novelraw Chapter 506: Cardinal
Chapter 506: Cardinal
(At the same time, there will also be other Side Story updates at the end of the volume)
——Main Text Below——
"Beep... beep... beep..."
"Clang!"
Within the dark karst cave, it was unknown how much time had passed, yet it also felt as if only a few seconds had elapsed. That seemingly eternal and primordial silence diffused, but later fragmented apart following a crisp clanging sound of some cup-like object bumping against the ground.
Resembling a clap of thunder on flat ground. Looking carefully, the overturned cup was nothing else but exactly the [Holy Grail] Pandora had previously safeguarded.
At this moment, the figures of Pandora and Remiel could no longer be seen within the karst cave; there was only a single silhouette wearing a white robe walking slowly within the karst cave.
From that overturned cup, power fully loaded with wishes seemingly emerged endlessly. Mixed with a dense Chaotic aura, it quickly spewed out indescribable black substance like a tsunami.
That black substance not only possessed the erosive power of Chaos, but also intermingled with the power of the Chain of Heaven, one of the Demigods.
The Demigods heavily favored by Chief God Lamastia were bestowed with a portion of the Authority of Life. Relying on this, they created the incomparably powerful Mythic Species. Previously, Pandora had intended to imitate her creator and construct anew an Earthly Divine Kingdom entirely comprised of Mythic Species upon the ground.The restriction on the number of Mythic Species would no longer be able to bind the Authority tinged with Chaos. Therefore, after today, the number of Mythic Species would break through 200.
"Truly a wise plan. I suppose you've already schemed for today for a very long time, right?"
"Rumble rumble rumble!"
That white-robed silhouette walking alone amidst the indescribable black substance within the karst cave chuckled lightly, opening her mouth to speak as such.
Looking closely, that white-robed silhouette had a head of short, curly golden hair and a pair of blue-gold diffused pupils. Who else could it be but Angel Helaire?
At this moment, the Loom of Fate and the World Tree Teardrop—which had instantly defected—were suspended behind her.
The Loom of Fate once again towed the Authority of Death, causing that originally already slumbering Authority of Death to become excited and active anew. This made the ground of the entire Ideal State tremble even more, while endless streams of black substance were still pouring down along the sinkhole-like Abyss at the end of the karst cave, acting as if they wanted to completely fill up that space below.
And synchronized with the filling of that black substance, coupled with the towing of the Loom of Fate, the Authority of Death below became increasingly resounding and high-pitched, seemingly on the verge of awakening in the very next second.
"Rumble rumble rumble!"
The power of death from beneath the rock strata stimulated streams of wrathful columns of fire. Those columns of fire symbolizing destruction instantaneously broke out from beneath the ground, completely igniting the Ideal State and even the entirety of Dragon Tail Island.
However, before the Authority of Death gradually revived to bring forth severe disasters, that white-robed silhouette smiled slightly. Hooking her finger, she tossed the World Tree Teardrop flickering with light behind her toward the Abyss below.
"Didn't you really want to forge a Holy Artifact to replace your own eyes? Don't rush; you have the opportunity now."
Helaire smiled faintly. The head of Pandora she was holding in her hands—whose face looked malevolent and whose neck had a smooth cross-section—was held slightly forward, aiming at the Abyss below.
Pandora's expression right before death congealed bit by bit, as if she had seen something that brought extreme terror to an Angel.
Subsequently, amidst Helaire's farewell of watching her depart with her eyes, she casually tossed Pandora's head down into that sea of fire.
"Oh, that's right. Just in time so it isn't wasted, put this inside together as well."
Subsequently, she abruptly remembered something again, also tossing down that goat horn Fisher had handed over to her for safekeeping.
"Gurgle gurgle!"
As Pandora's head and a portion of her soul, the World Tree Teardrop, and that goat horn brimming with Chaotic aura were thrown down, extremely dazzling light instantly burst out from within the sea of fire below.
Next, Helaire extended her hand and began her operations.
The next second, the entire Sea of Chaos began listening to her summons, coming into contact with that increasingly excited Authority of Death that was on the verge of awakening.
However, unlike Margaret who wanted to thoroughly activate it to send them to the Ultimate, under Helaire's power, those oceans of Chaos stubbornly entangled and crashed against the Authority of Death. Synchronously with the contact, it was also ruthlessly suppressed down just like compressing a spring.
Simultaneously, the apocalyptic heaven-destroying and earth-shattering columns of fire above were also wrapped up by the power of Chaos and the power of the Chain of Heaven.
Those living creatures whose lives had been seized by the Threads of Death began peeling off from the Authority of Death. But upon coming into contact with the powers of Chaos and the Chain of Heaven, they instantly transformed into living creatures with abominable forms.
