Chapter 716: Redemption
In the dead of night, across the vast land of Busairite, while countless plague-ridden folks celebrated and cheered for their ailments to depart, a long-standing, tangled battle continued in a rarely visited desert. However, this battle was finally entering its final phase.
High above, at an altitude of a thousand meters, Amayaba had transformed into a massive, bizarre bug, buzzing its gigantic wings, soaring through the night sky shrouded in thick bacteria mist. Having just recovered from a brief moment of spiritual chaos, it was ready to challenge the distant steel warship.
Amayaba had no idea why its epic external spiritual supply from the plague had suddenly cut off. Yet, during its previous escapades with the plague’s power, it had amassed a significant amount of spirituality. Even with the supply interruption, Amayaba’s total spirituality was still immensely high—much higher than its normal state.
With such a vast reservoir of spiritual backing, Amayaba was not about to back down easily. After all, it had established an advantage over Evi thanks to the earlier chaos. Evi’s battle capability was already compromised, and to give up now would be a shame.
Besides… there was a chance that “that esteemed person” was still watching, the one who had handed such great power to it. Amayaba didn’t dare to simply skedaddle off…
So, enveloped in dense bacteria mist and still brimming with power, Amayaba charged toward the distant steel warship. Its target was very clear: the left flank, previously battered by bacteria bombs—a weak point in Evi’s defenses.
Earlier, while catching the returning Vania, Evi had exposed a gap in defense right in front of Amayaba, causing part of the left flank’s close-range defense systems to get corroded and fail. Furthermore, some propulsion nozzles had suffered damage, affecting the power systems. Not only was mobility sluggish, but there were serious holes in the defenses, leading to clear firepower shortages from that angle.
Amayaba raced toward the weak point in Evi’s defenses, as the ship’s left flank’s firepower was entirely incapable of stopping its rapid approach. Thin energy barriers struggled to penetrate the bacteria mist, causing just a few minor explosions that healed quickly—nothing could genuinely harm it.
“It’s coming, Sister Vania, please be ready…” Inside the steel giant, in a vast chapel, Evi’s semi-transparent image said solemnly to the nearby white-robed nun, who nodded in response.
“I know, we no longer have to let it bother us…” Standing in the center of the chapel, Vania, glowing softly with serene light, smiled.
Although she had undergone subtle changes due to a special purification ritual on Sacred Summit, and despite spending nearly a year in the virtual world with no significant alterations, there was something mature and solemn about Vania now. She emanated a calm, pure aura, making Evi feel like she was looking at a different person.
As Amayaba zoomed in at high speed, Vania extended a hand towards the direction of the incoming bizarre insect. The bacteria mist obscured her view of the creature’s monstrous exterior, but she could still sense Amayaba’s form through the mist.
In an instant, the massive green bacteria cloud containing Amayaba rushed towards Evi. Its giant claws rose like sickles, ready to slash down onto Evi’s hull with the ferocity that could easily carve a gaping hole into the corroded ship.
Just as Amayaba’s claws were about to descend, the few remaining energy defense cannons on Evi’s left flank opened fire. They struck at Amayaba’s claws, generating minor explosions that only produced superficial damage, failing to halt the blade-like descent.
At that moment, Vania opened her eyes. An invisible force suddenly spread from her, causing the countless minor wounds inflicted on Amayaba’s claw to suddenly flare up. What was once a mere scratch now tore open into a massive gash.
Wounds that were initially just a few centimeters long rapidly expanded to several meters, with the once-solid claw of Amayaba covered in horrific injuries. Overwhelmed by structural damage, the monstrous claw exploded, splattering yellow-white viscous liquid everywhere.
What had previously been a trivial injury instantly evolved into a grave damage. With Vania’s extraordinary power, Amayaba lost an entire claw. Not only did its attack on Evi fail, but the enormous creature also let out a painful shriek, determined not to let it end there. It swung its other claw toward Evi, but Evi’s counterattack quickly left numerous small scars on this claw, which under the same invisible power, rapidly worsened, eventually smashing the entire limb into bits and grotesque goo.
