What did John see upon entering the portal?

It wasn't the chaos realm.

The calamity realm had multiple layers

The space John met 'Emflowcreagen' was called the 'infinite' layer. It was connected to most multiverses. The other creatures weren't allowed in this area.

John could still feel a sort of mental body in that special space, even now.

He felt he had full control with this body. But he also had a physical body as well. He felt he would soon change this.

This was the body he had stolen from someone upon crossing over to this world, when his true immortal body had been erased.

There were ever expanding layers. This is the new home of the entities that once existed briefly in the abyss. They had found a new home. One less hostile to their existence.

John's physical body that he had stolen had entered the portals, mostly out of curiosity.

He entered the layers of the entities origin.

He saw monsters all around him. They weren't fighting one another.

They looked at him and parted as if to show respect.

John continued to fly as the backlash faded from his mind.

Gods that had been mere fiction had become real.

One of them appeared in front of John.

"Master! We await your orders!"

Millions of eldritch abominations and gods had surrounded John. He felt a pressure like nothing ever before.

"Master?"

"You are our creator!"

John felt a hunger deep in his bones.

But then John felt something pull his body out of this layer of the calamity realm.

John found himself in a another world. He was in a castle surrounded by mages. Below him was a magic circle.

"Hero! We have summoned you to fight the demon lord."

John was confused.

"Hero?"

He started to laugh.

Knights surrounded him.

An ancient wizard looked at him.

"Miss... The ritual failed. This isn't the hero. This is an entity of chaos."

John spoke:

"Entity of chaos? I am just a man."

Before John could react his head was sent flying. He collapsed to the ground. But within a few seconds his head had regrown.

"...My forbidden dao pillar!"

His upper dantian was located in the head. Him having his head cut off. It made him lose connection with his dao pillar. He had dropped in cultivation.

John heard whispering in his ears.

They made you lose your cultivation.

They deserve death.

John shook his head. He then went into a combat stance.

The wizard grasped his hand and soon had John's heart within it.

John frowned.

The wizard crushed the heart. John collapsed to the ground.

John found himself back in the calamity realm. He was also looking at the history of the now dead body he had taken over.

Something interesting had happened. When John went through the portals and wasn't rejected. A benefit of his curse of calamity took effect.

He was no longer human.

He could 'respawn' in the lower layers of the calamity realm.

It was like returning to hell to be punished upon death. Except he was the devil in this case. So it might as well be heaven! He had basically constructed his own afterlife.

His soul on the other hand had returned to the world will. In other words, the original owner of the soul had gained control again.

But John retained a copy of the body.

But he was now in a weird state.

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He was restored in the calamity realm. This curse didn't just effect John. Every creature from the calamity realm could 'respawn'.

Originally, you could think of him as being immortal.

Now he lacked even a soul.

Well now, with his curse. He literally couldn't die.

Respawning also was of a higher level of power. It restored his Qi and mental energy to their maximum, Not that he had mental energy in this body.

But the body itself was 'fake'.

How so? Think about it this way. The calamity realm was ensuring he kept his awareness even without a soul. But once he stepped out of the realm. He would be affected by the laws of reality.

Since he lacked a soul. His body would instantly become braindead and he would die.

Since the structure of his body was also birthed from nothingness in the calamity realm. It would then fall apart completely, he would vanish from the world.

This wasn't a problem while in the calamity realm. But he'll need to cheat a bit to leave this 'afterlife'.

"I can't believe I died... Immortalize isn't perfect. I need to recover my powers."

It also seemed that the calamity realm had been in operation for thousands of years. Despite him literally creating it not too long ago.

It was similar to the chaos realm in its inconsistency. Some of the monsters had been here thriving for thousands of years.

John felt as if there were layers to the calamity realm. He could see a container full of the monsters that had retreated. As well as existences so powerful they couldn't step out of the calamity realm.

John wondered if he could influence his skeletal body in his universe. Give it hints to reopen the connection.

He tried. But his other body seemed resistant to orders. It thought a foreign force was trying control it. That body was naturally resistant to mind control.

The monsters on the other hand...

They had all claimed the calamity realm as their home.

John sent a command to gather.

He was surrounded by things so big that it was absurd.

Creatures the size of planets.

He sent a wave of information to everyone.

"Do any of you have the ability to modify soul?"

A skeleton with a human face and a skull face on both sides of it, appeared in front of John.

"You are?"

"My lord. I am Animaus!"

John in this realm was able to see soul.

