CHAPTER 277: CHAPTER 277 LURK

Riley saw the fate of stars before they were ever lit.

He felt the heartbeat of beings not yet born and grieved for lives lost a trillion years from now.

He walked through his own past lives—countless of them—spread across various timelines and incarnations, some familiar, others alien and unrecognizable.

And in the deepest recess of the temporal stream, he met himself—a version of Riley that had existed outside linear causality.

A man who had long since become the embodiment of time.

That version smiled, nodded, and disappeared... like mist at dawn.

Back in the void sanctuary, Riley’s eyes remained closed, his body floating a few inches above the desert ground he created.

The space around him was no longer still—it pulsed with silent force.

Unlimited energy crackled around him like arcs of lightning slowed to a crawl, weaving ethereal symbols and ancient runes into the air.

His Primordial Chaos Physique, already unmatched, had now fused perfectly with the Dao of Time, amplifying his existence beyond conventional comprehension.

Seconds outside the sanctuary ticked by slowly, but inside...

A thousand years passed.

And in that time, Riley studied every law, every anomaly, and every paradox time had to offer.

He saw how time wrapped around emotion, how destiny bent around decisions, and how causality was nothing but a fragile illusion.

Then, as suddenly as it had started, the flood of revelation ceased.

Riley opened his eyes.

They were no longer the eyes of a mortal, a cultivator, or even a True Immortal.

They were eyes that had witnessed eternity.

Eyes that now saw the past, the present, and countless futures layered atop one another—like pages in a cosmic book only he could read.

"Time bends to me now," he whispered to the desert wind.

No one heard it.

Not his wives. Not the clan outside. Not even the heavens.

Because in that moment—Riley existed outside the very concept of time itself.

And when he finally rose to his feet, the fabric of reality bent with him... waiting for his next move.

Riley extended his divine sense into the void—and in that instant, reality peeled open before him.

He saw everything.

Every corner of the universe, every breath of life, every flicker of creation and destruction across the multiverse unfolded in perfect clarity.

Stars were born and extinguished in the span of heartbeats, galaxies spun in choreographed dances, and entire civilizations rose and fell like waves against an eternal shore.

Time lost its meaning as he beheld it all at once.

But amid the endless torrent of cosmic visions, something impossible appeared—something he had never expected to see at such a moment.

A lone figure stood within the void.

An old man, ancient beyond words, looked at Riley with eyes full of warmth and sorrow.

His presence radiated a quiet power, and yet there was no malice—only a deep, aching peace.

His robes swayed despite the lack of wind, and his entire being shimmered faintly, like a mirage that might vanish at any second.

"Hello, Riley," the old man said with a soft, knowing smile.

His voice carried not through sound but directly into Riley’s soul, gentle and calm.

"I expected to see you sooner... but you took a detour, didn’t you? You wandered through a few years and paths you wanted to take before ascending in the immortal realm. Still, none of that matters now."

His smile faded into something more solemn.

"I can finally rest. You’ve come, and that’s enough. Thank you... and I’m sorry."

As he spoke those final words, his body began to dissolve—not into dust, but into shimmering fragments of light, like crystalline particles drifting into the vast dark.

One by one, the pieces of him scattered, carried off by invisible winds that hummed with the echo of memories long forgotten.

In a blink, he was gone.

Riley remained suspended in the emptiness, his mouth slightly open, his mind spinning.

He wanted to speak—to ask who the old man was, what he meant, and why there was sorrow in his goodbye.

But before he could form a single thought, a pressure struck his mind like a tidal wave.

And then came the pain.

"AHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

It started as a piercing throb and then expanded, growing into a full-body agony that ravaged him without mercy.

Countless memories, experiences, and truths—spanning eons—were poured into his consciousness in a single, unstoppable surge.

Knowledge from the dawn of creation to the end of time flooded his mind.

Concepts too vast, too complex for ordinary comprehension slammed into him one after another.

