However, the creation of living beings was far more difficult than creating the myriad Daos of a universe.
The myriad Daos of a universe could all be derived from the evolution of his Primordial Chaos Great Dao, but creating living beings meant creating souls, which contained endless profound mysteries.
Fundamentally, the living beings within the inner worlds of other powerhouses were all beings that had entered from the outside world, not created by the inner world itself.
The profound mystery of the soul involved the True Spirit, unfathomably deep.
Ye Chen was capable of creating some living beings, but wanting to create truly powerful innate beings, such as Chaos Saint Spirits or Innate Chaos Fiendgods, was impossible—it involved another, higher level.
The Chaos Sea was the boundless land formed when Pangu split the singularity and created heaven and earth.
The Innate Chaos Fiendgods were born from the blood shed by Pangu.
The Creation Great Dao of the Pangu Universe permeated the Chaos Sea, thus enabling it to nurture supreme innate beings.
For Ye Chen to reach this step was still some distance away; he needed to wait until his Origin Universe gradually perfected and the myriad Daos of the universe were complete before powerful beings could slowly, bit by bit, be born.
And this would still require time.
The years flowed by. Since Ye Chen's return from the Origin Saint Race, the Chaos Sea had grown even more chaotic, surpassing any previous era.
The Blood-Stained Epoch was intensifying.
Currently, the Chaos Sea was divided into four tiers.
The first tier consisted of the strongest powers like the Primordial Immortal Realm, the Alien Ancient Universe, the Pangu Universe, and the Origin Saint Race, each with a peerless Overlord presiding over them. They were now called Overlord-level powers, completely dominating the peak of the Chaos Sea.
Especially with the Primordial Immortal Realm allying with the Pangu Universe, and the Alien Ancient Universe allying with the Origin Saint Race, these four Overlord-level powers restrained each other.
The second tier consisted of powers like the Eternal Heavenly Realm, the Chaos Burial Ground, and the factions where the Divine Emperor and the Henggu Monarch resided.
Because they all possessed Half-Step Overlords.
Among them, the Eternal Heavenly Realm and the Chaos Burial Ground were the strongest, having not only Half-Step Overlords but also multiple Giants.
The Eternal Heavenly Realm was the most powerful; below the Half-Step Overlord level, it was in no way inferior to the four Overlord-level powers, its overall strength extremely formidable.
The third tier consisted of ordinary Chaos Ancient Universes or Great Worlds that had Giants presiding over them.
The fourth tier consisted of factions that lacked Giants but still possessed a Chaos Ancient Universe.
Naturally, below the fourth tier were forces that were utterly insignificant.
Nowadays, the four Overlord-level powers occupying the first tier rarely engaged in open warfare, as they all knew the terrifying consequences that would ensue if they did.
Especially after Ye Chen single-handedly charged into the Origin Saint Race, causing them heavy casualties that struck at their very foundation—the Heavenly Dao Ancient Ancestor was almost killed—which had a significant impact.
The second tier also largely refrained from open warfare. However, the Desolate Heaven Demon Lord was a battle maniac who occasionally roamed the Chaos Sea, even frequently setting his sights from afar on the Alien Ancient Universe and the Chaos Burial Ground, revealing deep killing intent without the slightest concealment, enraging the many powerhouses of those two Ancient Universes.
The two Half-Step Overlords of the Chaos Burial Ground even wanted to directly ambush and kill the Desolate Heaven Demon Lord.
But although the Desolate Heaven Demon Lord was constantly in the Chaos Sea, he understood the stakes and always stayed not far from the Pangu Universe. Once in danger, the Pangu Universe would come to his aid immediately.
This was especially true given the understanding of the aggressive nature of those few Half-Step Overlords from the Pangu Universe—each one more aggressive than the last, to the point where even the Alien Ancient Universe had to admit defeat, unable to match their ferocity.
