Hulala~~
With a thought, Gu Chuan released his Divine Sense. It swept outward like a silent tide, blanketing tens of millions of kilometers. The void itself seemed to bend beneath its weight, every ripple of chaos reflected within his sea of consciousness like light in a mirror.
Ever since comprehending the Tao Te Ching, his mind had expanded. The verses of Dao were no longer abstract lines on a page but living truths carved into his soul. Divine Sense was no longer merely a probing perception—it was the extension of Dao itself, and through it, he touched the breath of existence.
The void whispered back.
And then—he froze.
Far away, scattered across the gray tides, countless auras surged like stars igniting. Shapes loomed: massive crocodile-like demon gods, each hundreds of thousands of kilometers long, their bodies jagged and armored, jaws yawning wide. They came on in a tide, hundreds strong. From a distance it looked like a swarm of worlds crashing toward him.
The killing intent struck first—vast, brutal, animalistic.
"…Hundreds?" Gu Chuan's serpent eyes narrowed. "How can there be so many?"
The records of later generations said only three thousand Chaos Demon Gods had ever existed. And yet here, in this moment, hundreds bore down on him at once, every one of them radiating the raw hunger of newborn predators.
His thoughts sharpened. So the myths were wrong. It wasn't three thousand at the beginning—it was countless. Hundreds of millions perhaps. Only three thousand survived long enough to be remembered.
The truth crystallized. The chaos was a crucible. Demon gods were born weak, mere beasts of instinct. They killed and devoured, and only those who fed on their brethren endured. Just as Gu worms devour one another until only the king remains, so too did chaos breed its kings in blood.
A slow, cold light flickered in Gu Chuan's eyes. "So that's it… survival of the strongest. The rest erased from history."
The crocodile demons roared, their gaping maws leaking mist, their combined aura enough to shake the void. To them, his ancient serpent body was not an equal but a prize—a feast whose flesh promised transcendence.
Gu Chuan's coils tightened. If they wish to devour me, then let them be the ones devoured.
His aura vanished.
In an instant, his titanic body dissolved into the mist, his presence melting seamlessly into chaos itself. The crocodile demons surged forward but froze, bewildered. Such a colossal form—gone? Their primitive minds struggled to understand.
Then the void rippled.
Boom—!
Gu Chuan erupted from the mist, his body unfolding like a living wall of gold. His eyes blazed, and his tail lashed with the force of an executioner's blade.
The first strike split the tides of chaos. Winds howled, currents shattered, and dozens of crocodile demons were crushed in an instant, their bodies bursting apart in showers of flesh and blood.
The survivors howled, their roars mixing confusion with fear. They lunged wildly, snapping and thrashing, but Gu Chuan had already vanished again. The serpent of chaos was everywhere and nowhere—appearing behind them, above them, coiling through the gray like a phantom predator.
Each movement was devastating. His body cut through the swarm like a scythe through grass, scattering their massive forms as if they were brittle clay.
Within moments, the void stank of blood. Chunks of demon flesh drifted, glowing with an intoxicating fragrance—raw chaos essence condensed into meat.
Gu Chuan's serpent tongue flickered. His blood stirred with hunger.
He opened his mouth wide.
One gulp, and an entire crocodile demon vanished into his furnace stomach. Another bite, and chaos itself seemed to shudder as he swallowed their bodies whole.
It was supposed to be foul, metallic, rotten. Instead, it was rich—sweet, fresh, like divine sashimi. His blood surged, scales shone brighter, and his body demanded more.
And so he devoured.
One after another, the crocodile demons fell, torn apart by coils and fangs, consumed by the primordial furnace within his belly. For seven days and seven nights the feast continued, their roars dwindling to silence until nothing remained.
Not a drop of blood.
Only Gu Chuan, coils stretching endlessly across the void.
Then it hit him.
Boom~~
A furnace of dark gold roared to life in his core, refining the flesh and blood of hundreds of demon gods. Chaos energy surged through his limbs like a tidal wave. His scales hardened, glowing like forged armor. His body swelled, stretching further, growing until he spanned four million kilometers—twice his former length, long enough to circle Earth a hundred times.
His soul blazed with equal force, nearly condensing into liquid, every thought sharpened to a blade.
And deeper still—within the marrow of the flesh he had devoured—lay fragments. Threads of law.
Wind.
Fire.
Darkness.
Light.
Fog.
Killing.
They pulsed in his consciousness, alien truths branded into his being, knowledge that would take mortals millions of years to comprehend. Here, he acquired them by eating.
"This…" His serpent eyes narrowed, awe and calculation mixing. "The laws themselves."
For most, cultivation meant endless meditation, bitter struggle for insight into a single strand of Dao. But in chaos, the simplest path was also the cruelest: kill, devour, inherit.
No wonder the three thousand who survived were monsters.
He flexed his coils, feeling power surge unchecked. Already he teetered at the peak of the Earth Immortal realm, only a step away from Celestial Immortal. The growth was intoxicating—yet also dangerous. If power rises too quickly, control slips. Strength without mastery is just brute force.
He thought of Pangu. The strongest of them all. Born not only with monstrous strength, but with treasures beyond compare—the Chaos Green Lotus, the Jade Plate of Good Fortune, the Sky-Opening Axe. With such weapons, he had slaughtered every rival.
A wry chill flickered through Gu Chuan's heart. "Born favored by Dao itself. And I? I awakened with nothing."
But the coldness quickly hardened into resolve. His coils rippled like thunder.
"Then I will seek them." His voice rumbled across the void. "Chaos is infinite. Its treasures are masterless. If Pangu was born with them, I will carve mine from blood and time."
His golden eyes gleamed, sharp as blades.
The serpent stirred, vanishing back into the gray tides. Somewhere in the endless void, the first treasure of chaos awaited.