He screamed and screamed, but the sound was lost in the silence of the void.

Every cell in his body trembled. His soul buckled under the weight.

His spirit felt like it was being ripped apart and reforged all at once.

The knowledge did not just enter his mind—it branded itself into his very essence, reshaping his being.

Time had no meaning in that space. A second could have been a century.

A thousand years could have passed in the blink of an eye.

Riley no longer knew how long he was trapped in that inferno of revelation and agony.

But he did not die.

A lesser being—mortal, even a peak cultivator—would have been obliterated by the sheer immensity of what he endured.

But Riley had already stepped beyond the mortal coil.

He was a true immortal, and that title was not merely for show.

His body, soul, and spirit, refined to perfection through tribulation, withstood the storm.

Barely.

When the pain finally receded, leaving only the echo of silence, Riley floated there—shaking, gasping, and changed.

Forever changed.

Riley gasped, his body trembling as the last traces of pain ebbed away.

The echo of that agonizing transformation still rang in his bones, but clarity was beginning to rise like sunlight through the fog.

Then it hit him.

That old man—the one who spoke so gently in the void—wasn’t just a passerby or a lingering remnant of power.

No. He was the one. The origin. The architect of all.

The Ancient One.

Riley’s eyes widened, his breath catching in his throat.

He had heard that title before—many times from the memories of both Ruby and Evangeline, carved into the walls of a forgotten shrine, whispered in sacred texts, referenced by dying stars and sentient worlds as a being of unfathomable might.

A mysterious influence. The Abode of the Ancient One... that mythic place wasn’t just a name. It was real.

And now, Riley knew the terrifying truth:

That old man had created the multiverse itself.

He wasn’t merely its protector.

He was its sole owner.

And now... Riley had inherited everything.

Power unlike anything he’d ever imagined coursed through his veins, thrumming like the heartbeat of a living universe.

The laws of physics bent before his will.

He could split atoms with thought, unmake galaxies with a whisper.

He could create life, erase time, and reshape reality as casually as flipping a page in a book.

He had become omnipotent.

But as the truth settled in his chest, so did something else—something darker, heavier, more terrifying than the power itself.

Responsibility.

Memories that weren’t his flooded his mind—wars spanning epochs, countless cosmic threats, betrayals, experiences, love lost to entropy, mechanics that shaped creation, and the burden of keeping existence balanced on a razor’s edge.

The Ancient One hadn’t passed this on as a gift.

He had passed it on as an escape.

"...I’m fucked," Riley muttered under his breath, his voice hollow with disbelief.

He shook his head slowly, eyes unfocused as the weight of his new identity threatened to crush him from within.

The Ancient One had grown tired—not physically, for he had transcended such limitations, but spiritually.

After uncountable millennia of holding the line against everything that sought to unravel reality, he had simply had enough.

His departure was not an act of charity—it was surrender.

And Riley was the one chosen to replace him.

Chosen? No. That implied a choice. This had always been a trap in disguise.

A mechanical sound suddenly shattered the stillness.

Ding!

The tone echoed through the fabric of the multiverse, resonating in every plane of reality that now bowed to his command.

It wasn’t just a sound—it was a notification. A warning.

Something had breached the outermost veil of his realm.

With a flick of thought, Riley’s awareness stretched beyond this dimension, his divine sense cascading across the layers of existence like a wave of golden fire.

And what he saw chilled him.

Beyond his newly inherited domain loomed an army.

An infinite army.

They gathered at the edge of reality like a storm waiting to break.

Countless abominations stood ready, their forms alien and shifting, their purposes unknowable.

Towering beasts made of shadow and flame growled in silence, their eyes glowing like dying suns.

Monstrous constructs the size of planets drifted forward in rigid formations, their cold steel adorned with runes from forgotten dimensions.

Titans with wings of shattered glass hovered like angels of death. Some bore the faces of men, others bore none at all.