Chapter 1744: True and False

The moment all starlight was swallowed, every sight and sound from beyond him disappeared. True, pure darkness and silence completely enveloped Zhang Fan. There was nothing else besides Zhang Fan; even the concept of time ceased to exist.

After a long period of deathly silence, faint, murmuring sounds suddenly began to whisper in Zhang Fan's ears. Against the backdrop of the extreme stillness, they sounded like thunder. “What is this…” Zhang Fan found the sounds inexplicably familiar, yet he couldn't recall them immediately. Although only an instant had passed since all things returned to the Divine, to Zhang Fan, it felt as if an immeasurable expanse of time had gone by. Even his memories began to decay and blur. Instinctively, he tried to listen carefully.

Just like a sudden burst of cicada song, followed by a chorus of thousands, what was a mere whisper one moment transformed into a grand and magnificent symphony resounding all around the next. “Xuanyuan Hong, Life Ender, Old Man Angler…” One after another, familiar yet strange names surfaced in Zhang Fan's mind, making him hesitate. Zhang Fan no longer remembered who these people were, but their desperate cries seemed to be urgently telling him something. Sensing their emotions, he tried to calm himself and filter out the influence of other chaotic sounds.

However, things did not go as he wished. Soon, these familiar voices were drowned out by the incoming tide of sound. New voices began to emerge, both familiar and strange. So familiar that Zhang Fan could blurt out their names, yet strange because no memories of them remained in his mind. Zhang Fan vaguely sensed that something was wrong. “I… Am I decaying?” At that moment, he was plunged into immense doubt and confusion.

He suddenly recalled his objective: to slay a god. His ambition from years past was still vivid in his mind; after triumphantly devouring mountains and seas and destroying stars, his realm, strength, and temperament had all reached their peak state. He had made full preparations to confront the legendary fallen true god. But he never expected to find no true god. Only endless solitude and darkness awaited him. An instant stretched into eternity.

His body and consciousness began to decay and wither. Meanwhile, everything he had once consumed, contained within him, began to revive. All of this was vastly different from what he had anticipated. As if deceived, a surge of hostility suddenly rose within Zhang Fan. “Get out! You, get out here, now!” He was beside himself with rage, roaring. Yet, not even he could hear the sound.

The dark void remained eternally unchanged, like icy seawater silently devouring Zhang Fan. At that instant, he felt the bone-chilling cold emanating from the darkness before him. He suddenly felt weak, and the ground beneath him, upon which he depended for survival, was rapidly vanishing. Instinctively, he yearned to gasp for breath, but he was utterly unable to reverse this trend. The sounds constantly echoing in his ears grew ever denser, gradually, like dark clouds, obscuring the sky and sun.

Zhang Fan felt as if he were a dying behemoth, lying on the ground, stripped of all strength, unable to struggle, left to be scorched by the blazing sun, his body decaying, gnawed by flies and worms. “I am dying.” This clear realization flashed through his mind. Then, an intense unwillingness surged within him. “I painstakingly grew step by step from an ant-like clone to what I am now. I devoured my true form, consumed mountains and seas, destroyed isolated stars. I was almost a god! How could I die so inexplicably?”

Zhang Fan furiously waved his hand, trying to drive away the flies and worms swarming over his body. But when he extended his arm, it merely became a breeding ground for more flies and worms. Not only did this not improve the situation, it made the surrounding sounds even louder. The sounds were like a roaring tide. Despite a myriad of unwillingness, Zhang Fan felt his existence growing increasingly tenuous, irreversibly drawing closer to death.

In his hazy state, he seemed to hear a chilling chewing sound. It seemed that in the darkness, a colossal entity was silently devouring him. Compared to those tiny flies and worms, its feeding was slow and elegant. It even seemed to carry a hint of mockery, quietly relishing the downfall of Zhang Fan, this ‘new god’. As if doused with a bucket of ice water in winter, Zhang Fan’s boundless rage instantly extinguished. Only fear remained. At this moment, no thought of resistance could arise in his mind. The only thing left was the desperate urge to struggle and escape from its maw.

However, its consumption was undeniable, inescapable like fate. Zhang Fan could only watch, with chilling clarity, as every inch of his body was gnawed, shredded, and swallowed, then digested. Everything he had ever consumed was lost with this invisible digestion. Ultimately, only Zhang Fan himself remained. The next moment, even Zhang Fan himself was about to be completely engulfed.

Freed from the constraints and burdens of other things, Zhang Fan surprisingly felt a renewed surge of hope for life. He had forgotten many things, indeed, almost everything, but one thing he still remembered. “True…” “True and false…” Like a flickering lamp igniting in the darkness, though precarious, it briefly illuminated Zhang Fan's lost thoughts. “True and false… Dao marks?”

He vaguely recalled a world where true and false were being nurtured. It was on the verge of birth, yet constantly unable to fully emerge due to its location within the mountains and seas. During his process of achieving godhood, he had not swallowed that world; he had simply let it evolve. “It is still there!” As if seeing hope, Zhang Fan's last vestiges were completely ignited by a spark. He struggled to open his eyes, trying to find that one possible sanctuary in the boundless darkness. “It’s there!” His memory revived, and he quickly located his target.

An eternal world, silently drifting, as if it had been there since its very creation, unchanged for eons. The silent feasting entity in the darkness, however, paid him no mind. As if grasping at the last straw, Zhang Fan's remaining divine consciousness resisted the external devouring force, and he quickly reached that eternal world. Though merely a corner of a place, it brought him an unprecedented sense of peace. All external threats instantly ceased to exist, and Zhang Fan actually managed to survive.

The darkness receded, and time regained its meaning. Zhang Fan became strong again. After all, he was an existence who had once devoured entire mountains and seas, even absorbing an isolated star. Even if only a mere remnant, it was enough to be called 'powerful'. He slowly regained his composure. Everything he had just experienced was like a nightmare. Even now, Zhang Fan still couldn't understand what exactly had happened, but the familiar aura of true and false emanating from this eternal world brought him waves of reassurance. His sanity gradually returned. “It actually managed to form?”