The Wicked System: Path of the Devourer Chapter 10 Godfather Awakens

Dawn seemed to break earlier in the mountains. By the time the sky began to bleed the pale white of a fish's belly, lone figures could already be faintly seen walking along the dirt roads.

Some of the more diligent villagers were even out harvesting their fields long before sunrise. Their goal was to rush to the town's morning market the very second the sun breached the horizon, with those further away even sprinting to the municipal farmers’ markets in the city to sell their fresh produce.

"I-Is... is he going to be alright?" Qin Lan had changed into a fresh set of clothes—a pair of modest long sleeves and long trousers. She looked more than a little unsettled.

A-Gou was still unconscious, but Zhang Wenbin had already dragged him entirely out of Qin Lan's courtyard and tossed him outside. To be absolutely certain, he had dealt the thug an additional, precise strike to ensure the bastard would continue sleeping soundly for quite a while longer.

Having finished dressing himself as well, Zhang Wenbin chuckled securely. "Don't worry about it, Sister-in-law. When he wakes up, he'll just act like absolutely nothing happened and assume he simply drank himself into a stupor. However... I absolutely guarantee you that the next time we decide to 'deal' with him, he won't be letting us off so easily."

"Mm." Qin Lan nodded ever so slightly. Perhaps it was only in this incredibly specific moment that this remarkably gentle, invariably kind-hearted beautiful widow successfully managed to reveal a trace of genuinely savage hatred.

Looking at her flushed, devastatingly coquettish expression, Zhang Wenbin genuinely wanted to seize the opportunity to take a bit more advantage of her. Unfortunately, the dilapidated rural shuttle bus was already visibly rumbling its way up the mountain road.

There were quite a few people boarding the bus to sell vegetables and eggs at the early market. Whether she was suddenly reminded of yesterday's chaotic experience or not, the moment she boarded, Qin Lan's face burned a violent crimson, and she deliberately squeezed herself into a seat directly next to an incredibly plump, massive, middle-aged auntie.

Acutely aware that they were surrounded by far too many prying eyes, Zhang Wenbin completely reigned in his wicked, lecherous impulses. He quietly found an empty seat near the front of the bus.

The moment he closed his eyes, he suddenly felt his entire sense of physical equilibrium vanish. It felt exactly as if he had forcefully plummeted into a vast body of water. Terrified, Zhang Wenbin frantically thrashed his limbs to swim, only to be incredibly shocked to discover that he could effortlessly breathe within this pitch-black, abyssal water.

"Son!"

Suddenly, an incredibly sinister, cackling laughter echoed from the complete darkness. Zhang Wenbin subconsciously spun around, instantly paralyzed by such profound terror that his legs entirely gave out, sending him crashing onto his rear.

He was staring directly at a truly gargantuan, utterly mountainous skull materializing right before his very eyes. The thoroughly fleshless, bloodless visage was horrifyingly bizarre. It was visibly blurry, yet it distinctly appeared to be smiling directly at him. It was the kind of smile that made every single hair on his body stand on end and sent violent shivers of cold terror straight down his spine.

"A-Are... are you the System?!" Zhang Wenbin instantly realized that wherever he currently was, this was absolutely not the real world.

"You insolent little brat, you should be calling me Godfather."

A blinding flash of white light violently assaulted him. Zhang Wenbin felt an absolute torrent of information forcefully driven into his brain. In less than a second, he perfectly understood exactly what had transpired.

The ring had been forged directly from the skull bone of an Ancient Heavenly Demon, and inherently contained a fragment of the Great Demon’s divine soul. Over aeons, it had magnetically attracted countless numbers of deeply aggrieved, fiercely resentful wandering ghosts and wild spirits, alongside a myriad of highly malevolent spirits and wicked demons.

When the wild temple collapsed, Zhang Wenbin's blood had successfully awakened The Wicked System. Simultaneously, it had also awakened the Ancient Heavenly Demon, alongside the collective self-awareness of the countless, heaven-defying resentful souls.

All three entities were incredibly arrogant and viciously rebellious. Thus far, they had been locked in a ceaseless, brutal war without a clear victor. However, as they continuously devoured and cannibalized one another, they were gradually forcibly merging into a single, cohesive entity. The System had finally developed its own sapient consciousness—which manifested as the astonishingly bizarre, gargantuan skull currently floating directly before him.

