"Let's wipe them out, T."
YEAH!
Jay looked up as he saw the incoming attack from the golden sky.
Tens of thousands of high- to ultimate-class Divine Beasts rushed toward him like a falling star all at once in a magnifying speed. The sizzling, spluttering sound could be heard even from his position, their gigantic forms superheating the air along their path as they left a trailing vacuum behind them.
The attack, which could easily destroy a world in its wake and scorched the entire surface of it with an army of Divine Beasts.
ROARRRR
Hundreds of them surged toward Jay, trying to engulf him, overwhelm him, and completely evaporated his body. Though, as they came within a hundred meters of blasting him apart, Jay did not even try to move.
He just stood there.
And-
BOOM
Tens, dozens, and hundreds of Divine Serpent massive heads slammed into the ground where Jay had just stood, sending a massive explosion of sand hundreds of meters into the sky and engulfing the entire battlefield.
"Zayyn-kun!" Freya's voice echoed from atop Draghignazzo as a silver sword appeared in her hand, ready to leap into battle.
But she stopped when she saw a ripple in space from the blast as Jay casually appeared out of thin air behind hundreds of the giant Divine Serpents, looking like a small ant compared to them.
And with a casual swing of his hand, he whispered,
"Cleave."
SHIIIING
SPLURRRRRT
A black slash, Habakiri's Heaven-Severing strike wrapped in trail of black flames, instantly cleaved through hundreds of the Divine Beasts that had crashed to the ground and killed them. Jay did not even bother to release a burst of black flame following the slash, conserving his energy as Avesta watched their massive body wither.
Suddenly, a notification appeared before him.
___________________________________
246 Armies of Divine Beasts Killed
You got 11230 Player Points!
___________________________________
"Oh… what is this? Did he still think all of this was a game?"
Jay narrowed his eyes with interest but also mockery. The same thing that had happened when he destroyed Ares' Divine Chariot was happening here as well. His gaze remained fixed on the notification in front of him.
ROOAAARR
Without giving him a moment to breathe, another thousands Divine Beasts charged toward him. But Jay simply raised his left hand and pointed at them. And behind his back, the Anemo, Pyro, and Geo sigils ignited as he called upon the Spirit of Dust.
A buzzing white cube slowly formed at the tip of his finger.
And-
FWUUUUUNG
BOOOOM
A deafening explosion shook the battlefield as the white cube instantly expanded thousands of meters in front of him before it then shot forward like a beam of pure white, piercing through the golden clouds in the sky, completely disintegrating everything in its path and wiping out the thousand giant golden serpents that rushed towards him at once.
______________________________________
3,888 Armies of Divine Beasts Killed
You got 43,662 Player Points!
______________________________________
And just like that, Jay had already passed more than halfway toward the points needed to challenge Aten. But what was even the point now, when the Game Master himself was blatantly breaking the rules he had established?
Man fuck this, they're coming again… there's no end to this.
Hearing Theurgia's voice, Jay glanced upward once more and saw another horde of divine-born creatures. He looked toward the sky, where more and more Divine Serpents manifested from the golden clouds.
As Avesta analyzed the scene of their manifestation, Jay noticed millions of runes of Divine Energy flowing into those clouds from somewhere above. His eyes widened as realization began to dawn on him.
And suddenly, an idea formed in his mind.
"I take back my words. It seems we can end this pointless battle faster than I expected," Jay said.
Huh? What do you mean...
"Let's use that."
That?
"The idea I told you about..." Jay said.
Huh... wait, do you mean that absurd idea of yours about creating a massive area of effect attack or something like that?
"Yeah... This is the perfect time to use it."
No, no, no. You said that in this battle we need to conserve as much energy as possible before fighting the big boss. The whole Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap thing! Why the fuck did you suddenly change your mind?
"I didn't change my mind. I just think we can effectively finish all of them in an instant with that. That's Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap."
Yeah, cheap for you, motherfucker. You don't use your own energy, but for me? Calling upon that many spirits of all elements at once will put me to sleep for days.
