NOVGO.NET Chapter 491
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Chapter 491
Luna staggered forward and reached toward the collapsed tower of bones.
As she cleared away the mountain of bones that had completely crumbled into a heap, a battered girl burst out from inside with a loud KWAANG!
Various parts of Baal’s body were covered as though a layer of bone-like skin had been overlaid onto her flesh, and perhaps because it had shattered, pure white powder trickled down from the edges in little showers.
“......”
She silently looked around before letting out a hollow laugh.
“This is fucking ridiculous. Feels like we got completely played.”
“Same here.”
That was the only thing that could possibly describe how the two of them felt.
“How’s your body?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. I just got bound by some weird power. It’s not like I actually took damage.”
She said that, but Luna couldn’t help being deeply shocked.
The power Nyarlathotep displayed when clashing against Baal had been far beyond expectations.
Was it because he had devoured Cthugha?
That bastard’s strength was vastly greater than anticipated.
If he had been an outright enemy, it would have been the kind of unexpected blow that could prove fatal.
But precisely because of that, Luna couldn’t understand Nyarlathotep.
“What the hell are you even doing this for?”
“You usually can’t understand the mind of a madman.”
-If you follow Leon Cascadia right now, you’ll die before he even has time to react.
That was the reason Gabriel had stopped her.
The battle itself hadn’t been one-sided for anyone.
Perhaps Gabriel had been hiding his power, because he did not get easily pushed back even against Luna.
He matched her perfectly, and the very moment he sensed a change occurring inside after enough time had passed, he immediately abandoned all intent to fight.
As though everything had gone exactly according to plan.
Seeing him like that, Luna had no choice but to ask.
Why had he done it?
No matter what, was there really something that required going this far while sacrificing hundreds of thousands of lives?
At that, Gabriel gave a bitter smile and answered like this.
* * *
“There is only one chance. If we miss this opportunity, everything ends.”
Gabriel raised an open hand.
“An Archangel cannot betray. However, if the cause behind the action is for the protection of the Lazarus Continent, one becomes free from those restrictions.”
Michael swallowed a groan.
“Brother. You, who hated my methods more than anyone, are the one who caused something this enormous?”
No matter how insane Michael was, he was not the type to escalate matters by grinding hundreds of thousands of people into fuel.
That alone showed just how horrifying the scale of what Gabriel had done truly was.
The most absurd part was Nyarlathotep’s existence.
Why the hell did that bastard suddenly betray them?
Leon thought that inwardly, yet he never stopped refining the flow of energy within himself, focusing entirely on restoring himself to perfect condition.
He didn’t know exactly what Nyarlathotep had done.
But at least one thing was certain.
Yog’s offensive would become even more violent than before.
Shrrriiiik!! KWA-A-A-AANG!!
A colossal roar exploded as tentacles carrying incomparably greater power than before came hurtling toward them, sending chills through Leon’s heart.
“What the hell did you do to make that thing this strong?!”
Leon shouted in irritation.
That bastard really betrayed Yog, right?
Even as he thought that inwardly, he couldn’t rid himself of the seed of suspicion.
“Hehe. It is quite simple. I merely pulled my master’s position closer.”
At those words, Leon’s eyes widened.
Interpreting Nyarlathotep’s words led to only one conclusion.
Now attacks could actually reach him.
Though the enemy had also grown stronger.
Leon grimaced.
“Everything else aside, can we even handle that? It was already insane before. If it goes berserk like this, even I can’t guarantee anything.”
At that complaint, Gabriel gathered pure white light in one hand.
It was not his divinity.
“Leon Cascadia. What is the activation rate of the Demon Sword?”
“99.8%.”
“Then preparations are complete.”
The moment he finished speaking, Gabriel clenched the mass of light in his hand and rapidly approached Leon.
“This will hurt a little.”
PPEOK!!!
Gabriel’s hand struck Leon.
At the same time, the area around Leon’s heart rippled as though space itself had opened, and Gabriel’s hand thrust deep inside.
“Kuheok!”
Leon openly revealed his pain.
“Michael! Buy us time!!”
Rather than questioning Gabriel’s desperate shout, Michael immediately chose to move.
However, after releasing a sigh heavy with complicated thoughts, he declared.
“Gabriel. Whatever your purpose may have been, what you did crossed the line.”
Even Michael, who would casually sacrifice the few for the preservation of Lazarus, had judged this to be too much.
