Thea handed legion command to her deputy Bekka. Bekka was Orion's future wife and daughter of scientist Himon. Himon was the undercover agent New Genesis had sent to Apokolips—a remarkable scientist and inventor of the Mother Box. From every angle, Bekka could be considered one of Highfather's most trusted allies.
In the initial phase, Thea's mental power had already been double that of normal people. Having ascended through the magic path and possessing multiple emotions, her mental power was her strongest attribute. She could brainwash others—there was zero chance of anyone brainwashing her.
While others feared Granny Goodness's elusive mental manipulation, Thea didn't. With a thought, she donned her divine artifact robe and wielded her lightning whip, rising slowly to face the old woman directly.
"You monster! You deserve punishment for all the innocent people you've murdered!" Thea actually had no idea what evil deeds the woman had committed, but the justice faction's advantage of pinning labels on enemies couldn't be wasted.
She didn't just talk—her hands stayed busy. A lightning beam rich with thunder magic shot straight at her opponent.
As trainer of the Female Furies, Granny Goodness's skills were battle-hardened. She showed no fear, punching through the lightning beam and charging forward to seize the initiative.
"Little girl, you're still too green. Come to me—my training will grant you tremendous power! Don't you remember? I'm your friend." Granny Goodness's voice carried a seductive quality.
This shameless old hag was spouting nonsense to her face. How nauseating. Wasn't this just brainwashing? Who was afraid of whom? Thea suppressed the irritation the woman's words caused in her mental world and immediately fired back.
"You old woman, running out at your age to play the victim! You desperately need pity!"
Granny Goodness brainwashed people daily and had extremely high resistance to mental pressure. With a little effort, she shook off Thea's pity.
"Don't want pity? Then how about fear? Someone in the evil faction like you definitely has fear, right?" Thea switched to her specialty—fear.
As an Apokolips native who'd climbed through mountains of corpses and seas of blood to her current position, Granny Goodness's will could fairly be described as iron. Did she have fear? A little, but truly not much.
Theoretically, this attack shouldn't hurt her badly. Except Thea was shouting loud enough for everyone to hear, and that ruined everything.
Darkseid was the Dark Lord—Destroyer God, Annihilator, and a pile of other titles. Such an evil boss parading before your eyes daily—and you claim you're not afraid? Did you still want to keep your job?
It was like having to call Highfather benevolent to his face and Darkseid evil to his. This wasn't about combat power—it was a serious political issue!
If Granny Goodness didn't want to get executed upon returning, she had to be afraid from a politically correct standpoint. Even if she wasn't afraid, she had to claim she was—terrified, even.
The old woman's acting skills were truly impressive—not at all over-the-top. Within one-thousandth of a second, she put on a dumbstruck expression, giving Thea the opportunity to slash a large gash in her arm.
The short sword Highfather had given prevented Granny Goodness's wound from healing at all. Righteous fire continuously burned, causing her heart-piercing pain. She had extensive experience with righteous fire. Using some pitch-black bandages, she wrapped the wound. The righteous fire was temporarily suppressed, but rooting it out would require serious effort. Darkseid had no patience for treating subordinates' injuries—everything depended on solving it yourself.
No longer daring to play mental games with Thea, Granny Goodness observed her wielding the soft whip and figured the girl probably wasn't skilled in close combat. She decided to use her strengths against her enemy's weaknesses to recover her disadvantage.
Naturally, Thea wouldn't let her have her way. Rashly engaging in close combat without understanding the opponent's moves was dangerous. Deities had all survived countless years—their combat experience was exceptional. Trying to suppress them with Earth's few thousand years of martial arts was pure fantasy.
Maintaining distance to probe the opponent's techniques was the smart choice. Thea didn't care about gains or losses in individual exchanges. She danced her whip into an impenetrable defense while constantly probing the opponent's various attributes with magic.
Granny Goodness had high resistance to all types of magic. Her only weakness was slightly lower light attribute resistance. Thea immediately launched a fierce assault—Arrow of Light, Flash, a modified version of Six Rods Prison of Light—all hurled at her opponent.
Granny Goodness struggled to break free from the restraints, paying the price of getting a bloody gash whipped across her face by Thea's lightning whip.
After losing two exchanges, she quickly calmed down. Her mouth released a piercing shriek that temporarily forced Thea back. Darkseid knew his eldest son Kalibak had no brains—nominally leading the troops, actual command rested entirely with Granny Goodness. Challenging Thea in the first place had served two purposes: testing the new deity's quality, and disrupting the devastating magic clearance. Unfortunately, prolonged combat had achieved nothing.
Only now that she'd driven Thea back did she have leisure to survey the entire battlefield.
The two Female Furies who'd come with her had already entered battle. Bernadeth, wielding a spear-sword, barely managed to fight Lightray to a draw. Stompa, wearing metal combat boots and possessing tremendous strength, had the misfortune of facing the even stronger Uggha. Deeply hating these people for slaughtering his clansmen, Uggha swung his hammer with tremendous vigor.
Vaguely serving as first among Highfather's three legion commanders, Uggha's personal combat power also ranked in the first tier. Him handling the bottom-ranked Female Fury? The result was self-evident.
Stompa was currently struggling desperately against Uggha's fury.
On the other side, Orion and Kalibak's battle saw Orion afraid to over-extract Violence, so both sides had fought to another stalemate. But Kalibak had been injured earlier—in the long run, his losses outweighed his wins.
"Retreat!" Granny Goodness shouted harshly.
"Keep them here!" Uggha roared simultaneously.
Handling this scam artist granny, Thea had no great confidence in capturing her. Moreover, even if she could manage it, she didn't want to stand out that much. Just arriving and killing an opposing commander? From any angle, that wasn't a good thing.
However, with Uggha giving orders, she had to make some effort.
She'd been preparing for this moment, immediately activating a spell she'd been quietly chanting. "Stay here!"
A giant mouth capable of swallowing sky and sea appeared behind Granny Goodness, biting down viciously.
This was Sobek the Crocodile God's phantom form, extracted by Thea from the timestream. This Egyptian mythological animal god possessed tremendous bite force. Killing Granny outright? Impossible. Not only was this just a phantom formed from Thea's divine and magical power, even the real Sobek couldn't kill Granny Goodness.
But trapping her temporarily? No problem.
The scam artist granny braced against the lower jaw with her feet and pushed against the upper jaw with her hands, struggling desperately against the Crocodile God in an extremely awkward position.
On the other side, Orion stopped worrying about mental damage and activated his Violence divine position again. Endless power began crushing Kalibak.
Like beating up a child, Uggha let out an excited roar. Already completely outclassing his opponent across the board, his heightened emotions boosted his combat power another ten percent. Stompa normally relied on overwhelming strength, but facing someone even stronger, she had no ability to fight back.
Having trapped Granny Goodness, Thea naturally wouldn't just watch. She used the same Magic Penetrating Light Killing Cannon she'd employed against Horus that day. Divine power stronger than before condensed between her fingers, firing relentlessly at the trapped scam artist granny.
Currently serving as a living target, Granny Goodness had to resist the crocodile god's bite while dodging lethal attacks.
This left her in extreme distress. After clumsily dodging two shots, the bite grew increasingly tight. Her situation hadn't improved—it had worsened.