This was evident merely from the Chaos Heavenly Emperor daring to charge alone into the secret realm world of the Origin Saint Race. This young and strongest Half-Step Overlord had been this audacious more than once.
In the Chaos Sea, it seemed there was nothing he dared not do.
Of course, ever since Ye Chen returned from the Origin Saint Race, he had hardly appeared, allowing both the Alien Ancient Universe and the Chaos Burial Ground to breathe a sigh of relief.
Once he appeared, it would be major trouble, for even Shidai found him difficult to deal with, protected as he was by the Heavenly Emperor.
Within the Alien Ancient Universe, many Giants harbored doubts.
Ever since Shidai declared all-out war and then abruptly ended it, he had returned to the Ancestral Temple and remained motionless.
Within the universe's origin, there existed a black hole, seemingly eternal, never disappearing.
Multiple Alien Giants had witnessed with their own eyes that Shidai remained seated before this black hole, formed from the collapse of an entire Chaos Ancient Universe, continuously watching. No one knew what Shidai was actually looking at.
Within the Pangu Universe, Ye Chen had been healing his injuries while also creating the myriad Daos of the universe, continuously perfecting his Origin Universe.
After the embryonic Heavenly Dao fused with the Heavenly Dao Grindstone, it became a brand new Heavenly Dao.
Ye Chen named this Heavenly Dao the Chaos Azure Heaven.
It was to commemorate the Azure Heaven of the Pangu Universe's Tenth Heaven.
To save him, it had not hesitated to expose itself and was killed by Shidai.
The Chaos Azure Heaven was extremely powerful, a complete Heavenly Dao he had personally created. It was not divided into ten layers, also contained Chaos characteristics, and had fused with the Heavenly Dao Grindstone, presiding over the Heavenly Dao of the Origin Universe.
Combined with the power of the entire Origin Universe, the Chaos Azure Heaven could even contend with a Half-Step Overlord.
Boom—
While cultivating within the Chaos Sea, Ye Chen, on this day, suddenly felt the cosmic projection enveloping him suffer a massive impact from a colossal object.
Opening his eyes, he saw it was an unimaginably gigantic headless corpse, far larger than even a Chaos Primordial Great World. It was entwined with endless world fragments and carried an utterly terrifying pressure as it slammed fiercely into the projection of the Origin Universe. With a thunderous crash, it pierced through and hurtled towards Ye Chen.
Seeing this corpse, Ye Chen was greatly shocked—it was actually the corpse of the Origin Burial Lord.
He had only seen it once back when he was still an Extreme Realm Quasi-Giant. Afterwards, the Origin Burial Lord became the origin of the Blood-Stained Epoch, with various factions contending for its heads.
Because the Origin Burial Lord was a Half-Step Overlord existence, each of its ten heads contained a Dao of Origin.
Back then, he had fallen into a feigned death slumber because of the Origin Burial Lord.
He never expected that after so many years, he would see the corpse of the Origin Burial Lord again.
However, the ten heads had long since vanished without a trace. He had obtained one back then, acquiring a Chaos Thunder Pearl, but it was fundamentally different from the Chaos Thunder Pearls he had obtained before—it was the opposite, a Chaos Origin Pearl condensed from the other half of the Chaos Great Dao missing from this Chaos Sea.
Ye Chen felt a pang of melancholy. To think that the Origin Burial Lord was once a peerless Overlord level, not inferior to the Heavenly Emperor, Shidai, the Immortal Ancestor, and others. Rumors said it was a prisoner exiled and imprisoned in the Dark Universe by the Origin Land. Having been imprisoned for endless eons, it had long grown weak.
During that battle long ago, he had also wondered how those Giants managed to kill the Origin Burial Lord.
Even after being imprisoned for endless eons and grown weak, the Origin Burial Lord was still a peerless Overlord level. No matter how weak, it was still an Overlord. For Giants to kill a peerless Overlord was exceedingly difficult.