But that wasn’t over yet! After both claws had exploded, Amayaba’s other injuries began to worsen rapidly. Wounds started spreading across its body, causing it to howl in pain as it retreated from Evi. At that moment, it realized that the closer it got to Evi, the stronger the pain’s catalyst became. It had to distance itself from Evi in order to lessen the effects.
‘What’s going on? Why does that steel b*tch suddenly have such power?!’
Fleeing to a distance, Amayaba thought anxiously, busily spending its spirituality to heal its horrifying wounds.
However, as Amayaba began to regenerate quickly, it encountered a peculiar problem—its regeneration process was malfunctioning. Those wounds that should have quickly healed were instead growing bizarre, decayed tumors and rotten flesh. Under some dark force, its body was indeed rebuilding, but instead of healthy tissue, it was sprouting all manner of grotesque things!
With its regenerative power at work, Amayaba sprouted pus-filled tumors and rotten flesh all over. The massive, broken claws should have quickly regrown, but instead, what emerged were soft, flabby, white tentacles—motionless and swaying in the wind, making an already disgusting Amayaba even more repulsive.
‘What is this! Why is my body transforming like this?!’
Staring at the revolting growths sprouting from its body, Amayaba thought desperately. Unbeknownst to it, another powerful red-tier entity was opposing it somewhere on the battlefield. Within the warship’s chapel, a solemn nun in white was silently observing, her pupils gleaming with golden light.
“Don’t think you can save yourself with the spirituality stolen from others…” Vania whispered, gazing into the distance. The recent sudden escalation of Amayaba’s wounds, and the fact that its injuries were spiraling out of control, were all her doing. As an extraordinary being ranked red-tier, the Reliever Saint’s abilities were in full effect.
The amplification of wounds was one of the Reliever Saint’s powers. Within its range, any form of “scar,” big or small, new or old, could be directly worsened and magnified—so that minor scrapes could become fatal injuries, just like how Amayaba’s claws had been rendered useless. The minor scratches inflicted by Evi’s energy cannons had been turned into injuries severe enough to warrant amputation.
And then came Vania’s ability to hinder Amayaba’s attempt to regenerate, known as malicious treatment. This was an attack that made enemies heal incorrectly, causing grotesque growths, effectively countering quick, physical regeneration.
Vania had learned this ability long ago while in the Black Earth, but back then, she could only afflict directly touching wounds. With limited applications, it was only now, after becoming a red-tier being, that she could apply it remotely from great distances, almost like casting a curse. As long as a target was within her skill range and could be perceived, they could be impacted 100%.
By utilizing amplification of scars and malicious treatment, Vania directly dismantled Amayaba’s offensive and suppressed its regeneration. Of course, these abilities could achieve such effects largely thanks to Evi’s warship providing a supporting boost.
With its healing impeded, Amayaba, the giant flying bug, let out a piercing wail, shaking its wings as it prepared to retreat, clearly recognizing that something was very wrong.
“Sister Evi… knock it down! Unleash your firepower!” Vania urged, and Evi nodded seriously, maneuvering the ship’s turrets to target the escaping Amayaba.
A deafening roar erupted as numerous cannons on the side of Evi’s ship fired in unison. This time, they shot not just the shining energy projectiles, but also long-unused solid projectiles!
The projectiles quickly soared toward the fleeing Amayaba. As they punched through the bacteria mist, a warm golden glow enveloped their heated bodies, allowing them to penetrate the murky cloud and hit Amayaba, triggering a massive explosion.
“Boom!”
Under the immense destructive power of specialized projectiles designed to k*ll large biological entities, Amayaba’s hundred-meter-long body disintegrated into countless tiny fragments, raining down from the sky. After a round of barrage from Evi, the giant flying bug’s body lay in ruins.