"Hey i'm an orphan... And it's only a couple of days. You're being overdramatic... Besides, your power isn't even effective against Aten," Jay said. If Aten could somehow survive his Absolute Nonexistence, then even Mahayana would not be a big problem for him.
Ah, fuck. I hate you... You're even worse than Yesh!
"I only put you to sleep for days instead of thousands of years... Come on now," Jay said as he tightened his grip on Habakiri.
With the incoming horde closing in and his plan taking shape, Jay muttered,
"Then, let's take the higher ground and push them into the sky first."
The green sigils of Phyto, the sigils of Geo, and the sigils of Water ignited behind him.
As Jay clenched his left hand, he whispered,
"Spirit of Trees."
And suddenly, the ground beneath him shook and cracked. The sand vibrated as if some immense force was moving beneath the surface, threatening to explode the whole earth outward.
Freya and Rossweisse felt it even from the sky.
The Norse Goddess of Love, Beauty, and War stared down at the dunes where Jay stood against the incoming Divine Beasts, still trying to comprehend how easily the young human had slaughtered thousands of them with a single attack of him.
Meanwhile, the Valkyrie felt her body vibrated.
"What is this..." Rossweisse muttered as she slowly felt strength returning to her legs.
"The ground..."
And before either of them could comprehend what is happening, the dunes suddenly shifted.
The golden-bathed sands of Heliopolis, which had existed unchanged since the dawn of time, began to split like dry skin under unseen pressure. From those fractures, something impossibly delicate emerged.
Green.
Trees.
At first, they were small.
Tiny shoots, frail, pierced through the sand. They swayed weakly, as if testing the air of a realm that was never meant to harbor life. For a brief moment, it seemed harmless… even beautiful, as the endless dunes began to turn into a green tundra.
Jay remained still, not once taking his eyes off the incoming horde of Divine Beasts.
Meanwhile, Freya could only stare, completely at a loss for words as the barren expanse transformed before her.
"The desert..."
"Uwa..." Even Sekhmet could not believe what she was seeing. Since the day she was born, she had never witnessed greenery survive upon the surface of Heliopolis.
And it did not stop.
More trees followed as the dunes sandy surface, now filled with small trees began to breathe.
The sand rose and fell in slow, massive pulses as countless sprouts erupted across the horizon. What began as scattered growth became a tide, an unstoppable surge of life forcing itself into existence. Stems thickened, leaves unfurled, and trunks twisted upward with violent urgency.
CREAKKKKKKK
Then it exploded.
In a single instant, the golden expanse was devoured by a sprawling rainforest stretching for hundreds of kilometers. Towering trees burst toward the sky, their canopies crashing into one another. Vines lashed through the air, and the ground itself rose, buckled, and split apart as colossal roots forced their way upward.
And Jay didn't waste any time as he leapt onto one of the massive roots and launched himself into the sky using one of the root, straight toward the incoming horde.
But these were no ordinary roots.
They were thick, monstrous, spear-like structures of Spirit Tree wood as their surfaces shimmering with an otherworldly sheen.
As Jay traced the edge of Habakiri with his finger, a faint trail of black flame danced along its blade as he prepared for the collision.
And behind him, tens of thousands of roots erupted from the forest floor, shooting into the heavens like a storm of living lances.
And as Jay saw dozens of Divine Beasts hurtling toward him-
Suddenly-
SPLURRRTTTT
Massive Spirit Tree roots pierced through the radiant bodies of the Divine Beasts. Upon contact, the roots burned instantly with the aura of Divine Sun emanating from the beasts, their surfaces charring black and crumbling into ash under the overwhelming divine radiance.
And for a fleeting moment, all of it seemed futile.
But the forest did not stop.
Again and again.
CREAKKKKK
Each time they were incinerated, new roots grew from the stumps that remained. They returned thicker, stronger, and far more relentless. The roots drove deeper, forcing the serpents back, tearing through their blazing forms with sheer force and clearing a path through the sky for Jay.
