# 1131
Chapter 1132: The Back
After sprinting without pause, Lin Qiye and An Qingyu quickly reached the summit.
The moment they set foot on the peak, a massive circular meteorite crater appeared before them. Countless cracks spread outward from the crater's rim, connecting to the surface of the mountain beneath their feet, as if an earth-shattering battle had once taken place at the center of this crater.
"What's that?"
An Qingyu's gaze fell upon the center of the meteorite crater, where a massive shadow stood. All the cracks on the mountain had spread outward from beneath it.
Upon seeing that gaze, Lin Qiye frowned, his expression somewhat puzzled.
He hesitated for a moment, then closed his eyes again to carefully sense, speaking with疑惑, "Strange... Why can't my spiritual perception detect the existence of that thing?"
An Qingyu pushed up his glasses, squinting hard as he tried to make out the shape of that shadow. In the faint distance, he could see the outline of six white feathered wings, drooping low against the earth's surface, hands seemingly gripping a massive sword thrust into the mountain.
"Six white wings, hands gripping a great sword?" Hearing An Qingyu's description, Lin Qiye froze, and an image quickly emerged in his mind of Michael, "A Seraph... is it Michael?"
Could it be that after Michael finished hunting Odin and returned, saw the message Lin Qiye left in Heaven, and came down to Hell to find them?
The moment this thought appeared in Lin Qiye's mind, he rejected it outright.
Impossible.
If Michael had seen the current state of Hell, He would never just sit quietly at the center of the meteorite crater. He would have soared into the clouds to seal the gap continuously shedding ash, then slaughtered every demon and vengeful spirit within Heaven and Hell.
Whatever sat at the center of that crater, it was definitely not Michael.
"Don't go near it." Lin Qiye spoke solemnly. "We'll go around the outside of the crater. Don't make contact with it."
An Qingyu nodded, and the two figures, cloaked in deep crimson, quickly moved along the edge of the summit's crater.
Though this mountain wasn't tall, the area at its peak seemed far larger than either of them had imagined. They ran along the crater's edge for nearly a minute and still hadn't reached the other side of the mountain. Conversely, the figure sitting at the center grew increasingly clear in their field of vision.
Its front faced the other side of the crater, so from Lin Qiye and An Qingyu's vantage point, they could only see a back view.
Just as An Qingyu had described, it was a massive figure with six pristine white wings on its back, gripping a great sword. From behind, it was nearly identical to Michael.
But the difference was that its wings were covered in bloodstains, feathers falling away, as if someone had torn several gashes through them. The great sword thrust into the earth had a shape even more exaggerated than Michael's, and its blade was likewise stained with blood everywhere.
"Something's wrong!"
An Qingyu immediately stopped in his tracks, his expression grave as he surveyed their surroundings. "Before climbing the mountain, I scanned this peak's structure. It absolutely shouldn't be this large. At our speed, we should have crossed this mountain long ago."
"Ever since we stepped into this crater, my spiritual perception seems to have failed." Lin Qiye also frowned. "I can't perceive the figure at the crater's center, nor can I perceive our movement... There's something in this place interfering with my 【Mortal Divine Realm】."
"There's one more thing. Have you noticed?"
"What?"
An Qingyu extended his hand, pointing at the figure at the crater's center, his expression grim.
"No matter how we run, from what angle we look... He... is always facing away from us."
Lin Qiye's eyes narrowed. A memory suddenly surfaced in his mind—the back view they'd seen the moment they first set foot on the mountain. Though he'd been too far away to distinguish whether the figure faced forward or back, during their entire time of movement, that silhouette hadn't turned even slightly, hadn't revealed so much as a profile.
"It's Him. He's rewriting time and space!"
Lin Qiye's mind raced. He grit his teeth and summoned the 【Somersault Cloud】 once more, placing both of them atop it.
At this point, there was no need to worry about being spotted by demons if they flew into the sky. Although the figure seated at the crater's center hadn't moved at all up to now, his instincts told him that presence was far more terrifying than dozens, even hundreds, of demons combined!
They absolutely could not remain here any longer.
The 【Somersault Cloud】 carried their forms swiftly across the sky. An Qingyu stood at the cloud's trailing edge, watching that mountain peak gradually recede. A suspended heart finally began to ease.
Fortunately, nothing unusual had occurred.
After An Qingyu let out a long breath, as if remembering something, he grasped the frozen severed arm at his waist, encased in frost, and examined it carefully.
"You brought that thing out?" Lin Qiye, piloting the Somersault Cloud, caught sight of this from the corner of his eye, eyebrows rising.
"Mm." An Qingyu nodded, curiosity gleaming in his eyes. "This severed arm I cut off has already been contaminated and eroded by the Cthulhu essence within the ash, becoming part of a Cthulhu Faction deity's power. This might be the first Cthulhu pantheon specimen obtained by humanity to date, possessing extremely high research value."
"You want to dissect it? Isn't that too risky?"
"Perhaps. But only by understanding them better can we uncover their weaknesses... Honestly, in this aspect, perhaps only I can accomplish this in the world." An Qingyu spoke calmly. "And I'll take protective measures. The residual power within this arm alone could hardly harm me."
Seeing this, Lin Qiye didn't press further, merely nodding.
In the realm of dissection and analysis, An Qingyu was undisputedly the strongest in the world. This was the prodigy who had even deciphered Heavenly Court's spiritual energy. Perhaps he truly could unravel the weaknesses of the Cthulhu pantheon.
Lin Qiye opened his mouth, about to say something more, when his body suddenly froze atop the cloud.
After a dazed moment, his expression visibly paled.
"What's wrong?" An Qingyu, sensing Lin Qiye's abnormality, immediately asked.
"This isn't right..." Lin Qiye, steering the Somersault Cloud, murmured to himself. "Why is my spiritual perception still unchanged?"
"What do you mean? Is 【Mortal Divine Realm】 still failing?"
"I don't know, but when I extended my spiritual sense outward, what I received was still the scene of us inside the crater..." Lin Qiye glanced at the sky above, his voice slightly hoarse. "Moreover, don't you find it strange... We've been flying for so long, yet no demons have appeared..."
An Qingyu's pupils constricted sharply!
Almost simultaneously, the spacetime around them warped eerily, as if an invisible giant hand had seized their bodies, dragging them forcibly back into the past. Everything around them rapidly reversed!
In the span of a breath, the sky before their eyes vanished entirely, replaced by that familiar meteorite crater covered in cracks. And now, less than fifty meters separated them from that figure at the crater's center, its back still turned, six pristine white wings silhouetted against the ash.
In the dead-silent sky, ash fell like a blizzard.
Under their watchful gaze, the figure that had always faced away from them trembled slightly, shaking off the ash coating its form. Its waist began to turn, as if it was about to face them!