Bro, I'm not an Undead!-Chapter 1678: A Blend of Life and Chaos
Meanwhile...
<Now this is a wild stroke of luck, isn’t it?> said Suzamete.
<Is this a common thing? Do miracles just fall from the sky like this? Why didn’t I ever get one?!> Luserus cried.
Suzamete didn’t answer. She was too busy looking at everything unfolding. With a glance, she could tell exactly what made the scene before her possible, and it was astonishingly... prophetic. If she drew only the positives from it, she could see it as a sign that her plan was going to work, or at the very least that she was on the right track.
Beyrmir had descended from the skies and crashed right on top of the Doom Knight that the Faction Leaders, the Herald, and the Mages were fighting. His form was immense, mercury bubbling and gurgling over the Undeath creature.
The Apostle was world-sized now, and half of his body was sprawling beyond the shattered Rules of Aigas, in the great void. He didn’t look like some draconian being with a crocodilian maw, as the Mercurian Long-Snout Legend should. No. He had discarded that form temporarily in order to capitalize on the size and strength he had recently acquired.
The Doom Knight struggled immensely, each twitch it made causing Aigas to groan and bellow, its winds raging and sharpening to cut randomly at things that couldn’t withstand Divine blows.
...But it was meaningless. The dead Deity couldn’t struggle free with raw physical strength, not against the current Beyrmir. Slowly, it began to understand why. It felt the cold, but boundless power pressing on it, lathered with mercury. The creature above it had bonded with something not only astonishingly large, but saturated with the dense might of a Deity, however much that power seemed to diminish.
’I was right. It might only be for a limited time, but I will be most useful this way,’ Beyrmir thought.
The Apostle had bonded with the remains of the world Fulgardt had blasted apart while battling Skullius in the great void. Somanda had used his advanced Undeath powers on said world, reaching for its inanimate soul and turning into a great monster that Skullius had to contend with on top of his already dire odds. That was when Beyrmir, Araeyn, and Red Rage had appeared to help him, with the Mercurian Legend taking on the abomination.
(A/N: Refer to Ch.1585.)
Beyrmir had been wrestling with the behemoth ever since, which was why he hadn’t returned to Aigas with the other Apostles earlier. Araeyn and Red Rage had abilities that allowed them to be exceptionally useful in the conflict with Fulgardt, he’d seen. Thus, he’d searched for a way to upgrade himself. His arsenal was lacking. Great physical power wasn’t enough. Great speed wasn’t enough.
On the Divine stage, it should have mattered, but AKHASHA had made it so that the keen, the intuitive, and the resourceful would be the ones left standing. Not the ones who simply farmed high-ranked gains.
The Undeath energy running through the behemoth Somanda had made had vanished after his presence left SoSei for the umpteenth time. This had allowed Beyrmir to use the world as a host. The power imbued into it by its Deity was rapidly spilling away, but that was fine. Beyrmir was sure he would have wrung all it could be used for by the time it went dry.
"Don’t waste this chance!" cried Aingor right then.
The Bishop grinned and continued waving her hands as though leading an orchestra. She was hardly fazed by the gargantuan being in front of her.
Listen to the collective,
The collective of pure thought,
This indeed is collective,
The collective of lull thought,
The fire burning in the senses,
Let it cool and simmer down,
The fire raging to the sword,
Let it cool, let it simmer down,
The collective thought, the collective,
Come together quiet just as one,
The collective thought, the su-um,
Come together, lay hate down~
The song went on. Her battle of faith with the Doom Knight continued. It was easier now that the Doom Knight couldn’t attack her and everyone else physically, thwarting the real pathway towards their win in the process. This also gave the others enough time to act.
"I’m ready," Em-Sul said to Eaniss.
The woman nodded.
"Sure you are," she said. "Lucky for us, this is chaos like I’ve never seen before. Without the Bishop’s augments, I’m not sure I would have been able to contain it."
Her eyes turned black as a dark swirling mass rippled from her outline, fell to the ground, and spread like a virus.
It was... Chaos.
Eaniss’ Hidden Class was a very unique one. It was in the same class as Grim’s in terms of power and potential, only limited by the user. Eaniss had often imagined that the man or woman who created it, back during the Grand Wars, was killed prematurely.
’There’s no way someone with a Class like this would lose if they had been a Transcendent Stager or greater.’
Whenever Eaniss was part of an event that consisted of multiple parties pursuing different goals in a manner that was anything less than civil, Eaniss’ Class forced all the negative energy within the bounds of that event into her body and generated Chaos energy.
Eaniss often called the energy, Weaponized Enmity. It was lethal against living beings, shockingly so. Even the masked man had been forced to avoid her blows with Chaos energy at all costs during the battle across the Central Boundary.
But it had more supportive uses than combative ones. Eaniss normally used the ability to create powerful humanoid beings that secured and managed the Severed Union.
This was the key for the present moment.
Seven hundred thousand of these creatures were sculpted from the dark energy flowing from Eaniss, and they covered every square inch of land left exposed on Edagon. It was a hefty number. But what purpose did they serve?
Em-Sul made his move. His towering metallic body, somewhere between ethereal and physical, cronked and cranked. Life energy burst out of him in heated droves. He might have been several dozen million commonfolk pooled into one body.
The Faction Leader had an Advanced Class called Material Augment Shifter. He could transform into unique magical suits of armour at will. That was, until he got his hands on the Harmonic Ember, a powerful crystal stolen from the Bryne Family (Stylla’s family). It completely changed his anatomy, using his Class to bring about the ultimate result he desired: immortality and heightened potential.
Em-Sul could generate a ridiculous mass of life energy, which effectively made him immortal and secured higher combat potential. Life energy had a way of galvanizing living cells, improving their quality.
As it happened, Em-Sul could share this life energy.
Swiftly, he poured a staggering volume into the humanoid beings Eaniss had created. In a blink, they were each blessed with a life signature, like actual living beings – strong living beings.
Em-Sul imagined that if he kept feeding these creatures life energy, they would likely develop something like a soul over time... perhaps a million years into the future. That was how potent his abilities were.
In a breath, he and Eaniss made seven hundred thousand pseudo-living Master Stage experts!
...And the Mad Bishop took them all into her cult, consolidating her faith!
...!!!
Her song grew louder, and she shuddered. She felt the strain. Her powers were reaching a forbidden height – a height too great for a mere Incandescent Stager. But she was crazy enough to survive it.
"Blessed are those who feel their veins bursting with the heresy of bread, who believe wholeheartedly that the truth is not beyond the world, but rather, inside the finest grain of wheat! Do you hear that, you deific bastard! You’re getting bested by bread!" she cried, nose bleeding, at the Doom Knight.
<That’s right!> thought Eaniss. <Whatever Liches do to fallen Deities to turn them into that makes them weaker than their living form. They lose a lot of autonomy, in some cases of all of it, depending on the skill of the Lich. This particular creature is not too strong-willed. It relies on instinct, for the most part. I will use the last sliver of my powers to amplify the Bishop’s powers and cripple that autonomy within the Deity. A Deity without ambition is a Deity with a washed-up fate and faith. Even the Mad Bishop’s belief can defeat it in that regard at this point.>
Indeed. This was why Quintess had worried for Listafelle once she started to feel content. There was no place for contentment among Deities.
<After that is done, we will banish the Undeath energy inside the Doom Knight and use its Deific powers to sustain Aigas!>
And indeed, that was Suzamete’s plan.
