Chapter 197: Remembered the Birth of the New God.

Chapter 197 Remembering the Birth of a New God

The Serene Sea Princess was both the leader of the cult and the Pope serving the Mother of the Tides, as well as the only follower in Her service who understood language and could communicate with intelligent life.

In the past, when maritime faith flourished, She would sometimes respond to prayers on behalf of the Mother Goddess, protecting shipwreck survivors and guiding vessels safely through storms—this is how "Serene Sea" became part of Her title.

However, Her blessings were not born from mercy or any other benevolent sentiment—

They were solely for spreading the faith of the Mother Goddess.

Those fortunate sailors who survived would often go mad or mutate... Severe Divine Pollution would scour their souls, twisting their emotions, thoughts, and personalities until they became utterly mindless fanatics.

For the rest of their lives, these fanatics would stop at nothing to conduct dangerous rituals, until they succeeded in summoning the Princess upon a calm, still sea, turning their world into the domain of the Mother of the Tides.

In the previous timeline, Yi Fengchu first encountered this divine being during a fanatical sacrificial ritual.

It was a B+ level instance called *The Call of the Deep Sea*.

The instance took place in a human fishing village in a small world, where every fisherman was a fervent believer in the Mother of the Tides and Her followers. The players were given the role of sacrificial offerings lured to the coastline by the fanatics, and their task was to escape the ritual.

At the time, Yi Fengchu was only a fourth-tier Ability user with limited offensive capabilities.

By the end of the instance, he and the other players had failed to defeat the insane fanatics. They were all bound and dragged onto the deck of a ship, where a blood-drawn ritual circle emitted a waxen fragrance mingled with the coppery stench of blood—a sacrificial altar meticulously prepared by the fanatics.

The looming moon resembled a ghastly eye, and the sacrificial knife glinted coldly as it cleanly lopped off the heads of the players one by one.

The only "luck" Yi Fengchu had was that he was last in line.

When it was his turn, Yi Fengchu "saw" the trajectory of the descending blade in advance. With a frantic effort, he raised his bound wrists to meet the edge, successfully breaking free.

Under the shocked gaze of the sacrificer, Yi Fengchu gripped the blade barehanded, using his knuckles and flesh to jam the knife, then—with humanity’s most primitive tool, his teeth—bit through the sacrificer’s throat.

Warm blood sprayed across his face. Yi Fengchu released his blood-slicked hand, and with a clang, the blade fell to the ground as the sacrificer collapsed backward.

Despite this brief interruption, the sacrificial ritual had succeeded.

The ritual required seven sacrifices—the sacrificer’s death made the seventh.

Thus, the roaring sea winds abruptly stilled, leaving only the ever-louder roar of the tides. Wave after wave surged, lifting the ship high into the sky, bringing it dangerously close to the full moon.

Yi Fengchu’s right hand hung limply at his side, twitching spasmodically—the blade must have severed his tendons, leaving him unable to control it for a time, effectively reducing his mobility by half.

Habitually ignoring the pain, he coolly analyzed his predicament:

If the fanatics decided to kill him in retaliation now, his chances of survival were virtually nonexistent.

But fortunately, Yi Fengchu had always been lucky. What he feared didn't happen.

At this moment, none of the fanatics cared about the sacrificer who had been killed by the offering.

Even if that person had been their comrade—or even a leader of high status—his life had to yield to the descent of the great deity. Becoming the final stepping stone for the Princess’ arrival was his supreme honor.

Seeing the ritual truly completed, the fanatics threw themselves prostrate, rapturously chanting the title of the divine firstborn.

"Firstborn of the Sacred Line! Pearl of the Calm Sea! Princess Who Commands Wind and Waves!..."

Their cries merged with the roaring sea, almost deafening, while a crushing presence of a superior pressed down, making Yi Fengchu’s hair stand on end. His primal instincts screamed warnings, the sensation spreading from his back to his entire body.

It felt as though an immense weight pressed on his spine, mountainous in weight, forcing him to kneel—to submit like every other insignificant mortal, humbly welcoming the arrival of the divine being.

Yet, in the end, Yi Fengchu did not kneel.

He raised his head, staring intently at the teleportation countdown on his System Panel, silently counting down in his head.

10, 9, 8...

The sacrificer’s blood had also splashed into his eyes, dyeing everything in his vision crimson—the crimson moon, the crimson waves, and the crimson numbers.

The red countdown pulsed like a struggling, beating heart, determining whether Yi Fengchu would step into life or death.

He knew one fact with absolute clarity:

If the divine being truly descended, no living creature present would survive... including those exhilarated fanatics.

The best outcome was death. The worst was mutating into a monster like his neighbor—covered in soft, rotting fish scales—forever enslaved by the divine being.

The moment the countdown hit "0," Yi Fengchu caught a distant glimpse of the Serene Sea Princess rising from the sea.

She was like glass, like a pearl, like seawater—

She was an existence beyond human comprehension.

That single glance nearly melted Yi Fengchu’s brain, as if it were turning to seawater, merging with the ocean—an impression that seared itself into his memory.

He never denied that he, too, had felt that primal, genetic fear.

