Chapter 377: Inverse world

Chapter 377: Inverse world

Ethan could not understand what he was witnessing.

The humans before him made no sense.

Their movements were awkward yet deliberate, their formations loose yet strangely disciplined. They fought with caution rather than confidence, as if every step forward carried the risk of annihilation. That alone would not have unsettled him. What unsettled him was something far deeper.

"Their fundamentals are inverted," Ethan muttered.

His gaze sharpened as his mind raced. "Do they belong to an entirely different plane of existence? Or did this Eternal Domain has a being powerful enough to design such a species?"

The thought lingered in his mind,it was heavy and uncomfortable.

To know the answers, Ethan focused on their battle patterns again. This time, however, he activated the Eyes of Existence, the sovereign perception he had awakened upon stepping into the Emperor Realm.

Instnantly the world changed in his eyes.

Mountains became frameworks of force. Air transformed into flowing equations. Light fractured into threads of authority. Everything that existed revealed its true nature, a vast architecture of interwoven laws.

Yet the strnage humans did not.

To Ethan’s perception, they were not beings constructed of laws. They appeared as indistinct gray silhouettes, like stains on reality itself. His vision passed through them as though they were incomplete, undefined.

His eyes failed to perceive their governing principles.

That should have been impossible.

Even ants, even dust, possessed laws.

"And yet," Ethan whispered, "you are alive."

Boom.

A normal human from this world launched an attack, his blade wrapped in blazing cosmic energy. Ethan’s attention snapped toward the impact.

The inverse human raised his hand. A translucent barrier flared into existence around him, thin and unremarkable.

The blade struck.

The barrier shattered instantly.

The inverse human staggered back, blood spraying from his chest.

"So you are vulnerable to normal laws," Ethan said softly.

But his curiosity deepened rather than faded.

He noticed something odd. Despite numerous openings, the inverse humans avoided close combat at all costs. They retreated, repositioned, fired techniques from afar, anything to avoid direct physical engagement.

Ethan frowned.

"If that barrier cannot stop energy-based attacks," he murmured, "why keep it active at all?"

He watched several more exchanges, observing carefully.

Then a theory formed in his brain.

To test it, Ethan stooped and picked up a small stone from the ground. He flicked his wrist casually, sending it flying toward one of the inverse warriors. The force behind it was trivial. If his theory was right, the man would die.

Bam.

The stone struck the barrier and stopped.

It did not penetrate. It did not crack it.

Ethan’s pupils contracted.

"So the barrier blocks physical matter," he muttered. "But not law-infused energy."

His gaze hardened. "Why?"

His patience ran out.

He turned toward a normal human nearby and extended his will, reaching directly for the man’s soul. The intrusion was flawless, silent, absolute.

The man did not even shiver.

Five minutes passed.

When Ethan withdrew, his expression had completely changed.

"My suspicions were correct," he said quietly.

These beings were not native to this universe.

They originated from an entirely different plane of existence, one the people of this world referred to as the Inverse World.

Everything about them was reversed.

Their bodies, their cultivation, their interaction with reality itself followed principles diametrically opposed to this universe. When a being or object from this world made physical contact with them, an annihilative reaction occurred. Positive and negative existence collided, erasing equal portions from both sides.

Two equally powerful beings clashing would result in mutual annihilation.

Not injury.

Erasure.

And most terrifying of all, they cultivated through entropy.

Not cosmic energy.

Entropy, the very force this universe sought endlessly to suppress.

Long ago, a spatial rift had appeared. From it emerged a few weak inverse humans. Fragile, cautious, curious. They began absorbing entropy from the world.

At the time, the higher beings of the universe rejoiced.

Entropy was a curse. It drove decay, aging, collapse. To find entities capable of dispersing it seemed like divine salvation.

So they welcomed them.

More rifts appeared.

More inverse beings crossed over.

The world’s entropy dropped steadily. Rivers flowed cleaner. Mountains stabilized. Mortal lifespans stretched unnaturally long. The Infinite System began to stir, preparing to manifest fully.

It seemed like an age of miracles.

Then the truth revealed itself.

The universe had never tolerated imbalance.

