“Remember. We are ‘still’ very much insufficient.”
Lin Miao hoped that Elise and his other vassals would clearly grasp his will, especially now that they could understand a portion of his speech.
He was well aware that his situation was extremely precarious, hanging by a thread.
He was the error that the system itself tried to reject—an anomaly that no one could explain.
Thus, for his own life, for the home he relied on for survival, and for the Great Devourer colony he had to carefully protect, Lin Miao kept this fact at the forefront of his mind.
“Wars with Outer Gods are common, and it is not unheard of for a faction to be destroyed by one. While the total downfall of a high-tier deity and their entire organization is rare... it is not entirely impossible.”
Lin Miao had carefully scoured the Divine Net forum to get a sense of the general landscape. Although he knew little about the Divine Net, he possessed keen observation skills.
After observing for a while and interjecting at the right moments, he naturally blended into the discussions among the gods, gathering the answers he sought. Based on this information, he reached a final conclusion: learning how to “pick a side” was crucial.
“It was a complete miracle that we were able to defeat the Goddess of Light Association, a higher civilization far more powerful and developed than our own. At every stage of the victory, there was a single winning condition, and each one just happened to be met.”
Lin Miao had been mistaken for an Outer God from the very beginning. Hestia, who had been exiled from the Terra competitive zone, had leaked information about her Pioneering Zone on the Divine Net—a network that Outer Gods were supposedly unable to use.
Because of this, they had seized the Stargate and its coordinates, allowing them to easily and rapidly invade a Pioneering Zone. By the time the shocked deities began verifying the Stargate coordinates, Lin Miao and his vassals had already mastered Stargate technology.
They used that technology to launch a surprise attack on Hestia's territory, seizing the resources and knowledge they needed. In the process, they crushed the etheric civilization mercenaries Hestia had hired and eventually gained a foothold in space technology.
With that space tech, they struck first in the disputed territory, successfully instigating a conflict between two different gods. This cut off support from all sides, leaving Hestia's allies unable to intervene.
By then, the Great Devourer colony had already consumed several planets, growing into a force so powerful that the Goddess of Light Association could no longer stand against it alone.
Could this process be replicated now? Absolutely not.
Misunderstandings, illusions, luck, decisive judgment, and their own strength—their victory was the result of all these factors stacking together.
Lin Miao and Elise reached the same conclusion through their simulations. Elise, in particular, always sought to eliminate as many probabilistic variables as possible from her deductions to ensure precise judgment.
“The world is still vast, and the deities of the Divine Net remain powerful. Think back, Elise, to how you felt when you first saw the ocean or looked up at the stars.”
“The world...”
“The world is immense. It was because of this scale that we were able to strike before the Goddess could gather enough prestige and support. But because the world is so vast, we could also easily be crushed by it, leading to our total destruction.”
Lin Miao looked up at the sky, then down at Elise, who was listening with a pious expression, carefully weighing his words.
Across the entire Divine Net, high-tier deities were still numerous. Even if Hestia vanished, they would only be slightly surprised; they would never think their own order was on the verge of collapse.
War had always been the norm. Just as new civilizations and gods were born in the universe every moment, falls and disappearances were equally commonplace.
“Our defeat of the Goddess is within the acceptable limits of the other gods. But if we were to reveal the truth—that we are performing cruel modifications and experiments on a deity—there is no telling how they would react.”
The deities of the Divine Net strictly adhered to order, rules, and established customs. Unlike the original intent of the Primordial System, they had now even integrated the war against Outer Gods into the framework of their Order.
This meant they would be extremely wary of any existence that broke the established order. They would label any anomaly appearing after the Outer Gods as a top-priority target for elimination, stopping at nothing to wipe it out.
“As expected of your greatness, your teachings are profound.”
The first to grasp and agree with Lin Miao's point was Celia. Her face was filled with emotion as she stood up from her seat. After all, Celia never cared about Hestia's ultimate fate.
“Since they only see us as an ordinary foreign colony, we have no need to overstep that boundary and invite unnecessary risk.”
“...The judgment is sound.”
Elise offered a thin smile and nodded in agreement with Celia. Even as her self-awareness grew, her essence remained that of the Queen of the hive mind.
She was never stubborn when it came to choosing a more efficient or advantageous plan. Moreover, Lin Miao had issued a clear warning.
The punishment marks left by the electric shocks on her body were deeply engraved in the depths of Elise's consciousness. During the days in the terrarium, Lin Miao had been the entire world to her—an absolute powerhouse who could crush her body with a single thought.
“But the Goddess's resistance remains fierce. I fear we can only discuss the subsequent treatment once she has completely submitted.”
Begrun spoke up softly at that moment. As he said, Hestia refused to surrender. She claimed that even if she fell and her vassals were wiped out, she would never stop fighting. She was still putting up a desperate struggle.
Even though Hestia's power continued to wane, the pressure of her Transcendent Divine Status was still difficult for the vassals to bear. Furthermore, if they slaughtered all her vassals just to neutralize that divine status, the original goal of forcing her surrender would be lost.
“Those diehard believers who are willing to die for their faith... aside from forcing the Goddess to surrender or killing her, there is likely no way to persuade them to give up, is there?”
Yuno mentioned the members of the order who were ready to become martyrs. If it were just Hestia being stubborn, it would be manageable. But the forces of the order scattered across various planets were mostly diehard loyalists who would die for their Goddess.
This task, left to the Great Devourer, was extremely difficult. Any other deity would typically choose to purge these loyalists entirely, regardless of their numbers.
“Make them all fall asleep.”
“...Pardon?”
But the Great Devourer, a race that had never before existed in the history of the universe, might just be able to do it. Since their birth, they had been an existence full of unknown variables, impossible to measure by common sense or established laws, always walking a difficult and uncharted path.
This meant they had the potential to pioneer a better, more efficient method of disposal. Elise's words, “Make everyone fall asleep,” left every consciousness connected to the hive mind speechless.
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