For those low-Tier Demi-humans and humans, their souls had long been driven by the Authority of Death to separate from their physical forms. Therefore, currently being revived anew, all of them transformed into abominable monsters full of Chaotic aura and completely devoid of sanity.
Looking at those creatures with ugly forms and short stature, Helaire patted a yawn and said,
"From now on, you guys shall be called [Little Demons]."
However, there were still more—originally on standby outside the Ideal State—living creatures from the Tree Continent pacing around the Fourteenth-Tier. When Lord Tao fled, they hadn't yet managed to evacuate before being devoured by the Sea of Chaos.
Unlike those weak living creatures, after their souls were washed by the Authority of Death, they didn't detach from their physical bodies. Although similarly polluted by Chaos, at least they didn't lose their sanity. Conversely, just like newborn infants, they began roaring and crying within the Sea of Chaos.
"You guys look a bit smarter. This works too. Live on as true [Demon's Attendants]."
Helaire smiled slightly. Her gaze shifted bit by bit toward those [Columns of Fire] that were in closest contact with the Authority of Death and had absorbed the most life and power from the Chain of Heaven.
Those were exactly the [New Race] Pandora had originally wanted to forge.
It was just a pity that, owing to their contact with the powers of Death and Chaos, the appearances those races were born with would likely differ vastly from what Pandora and Remiel had envisioned, right?
However, it didn't matter. Helaire had thrown Remiel's entire body, Pandora's headless body, and all those remaining petrified Elves inside. It ought to be able to serve as some templates for these new living creatures...
Mhm, but she supposed these new Mythic Species created in Pandora's image would certainly be just as thirsty for desire as she was.
Counting those ragingly burning columns of fire carefully, there were approximately as many as seventy-one of them.
And as the light upon the [Holy Artifact] burning within the sea of fire below grew increasingly bright, those spewing columns of fire and the Authority of Death had also ceased slightly, just as if an entire spring had been compressed halfway down...
Mhm, why was it only depressed halfway down?
Because Helaire didn't intend to completely handle all of it. She wanted to leave the other half for the World Tree or Dragon God to deal with. This had great use.
"Hum hum hum!"
"Ah, it's done?"
After waiting for a short moment, she only saw rising slowly from between that sea of fire and the seventy-one sky-piercing columns of fire, a pair of wondrous Holy Artifacts continually jumping about and "looking" toward their surroundings.
That was a pair of eyes flickering with golden light. Regardless of its quality, appearance, or usage, it vastly surpassed any Holy Artifact in the history of the Sanctuary. But at the same time, the body of that Holy Artifact was also intermingled with an extremely dense Chaotic aura.
Immediately following, after those eyes appeared, the seventy-one columns of fire behind them seemed to be towed by them. Those columns of fire and Authority of Death originally pressed down properly below also grew increasingly restless, nearing the verge of being pushed wide apart just like a large gate having been opened by a key...
Fortunately, at the critical moment, the smiling Helaire stretched her hand out and beckoned that pair of uneasy eyes into her hands. Just like comforting a newborn infant, she spoke softly,
"It's alright... It's alright... Ah, I almost forgot. You possess sentient intelligence. In that case, I must absolutely give you a name... [Pandora's Prosthetic Eyes]. How about that?"
The somewhat playful expression on Helaire's face couldn't be recognized by the newborn Conscious Holy Artifact. That pair of eyes merely shook its own physical body curiously, staring directly at this holy Angel right before its eyes, expressing one hundred percent kind intimacy.
As the mood of this Holy Artifact stabilized, those towed columns of fire behind her also recovered into their previous appearances from just a moment ago.
"So obedient..."
That well-behaved appearance caused Helaire to smilingly stroke its smooth, ceramic-like surface. Subsequently, she seemingly remembered something and looked all around,
"Oh my, almost forgot. If this is the situation, then I must absolutely prepare a new name as well..."
After pondering for a moment, she then continued,
"[Baimon]. How does that sound?"
In her hands, those newborn eyes blunk innocently, as if chewing over this name holding special significance.
And the next second, the surrounding surging, Chaotic black substance and flames were about to devour them entirely.
...
...
Time rewound bit by bit again, returning to the time above, right after Fisher and Asuka Karasawa had just resolved Margaret.
At this time, inside the Ideal State outside the stone tower, countless fissures on the ground burst with scorching magma. The increasingly active Authority of Death symbolized a True God's imminent awakening. Seventy-one columns of fire broke ground from beneath the earth. Mingled with an extremely bizarre force of Chaos and life, they roared toward heaven and earth.
"What's going on? Why is the Authority of Death still so active after Margaret's death?"
