Peloponnesus, the second line of defense. The fighting was at its fiercest.
Samael spread his fingers and looked down at his palm. A golden Ouroboros phantom rested there, its head and tail joined, formed from densely packed, wedge-shaped divine sigils. He let out a faint sigh, then suddenly clenched his hand into a fist and crushed it outright. Golden ripples spread rapidly across the surface of the Oceanus Sea.
Pfft…
The moment the Ouroboros phantom shattered, the authority sealed within it rebounded violently. The Ancient Serpent's face drained of color as a mouthful of blood sprayed from between his lips. His aura wilted, his body swaying as if it might collapse at any moment.
At the same time, in the Storm Sea, Sefar's star markings flickered. From afar, he turned his gaze in this direction, clearly having locked onto his old nemesis.
The roaming stellar vanguard raised its seven-colored light sword without hesitation. High in the air, the dimly rotating halo of light slowly adjusted its orientation, its circular aperture aligning with Samael's position. A pillar of prismatic light crashed down with merciless force.
Just as the weakened Ancient Serpent was about to be obliterated by the sharp-eyed Sefar, thunder exploded across the heavens. A streak of silver-white lightning tore through the sky from behind, cleaving the seven-colored beam cleanly in half.
"Oh? You're here?"
Samael narrowed his eyes and smiled. Before he could say anything else, the giant divine soldiers under Sefar's command swung their arms and hurled their luminous spears.
Zeus's expression darkened at once. He raised his divine shield, blocking the thunderous impacts one after another. Then he turned his head, glaring at the man leaning against the city wall behind him, arms crossed, posture lazy and unbothered. The muscles in Zeus's face twitched as he frowned and let out a cold snort.
"So it was you who sealed the [Taboo of the Gods] and set a restriction to trap this king?"
"Coming from you? Didn't you do the same back then, planting [Pandora's Box] and stabbing me in the back?"
"So War God Mountain was under your control all along? That black serpent that devoured the box of original sins… damn you, long worm. You were plotting disaster from the very beginning!"
"Oh, spare me. Imprisoning your father, devouring your wife, setting traps for your own children. If we're digging up old accounts, your hands aren't any cleaner than mine."
Rolling his eyes, Samael sneered as he traded insults with Zeus, holding nothing back.
No need to pretend. None of them were saints.
As the two god-kings of War God Mountain and Mount Olympus exposed each other's past crimes mid-argument, the two roaming stellar vanguards in the Storm Sea resumed their assault. Twin beams of dazzling light erupted, smashing through the magecraft barriers of the second defensive line layer by layer. The forward flank defenses of the Peloponnesus collapsed once more, peeled away like the skin of an onion.
The resulting shockwaves rippled outward, sending violent tremors across the entire Greek mainland.
The two gods, each harboring deep resentment toward the other, snorted coldly and fell silent, temporarily shelving their grudges.
"You dared to injure yourself just to break the seal. Aren't you afraid that this king will one day wipe War God Mountain off the map?"
Zeus narrowed his eyes, his expression grim.
"That's a problem for the future. For now, it's your turn. Try surviving the present first, God King."
Samael replied calmly, without the slightest hint of fear.
Zeus studied the opponent who had driven him into repeated frustration, his gaze heavy with unspoken meaning.
"You should consider yourselves lucky. The [Taboo of the Gods] was created to deal with the Catastrophe of the Stars, not to target you."
The God King of Wisdom snorted and raised his thunder scepter. As dense peals of thunder crashed down along the nearby coast, the authority of the Sky God surged into motion.
From the sea's surface, towering pillars of golden light took shape, like massive gates rising from the deep.
Splash!
As luminous patterns rippled, earth-shaking roars burst from a vortex in the abyssal depths. Titans newly freed, Typhon-born monstrosities, and ancient Greek gods surged out of Tartarus, the prison of the abyss. Like beasts seeing daylight once more, they plunged into savage battle with the monsters swarming across the sea's surface.