But it was precisely this profound emotion that drove him deeper and deeper into the mysteries of this world...

If he couldn’t escape fear as a human, then he would become fear itself.

Snapping back to the present, Yi Fengchu pulled himself from the distant memory, studying the divine being before him with a strange sense of familiarity.

Hah, in a way, this could be considered an old "acquaintance"...

And as Yi Fengchu gazed at the Serene Sea Princess, She, too, turned Her attention to this walking skeleton.

The skeleton gave Her a contradictory, peculiar impression.

The fluctuations of power around him were nearly nonexistent, and the flesh on his face could not withstand the corrosive seawater, rapidly dissolving into dark pink fluid. Blood trickled down his pale bones, making him seem like nothing more than an ordinary, horribly mutilated human corpse.

Yet, as far as the Serene Sea Princess knew, fragile humans could not possibly continue moving in such a skeletal state. And besides...

The gilded serpent's eyes in the skeleton’s sockets gave Her an inexplicable sense of intimidation.

Those slit pupils, like cracks into oblivion, resembled black holes in the universe, devouring all light and energy.

Before these eyes, the Serene Sea Princess felt like an insignificant celestial body, captured by the immense gravity of the other, Her very consciousness dissolving, being drawn through that dark fissure into the unknown.

Moreover, She felt an indescribable... familiarity.

Yes, familiarity.

As if She had once encountered the mysterious existence now inhabiting this skeleton.

"..."

Finding no answers in Her thoughts, the Serene Sea Princess shifted Her focus, no longer probing the eerie snake eyes in the skeleton’s sockets. Instead, She chose to test the waters with a harmless, friendly demeanor—unless absolutely necessary, She had no desire to provoke conflict with an unknown entity in Her current vulnerable position.

From within Her glistening, gelatinous form, soft undulations of sound flowed forth, accompanied by the lulling cadence of the waves:

"In this world, you are the second life to stand before me."

Yi Fengchu casually asked, "The first one was Wend?"

"Seems so, that name," the Serene Sea Princess replied, "He was the only one who could sense me, so I called out to him in my dreams, promising him immense power, long life, and endless treasures from the depths of the sea."

"I waited for a year, but he never agreed... It was just a difference of one year, which meant nothing to me."

To the Serene Sea Princess, His arrival was inevitable; the brief human delay was meaningless and incomprehensible.

Yi Fengchu laughed, but the face of this body had already melted, or he would have smiled.

He said, "A year or a moment, it makes no difference to you; but to humans—it does."

The Serene Sea Princess noticed the subtle attitude the skeleton had toward humans and immediately followed up, "Humans are indeed fascinating creatures."

"Their numbers surpass the stars in the sky, their resilience rivals that of ants underground. They seem to have harbored ideals of conquering nature and exploring the oceans since ancient times... Though small, they are worth paying attention to."

"Is that so?" Yi Fengchu asked with a neutral tone, then suddenly continued without waiting for a response, "Perhaps your memory has been 'corrected,' but in fact, we have met before."

"—Before I initiated this cycle of rebirth."

The Serene Sea Princess fell silent, but the flow of the gel-like liquid quickened, revealing her agitated thoughts.

"…Cycle of rebirth?" She slowly repeated.

As Yi Fengchu revealed this truth, it was as if a veil over the Serene Sea Princess's consciousness had been torn, and an invisible restraint began to waver.

Memories from a timeline that should no longer exist came flooding back.

... No wonder.

No wonder that as the Mother Goddess gradually weakened, the Serene Sea Princess often felt a sense of dislocation—

She always felt that things should not have developed this way.

She always felt that the Mother Goddess should forever reign over the ocean, the Holy Tide Sons should forever flourish and grow strong, and She should forever serve at the Mother Goddess's side, basking in endless glory.

It turned out that it was not Her illusion or delusion... but the reality of the previous timeline.

Such a beautiful reality, however, faded away like an illusory shadow, irretrievably distant from Her.

The Serene Sea Princess recalled the birth of the new deity.

At that time, the Mother Goddess was eroding a small world in the third dimension, and the Serene Sea Princess stood by Her mother’s side, watching as Her kin transformed the entire world into a breeding nest, proliferating within human bodies, growing ceaselessly.

But just then, the terrifying serpent lair descended.

Serpents spread wildly, countless fierce gilded serpent eyes struck fear into all living things, and their gaping maws revealed gleaming fangs—He seemed to be roaring, raving, and wailing.

The serpent almost forcibly drove away the Mother of Tides, nearly devouring half of the Mother Goddess’s body; but as a consequence, He also lost one of His serpent eyes.

For the Serene Sea Princess, that divine battle was a nightmare.

It marked the beginning of the Mother Goddess’s decline and became an indelible shadow for all the oceanic devotees.

This shadow was so profound that even after the timeline shift, the Serene Sea Princess would still feel an instinctive fear the moment she saw those serpent eyes.

"Why..."

The sound waves emitted by the Serene Sea Princess were particularly sharp, like countless knives scraping against the walls of the cabin, leaving deep scratches.

"Why am I back in this world again?!"