Chapter 218: Divine Battle (Part Five)
Boom—
In an instant, mountains crumbled and ground shattered.
A gigantic bony hand, carrying the stench of bl**d, smashed down on the black rock where the dancer stood. The explosive force instantly crushed the rock to bits, creating terrifying cracks that spread like a chasm, extending from beneath the palm all the way to the steep cliffside on one peak. Strange red light burst forth from the fissures, a blink-and-you-missed-it kind of destruction, and shortly after, a good chunk of the rock peak collapsed with a resounding crash.
Boom, boom, boom, boom…
A gale howled, debris exploded, and the ash falling from above began to fly backwards in defiance of the shockwave. The four pillars of light standing around the pit turned as fragile as glass the moment the dancer was struck, collapsing and shattering in the baptism of bl**d, scattering into radiant shards. Chains torn by the aftershock sunk into the bl**d lake with nary a ripple, disappearing into the seething depths.
That woman…
Is she dead?
I felt my body shaking like a leaf, a genuine fear unlike anything I’d faced before.
What the heck…
“Buzz—”
The corpse floating in the bl**d lake let out a haunting wail, and its other bony arm suddenly shot up, gripping the crumbling edge of the pit, pulling its grotesque body out halfway. bl**d poured down like a torrential rain from the peak, and the red glow in its eye sockets intensified. It seemed to sense something, abruptly turning its gaze to me hovering in mid-air.
!!!
In an instant, a bone-chilling dread shot up my spine, my heart racing, and I swore my hair was standing on end.
“Gulp.”
I unconsciously swallowed hard.
The golden light above me was fading, and the echoes of the deity’s roar reverberated in my ears. I felt dizzy, clenching my teeth and tightening my body. In that moment when the corpse fixed its gaze on me, I summoned all the chaotic power within me. A swirling black mist erupted around me, instantly enveloping a radius of dozens of meters. I took cover in the mist, flapping my wings and catching my breath, my mind racing.
What to do, what to do, what to do…
How on earth do you fight something like this…
This isn’t something I can handle… not something any human can handle…
Not anyone…
I was so scared my hands and feet felt cold, and my mouth was dry and bitter. I felt like fleeing, a primal instinct bubbling up from deep within me. I nearly turned to run, but in the next moment, I forced myself to remain still, fists clenched until my lower lip bled, slowly pushing through the mist.
I can’t run…
I can’t…
Stop trembling…
I have to face it…
No matter if it’s a deity or whatever else… I can’t let it enter the outside world…
Absolutely not…
“‘Abyssal Tongue’ Rabishixemos…”
Suddenly, the corpse spoke again.
Its jaw didn’t move, nor did it have a tongue, yet its ethereal voice somehow felt oddly melodious, entirely at odds with its horrifying exterior. It was as if a graceful woman’s voice echoed from the heavens, whispering in my ears, resonating in my mind.
“‘Abyssal Tongue’ shameful… traitor…”
Boom!
The enormous bony hand reached for the outside of the pit, gripping the cracked chasm to fully pull its body out of the bl**d. It sprawled on the edge of the deep pit.
It had no lower body.
From the lower segment of its spine, thick, grotesque bl**d vessels resembling the ones that attacked me hung down, covering its bones. Dark red flesh hung down from the scapula, extending even longer than its massive body, resembling wings of a freshly emerged cicada or a creepy cloak drenched in dark red bl**d, tightly adhering to the corpse’s back.
It was both terrifying and disgusting…
But I understood what it said in Abyssal Tongue.
Again, there was that name—Rabishixemos…
Again, the word “traitor”…
Boom!
The second bony hand climbed far up the crack of the pit.
The corpse pulled its body fully from the pit, lying at the edge, its skull tilting back, dark bl**d seeping from its eye sockets and bones, dripping to the ground below.
With a thunderous rumble, the peak continued to collapse, and above the corpse, shattered fragments of light pillars rained down, transforming into wisps of gold smoke scattering to the higher skies. Dark red bl**d had already flowed to the midpoint of the peak, the air stifling, ashes billowing like smoke, the nauseating metallic scent overwhelming.
I watched the corpse from a hundred meters up in the air, my pupils dilating, sweat trickling down the sides of my face.
But my fists were clenched tight.
Even with the fear and shock deep within me that threatened to overwhelm my reason…
I couldn’t retreat.
I would not back down.
“Even if you’re a deity—”
Above the gray skies, the angry girl encased in black armor spread her fiery wings wide. Underneath the swirling dead smoke, she raised her right hand. Her palm turned into a blade, and chaotic power surged wildly, as countless black snake-like clouds twisted and swirled, rapidly coiling into the palm she raised, gathering into a sphere.