That was how dangerously extreme Gabriel’s gamble had been.
“......”
“You won’t escape the consequences.”
Michael blocked the incoming tentacles with his spear in an instant, but though he managed to stop their advance, the recoil alone blasted him backward and smashed him into the wall.
“Ghurk......”
The fact that a groan of pain escaped Michael’s mouth made it obvious just how absurd that firepower truly was.
“What did you do?”
Leon asked as he looked down at his own heart.
In response, Gabriel drew a sword of light and stepped forward as though taking Michael’s place against Yog’s tentacles.
“Do you remember your origin?”
“You’re the one who told me about it.”
“Yes. Since then, I have thought about it greatly. Setting Adam aside, the power of Eve, who fell to the Outer God, should certainly have been unstable. So how could a plan like this even be possible?”
KWAJIK!!
A tiny tentacle shot forth like a flash of light, tearing away one of Gabriel’s wings and piercing through his shoulder.
Even so, he did not stop advancing, batting away and blocking every incoming attack.
“The Demon Sword Elekstra was an item once carried by Adam, the God of Death. Perhaps it was fate that it ended up in your hands… but what truly matters is that the Demon Sword slowly assimilated with you.”
His explanation meant this.
The activation rate of the Demon Sword was effectively the awakening rate of the Hall of Martial God—in other words, Leon’s true essence.
And yet, that awakening rate had completely stopped at 99.8%.
Meaning something was lacking.
That missing 0.2%.
Gabriel had sought the reason elsewhere.
“Because the power of Eve, the Goddess of Life, was incomplete. The trace of Eve that I just forced into your body is the final fragment.”
Leon couldn’t help feeling bewildered.
Yog was a monster even the Chief God could not kill, only seal away.
And yet the powers of the God of Death and the Goddess of Life—mere creations who weren’t even that much greater than Archangels—were somehow becoming the line of hope?
Did that causality even make sense?
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“Why do you think the Chief God fell silent?”
“Huh?”
Leon’s eyes widened.
Why was the Chief God suddenly being brought up here?
Leon had believed the reason the Chief God fell silent was because of the regression.
But… that wasn’t all?
Of course, this was hardly the time to dwell on confusion.
For some reason, ever since Eve’s final fragment seeped into him, insane warning messages had begun flooding his vision.
[Warning]
[Warning]
[Massive quantities of unidentified energy detected]
[The Hall of Martial God is activating.]
[All memories of every hall absorbed by the Hall of Martial God will forcibly transfer in a mixed state.]
[Prepare for extreme pain until activation is complete.]
Pain was familiar.
Did they think he’d only died horribly once or twice?
Back when the Red Moon Incident first erupted, being devoured by Void Gluttony had inflicted pain beyond imagination.
So ordinary pain was—
Leon staggered.
“Ghk?! You insane bastards!”
He gritted his teeth and tried to endure it, but this was not physical pain.
His soul was being forcibly torn apart, hammered down, reshaped, expanded.
[Attempting adaptation]
[Part of the pain has been alleviated.]
[Adapting]
[Part of the pain has been alleviated.]
The endless stream of text only made his mind more chaotic.
Unknown information entered his head and disappeared.
What made it even more unpleasant was that he couldn’t remember what any of that information even was.
Something was progressing at terrifying speed.
Something sleeping within his body was awakening and violently shaking his consciousness.
[Nyarlathotep. Why did you betray me?]
Yog’s furious voice echoed throughout the surroundings.
At that, Nyarlathotep, who had been standing still, smiled eerily.
“My apologies, my lord. However, I could not pass up such a perfect opportunity to directly witness and confirm the existence of the Martial God.”
Nyarlathotep carried an attitude that made it seem as though nothing else in the world mattered.
As long as he could satisfy his curiosity and interests, nothing else concerned him.
Ironically, the existence he had spent ages obsessively researching was the Martial God.
“The more I investigated the existence known as the Martial God, the more incomprehensible it became. A divine being, yet different from ordinary divinities. And despite that, an executioner capable of killing transcendent beings who possess divine authority. Isn’t that fascinating?”
At those words, the void tore apart in every direction as tentacles burst forth and shredded Nyarlathotep’s body into pieces.
Everything except his head exploded apart, yet Nyarlathotep’s smile did not vanish.
“I cannot die before achieving my objective.”
[After I dispose of these insects, I shall personally tear you apart.]