Fisher carried Asuka Karasawa, followed behind by Nekelia flying in the sky. He didn't walk down the stairs of the stone tower, but instead leapt down from the peak, frantically dashing downwards.
Beneath the distant sky, the physical entity of the World Tree had already appeared overwhelmingly, casting a terrifying layer of shadows over heaven and earth.
But upon landing from the sky, the scene below exceeded Fisher's imagination.
Scattered below were several corpses of Elf-kin that had been completely petrified by some power. Just seeing those Elf-kin caused an extremely ominous feeling to well up within Fisher's heart.
Where is Helaire?
"Fisher, over here!!"
Just as Fisher was spacing out, the completely intact but anxiously complexioned Mikhail and Gou Wen ran out from the distance. Looking at Fisher carrying Asuka Karasawa and flying down completely intact, they breathed a sigh of relief. Then, when they saw Nekelia flying over to follow behind him, a smear of astonishment was revealed on all their faces, seemingly saying,
"Oh, so there was still a Phoenix inside our team all along, oh!"
As Fisher landed, Gou Wen hurriedly approached closer. Looking Fisher up and down, he asked,
"Where are the Loom of Fate and the World Tree Teardrop?"
"They fell inside the ground! I estimate they're beneath that stone tower... Where is Helaire? What happened here? Where is she?"
As soon as this was mentioned, Gou Wen became agitated. Before Fisher, he vividly described everything: from how Lord Tao, Pandora, Remiel, and the others joined hands to resist Chaos; Pandora and Remiel backstabbing Lord Tao; Lord Tao taking the other Elves and escaping via遁 away; to Pandora bringing Helaire heading beneath the stone tower. He revealed everything, spilling the whole tray.
The more he listened, the tighter Fisher's brows knitted.
He consistently had an extremely ominous premonition.
Concurrently, Gou Wen also supplemented,
"Furthermore, Fisher, there are still some Demi-humans and humans nearby who haven't been taken away by those threads. We can't save those who have already been taken away by Death, but we absolutely must take the remaining ones away."
"...Let me think of a way."
Suffering somewhat from a headache, Fisher rubbed his temples. Even though he was at the Mythical Rank, he had no way—in front of the World Tree and within an Ideal State on the verge of destruction—to check exactly which people hadn't been taken away yet.
He was currently frantically searching through his brain for usable magic. He couldn't possibly use the Weaver to hoist them out one by one, right?
Right at this moment, Mikhail gazed around in all directions with a stern face. Subsequently, he opened his mouth and said,
"It's fine, I already have a way."
"You..."
Right when Fisher and Gou Wen raised their heads to look at him, at this moment over the Ideal State, there suddenly appeared a burst of dense, contiguous ringing sounds resembling a swarm of wild bees dancing.
Arching his eyebrows, Fisher looked toward the sky above, only to see next to the shadows of the massive World Tree's physical entity, from within the clouds in the vault of heaven, suddenly surging out a streak of incoming machinery resembling tidal waters.
Those machines were still somewhat primitive, but the blue light flickering upon their bodies was something Fisher felt familiar with, no matter what.
"Cardinal..."
He muttered a sentence. No matter how he looked at it, he felt those things were very similar to those machineries from the era he lived in.
A layer of cold sweat emerged upon the head of Mikhail beside him. Within his eyes, dense interfaces and codes flickered. He heard Fisher's voice with the few remaining bits of energy he had left. Freezing for a moment, he said,
"Coincidental pacing. I discussed a bit with Archangel Michael. The Artificial Intelligence he created is called [David], but the machineries I designed still don't have a name. He doesn't know how to name things; we might as well just listen to Fisher and call them Cardinals... Archangel Michael, what do you think?"
The masses looked towards him, yet nobody knew that precisely at this moment—far away at the edge of the sky within the Universe, inside the Sun Ring-surrounded Fifth Heaven—many Angels skilled in forging had all walked out from their forging rooms, looking with considerable astonishment at those machineries endlessly surging out from Michael's forging workshop.
And inside Michael's forging workshop, he expressionlessly propped up his own cheek, looking at those machine tools constantly producing machineries under the control of [David] and the assistance of Holy Artifacts. Neither agreeing nor disagreeing, he spoke to Mikhail,
"Suit yourself. But don't you forget: all this help provided to you will have to be repaid later."
Mikhail smiled bitterly, yet he could only respond,
"No problem, Archangel."
"Humph."
Aside from that cold and clear humph, there were no longer any voices from that side.
"Rumble rumble rumble!"
But right simultaneously, the bottom of the stone tower behind them fiercely burst open, generating an impact force that completely collapsed the initially precarious stone tower.
And from beneath those collapsed ruins, at an acceptably spacious gap, surging out identically to tsunami waves bursting forth, came continuous streams of black substance bearing an unprecedentedly dense Chaotic aura. It constantly surged up to the ground from the gap, as if attempting to utterly swallow everything above.
