The Authority of Creation completely saturated the Living Soil, and this ancient wondrous treasure of heaven and earth was now entirely under Chen Xu's control.
Under his manipulation, the Living Soil formed a perfect, smooth-surfaced sphere.
Then, the Authority of Creation continued to penetrate deeper along the Living Soil, beginning its invasion of the soulstone.
Cracks began to appear on the massive soulstone.
One, then two, until the cracks gradually crawled across the entire surface of the soulstone.
Crack!
With a crisp snapping sound, the soulstone shattered and melted into the Living Soil.
The originally earthy-yellow Living Soil changed color after the crimson-black hue of the soulstone was added. It didn't become vibrant; instead, it grew increasingly plain.
The yellow faded, turning into a mass of gray, semi-transparent material that possessed several properties of a soul.
Suddenly, a hideous demonic face surfaced upon the Living Soil.
Without the soulstone to bind it, the frenzied soul of Karl, the Demon King of Destruction, began to struggle, attempting to find a way out and regain its freedom.
Unfortunately, under the influence of the Authority of Creation, the Living Soil and the soulstone had already merged into one. This brand-new special soil had also inherited the soulstone's property of imprisoning souls.
No matter how Karl struggled, he could not break through, just as he had been unable to escape the soulstone.
Watching this, Chen Xu grew thoughtful.
The combination of the soulstone and Living Soil had serendipitously gained an extra soul-binding characteristic. This property might allow Chen Xu to add a new function to the Undead Network he was preparing to construct.
And that was an Undead Network Firewall.
Since it was a network intended for use by all necrotic creatures, it was destined to have some level of openness.
If an enemy targeted this characteristic and invaded the Undead Network through the soul of a low-tier undead to plant curses or some strange destructive power, it would be a major problem.
Chen Xu didn't want the thing he had worked so hard to create to be easily broken by others.
With a firewall, he could block unauthorized users and perform specialized interceptions based on the nature of a soul.
For example, he could only allow creatures whose soul essence was that of the undead, while flatly banning angels, demons, and even humans.
Furthermore, besides the firewall, he needed to set up permissions. The Undead Network would be extremely useful for total war, and in the future, it might be opened to the necrotic archdukes of the Land of the Undead and their subordinate private lords.
However, Chen Xu did not want to share all functions with them, so the permission aspect had to be handled properly.
Besides, if the Undead Network proved effective, he might even promote it externally to transcendents across the myriad worlds, creating a dedicated network for them.
What? You're a Berserker focused purely on strength with terrifyingly low intelligence? No problem. Just connect to the Undead Network and activate a basic membership to instantly master hundreds of basic undead spells, from summoning to curses—everything you could need.
From then on, you could begin a career of solo adventuring, never having to split your spoils with teammates again.
Chen Xu looked at the gray-white sphere in the air and unleashed a powerful soul shock, hitting the thrashing Karl inside once more.
The demon king's soul was too active in its vigorous state, making the Authority of Creation's invasion speed too slow.
Chen Xu was impatient to see the results and had no time to wait, so he granted Karl a soul shock to let him sleep like a baby.
Soon, the Authority of Creation completely penetrated Karl's soul. Chen Xu reached out his right hand and began to carefully disassemble it.
He broke down the complete soul into tiny soul particles.
Then, he categorized these soul particles: one part was the demon source, another was the hellfire source, and the rest was Karl's 'Dao'—the Dao of Power and the Path of Flesh.
He integrated these soul particles into the external gray-white sphere one by one. The entire process had to be handled with extreme caution.
After all, he only had one set of materials. If the experiment failed, there would be no second chance.
As the first part, the demon source, finished merging, the volume of the gray-white sphere multiplied several times, becoming as large as a moon.
At this point, the color of the gray-white sphere became even more indifferent. No trace of the Living Soil remained; it looked more like a mass of gray-black shadow, constantly twisting in the air.
Chen Xu continued to manipulate the Authority of Creation to merge the remaining soul particles.
The shadow changed again, vanishing directly from the material world and becoming a special organism that could only be perceived through soul vision.
At this moment, it possessed a trace of spirituality, but this spirituality was not something Chen Xu had ignited; it was a true spirit that had accidentally been born under the nourishment of the demon king's massive soul.
Chen Xu wiped it out with a wave of his hand. He couldn't trust anything he hadn't ignited himself.
Regardless, he had plenty of power of creation and didn't mind spending a little extra.
As the final part of the soul particles containing the 'Dao' merged, the soul shadow changed once more, actually beginning to penetrate toward the foundations of the Undead Dao Court.
Those were the underlying Dao principles that constituted the Undead Dao Court—various complex and overlapping undead Daos.
"Using the Dao as a foundation? That seems viable."
Chen Xu mused that if he integrated this network into the underlying Dao principles of the Undead Dao Court, it would form a symbiotic relationship with the court.
As long as one side remained, the other would not vanish.
And since Chen Xu's Undead Dao Court was connected to the Land of the Undead through the sub-system property, it meant that one would have to simultaneously destroy the Land of the Undead, the Undead Dao Court, and the Undead Network to completely eliminate all three.
After confirming it was feasible, Chen Xu proactively opened the Dao principles of the Undead Dao Court, crushed the shadow into powder, and stuffed it inside.
Then, he poured a massive amount of power of creation into it. He planned to complete the final shaping and Spirit Ignition together.
However, to Chen Xu's surprise, the final step of ignition cost an unexpectedly high amount of power of creation and took an unusually long time.
A long time passed, and just as Chen Xu began to think this Undead Network would be like the girl his incarnation had encountered—gestating for nine years before being willing to be born—a spark of spirituality was quietly born.
The Undead Dao Court began to emit various sounds: the rattling of skeleton bones, the long roars of bone dragons, and the clashing of necrotic knights' swords and armor.
The undead within the Undead Dao Court also stopped their work and looked up at the sky.
It was as if the entire world was celebrating this new life.
"Miracle, awaken!"
Chen Xu shouted loudly, completing the final step of creation: the naming.
Miracle was both the name of this network and Chen Xu's expectation for it.
The birth of Miracle would be the first step for the Land of the Undead to march toward the myriad worlds.
As his shout fell, a being awakened at the intersection of life and the world's Dao principles. It had no common biological form and could not be observed with the naked eye.
Only eternal-tier existences who had entered the Dao could perceive its presence through their souls.
This was Miracle, a special being that existed at the level of the world's Dao principles.
As the master of the Undead Dao Court, Chen Xu could communicate directly with Miracle through his soul, and Miracle could also come directly into Chen Xu's soul.
This new little fellow was curious about everything.
Miracle looked at Chen Xu. Although it had no memories, an instinctual perception from deep within made it utter its very first words after birth.
"Father."
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