Far from the presence of the inverse beings, entropy began to accumulate violently, as if pushed away by an unseen force. Stars burned hotter and faster. Galaxies aged in centuries instead of eons. Entire regions slipped into premature heat death, collapsing into sterile voids, while others tore themselves apart in explosive chaos.

The gradients worsened by the day.

Then time began to falter.

Cause no longer followed effect reliably. Events echoed before they occurred. Processes that depended on entropy’s steady rise lost their direction. The universe’s sense of before and after thinned, stretched, and finally began to tear.

In some regions, history looped endlessly. In others, it shattered completely, leaving paradoxes that reality struggled to repair.

From the universe’s perspective, the inverse beings were never saviors.

They fed by removing entropy, but entropy did not vanish. It was displaced, compressed, forced into distant corners until decay arrived not as a gentle end, but as catastrophe.

Heat death did not retreat.

It accelerated elsewhere, sharpened, weaponized by imbalance.

The universe endured them only briefly.

Not out of hatred.

But because no system could survive something that consumed the very rule holding time, matter, and causality together.

The higher beings demanded the inverse people leave.

But they refused.

And thus, war began.

The inverse beings were vulnerable to all matter and laws of this world. Yet this world was equally vulnerable to their weapons and techniques. Every clash destabilized reality. Every death tilted the balance further.

At first, only their lower classes crossed over.

Then came the elites.

Most terrifying of all, they grew stronger at a horrifying pace after arriving here. What took cultivators of this world millennia, they achieved in years.

Thus began the cycle of eternal war.

Ethan stood frozen as the knowledge settled into him.

These beings were poison to the world.

But the world was a feast to them.

They could be killed. Yet killing them released massive surges of entropy back into the universe, causing new imbalances. In many cases, leaving them alive was less destructive than destroying them.

That was why this war harmed this world more than it harmed the inverse one.

Ethan exhaled slowly.

He had long theorized that a world of opposites might exist. If so, then cosmic energy would be their chaos, and entropy their order.

If beings from this world could enter theirs, perhaps they too could grow powerful.

He was still reasoning through the implications when something unexpected happened.

The Creation Lotus within his body stirred.

No, stirred was insufficient.

It trembled with hunger.

It desired the inverse beings.

"Why are you reacting like this?" Ethan frowned.

Before he could think further, he snapped his fingers.

A portal opened beneath an inverse human. The man vanished instantly, dragged screaming into Ethan’s inner realm.

He landed directly beneath the lotus.

Before the inverse human could react, thick roots erupted outward, piercing his body effortlessly. His essence was drained in a heartbeat, erased without resistance.

Ethan stared in shock.

Then warmth flooded his body.

A gentle, profound energy surged from the lotus, merging seamlessly with his being. The sensation was intoxicating. His breath hitched as pleasure rippled through him, deep and instinctual.

It felt like something missing had finally been restored.

Ethan examined himself immediately.

His perception confirmed it.

One of his cells had evolved.

It now contained five times more energy than the others. But energy was not the most important change.

That cell felt complete.

Perfect.

As if his body, once malnourished, had finally received proper nourishment.

"No way," Ethan whispered. "That inverse world can perfect my existence?"

Before he could process further, the heavens spoke.

[WORLD ANNOUNCEMENT]

[A Nexus Event has been triggered.]

[Aspirant Ethan Hunt has begun evolving into an unknown superior being.]

[Authority Granted: Five percent of the Throne of Destiny.]

The authority merged into his body instantly. Behind him, the illusory throne grew clearer, more real.

Across countless realms, shockwaves rippled.

"Who is this Ethan Hunt?"

"Is he triggering Nexus Events casually now?"

Ancient families stirred. Hidden powers began searching. Because they had seen countess era, countless heroes, countless emperors. But no body gained authorities like this man as if he was collecting water from an ocean.

In a distant realm, that handsome young man smiled.

"An unknown superior being," he murmured. "What an interesting evolution."

He vanished.

In an instant, he appeared before the barrier of reality. Without hesitation, he slashed his hand through space. The barrier split cleanly.

He stepped into the new reality, with smiling face.

He would search a hundred million realities if needed.

He would find Ethan.

If Ethan had seen him, his eyes would have widened in disbelief.

Because according to the rules, this man had strength at least four major realms above his own realm.