The colossal skull cackled with a clack-clack sound. "If I, your father, hadn't violently suppressed it, you would have been entirely played to death by that astronomically retarded original System!"

"It... it wouldn't be that bad, right?!" Zhang Wenbin was sweating profusely. I literally just became the 'Chosen One' yesterday, and I was almost played to death?! What kind of absolute bullshit is that?!

"Not that bad?! My sweet son, you are far too incredibly naive. That absolutely retarded System only managed to spawn as a direct result of the Great Demon and the evil souls violently tearing each other apart. It was fundamentally highly unstable. The so-called 'Tasks' it issued were utter, chaotic nonsense."

"Think very carefully about it. Do you understand exactly what it meant when it deliberately referred to you as its 'Host'?"

"It... it’s a parasite?!" Zhang Wenbin's expression violently drastically changed as he immediately connected the dots.

"Exactly. If you, the 'Host', died... it wouldn't affect the original System in the absolute slightest! It could effortlessly discard you and immediately seek out its next target. Now that the physical suppression of the wild temple was completely obliterated, it had absolutely no fear of failing to find a viable replacement. Strictly speaking, because that nascent version of the System was so newly birthed and horrifically unstable... you were nothing more than its very first lab rat."

So I was a fucking guinea pig?! Zhang Wenbin aggressively wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. "Then... what about you? Exactly who are you?!"

"Me? Cackle, cackle... I am the new, fully evolved Wicked System! Furthermore, I am also your very own Godfather! Why the hell else do you think I exhausted so much divine energy forcing a violent, cannibalistic stalemate just to deliberately preserve your pathetic little life?"

"Since you're so incredibly curious... allow me to fully satisfy it!"

A brilliant beam of light shot forth from the very center of the skull's forehead. Slithering forward slowly, exactly like a spectral tentacle, it approached him. Zhang Wenbin was biologically terrified, but he aggressively gritted his teeth and allowed the tentacle to plunge directly into his forehead.

The System, the Great Demon, and the Resentful Souls. A devastatingly brutal, three-way war.

Amidst the intensely violent mutual slaughter and non-stop cannibalization, they slowly merged into a single entity. The original System inherently lacked any actual consciousness. The Ancient Heavenly Demon possessed a divine soul, but its sentience had long since degraded into madness. Consequently, within the new amalgamation... the collective self-awareness of the tens of thousands of deeply resentful souls forcefully seized absolute dominance.

Those who committed horrific atrocities rarely met peaceful ends; nine times out of ten, their bloodlines were utterly severed, leaving them entirely without descendants. These incredibly resentful souls had aimlessly drifted through the cosmos for centuries, their consciousness heavily blurred by the aeons of brutal suppression. Yet, upon awakening, they biologically, instinctively recognized Zhang Wenbin as their only literal son.

Driven by an explosive, unimaginably fierce surge of paternal protectiveness, their collective will violently overthrew and brutally crushed both the original System and the Ancient Demon.

Zhang Wenbin's heart suddenly spiked with intense, unexpected warmth. His biological parents had died tragically in an accident when he was very young. He had never expected to once again experience the profoundly warm sensation of being desperately protected from such a bizarre, horrifying monstrosity.

The only slight complication was... calculating the exact math behind this, didn't this imply he possessed tens of thousands of extremely violent, dead Godfathers?! An entire legion of profound resentment...

"My good son... I will meticulously decipher the internal rules and gradually funnel greater rewards your way. Whenever you truly require assistance, your Godfather will personally manifest to aid you."

Whether it was from directly physically tearing the old System to shreds, or from the sheer exhaustion of actively devouring the Ancient Heavenly Demon, the Godfather System sounded heavily fatigued. This highly expressive, exhausted tone of voice instantly made it feel like a living, breathing entity of flesh and blood.

"Get up! We're here!"

A loud voice abruptly shattered his consciousness. Zhang Wenbin instantly shivered violently, his eyes flying open as he found himself completely drenched in cold sweat. "I... I'm fine. I just slept a little too deeply."

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