SCREECH—

Dust billowed into the air.

Zhou Chen slammed on the brakes. He stared at the surging flames in the distance and frowned. "Has City No. 19 been destroyed?"

"If City No. 19 were destroyed, I should have received a notification by now," the Plague Doctor said, pulling out his phone to check. None of his intelligence channels had any related information.

"Maybe it just happened. Let’s wait a few minutes," Zhou Chen said. He drove the car into a dense forest, killed the engine, and blended into the darkness.

Miles away, City No. 19 burned fiercely. The inferno churned, its flames clawing at the night sky as if trying to devour it. Five minutes passed, and the Plague Doctor still hadn’t received any news. He reported the matter to the Salvation Army’s command, and the response he received was chilling.

Havier had secretly launched a satellite over a decade ago, but the uprising failed before it could be put to use. To prevent the government from discovering the satellite and taking control of it, the Salvation Army destroyed and sealed all related information. They only recently revived the satellite program. According to real-time observation from that very satellite, City No. 19 was as brightly lit as ever, with no signs of anything unusual.

And yet, from where Zhou Chen and the Plague Doctor were watching, City No. 19 was clearly being devoured by an inferno.

’So which is real, and which is fake?’

"Perhaps we’re under the effects of some kind of psychic contamination, or something else. That broadcast just now was a huge red flag. City No. 19 has never been called the ’City of Dreams’... Command just found some relevant files."

The Plague Doctor looked down, reading the latest intelligence on his phone. He spoke slowly. "The term ’City of Dreams’ first appeared on March 14, Year 45 of the New Era, in a small town in Europe. A writer, while dreaming, unexpectedly found himself in a mysterious city. This place had its own unique physical laws and was inhabited by all kinds of wondrous creatures and races. He learned from one of these creatures that the city was called the ’City of Dreams’ and that it could fulfill any wish a person might have.

So, the writer obtained the fame, status, women, and money he desired—everything. When he woke up, the gold and treasures he wore and the evidence of his trysts with the women were all still there.

Every day thereafter, the writer would enter the city as soon as he fell asleep. That June, he wrote about the ’City of Dreams’ in his new book. The book was a massive success, which drew the attention of the Star Association. One day, he was taken away and never came home again.

Afterward, the Star Association conducted a thorough inspection of the town and discovered over a dozen other people with high spiritual sensitivity had also entered the City of Dreams."

"From Year 45 to Year 225 of the New Era, the City of Dreams appeared a total of nineteen times. Each appearance was separated by exactly ten years, and its location was random, materializing anywhere in the World for a period of seven days.

This is Year 235 of the New Era, and today is March 14th. The timing fits. This should be the twentieth appearance of the ’City of Dreams’."

At this, the Plague Doctor paused. He must have read something astonishing, because his tone became exceptionally grave.

"Command learned from the Alchemy Association’s intelligence channels... that the ’City of Dreams’ is a Divine Kingdom adrift in the Spirit Realm..."

’A Divine Kingdom adrift in the Spirit Realm?’

’A Divine Kingdom?!’

Zhou Chen was dumbfounded, thinking he must have misheard. A Divine Kingdom was the realm of a God, their personal domain. But he had never heard of any God whose Divine Kingdom was called the "City of Dreams." There was only one possibility: this was a Divine Kingdom created by another, unknown God!

"And then?" he asked, taking a deep breath.

"It’s a masterless Divine Kingdom, suspected to originate from the Old Era," the Plague Doctor said. "For many years, numerous organizations, including the Star Association, tried to capture it, but they all failed. That is, until the Dream Lord entered the City of Dreams. After he emerged, the Star Association and the others gave up their attempts to capture it, allowing the Divine Kingdom to continue drifting through the Spirit Realm. Because the Dream Lord had already neutralized it."

’The City of Dreams is supposedly from the Old Era...’ Zhou Chen mused for a moment, then looked toward the burning city in the distance.

"You call this neutralized? It looks to me like the City of Dreams is about to burn to the ground."

"Don’t worry. The Star Association definitely left some monitoring protocols in place. Since they haven’t shown up, it must not be a major issue."

"So... they’re just having a bonfire party?"

The words had barely left Zhou Chen’s lips when a colossal beam of fiery light streaked across the sky, crashing straight into the burning city. In the next instant, the world lit up as bright as day. Blinding white light flooded every inch of space. The Plague Doctor cried out in pain, the light searing his eyes beneath his mask.

"Siegfried" also squeezed his scorched eyes shut as two trails of bloody tears streamed down his face. But Zhou Chen’s consciousness, currently in a state of "Divine Descent," saw the true nature of that falling light.

A falling person.

No... a falling God!

Though he had never seen one of the Gods before, Zhou Chen was certain that’s what it was—a God, riddled with wounds and on the verge of death.

It smashed into the burning city like a world-ending meteor, utterly annihilating the already-lost metropolis.

’This is a projection from the Old Era!’

The Old Era was destroyed in the War of the Gods. This must have been just a tiny, insignificant fragment of that battle: a God struck down in the Divine War... Zhou Chen watched the light recede like an ebbing tide, his mind reeling. If a mere glimpse of the battlefield was this terrifying, it was impossible to imagine the true horror of the War of the Gods. The fact that human civilization hadn’t been annihilated was nothing short of a miracle.

As the light faded, the city vanished completely. But moments later, a brilliant glow, suffused with immense divine power, began to shine. Bathed in this divine radiance, countless silhouettes shot up from the ground, rebuilding themselves into a fantastical city.