Chapter 276: The Savior and the Savior's High Five
The inability to look directly upon a god was one of the laws of this world, and also the most fundamental principle behind Mystery itself.
It was the reason lesser mysteries always failed before older, deeper ones.
In the end, Mystery could be defined as nothing more than the degree of information coverage.
A small amount of information cast into a vastly greater amount vanished like a mud ox sinking into the sea, unable to raise even the faintest ripple. A mystery that covered only a brief span of time would naturally collapse before one that stretched back through an ancient age.
Mystery was like that.
Gods were like that as well.
The older the god, the more immense the information it possessed. Its scale alone was enough to make an ordinary person collapse at a glance. Even its outer shell carried a complexity capable of inflicting direct damage simply by being perceived.
And yet, at this moment, Fujimaru Ritsuka, who understood that principle very clearly, still chose to look directly at the Great Old One called Cthulhu, the being curled above R'lyeh and locked in battle against Rowe.
She bore that boundless information head on.
And because that information poured into her, because that Mystery surged through her, she fell into a nightmare.
The Lord of Slumber ruled over ten thousand dreams.
Its Mystery was the embodiment of dreams themselves.
And why were nightmares nightmares?
Because they were always the most fragile part of the human heart. They were the form taken by what a person feared most.
"I hope it works, last savior of human order."
Martha watched as Ritsuka vanished before her eyes, fully aware that the girl had stepped into the dream woven from the outflowing power of Cthulhu.
The Dragon Taming Saint let out a breath, then lifted her head toward the sky.
"Senpai..."
Mashu was worried, but she also knew that this was her senpai's battlefield.
And before that...
"We have to protect this place."
Martha grinned. Her long purple hair flowed behind her, and the white ornaments woven into either side of her hair fluttered in the wind like a bridal veil. She slightly lifted the cross spear in her hand while her other hand curled into a fist, faintly revealing the outline of toned muscle beneath the fair skin of her wrist.
The wind raged on.
The beautiful young girl stood her ground.
Mashu also took a deep breath, tightened her grip on her shield, and looked toward the opposite side, toward the streets of R'lyeh.
Heavy moisture saturated that ancient city submerged within a sea of dreams. The streets were slick and damp, the massive structures on either side towering and magnificent, yet twisted into impossible shapes. One figure after another crawled out from the shadows.
Bodies covered in scales.
Fins swaying and twisting.
Tentacles writhing and unfurling.
Gills pulsing and releasing bubbles.
These were the monsters currently spilling out into the outer world, into the Singularity of France. They were kin of Cthulhu's kin, a race hidden in the abyss beneath nightmare.
And they were the enemies Martha and Mashu had to face now.
They had to hold these things back and buy Ritsuka enough time to escape the nightmare and shatter the ancient dream called R'lyeh.
"Monsters, let me show you just how frightening I, Martha, can be!"
A violent roar answered her.
Behind the Dragon Taming Saint, who held spear and fist at the ready, a massive evil dragon descended from the sky. Once a wicked dragon that had rampaged unrestrained, now subdued beneath the Saint's authority, it let out a thunderous roar.
Martha, the Dragon Taming Saint, displayed the fearsome strength granted to her beneath the Lord.
Rumble.
Above R'lyeh, the holy sword and the descending tentacles clashed once more.
Cthulhu's vast body hung in the air, yet moved with terrifying speed and agility. R'lyeh was the domain of the Great Old One. Whether it was its movements or its very existence, everything about it was amplified without limit.
Rowe retreated half a step and blocked the incoming erosion.
He did not fear death. But even in battle, he still had to avoid being directly corroded if he could.
Being polluted by the power of the Great Old Ones would not kill him.
It would only defile his own Spirit Core and turn him into one of them.
But though he withdrew, he advanced again the next moment. The holy sword in his hand swept upward, severing tentacles and colliding with the fist Cthulhu drove down at him.
Sword and fist crossed.
R'lyeh trembled.
The truth proved once again that even Great Old Ones from the abyss could not escape the rules already established within the present universe.
