The Will of the World

Above the torrent of time, listening to the flat words of the phantom girl who claimed to be her own divinity, Miketsu felt her heart tremble. After slightly steadying her thoughts, she continued to speak to the girl.

"Are you saying... that the ancient gods aren't products of this planet either? That they are all outsiders from the universe? That for some reason, they gathered on this planet together?"

"No, that is not what I mean. The ancient gods are not alien gods; they are all lifeforms born from this planet itself," the phantom girl continued in an indifferent tone, devoid of any emotional ripples. This denial only made Miketsu more confused.

"Then... if they aren't outsiders from the universe, how do they possess power that exceeds the planet's carrying capacity?" Miketsu questioned further, and the phantom girl continued her calm reply.

"They are not outsiders from the universe, but their boundless power is also not something this world could have created... They, their abnormal evolution, originated from an unexplainable accident, a disaster whose truth will never be known..."

"What disaster..." Hearing the phantom girl's answer, Miketsu couldn't help but murmur, her eyes widening slightly. The phantom girl spread her hands, shook her head slightly, and continued to speak calmly.

"I do not know how to explain the cause of this so-called 'disaster.' You only need to know that our world was originally very peaceful. It was peaceful in the past, it is peaceful now, and it will be peaceful in the future. However, from a higher-dimensional perspective, a major anomaly occurred in our world that affected the entire timeline.

"Perhaps our world collided with another parallel dimension, causing multiple worlds to overlap. In the end, the volume of energy the overlapped world could contain remained the same, and the energy from those other worlds manifested in the form of ancient gods.

"Or perhaps our world came into contact with a higher-dimensional space-time, causing numerous organisms that exist, existed, or will exist in our world to be exposed to higher-dimensional radiation on the scale of the timeline. This led to abnormal evolution, ultimately creating the ancient gods."

After the phantom girl finished speaking plainly, she fell back into silence. Miketsu took a moment to digest her words before speaking again.

"Is everything you've said just speculation?"

"Yes. The true reason why ancient gods ran rampant in this world can no longer be verified. But what you need to know is that in the original trajectory of this world's fate, there shouldn't have been so many powerful ancient gods that surpass the world. The concentrated birth of ancient gods was an absolute accidental calamity for the world itself. The world, capable of peering into the timeline, saw a future where she would eventually be torn apart by the increasingly uncontrollable and powerful ancient god power. Thus, she began to seek salvation, attempting to save herself from this group of monsters she could not face alone."

The phantom girl continued her calm explanation, her words mentioning a name that caught Miketsu's attention... the world itself.

"Are you saying this world has its own consciousness? That the birth of the ancient gods was an accidental calamity for her? That she saw a future where she was torn apart and completely destroyed by them? That she wanted to deal with the ancient gods to save herself long ago?" Miketsu asked with a look of shock. The phantom girl nodded, confirming Miketsu's question, and continued speaking plainly.

"Correct. This world has a self-awareness. She felt panic regarding the future that the ancient gods would cause, so she began a desperate self-rescue. First, she crossed through space-time to summon a soul she deemed suitable from a similar world in another dimension. Then, she found a powerful ancient god who was still in the process of being born. Finally, at the cost of her own will nearly collapsing completely, she fused the summoned soul into the divine soul of the ancient god that was still in its early stages of birth. This completely rewrote the will of that ancient god, making her a complete outlier among her kind."

After hearing the phantom girl's words, Miketsu felt another jolt in her heart. After a long moment of shock, she spoke slowly.

"Are you saying... that soul was me?"

"It should be said it was 'us'."

"Fine, it was us. According to this, we didn't travel to this world thirteen years ago, but hundreds of millions of years ago. And we were summoned by this world. She let us fuse into this body of the Heavenly Mandate Mysterious Bird, letting us become an ancient god? All... to save this world from the hands of the other ancient gods?"

Exhaling, Miketsu continued to speak to the phantom girl. Knowing the true reason for her transmigration felt like a weight had been lifted from her heart.

"Yes. The world's act of self-sacrifice created an outlier like us among the ancient gods. Hundreds of millions of years ago, from the moment we traveled to this world, we made up our minds to guide it toward the 'right path' in our memories. As those who mastered time and causality, we were already in the most powerful tier among the ancient gods. Furthermore, the will of the world left us fragments of her power after her collapse, which further strengthened our abilities."

With an expression that remained unchanged, the phantom girl continued her calm narration. On the other side, Miketsu had already guessed the rest of the story.

"So, for the next few hundred million years, we hid in the shadows, using our invisible influence to affect the ancient gods of the entire world. While ensuring the world wasn't completely destroyed, we made them kill each other unintentionally to reduce their numbers. Am I right?"

Miketsu looked seriously at the phantom girl, who nodded directly.

"Exactly... Through manipulation from the shadows, we eliminated most of the ancient gods. The remaining ones realized something was wrong. They became extremely vigilant and found various ways to leave themselves a path for retreat. They established non-aggression pacts with each other after carving up the world, attempting to resist the fate we imposed upon them. Our manipulation became difficult.

"Therefore, so that the era in our memories could arrive smoothly, and to manipulate fate more deeply to completely end the era of ancient gods, we decided to temporarily abandon our ancient god body and incarnate as fate itself..."

The phantom girl finished and looked silently at Miketsu. Miketsu also paused for a few seconds before speaking.

"So... we decided to incarnate as the Mandate of Heaven to completely end the era of ancient gods?"

"Indeed. At the cost of sacrificing the ancient god body and merging with the remains of the world's consciousness, the divine soul of the Heavenly Mandate Mysterious Bird could incarnate as the Mandate of Heaven. However, this entire process is irreversible. To become the Mandate of Heaven is to become the rules and trends themselves. One must be absolutely precise and perfect; extra emotions are not needed. Thus, the will of the Heavenly Mandate Mysterious Bird split at that moment. The divine 'me' and the human 'you' were separated from then on."

The phantom girl spoke slowly. After hearing her, Miketsu was stunned for a moment, then took a deep breath.

"So, you abandoned me?"

Hearing Miketsu's words, the phantom girl tilted her head and spoke bluntly.

"No, you abandoned me."

After saying this, the two girls with the same face stared into each other's eyes, silent for a long time.