# 1135
Chapter 1136: Destruction
In the Chaos fog, An Qingyu's gray eyes squinted slightly.
"Yes, and what if I am? Even if you rack your brains trying to break the situation, in the end, aren't you still trapped within my game?"
Hearing these words, the figure under the maple tree fell silent. The hands clasped behind his back slowly lowered, and glimmers of light flickered from his palms.
He gazed at the future An Qingyu and spoke in a grim voice:
"Do you think that just because we're separated by the river of time, I cannot kill you?"
"Perhaps others couldn't, but for you, Lin Qiye, nothing is impossible... You've always been this way," the future An Qingyu replied calmly.
"Crossing the river of time to strike—it benefits neither of us. I'm not here to fight. I only wish to remind you of something."
"What?" the figure responded evenly.
The future An Qingyu stared at him, each word deliberate:
"The game between us remains unfinished."
With that, those gray-hazed eyes slowly closed. The two figures on opposite ends of time's river regarded each other in silence.
The figure beneath the maple tree narrowed his eyes, deep in contemplation. His gaze drifted toward something in the distance, and after a moment, he let out a cold hum before turning toward the courtyard's depths.
His palm swept outward, and the unknown domain sustaining both rivers of time began to recede and fade. His voice drifted back: "You should find it more convenient to handle the leftover mess here."
As the river of time above Lin Qiye's head dissolved, that figure vanished without a trace. The connection between present and future was severed completely, leaving only endless ash swirling above both him and An Qingyu, settling gently onto their bodies like thin gray shrouds.
With them locked upon the crosses, even the Skyward Bard couldn't be activated. Their figures lay fully exposed to the ash, and in just a few minutes, a fine layer of gray dust had already coated them.
An itching sensation erupted across Lin Qiye's skin, as if something was about to burrow out from his flesh and blood. His eyes had turned blood red.
Lin Qiye knew what would happen when this ash touched them. An Qingyu's hand had merely brushed against a piece of it and already become like that. Considering the vast area of contact Lin Qiye now had with the ash, in a few more minutes, those writhing masses of flesh in the valley would be his fate.
Seeing that the figure who had countered his God's Ruins had departed, the red worms in Uriel's eyes gradually calmed down. Just as He prepared to resume judgment, His body suddenly froze in place.
The second river of time had not vanished along with His God's Ruins being reclaimed.
Misty fog billowed above the second cross. The future An Qingyu stood calmly within the mist, gazing at the dissipating river of time above the first cross. His indifferent eyes held not a trace of emotion.
After a moment, he cast a casual glance at the shattered Six-Winged Seraph below and the madly surging wave of flesh orbs, then lowered his head to pull the black hood forward, concealing his entire face in shadow. He turned and walked into the fog.
In the fading silhouette, he softly raised his right hand and gripped the air.
"Annihilation."
A single syllable rang out from above the cross.
In the next instant, every writhing red worm in Uriel's eyes suddenly froze in place.
Boom—!!
A muffled explosion rang out as the worm bodies composing the eyeball detonated one after another, like firecrackers. Viscous blood splattered out, flowing down Uriel's eye sockets.
With that eyeball gone, Uriel's form went limp, like a puppet with its strings cut. It fell powerlessly into the meteor crater, stirring up billowing sand and dust.
With Uriel's power no longer sustaining them, the crosses behind Lin Qiye and An Qingyu shattered inch by inch. Their bodies plummeted from the sky, crashing down like meteors toward the valley below.
Boom—boom—boom!!
Successive explosions echoed through the valley. Those bloated, distorted flesh orbs also detonated completely. Amid countless agonized screams, a tide of blood rapidly spread through the valley.
The crimson tide expanded rapidly in Lin Qiye's vision. Bearing the itching sensation on his body, he activated the Somersault Cloud and dove to catch the falling An Qingyu. The two of them glided over the blood-soaked, foul-smelling valley and landed on the mountainside at the valley's edge.
The moment their feet touched ground, intense pain erupted from every part of their bodies.
Lin Qiye stumbled and collapsed onto the ground. His skin had turned bright red, and countless red worms frantically burrowed out of his body, falling to the earth below before popping open one after another like firecrackers.
These were all the worms that had drilled into his body along with the ash.
This dense popping sound continued for about half a minute before their skin gradually returned to its normal color. The previous itching sensation had vanished, leaving only a chaotic mess of worm corpses and bloody water flowing down the mountainside.
Once all the worms inside their bodies had died, Lin Qiye took a deep breath and weakly leaned against a massive boulder, slowly sitting down.
By now, the second river of time in the sky had vanished. The figure draped in black robes with the hood had also returned to the other end of time. Lin Qiye gazed at the dead-silent valley before him, an unbidden sense of relief at surviving washed over him.
Ghostly pursuit, angel judgment, and ash infiltrating their bodies from the heavens... If not for those two figures from the future intervening, they would have had almost no chance of survival.
But his confusion in his heart was also unprecedentedly intense.
Why did my future self want to kill me?
What did that conversation between my future self and the future An Qingyu mean?
Lin Qiye turned his head to look at An Qingyu, who was sitting on another massive boulder. She happened to look up at him at the same time. Their gazes met in mid-air, and the air suddenly fell into silence.
After a long while, Lin Qiye spoke first: "Qingyu..."
"I don't know what they were talking about." Before Lin Qiye could ask, An Qingyu shook her head preemptively. "I have no interest in what happens in the future... I only know that I will always be myself."
Lin Qiye froze in place.
After a moment, he helplessly smiled and cast aside the chaotic thoughts in his mind. "Mm."
Those two figures from the future—how far into the future they came from was still unknown. If he were to start doubting his brother based on just a brief conversation, he would be far too suspicious by nature. Regardless of what the future held, Lin Qiye only believed in what he saw now.
"I've more or less recovered. How about you?" An Qingyu walked unsteadily toward Lin Qiye. The blood holes from where worms had burrowed out were already healing at an accelerated rate.
Lin Qiye glanced at the密密麻麻 of blood holes covering his body. Though they hadn't healed, the bleeding had already stopped. He slowly stood up.
"I'm fine... Saving the others takes priority."