This extermination and protection was one of Vania’s abilities as the Reliever Saint. This power allowed her to grant herself and allies a transcendent protection against countless physical and certain spiritual “anomalies.” It precisely identified and blocked harmful substances, including sewage, poison gas, bacteria, and more, enabling the protected to largely evade the influence of “anomalous states” on the material plane.
Such protection could be — and was — applied to lifeless weapons too. Though not as effective as on living beings, it still offered visible results. Earlier, Vania had bolstered Evi’s shells to give them some degree of bacteria mist resistance, ensuring the projectiles could penetrate not too thick swirls of mist.
While Evi’s fleet of solid projectiles reduced Amayaba to bits, both she and Vania knew that it wasn’t gone yet.
As Amayaba’s giant body shattered, Vania peered down through the ship’s floor, catching glimpses of the tumultuous sea of bacteria mist below. She could sense that, beneath that mist, on the covered ground, and within numerous underground spaces, there remained a massive response from anomalous spiritual presences. Just like when they first faced Amayaba, it would never fight outright without reserves. Although its meticulously crafted giant body lay destroyed, viable “backup” was still scattered on the ground and beneath it.
“The surface… and underground. That guy has a massive horde of bugs. The bacteria mist is simply too thick; even with the empowerment on your artillery, I doubt we can hold out long down there…”
Feeling the expanse of the bacteria mist below, Vania spoke seriously, and Evi responded bluntly.
“Don’t worry, besides those artillery shells, I have other means to deal with it… and I’m not afraid of this mist…” Evi replied to Vania. The method she mentioned was, of course, her long-accumulated main cannon! As long as she fired it off, she wouldn’t care about the mists below.
“Sister Vania, I’m prepping now,” Evi declared.
“Got it… leave it to me…” Vania said earnestly, beginning to scan the conditions underground and on the surface. Sure enough, she found several eggs being nurtured in a tunnel dug out underground.
Vania recognized these eggs; she had sensed them before. They were Amayaba’s escape bugs. While Amayaba transformed its original escape bugs into flying giants to battle Evi, it had already started laying more backup escape bugs underground. With massive spiritual support, it had churned out several eggs all at once, and upon the hunting giant bug being destroyed, a few escape bugs had successfully hatched, meaning Amayaba hadn’t died outright. In a sense, these escape bugs served as nodes for directing the entire bug horde; as long as they weren’t wiped out, Amayaba itself wouldn’t perish.
At this moment, Vania, boosted by the temple’s support, saw that over three hundred of Amayaba’s escape bug eggs had successfully hatched, with about two to three dozen having emerged. These emerged bugs began scattering in various directions, and over two hundred more were nearing hatching, ready to join the fleeing horde.
Realizing this, Vania focused her mind again. With the temple amplifying her, she extended her powers into the western bug horde and directly utilized her malicious treatment ability on the eggs still in incubation. Speeding up their development, she distorted their proper growth trajectories so that when they hatched, they emerged as misshapen bugs—either lacking body parts or wholly deformed, unable to function properly, only flopping around while screeching.
“I’ve already taken care of most of those escape bugs, but a few nimble ones managed to slip away,” Vania reported to Evi, who nodded in agreement.
“It’s fine; catching one or two shouldn’t be hard; we just can’t let too many escape at once. Once I deal with everything here, I’ll go sort them out…”
Evi stated resolutely, adjusting the angle of the ship to point its open cannon ports downward. Even in the chapel, Vania could feel the massive surge of spirituality building up inside the cannon.
The moment Evi’s main cannon was about to fire, Amayaba, now transformed into a dense mass of bugs and with a pile of escape bugs unable to move, became anxious and unleashed the last remnants of its spirituality in a desperate attempt.
With a rumbling sound and a deep thrum, the earth beneath the heavy bacteria mist began to quake as deep fissures split open. From these cracks, an overwhelming tide of flying bugs surged outward, soaring towards the sky.
Upon closer inspection, these flying bugs all had bloated sacs and were exploding bugs. They streamed out of the subterranean fissures in droves, creating massive dark clouds.