He saw there were thousands of souls trapped in an orb in the center of this being. It would seem this person has been busy since the abyss collapsed.

"Animaus huh? How good are you at soul creation?"

His human head frowned.

"I was just recently born. I've only had my powers for a few thousand years. I am proficient at soul manipulation. But not creation."

"Anybody here willing to offer their soul?"

"Allow me!"

"No, ME!"

Soon all sorts of abominations were fighting for a chance to be in John's experiment.

Eventually a god won the fight and offered his soul in excitement.

"What rank are you?"

"Rank 7."

John was surprised beings of laws were willing to listen to him.

"What law did you comprehend?"

"I was born with 100% comprehension in Luck."

"Good. Animaus. Take his soul!"

The soul was ripped out of the god's body as his eyes lost intelligence. The calamity realm then consumed his body.

That's right! The soul gets recycled upon 'respawning'. So if the soul is destroyed. That creature won't reappear in the afterlife.

This obviously didn't effect John as he could now exist without a soul.

Animaus held the god's soul in his hands.

John then described the process of creating a soulverse to Animaus.

"You are truly worthy to be our master! Such genius design."

John had him disguise the outside of the soul as a white ball of energy. It wasn't a fake layer, but an actual change to the composition of the soul.

In the center of this white ball was a blackhole with an infinity symbol inscribed into it.

John wasn't able to mimic the exact properties that made his original soul immortal and deathless. But he was however, by relying on the data of the chaos holder world. Leave some abilities for himself. In other words, he had recreated his immortality by changing the soul to have Aion's abilities. He didn't have his time or space authority. But he could reverse or speed up time for the target. So it was similar to his immortality in a sense that it could reverse his state. It could even recharge his energy.

John then spoke:

"Anybody here good at creating artifacts?"

Another god appeared.

"I am Artis."

"Make me a phylactery to store this soul."

This god was able to summon materials and they began to work on an artifact. Years went by as the monsters had dispersed and did their own things, some invading other realities, others waiting for a hole big enough for them to fit through.

Time didn't matter in the calamity realm.

The decades might as well have been minutes as soon Artis was done.

The pendant was legendary.

Animaus infused the pendant with the soul.

John used his authority to view the matrix of the god that had sacrificed his life to give him his soul. He sifted through the infinite once again and found the version of the god that had died.

The history ended at the moment his soul was extracted.

"I see... even if I have custom designed the soul. It lacks a nascent soul. So it isn't conscious without something to carry its thinking."

John missed deeply his universe. He could easily form a nascent soul there.

There was also an issue. Even if he imprinted his will on the soul. Even if he had full control. It wasn't his original soul. He needed to get around this issue.

His existence now was a bit special.

He tried to leave the calamity realm through the portals. But the moment he stepped outside into a reality. He turned into raw information and basically dissipated.

He would then respawn in the calamity realm.

It would seem his 'respawned' body was too weak. It couldn't handle the stress of a higher reality. So he took a page out of his own book, and decided to be reborn.

John created an artificial intelligence for the crystal. It's thinking was simple and its awareness was almost nonexistent. He added sensory runes.

He was then able to see its history beyond the death of the god.

"Now it is time to be reborn."

This was just an experiment to John. Once he became stronger, perhaps he could create a completely new existence, a person that had no alternate versions of itself.

How truly wonderful that would be. The universe itself would not be able to keep tabs on such a being.

As things were now, he was still only just beginning to grasp the functions of his concept.

John held a competition in the lower levels of the calamity realm. A chance for a messenger to visit a higher level world.

The entities went crazy.

A eldritch creature named Yz'yze won.

John found out that it didn't matter if creatures of the calamity realm died. They would just be reborn in the lower levels. The size and scope of the lower levels was ever expanding. As more and more creatures that shouldn't even exist were born.

John was also able to look at the matrix and history of every creature. This was how he had found the history of the god that had sacrificed himself.

John gave the pendant to Yz'yze as he opened up a massive portal to a higher level world.

The other entities were jealous that Yz'yze was getting an entire world to himself.

John left an imprint of his will in the pendant and used his authority to erase himself from the calamity realm.

He found having a body at all was annoying. So he even erased himself from the Infinite layer. A blue star reappeared in the 'empty' space.

He could monitor the entire realm as if he was everywhere at once.

John had a few issues he needed to iron out. Firstly, he needed enough power to create a soul that was his own. If he could just pull that off. He could respawn with a body that could exist outside of the calamity realm.

This would be on an entirely different level then merely creating a 'phantom soul'.

"It is time to become... human."