“Don’t think you can…”
The black sphere solidified in the blink of an eye, floating higher, rapidly expanding under the continuous inflow of dead smoke, growing to over ten meters, then fifteen, then twenty… until it reached nearly thirty meters.
Here, thirty meters was already my limit…
The massive black sphere hovered above, radiating a ghastly white light, akin to the sun of d*ath in this bleak world. My hands trembled violently from some unknown influence as the chaotic power within me began to swirl uncontrollably, the shape of the black sphere starting to disperse. I bit my tongue hard, eyes wide open, and at that moment, feeling myself at my limit, I swung my right arm down.
“Damage anyone—!!”
With a roar from the girl, the black sun with its tremors and vibrations hurtled toward the corpse atop the mountain. The black sun shot towards it at breakneck speed and, in the blink of an eye, struck the peak.
Then came a catastrophic explosion.
Boom—!!
The mountain quaked, the earth rattled, and as the black sun touched the peak, a blinding light exploded, painting the entire world in scorching white, as the surging black mist instantly ravaged everything, consuming the pit and the towering peak, erupting like a nuclear blast into a dark mushroom cloud.
A terrible storm expanded, amidst a deafening roar, and the portion of the peak that had been smashed by the corpse disintegrated entirely, with enormous boulders flying in every direction, raining down like black meteors upon the scorched land below.
“Huff, huff…”
So tired…
I gasped mid-air, focusing my spirit, suppressing the chaotic power churning within me while shielding my face against the relentless gale, hair whipping wildly behind me. Through the gaps between my fingers, I fixed my gaze on the now utterly demolished summit.
Would there… be an effect?
After a long time, the black mist covering the peak began to dissipate.
The bl**d-red corpse came back into view.
It hadn’t even moved.
Despite the entire peak being blown to bits, the crumbling rocks enveloped in dead smoke quickly disintegrated, turning to ash before they could even touch the ground, leaving only a section of rock steaming with black mist, and the corpse had no place to land. Yet, it didn’t fall; it floated in the air, maintaining its previous position.
Its glowing red eye sockets still stared at me.
“……”
I turned pale, my lips quivering.
How is this possible…
My whole body felt immersed in an ice-cold dread, the kind that sends shivers down your spine, filled with chilling fear, total despair, and numbness.
It wasn’t even injured… not at all…
Completely unaffected…
How could this be…
After a dazed moment, a surge of defiance welled up within me, and my face twisted with rage.
Then let’s charge in to test it!
“Ughhh—”
My desperate shout seemed to chase away my fear. I controlled the chaotic power and dove toward the corpse, black fire swirling around me from the dead smoke, integrating into my right fist.
Compress it, condense it…
Once more, a full-power strike…
Two hundred meters, one hundred meters, thirty—
With a few explosive pops, I was suddenly right in front of the corpse. The air became unbearably hot, as if caught in a steam pot, the heavy stench of bl**d choking me, the gigantic skull like a small mountain reflected in my eyes, its dark eye sockets resembling deep caverns, fiery embers dancing inside.
I aimed for its brow and swung my fist.
Ten meters.
Suddenly, a thin, translucent golden barrier quietly appeared just ten meters away from the corpse’s skull.
“Let’s see how this goes!”
I barely had time to react before I crashed into it.
Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang—
It felt like hitting an indestructible steel wall.
I couldn’t even throw that punch, nor could I touch its body. The moment I crashed into the barrier, my neck snapped, and I could hear my bones cracking. My shoulder went numb, and the power I had condensed in my fist vanished instantly. My body flew back in the howling wind.
In that moment, I felt no pain, only a deep numbness.
I nearly lost consciousness as I soared through the air, flipping who knows how far back, my mind in a fog, devoid of thoughts, only aware that I was spinning in the gray skies, and in my blurred, chaotic vision, I vaguely caught a glimpse of the massive corpse’s eye sockets; the red flames within seemed to turn golden.
In the next instant, the entire sky turned golden.
A radiant golden orb, more brilliant than the sun, appeared in the hazy gray skies, far surpassing the black sun I had formed. Such power truly broke through the gray void, dispersing the fog and flooding everything in light.
That was no longer the power of faith.
That was the true power of a deity.
Buzz—
The brilliant golden light from above trembled violently, and the resonating sound suddenly spread. The golden sun hanging above the world silently exploded, without the overwhelming force of a landslide.
Yet the monstrous stones among the scorched earth trembled as if they had undergone another quake, collapsing in the brilliant sound as countless hidden figures—fairies, wolf-dogs—bathed in golden light, knelt in submission under divine might. At the moment the golden sun shattered, they imploded like balloons, splattering into a mass of debris.
Above the gray skies, the petite figure of the girl shot backwards as if struck by an invisible giant hammer, her armor shattering as she plunged rapidly towards the ground.