The existence of gods in the dark universe had never been material. During the age when darkness ruled the cosmos, there had been no true matter to speak of. Everything had existed as chaotic, disordered states of information.
But the current universe had long since entered an age illuminated by stars.
An age of light.
An age of order.
This was an era where matter and information coexisted.
And more importantly, one where matter dominated.
If information wished to erode the material universe, it first had to take on material form.
The same principle applied if Cthulhu wished to corrupt Rowe.
Because Rowe was not weaker than Cthulhu's true body, its chaotic information could not simply override his consciousness state directly.
"But if it were one of the strongest Great Old Ones, one of the Three Pillar Gods, or even Azathoth, source of the dark universe itself, then it likely would not be this troublesome at all."
The most powerful among the Great Old Ones possessed the ability to directly interfere with the material world while still remaining in informational form.
Rowe had no doubts about that.
After all, he had already clashed with their avatars before, during the countless occasions after the Origin Universe had been shaped, when he had gone from dead universe to dead universe, reigniting them one by one.
So Rowe was both fortunate and regretful.
And now, after retreating, the next swing of his sword became even more decisive, even more ruthless.
If you will not kill me,
then I will kill you.
Roar.
The killing intent pouring from him made the long slumbering Lord of Slumber emit a restless howl.
That deep roar was, to ordinary ears, nothing but unspeakable gibberish. Yet the waters of R'lyeh trembled in response. The vapor hanging through the city suddenly surged into a vast storm around Cthulhu's monstrous body. Layers of mist condensed into black clouds, and within those clouds, lightning began to flicker.
The vault above churned violently.
Rowe floated within it like a lone boat on a storm wracked ocean.
He stood at the prow and looked upward.
Ahead of him, the giant and hideous form of Cthulhu loomed against the sky.
But Rowe was no fisherman.
Cthulhu was enormous, yes.
But not invincible.
The monster raised its hand.
It thrust that hand into the dark clouds and vapor it had just formed, and its palm, which ended in a long blade like claw, clenched tight around something within.
It pulled out a spear.
Gripping the spear, Cthulhu thrust it toward Rowe amid a roar of inhuman noise.
At that instant, Rowe felt like a fish darting through a pond.
And Cthulhu became a fisherman holding a harpoon.
His eyes narrowed.
The spear shimmered in the distance, but within that shimmer was a twisted darkness spreading in crisscrossing strands. Though it appeared to be no more than condensed lightning, it was in truth a sea of plasma compressed to the utmost extreme.
Cthulhu, commander of water, was also a god who commanded thunder in the dark abyss.
In the dark side of the universe, everything was black, devoid of color and light.
Thunder was no exception.
But precisely because it lacked all light and color, it displayed its terror even more clearly. It could swallow every hue, every radiance, and naturally, it could also swallow matter itself.
To Cthulhu, the material universe was no more than a painting beneath an artist's brush.
One stroke was enough to erase the colors entirely.
This was the power of the ultimate abyss that Cthulhu wielded.
And yet, facing such power, Rowe merely bent his knees.
He reversed his grip on the Holy Sword of the Heart, and then all at once tensed his legs.
The air let out a piercing cry.
Vortices converged around him.
And with the sword held upward in reverse grip, he struck.
A reverse upward slash.
A sword line rising from below like a cold dragon ascending.
It collided head on with Cthulhu's spear.
The sea of plasma boiled on impact. Power spilled in every direction. The darkness of the abyss swallowed all surrounding light, engulfing the area in blackness.
But in that dimmed world, under the dome of nightmare that was R'lyeh, only the sword in Rowe's hand still shone.
The Holy Sword of the Star.
The Holy Sword of the Heart.
A blade forged from both the star and human order.
Though Rowe merely borrowed it, he could still fully wield its power, and through its nature, oppose the darkness of the cosmic abyss.
It was the Sword of Creation.
A sword that created matter and light.
And therefore it perfectly countered the power Cthulhu now wielded.