Nyarlathotep had been neutralized in an instant, but Gabriel, Michael, and Uriel—who joined belatedly—desperately blocked every attack aimed toward Leon.
Now that Yog’s true body had been revealed due to Nyarlathotep’s grotesque magic, Michael spared no effort in weakening Yog’s power in addition to defending.
“If it’s magic prepared by Nyarlathotep, then attacks from our side should work as well. Uriel. Handle the barrier.”
“I wish you victory, Lord Michael.”
Without hesitation, Michael entrusted defense to Uriel, aimed the tip of his spear toward Yog, and charged forward like a flash of light.
Yog’s tentacles violently and swiftly tried to intercept him, but Michael’s divine body transformed into light for an instant, passing straight through the tentacles.
PPEOG!!!!
And then he drove the spearhead into Yog’s massive crimson eye.
Just as Leon had, Michael instantly realized that the eye was where Yog’s true body was projected.
And unlike before, because the physical body itself had drawn closer, the attack inflicted real damage.
The strike had clearly landed.
However, there was also something Michael had overlooked.
[Pathetically weak… and utterly futile.]
“Gh?!”
JJEEEEONG!!!
In an instant, a sound like something shattering rang from Michael’s body, and his divine form was blasted away and slammed into the ground.
“Keugh......”
Pain-filled groans spilled from his mouth as though something inside him had clearly gone wrong.
“Lord Michael!!! Kuhuk?!”
Uriel moved immediately to support him, but he too was blasted away in an instant as though struck by something.
It was not the existence shock used against Leon.
Yog had simply struck them with tentacles compressed with overwhelming mass.
Nyarlathotep had created an environment where Yog could be damaged.
But at the same time, he had also amplified Yog’s power.
People might think removing the seal was the limit of it, but the closer Yog became, the less energy he had to consume for attacks.
Naturally, that made him stronger.
Gabriel looked toward Leon, who was crouched on one knee with his body curled inward.
He could not even imagine the agony Leon was enduring right now.
Back when they sparred in Heaven after unfolding a special domain, Leon had never screamed even while his flesh was torn apart and his body cut to pieces.
Yet now he was drenched in cold sweat, gritting his teeth like this.
That alone said everything.
“Lord God… perhaps the final revelation You granted me truly meant this.”
It had been a gamble from the very beginning.
But no matter how afraid he was, no matter how terrified he was of failure, it made no sense to abandon responsibility for the catastrophe he himself had set into motion.
At that moment, Yog unleashed a flood of tentacles toward Leon.
The very same power that had instantly incapacitated Michael and Uriel.
No—more importantly, it was dangerous.
Yog himself must have sensed something ominous in Leon’s transformation.
Gabriel was no exception.
He spread his wings and moved while even deceiving Yog’s senses.
Puuuk!!!!
Then he used his own body to intercept the attack aimed at Leon.
“Gabriel!!!”
Within Uriel’s desperate cry, scarlet blood spilled from Gabriel’s body.
“Oh dear.”
Gabriel spoke while coughing up blood.
Blood…
Usually, even when wounded, light flowed out instead of blood.
He had almost never experienced bleeding like this before.
This was practically a death sentence.
“Wasn’t this all far too late?”
“Even if you survive, you’ll die by my hand anyway. You didn’t commit something like this alone while hoping to live, did you?”
“Ha… that is true. I suppose my role ends here.”
His eerie voice spread low through the surroundings.
Grrrkkk—
A massive pattern bloomed behind Leon’s back.
“Adam......”
Seeing the strange pattern—a fusion of the sigils of Adam, the God of Death, and Eve, the Goddess of Life—Gabriel felt an indescribable longing and nostalgia.
Soon, the slowly rotating pattern came to a halt as though locking into place, then was absorbed into Leon’s body.
At first glance, nothing had changed.
But something was different.
In Gabriel’s eyes, Leon’s gaze had become utterly inorganic.
Leon slowly rose to his feet.
Then he blankly stared at Yog’s incoming attack before casually extending one hand forward.
PPEOG!!!!
Whatever method he used, Leon not only neutralized Yog’s attack with absurd ease, but outright crushed part of Yog’s body.
At the same time, Nyarlathotep’s voice echoed out from where only his severed head remained rolling across the hall.
[Oho… fascinating. So this is the state of the Martial God? Some unreadable power is steadily increasing in real time. No… rather than a Martial God… this seems more like a state of germination.]
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