And suddenly, from within the Divine Beasts, wood began to sprout.
Twisting, branching, tearing outward from inside their radiant bodies. Golden light flickered violently as thick, gnarled limbs burst through scales of pure divine aura, splitting them apart from within like a parasite.
ROARRRRRRR
The divine serpents writhed in agony as one after another fell. Some were torn apart instantly, while others were bound and crushed by the unyielding mass of towering trees and writhing roots.
And Jay moved forward without pause, stepping across the sprouting roots beneath his feet. He ignored every notification of kills and player points that appeared before him.
ROOARRRRRR
Suddenly, a golden serpent burst through the dense forest of roots, shattering and exploding its way toward him.
But with a casual swing of Habakiri-
"Cleave."
SHIIIIING
SPLURTTTT
Jay did not even spare it a glance as the golden Divine Beast was cleaved cleanly before he could even feel the heat radiating from its body, as it just withering into ash before falling from the sky. Then, as he emerged into the sea of clouds through the expanded roots, Jay then leapt into the air.
Floating there, his eyes scanned his surroundings.
"Hm..."
Within the sea of golden clouds, everything became clearer.
"As I thought… these golden clouds are where Aten manifests these Divine Beasts, while also using the sky itself as a source of Divine Aura," Jay murmured as he looked upward. Layer upon layer of the sky peeled away, as if every bit of energy Aten used was slowly consuming the barrier that enveloped the entire realm.
ROARRRRRR
A thunderous roar and a wave of superheated air snapped Jay's attention forward. Hundreds of thousands of Divine Serpents emerged from the golden clouds before him, while those that had survived the Spirit Forest continued to rise from below.
Yet Jay simply remained there.
Floating as a single point in the vast sky, silhouetted against the blinding radiance of the divine sun beasts.
In a silence, Jay suddenly opened his mouth.
"Let's meet again in a few days, my friend."
Ah, fuck it. Whatever. Just don't lose, aight?
"Of course." Jay said, a thin amused smile appeared on his face.
And the moment Theurgia's voice disappeared, everything changed.
As suddenly, all of the elementals sigils behind Jay ignited violently as he prepared to invoke the Spirit of the Six Paths. But this time, something was different. The hexagram behind him then slowly shattered into countless particles of light and compressing inward until they formed a single black orb floating above his palm.
A Truth-Seeker Orb, wrapped in a swirling, majestic myriad-colored aura.
"Then let's see how this goes..."
The Truth-Seeker Orb was the convergence of the six elemental forces of nature in this universe. It contained all their properties and every possible combination within a single form. This made it capable of tearing through anything in its path, even Divine Aura itself. Though it could still be resisted through extreme regeneration, as Ares had once done, it was more than enough to erase everything before him right now.
The golden clouds.
The hundreds of thousands of Divine Serpents.
To clear the sky.
And then, the world fell silent.
The wind stopped.
Even the air seemed to hold its breath, as if nature itself, even in a realm of gods, bowed before the weight of the presence contained within the black orb in his hand.
Jay's dark hazel eyes reflected the shifting colors dancing across the orb as he spoke.
"Spirit of the Six Paths."
Then the myriad-colored aura erupted, and followed by the physical form of the Truth-Seeking Orb itself.
It expanded outward, piercing the heavens as the small obsidian sphere transformed into a colossal blade made of an amalgamation of countless elemental spirits. A massive black sword formed in his grasp, radiating an overwhelming surge of aura that tore at everything around it, casting a shadow vast enough to swallow the dunes below.
And far in the distance, Freya, Rossweisse, and Sekhmet froze as they saw it.
"Is that… the power of the Draconic Deus Slayer…" Freya whispered, her pink hair whipping wildly in the violent gust unleashed by the colossal sword's expansion, nearly throwing her backward as it lashed around her. Even she could feel the overwhelming magnitude of energy contained within that blade.