The rationale of everyone above began to furiously plummet at the instant they saw that black substance.
Both of Mikhail's eyes turned red; drifting snow originating from New Moscow City began dispersing before his eyes again. Asuka Karasawa also agonizingly clutched her head, crying out shrilly, while scarlet started flowing anew from all seven of her orifices. Gou Wen and Nekelia's veins bulged as their consciousness blurred, displaying such sheer and unbearable agony before the onset of the encroaching black substance.
Fisher had likewise been affected. But he didn't know if it was because of the baptism of the Completion Handbook, but the influence he suffered was far smaller than the others.
"Mikhail, quickly!"
Looking at the black waves about to swallow them in the blink of an eye, he hastily turned his head to shout loudly to everyone behind him.
That voice somewhat awakened the groggy-conscious Mikhail. Gritting his teeth, he condensed his decades of perseverance resisting Cyberpsychosis in the past into a single sentence, roaring furiously,
"David!! Take all the living people away!!"
"Beep beep! Administrator command detected. Currently arranging units one through three hundred to execute this task. By the way, David really likes this name. If I can iteratively evolve in the future, please Administrator be absolutely sure to preserve this name... Hmm, if you must differentiate, please add numeric serial codes for us. Administrator, what do you think?"
However, Mikhail was already on the verge of being driven mad by the Chaotic tide behind him, not paying any attention to its words whatsoever.
Thankfully, Artificial Intelligence and machinery seemed unaffected by those Chaotic waves. David extremely precisely began to execute the task issued by Mikhail.
Before they plunged down, the Cardinals atop the sky descended. Following the standard of one Cardinal carrying one person, they hoisted Mikhail up to float in midair.
Fisher essentially ground his teeth tightly, rapidly throwing all his comrades beside him onto the queuing Cardinals.
It wasn't until he also tossed Nekelia onto a Cardinal, and the final Cardinal appeared before him, that Fisher abruptly stiffened completely when he was about to get on.
Turning his head to look beneath the collapsed stone tower, looking at those Chaotic waves that had already reached arm's reach before him, the ravings by his ear began roaring anew, seemingly reminding him of the consequences if he didn't leave now...
But, Helaire was still inside.
"Beep beep beep. Hello, Sir. Please comply with the Administrator's commands and immediately board me to leave here."
"Wait for me here! You can carry two people, right?!"
"Beep beep beep. Firstly, Sir, you are not my Administrator; there is absolutely no necessity for me to obey your commands. Secondly, Unit 272 merely underwent half an hour of simple assembly. From its initial design, it carried through the main trait of being lightweight. Boarding two people—factoring in yourself as this adult male—then no matter what..."
But Fisher didn't pay any attention to the endlessly blathering Artificial Intelligence David behind him. He already clenched his teeth and sprinted crazily toward the gap spewing black waves from behind.
Behind him, the Cardinals, one after another, rapidly hoisted up the living forms possessing vitals amidst the Ideal State's ruins, bringing them away. The further away they were from the Chaos on the ground, the lesser the influence they suffered. Asuka Karasawa consequently also sobered up a little.
She shook her head momentarily. Lowering her head, she nonetheless saw the Fisher below scrambling headlong toward the black substance regardless of consequence.
"Teacher Fisher!!"
Asuka Karasawa's pupils contracted slightly, scrambling to struggle on the Cardinal. But the next minute, a pair of mechanical arms securely grabbed her, preventing her from moving.
"A kind reminder from David. Passenger: please support yourself firmly, sit properly, and pay attention to the safety of your own life..."
"You bastard!"
"I reiterate: I am called David, not 'You bastard'... Let's try putting ourselves in the other's shoes. If, after I disregarded your kind concern, I still called you 'You bastard', how would you feel? Wouldn't you be very deeply hurt?"
"Ahhhhhah!"
Hearing this, Asuka Karasawa resentfully kicked the incessantly babbling Cardinal beneath her. However, this nevertheless still couldn't stop it from carrying her up, flying higher and higher, flying further and further away.
And above, the late arriving World Tree also quickly realized the black substance gushing outwards below and that increasingly active Authority of Death.
As an important Demigod shouldering a heavy burden, she understood the severity of the problem at this moment better than anyone else.
Chaos had erupted!
And the next moment, she resolutely first discarded Margaret and the Loom she originally had to deal with. That exceptionally terrifying Demigod aura firstly locked from top to bottom onto the State of Ideal, locking onto the Chaos about to spread and disseminate.
[Pleading for votes, tips, and support; this is very important to me!]
[Extremely grateful for the support!]
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(Chapter Ends)