assisting them. Even after he had neutralized the planetary defensive barrier with dimensional authority so the gods could fight at full strength, some still died to the monsters, revived, and were redeployed in an endless cycle. As expected of the highest-ranking Main God Star, the monsters were indeed formidable.
Still, even if their personalities clashed horribly with the past, the Divine Realm Management Main Gods possessed authority strength nearly at the Creator Candidate level or above. With the giant race’s Main Gods also actively participating to loosen up their revived bodies during this rare monster hunt, the situation would be cleaned up within a week.
Right before his eyes, inside the space the Origin of the Mage God had created through time manipulation, fierce shouts, continuous sounds of impact, and ultra-high-speed incantations leaked out so rapidly that even he could barely parse them. The absolute dimensional authority’s time manipulation reaches a maximum of one hundred years per second. Of course, it decreased exponentially depending on target and area, but this was close to that limit. Since he was a body implemented by the Origin of the Mage God, the Origin could utilize the same power. Yet although he had recovered only half his authority and rushed over immediately, five minutes had already passed. That meant up to thirty thousand years had flowed inside that space.
Just thinking about it sent a chill down his spine. Intervening would likely mean receiving training himself, so he kept silent. Then the Divine Realm Ego suddenly conveyed its will.
Urgent direct line from Almighty Hwi of the Main Divine Realm to the Magic God of Dimensions.
“Now it’s here? Connect it.”
“However…?”
The Divine Realm Ego hesitated. The one answering was clearly the Magic God of Dimensions. Yet it was not truly him. He was the gray, implemented through reality denial at enormous cost from the erased future Magic God of Dimensions. The same existence, yet subtly different. Originally, the future Magic God of Dimensions implemented by the authority of reality denial could not have been normal. But because the level of that authority was so high that no abnormality appeared, the principle that identical beings cannot exist in the same space and time should have resulted in both being annihilated. The ego of the Creation Realm understood that correlation, yet it also sensed that the past Magic God of Dimensions would never accept the current decision.
“You know that I am the future Magic God of Dimensions, correct?”
“Yes. The Divine Realm recognizes only one Main God, and that is the current Magic God of Dimensions alone.”
“Shall I tell you what happened to your future self after following that immature Magic God of Dimensions? It seems you wish to meet the same end? Do you not realize it would be far better for the gray—one of the 10 Mainstays—to handle this than my past self?”
There was no need to threaten a management god. Truth was the greatest weapon. And as the gray, the pinnacle of all management gods, reality denial and schemes built upon truth were his ultimate weapons. A Divine Realm Ego of that rank would possess flexibility, and self-preservation would be its highest priority. It would recognize the current crisis, and once given this much of the outcome, it could quickly infer the rest: if it did not help him, everything would end.
“For urgent communications from the Main Divine Realm, if a suitable proxy exists even if it is not the primary self, it must be accepted as top priority. Since all Divine Realm Management Main Gods and high-ranking deities are currently participating in the Main God Star subjugation, I will temporarily recognize the future Magic God of Dimensions—the gray—as that proxy.”
Beeeeeeeeep—!
A massive screen materialized before him. On it appeared Almighty Hwi with an expression like he was chewing on a bug, along with several Creator Candidates wearing thoroughly displeased faces. Beside Almighty Hwi stood the Main God of the management gods, endlessly radiating his will. The moment they saw him on the screen they flinched, but immediately intensified their will even further. It was likely a ploy to extract maximum benefit during negotiations. Unfortunately, they had chosen the wrong opponent.
He was not the naïve Magic God of Dimensions. He was the gray—who had tasted humiliating erasure in reality and now burned with vengeance toward the 10 Mainstays. To repeat: the gray was the pinnacle and strongest among management gods. To management gods, he was an existence above even the Creators. Yet a mere Main God of the management gods dared speak of negotiation before him? It was laughable. Moreover, all authorities of the management gods converged upon him, the gray. He could freely browse every domain of information under the Cyber Realm’s management. Even their secretly transmitted will was known to him without omission. Though the Creator Candidate-level management god had carefully adjusted his authority, the gray saw through it all. There was no greater farce.
It was the gray’s first time laughing loudly while mocking another since his implementation. As the one who presided over schemes, the fact that his very first target was his own past self was truly hilarious, he thought with self-admiration.