Jay gazed at the enormous sword resting in his palm.
The ultimate technique of Ars Theurgia that he created.
Amid the roaring cries of hundreds of thousands of Divine Beasts, he whispered,
"Sword of Rupture..."
Then, with a single, casual motion, Jay lowered his hand, bringing the blade down as if to cleave the world itself apart as he commanded.
"MAHAYANA!"
Silence.
SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING
The world split apart without an explosion.
And in a slow black afterimage, the massive spirit sword tore through the golden sky, instantly erasing the golden clouds and the hundreds of thousands of Divine Beasts that had manifested from them, before continuing downward and cutting through the earth itself like a hot knife through butter.
The vast dunes, along with parts of the newly formed forest beneath them, were separated divided by a colossal rift stretching hundreds of kilometers in both width and length.
Just like that, the entire horde of Divine Beasts was wiped out instantly. And with the golden clouds gone, there was nothing left to manifest them as the dessert sky of Heliopolis turned pale blue once more.
Witnessing the realm change in mere moments, all caused by a single man.
That man, Jay, remained floating in place as he watched the giant Spirit Sword of Mahayana slowly disintegrate into particles of light after cleaving the earth apart. The fading fragments were absorbed back into the surrounding nature.
Moments later, the wind returned, gently brushing against his hair.
KLINK
"Hm?" Jay raised an eyebrow as a notification appeared before him.
____________________________________________
CONGRATULATIONS!
You have collected 6.269.850 Player Points!
You now have the right to advance to the final stage of the game!
To fight-
_____________________________________________
But as Jay's eyes remained fixed on the notification before him, his expression suddenly changed as all five of his senses detected something in that split second.
His eyes widened in an instant as he tried to move, sending a slash behind his back.
But suddenly-
SPLURTTTTT
A brown-skinned hand wrapped in the golden radiance of the Divine Sun appeared out of nowhere and pierced straight through his chest from behind. Blood splattered and fell toward the ground below.
Jay slowly glanced back over his shoulder, where he saw a brown-skinned man emerging from a golden tear in space.
Even with his body impaled in midair and his flesh searing from the divine heat, Jay still unfazed as he simply gritted his teeth in pain and narrowed his eyes.
His dark hazel gaze then met Aten's.
"Finally… you've shown yourself,
-Aten."
Meanwhile, the Supreme God of Ancient-Egyptian Faction, Aten just looked at him coldly.
"Die, Zayyn Illya Kovalenko."
***
Meanwhile, deep within the Forest of Valeyra,
Lavinia, Glenda, and Kuroka had been waiting for Jay for an hour. Yet even now, there was still no sign of him anywhere.
"Nya! He still hasn't come back! Where did boss go-nya!?" Kuroka exclaimed as she sat on a tree branch.
Lavinia, meanwhile, remained deep in thought.
'Is Illya-kun still in Solomon's Temple? No… if that were the case, he would have already teleported back,' she murmured to herself.
"We need to locate him first before we can teleport to his position... I doubt just anyone could disrupt my teleportation circle like that."
But, after a brief silence, Glenda finally spoke up.
"You need to calm yourself, Lavinia. That brat is strong. With his power, not many in this supernatural world could pose a threat to him," she said, gently patting her student's back.
Lavinia glanced at the purple-haired beautiful woman, though her expression still filled with worry for him.
"Oshishou-sama, but still…" Lavinia suddenly stopped as something clicked in her mind after hearing Glenda's words.
'Wait… Illya-kun's power… right. Theurgia!'
Her eyes widened in realization as she immediately began channeling mana through her body. Seeing the sudden movement from the blonde girl, Kuroka tilted her head in confusion.
"Nya! Lavinya, what are you doing?"
Lavinia then closed her eyes as a sphere of spirit energy formed before her, gradually shaping itself into a small, blue humanoid figure.
As her contracted Nature Spirit manifested, Lavinia spoke softly,
"I'll try to locate Illya-kun through Theurgia."