Chapter 874: Chapter 874

Everything within several hundred kilometers of the shattered command center had been reduced to rubble. The once-sturdy metal buildings were half-melted and twisted, like candles that had been scorched by flame. Countless people had been reduced to ashes in the explosion.

Figures darted back and forth, flickering through the devastation. Rescue teams had rushed in from all directions, frantically searching for any signs of life. Many severely wounded survivors were pulled from the wreckage and received urgent medical treatment in time.

However, the very center of the blast, the site where the command center once stood, remained engulfed in extreme heat and radiation. Anyone below the Five Dragons Realm could not even approach as the lingering shockwaves alone would incinerate them on the spot.

Li Xiaofei arrived at the scene, sword in hand. He felt a familiar aura pulsing from the epicenter of the explosion, summoning him. With the protection of the Blood-Drinking Sword, he advanced quickly into the heart of the blast zone.

“Hm?” He first laid eyes on a glowing sphere, fifty meters in diameter. It was silver-white, radiating with a sacred light.

Upon closer inspection, he realized it wasn’t a sphere at all, but a pair of massive, divine silver wings curled inward to form a semi-transparent orb. It was like a mother’s arms cradling a child, sheltering the many figures within.

Two figures stood beneath that glowing sphere. One was tall and lean, with long black hair flowing down his back. The other was even taller, towering at nearly three meters like a small giant. His massive head was not that of a human, but a ferocious lizard’s—broad, scaled, and monstrous.

The two figures faced each other. They didn’t appear to be allies, but they weren’t acting like enemies either. The moment Li Xiaofei arrived, both figures turned their attention to him.

Six pairs of eyes turned toward him at once. Yes, six. Two belonged to the black-haired human. The other four came from the Lizardman. The Lizardman’s four eyes were arranged in two pairs. The upper pair gleamed a pale green and had the vertical pupils common to beasts, while the lower pair were a deep, demonic red—lacking both sclera and iris, just pools of bloody light. Fresh chapters posted on 𝓷𝓸𝓿𝓮𝓵✦𝓯𝓲𝓻𝓮✦𝓷𝓮𝓽

Those two blood-red eyes looked like bottomless pits of gore, radiating an aura of wickedness and sheer terror.

“Who is he?” The Lizardman was the first to speak, his voice rumbling in fluent human tongue.

“An uninvited guest,” the black-haired human replied calmly.

He was strikingly handsome. Not the youthful kind of handsome, but a mature, refined beauty that was like a fine wine aged through time. There was a depth and poise to him, a calmness beneath the weathered features that made people instinctively trust him, and even feel drawn to him.

Li Xiaofei’s eyes were filled with shock. Not because the man was handsome. But because he recognized him. This was someone who absolutely should not, could not, be here. Yet here he was.

“You look like you’re having trouble believing it.” The black-haired man smiled, a playful glint in his eyes, as if he’d just pulled off a mischievous trick. “Surprised? Thrilled? Haha, I told you, we’d meet again, Hall Master Li. Been well?”

Li Xiaofei took a deep breath, forcibly suppressing the emotions rising within him. Still, he couldn’t stop himself from asking the question.

“Gang Leader Wei... why are you here?”

Yes. Gang Leader Wei. Wei Xiaotian, the leader of the Exploding Star Gang in Chongque City. The man hailed as the most handsome in all of Chongque City. The man who had, time and again, reached out to help Li Xiaofei, who had shielded him from wind and rain and been a trusted ally. Yet now, he stood here at the worst possible time, in the most impossible place.

“Why do you think I’m here?” Wei Xiaotian asked with a gentle smile, answering the question with another.

Li Xiaofei couldn’t respond. But in truth, he had already guessed it. At this time... in this place... and the only human present. Wei Xiaotian’s true identity was now clear beyond doubt.

He was Zero, the mastermind of Eden in the Xiao Kuang Star Region. The real power behind the scenes. The man who had kept Eternal Night so utterly terrified that he died from fear without daring to betray him.

He was a ghostlike figure, ever-present and untouchable. The one who had enabled Eden to hold its ground against the Xiao Kuang Legion for centuries.

“Why is it you?” Li Xiaofei asked, his voice heavy.

He couldn’t accept it. Back in Chongque City, if there had been anyone he was willing to trust, aside from Huang Dinggou, it had been Wei Xiaotian. And yet, now, everything seemed to make sense.

If Wei Xiaotian weren’t Zero, then how could Song Yu have abducted Sikong Xue and the others across countless star systems, only for them to be brought here, to the heart of the Xiao Kuang Star Region?

Perhaps Song Yu hadn’t known Wei Xiaotian’s true identity. But one thing was now certain, she hadn’t acted out of personal motive alone. She had been following orders. Maybe even her obsessive search for the lost Heaven had been at Zero’s command all along. The greatest and most terrifying enemy had been by his side this entire time.

As Li Xiaofei reflected on it all, he realized it was both completely unexpected... and completely logical.

“Fate has a funny way of reuniting old friends,” Wei Xiaotian said with a faint smile. “Don’t you want to meet the real me at last? We’ve spoken so many times before... but every time, you rejected me.”

“Hm?” Li Xiaofei’s heart trembled at those words.

“You’re... Angrus?” he asked, the realization striking him like lightning.

Another mystery unraveled itself. He was also Angrus, the God General who had, again and again, approached him in various disguises, endlessly speaking about right and wrong and trying to indoctrinate him into joining Eden?

“To this day, I still hold the greatest goodwill toward you,” Wei Xiaotian said with a gentle smile. “You are the one I’ve placed my highest hopes in, the one I believe can lead the people of the Holy Garden across the void to the heavenly shores. So don’t reject my kindness. Take that step. You could become the greatest figure this universe has ever known.”

Li Xiaofei shook his head. He didn’t hesitate in the slightest. His voice was calm but resolute, “If any part of you still remembers what we once shared... then return my wife and daughter to me.”

“I’d like to,” Wei Xiaotian said with a smile, turning to gesture at the towering four-eyed Lizardman beside him. “But I’m afraid the esteemed Lord Delta here won’t allow it. He’s prepared to sacrifice everything, including burying his entire legion at Planet Nock’s anchor point, just to take Sikong Xue and the little girl back to the Fallen Zones.”

So this was Delta, a titan of the Reaper faction. A legendary powerhouse, honored by the title Death God’s Eye. He had truly descended, right here, in humanity’s Stargate Base.

Li Xiaofei’s gaze landed on the Lizardman. This was his first time facing a Wisdom Faction Reaper. The creature radiated an overwhelming pressure. Though his body vaguely mirrored a human frame, his massive reptilian head threw the balance into something both chaotic and strangely harmonious.

Li Xiaofei saw it the moment their gazes met. The murderous intent and hostility in his four eyes, especially those two crimson blood-pools, was crystal clear. There was no pretense.

“Alien scum... die.” Li Xiaofei didn’t hesitate.

He drew his sword and struck. The Blood-Drinking Sword, saturated with the blood of countless foes, erupted with the full might of an Emperor’s Weapon. There was nothing left to talk about with a being .