Chapter 517
"I will not be joining any of the armies," he said, and those words fell among the gods like a stone cast into what had once been a tranquil pond, sending ripples spreading throughout every corner of the hall. They made the god in the dark purple robe, who had already been halfway to the exit, come to a halt. They made the moss-haired Goddess turn around with widened eyes. They made the god in the torn gray robe clutch the edge of his own robe so tightly that his knuckles turned white.
"Because I have matters far more important than fighting at either the western or eastern gate. I have... a desire."
He rose from his throne.
Slowly.
Far too slowly.
Like a tree growing from soil that had never been watered.
And as he stood, the gods present realized that the youngest was neither as tall as they had imagined nor as short as they had hoped, for what made him seem so immense was not his height, but the shadow stretching across the marble floor, spreading like spilled ink upon paper that had never dried.
"That samurai man who has not bathed for a thousand years," he continued, his gray eyes, like the sky before a storm, now gleaming with something they had never seen before.
Not joy.
Not hatred.
But a starving curiosity.
A curiosity that would never be satisfied by merely watching from afar.
"You said he came through the western gate alongside a woman. Judging by his appearance, it seems he rarely ever touches his sword. Interesting. Very interesting. I want to see him. I want to stand beside him. I want to... find out whether the scent of a thousand years without bathing is truly as overwhelming as all of you imagine."
Fuuuuh!!
"Let the young hole come closer," the youngest continued, and his voice changed once again, returning to that whisper which seeped into the pores of the air, into the cracks of the marble, into the hearts of every god who no longer dared to move.
"Let him walk at his own unhurried pace, with his hands in his pockets and his eyes half-closed as though fighting off sleep. Let reality itself grow weary behind him. Let tiny fractures trail in his footsteps. Let him approach the pillar of the Inverted Crucifixion where Erietta Bathee will lie."
The Land of the Gods, which only that morning had remained silent beneath a suffocating stillness filled with restrained breaths and faint smiles, had now transformed into an ocean of chaos that no one had ever imagined.
Not the gods who believed themselves immortal.
Not the messengers carrying reports from collapsing gates.
Not even the youngest himself, seated upon his throne with a smile whose edges had begun to crack.
Across every layer, every corridor, every grand hall that had once been magnificent before its inhabitants fled with robes fluttering and eyes no longer capable of hiding their panic, the Rebels fought against the Gods with hatred carved into every strike of their weapons.
The Hypocrites infiltrated the ranks of the Gods with smiles just as thin as the youngest's own, yet driven by intentions infinitely more cruel.
The Deceivers twisted reality itself into endless labyrinths, causing gods who should have soared through the skies to wander in circles through the same place for hours.
And the Sinners, the most absurd among the four factions, attacked not with swords or spells, but with laughter.
Laughter that reminded every God of the ancient sins they believed had long since been buried together with the bones of victims they had never bothered to count.
"You have forgotten that you were never holy!" shouted one of the Sinners, his voice echoing from a thousand throats at once.
The Gods who heard him immediately dropped to their knees.
Not out of reverence.
But because they remembered a young girl they had abandoned to die in a distant universe thousands of years ago.
They remembered a child they had torn apart simply because he had been born of tainted blood.
They remembered prayers they had left unanswered, suspended in the air until those prayers transformed into curses that had now returned to them in flesh, bone, and laughter that refused to end.
Meanwhile, closer to the heart of the Land of the Gods, where the upside-down pillars of atonement stood in flawless formation awaiting the body of Erietta Bathee, who was still on her way toward death, the fourteen immortal Disturbers advanced like a storm that never grew tired.
Bes, whose body had once been shattered into countless pieces, now stood fully restored, smashing two Gods at once with fists incapable of feeling pain because he had never known pain since being born from the wrong womb.
Enlil, whose death had once been mourned by thousands of followers, now laughed while standing atop the corpses of three gods who had tried to block his path.
Lamashtu, her hair transformed into countless tiny serpents, bit the wrists of gods too slow to evade her.
Ahura Mazda, once revered as the God of Light, had instead become the deepest darkness imaginable, engulfing his enemies within a night that even divine eyes could not pierce.
And Mictlantecuhtli, the quietest among them all, merely walked through the ranks of the gods with slow, unhurried steps.
Every god he passed collapsed one after another.
Not because of wounds.
But because of forgetfulness.
For Mictlantecuhtli carried away their memories of who they were, why they fought, even their own names, leaving them to fall with mouths hanging open, unable to remember whom they served or why their bodies suddenly felt so unbearably cold.
The ten greatest gods guarding the area around the crucifixion site fought with everything they had.
Not because they were courageous.
But because they knew that only a few steps behind them, Erietta Bathee was being prepared for her death.
If they retreated, then every preparation for the Inverted Crucifixion, a ritual that had taken thousands of years to complete, would collapse within a single night.
"You will not get past us!" shouted a god wearing a golden robe already torn in seven different places.
Blood streamed down his forehead, yet his eyes still burned with a fire that refused to die.
In response, Bes merely smiled.
A broad smile.
Far too broad.
Revealing rows of teeth that had never been brushed since the very day he was born.
Then he struck again.
And again.
And again.
Until the god in the golden robe no longer possessed a face that anyone could recognize.
Not far from the center of the chaos, only a few light-years away, a distance that a god could cross in three blinks but that would seem like an endless journey to ordinary beings, Aldraya Kansh Que, the former Supreme Angel who had once devoted his entire existence to the Almighty Quil-Hasa before his love and devotion transformed into a hatred so profound that no god, demon, or angel could measure it any longer, now stood before three figures blocking his path.
The youngest's left hand, with neatly tied black hair and narrow eyes that never blinked more than necessary.
The youngest's right hand, shorter in stature, whose fingers remained tightly clenched as though forever holding something he would never release.
And the youngest's personal assistant, whose face could never be read by anyone, because it was never the same face on two different occasions.
To be continued…