In a bid to buy itself time to hatch more escape bugs, and to disrupt Evi’s cannon bombardment, Amayaba used nearly all its remaining spirituality to hatch exploding bugs, controlling the monstrous horde to command them to surge skyward.
Under Amayaba’s will, the advancing swarm of explosion bugs shot upward like a sandstorm. Once they cleared the thick bacteria mists, they launched an all-out assault on the floating steel giant.
The incubation time and spiritual cost for the exploding bugs were significantly less than for the escape bugs. With Amayaba’s massive input of spirituality, the size of the hexapod army was terrifying. From Evi’s warship, one could see a black “ocean” of buzzing bugs emerge from the green bacteria clouds, rapidly approaching her.
Overwhelmed by so numerous exploding bugs, Evi unleashed her entire firepower in a dazzling light to intercept them. Amidst a volley of gunfire and barrage, those incoming explosion bugs burst apart in waves, filling the air with swarms of floating mist.
Despite Evi’s powerful defenses, the sheer number of explosion bugs was too great. They advanced steadily toward Evi’s hull, as if pushing through dark clouds, with no signs of stopping.
Given the situation, Evi’s best option was to maneuver away from the phalanx of flying bugs—not the fastest, but fatally close. Yet, at that moment, she was at a pivotal moment for firing her main cannon. Various auxiliary ceremonies had begun, and if she performed high-speed maneuvers now, it would interfere with the cannon’s firing sequence.
Finally, the horde of explosion bugs truly pressed against Evi’s ship. Due to damage on Evi’s left flank, a substantial number of bugs surged through the defenseless area, speeding close to the ship and preparing for a close-range detonation.
And just when the fastest explosion bugs reached Evi’s flank, preparing for self-detonation, an unexpected event occurred.
Light! A gentle orange-yellow glow burst forth from Evi’s hull, illuminating the approaching explosion bugs. Under this light, the grotesque, bloated bugs all came to a halt, totally aborting their self-destruction, floating innocently in the air.
“The Lord once said, be they tiny… ugly… or flawed… each is a form of life, each with its purpose. If it’s life, then it deserves the chance for redemption…” Vania recited softly, enveloped in her soft glow, adopting a prayerful stance in the chapel.
“Oh pitiful bugs, though you lack essence, you are still life forms! Life has its meaning; your meaning can’t be self-destruction. You are entitled to experience the beauty of this world alongside other normal beings.
“Now, follow my lead, and I will grant you redemption…”
As Vania spoke, a wave of energy radiating “redemption” spread outward. Influenced by this power, the soon-to-explode, doomed explosion bugs were marvelously “rescued.” Under the “power of redemption,” their imminent demise was averted.
Their bloated sacs shrank, and their hideous bodies began to normalize. During this transformation, the bugs born for self-explosion slowly lost that ability. They gained a touch of their own will, extricating themselves from Amayaba’s horde, transforming into free bugs. They escaped their fated demise and were given “redemption!”
Subsequently, these released bugs, now devoid of self-detonation, turned around to fend off or attack their incoming naively hostile comrades. While lacking intelligent combat skills, these newly liberated bugs were touched by Vania’s powerful force—they felt a simple emotion: gratitude. The once-doomed bugs, now “redeemed,” paused in a show of thanks before they could truly embark on their new lives.
Under Evi’s defenses, amidst Vania’s redemptive radiance, and propelled by the effort of the “saved” bugs, the tidal wave of bugs crashing toward Evi came to a halt. Upon reaching a certain threshold, they could advance no further.
And in this moment, Evi’s main cannon finished its preparation.
“Holy Steel Ship, the Excommunication Nun is ready! Bombardment mode, fire…”
From the top of the spire bridge, Evi looked down at the sea of insects and bacteria, her voice cold as ice. Then, a brilliant golden-white beam shot from the bow of her ship, piercing through the sea of bugs and the murky clouds to strike ground zero.
In an explosion more radiant than the sun, both the bug horde and the bacteria cloud faded, enveloped in the brilliance of annihilating purity.