The unstoppable offensive of the roaming stellar vanguard was forcibly brought to a halt.
Boom!
Mount Etna erupted violently. Thick black smoke and heavy ash billowed skyward as thunderous explosions rang out in succession, the entire mountain collapsing amid the chaos.
Roar! Roar! Roar!
In an instant, hundreds of grotesque heads burst forth from the crater and the disintegrating mountainside. Some resembled dragons, others serpents, their hideous forms seeming to exist solely to embody slaughter and terror itself.
As the monster plunged into the sea amid falling ash and surging magma, vast amounts of seawater instantly vaporized.
Dark clouds rapidly converged, turning the sky pitch-black. Columns of black wind, like blades piercing heaven and earth, formed one after another around the creature, violently churning the surrounding sea.
Thousands of humanoid combat units and deep-sea warships were swallowed by the devastating storm and towering waves, torn apart until nothing remained.
Those on land caught only a brief glimpse, yet they clearly saw it. At the center of every single head was a lightning-shaped divine seal, blazing with cold radiance.
Typhon, King of Monsters!
Damn it. Even Zeus's divine seal had reached him.
Watching Typhon being driven forward, overturning the sea itself, Samael's eyelids twitched violently, shock rippling through him.
Hum!
At that moment, the cross-shaped spear in the Ancient Serpent's hand trembled faintly, its tip pointing toward a distant spot on the sea.
As towering figures forced open the pillar-like gates of light leading straight into the abyss, not only Samael, but even Themis and Poseidon, who had followed behind, saw their expressions shift.
On the left stood three Hecatoncheires. In the center were three Titan chief gods once imprisoned during the wars between the old and new gods. Among them were the second-generation God King Kronos, along with Iapetus, the Titan of soul and death. It was precisely their presence that had caused Samael's spear to react. On the right were several ancient gods, large and small, long since fallen into slumber.
Yet in the eyes of these former prisoners, only raw savagery and empty indifference remained. They had clearly been reduced to puppets after Zeus eroded their divine authority.
The number of entities Hades had summoned from the Underworld did not even amount to one-tenth of these divine-seal puppets.
So this was the power of the [Taboo of the Gods]. Those defeated, weakened, or long-dormant gods had all fallen under Zeus's control, their divine authority forcibly corrupted.
A trump card of this scale, if used in a direct confrontation, would be enough to single-handedly contend with both the War God Mountain and the Sea God Temple, the two rebellious divine factions.
"Good thing this was prepared for the roaming stellar vanguard."
Samael watched as the external threat was finally brought under control and let out a long breath. Even he could not help feeling lingering fear.
At the same time, the Ancient Serpent looked toward Zeus, who was exerting full control over the divine-seal puppets, deep wariness flickering in his eyes.
"God King… you really don't hold back."
Zeus cast a cold glance at Samael and spoke flatly.
"To gather all of Greece's power to resist the Catastrophe of the Stars, this is the most viable method.
Gods possess even greater arrogance and stronger selfish desires. Even though I have repeatedly stated that the giants will inevitably descend, how many of them would truly obey my command without reservation and devote themselves fully to a war that decides the survival of Olympus?"
Zeus turned his gaze behind him. Poseidon lowered his head awkwardly, his expression dark, unable to offer a single word in response.
Samael fell silent. It seemed that even he had become an obstacle to Zeus's unification of divine authority against the coming calamity. In that instant, he lost the grounds to openly condemn Zeus.
Even so, while this God King might intend to save Greece, his motives were hardly pure. This was merely a necessary step on the path to absolute divine supremacy, not something worth unreserved admiration.
Just as the Ancient Serpent was about to say a few polite words to ease the tension and discuss their next move, a phrase Zeus had spoken earlier suddenly resurfaced in his mind, causing his expression to freeze.
Giants… war… the survival of Olympus?
The Third Olympian Crisis. The War of the Giants.
Oh hell, so that's what this was about.
Samael slapped his forehead in sudden realization, caught between laughter and disbelief.