He blocked it.
But Cthulhu twisted its wrist at once, drawing the spear back.
The ancient terror intended to use that recoil to throw Rowe's balance into ruin.
Yet as the sea of plasma and the Sword of Creation scraped against one another, as sparks scattered and splashed around him, Rowe's body did not so much as sway.
He stood rooted in place like a mountain.
Spear and sword separated.
But Cthulhu advanced again.
Its giant body moved with astonishing quickness as the spear drove forward, carrying with it the force to pierce the material universe.
This time Rowe did not meet it directly.
Not because he could not.
Simply because he had no need to.
In an instant, he lifted one foot and stepped upward, avoiding the spear by the narrowest margin. At the same time his waist twisted and his body dropped. His legs stomped down hard onto the shaft of the spear.
Thunder seared at the soles of his feet.
It was as though an ocean had begun to boil beneath him.
The immense force surged upward, but instead of resisting it, Rowe bent his knees and then bent them again, launching himself into the air as though making a second leap.
This time he held the sword in a forward grip.
Its light aligned with his eyes.
Its path aligned with his gaze.
And through that, with his entire body.
One man, one sword.
The man became the sword.
Body and blade as one, like an arrow loosed from a fully drawn bow.
Its momentum resembled a rainbow piercing the sun.
A single hum rang out.
The surrounding darkness shattered at once, torn apart by a line of brilliant light.
Using the force of Cthulhu's own attack, Rowe crossed the distance in an instant and appeared directly before the Lord of R'lyeh.
The sword in his hand had already gathered power to the utmost limit.
The collision between the dark side of the cosmos and the surface world lasted only a heartbeat.
Cthulhu's body was vaguely humanoid, its blue scaled frame enormous and grotesque, but its face and head were made of countless writhing tentacles like an octopus.
Yet as Rowe closed in,
those countless tentacles suddenly peeled open.
Beneath them, Cthulhu revealed its true face.
An edge lined with intersecting fangs wrapped around crimson flesh.
Countless red tendrils twisted like giant snakes in frenzy.
And within that opening was endless darkness.
Endless void.
Beneath Cthulhu's true face was a passage leading directly to the ultimate abyss.
"Human, you fell for it."
Even an Evil God used schemes.
The Great Old Ones existed upstream of time itself. They belonged to the early age of cosmic birth, yet their existence stretched across all eras. They had always observed humanity, always influenced it in secret.
Because they found it interesting.
They understood humans very well.
Luring Rowe in.
Exposing a weakness on purpose.
Letting a powerful human grasp at hope, only to meet despair at the next instant.
Cthulhu found that delightful.
The sword light in Rowe's hand stabbed forward. The dark side of the universe and the present world collided. Cthulhu's body of flesh and scale was immense, but suddenly those tentacles opened to reveal the abyss behind them. That was the way in.
That was the trap.
If Rowe thrust any deeper, he would be pulled into the absolute darkness.
The Sleeper in the abyss delighted in the scene already forming in its mind.
"Humans are always humans. Ants are always ants."
"For you to entertain me, that is the highest value your existence can possess."
The delighted voice transformed into invisible gibberish echoing through R'lyeh.
Pleasure had always been Cthulhu's reason for acting.
For pleasure, it could war against other Evil Gods and send its kin into conflicts on a cosmic scale.
For pleasure, it could even allow itself to be overturned by a tiny fishing boat, simply to enjoy the momentary change in a human heart.
And at this moment, it was delighted.
Because it could already see Rowe's end.
That sword thrust would carry him into the ultimate abyss.
Cthulhu could sense it clearly. Rowe had always avoided corruption by the Evil Gods. He had always avoided becoming one of them.
Which only made Cthulhu desire it more.
"Come."
"Come join us."
"Become one of the ultimate abyss. Become an eternal player of ancient times."
"Become, gah...?!"
The final word broke off into a jarring sound.
Cthulhu's enormous body stiffened.
Its manifested form in the material world had encountered resistance, as if a single gear inside an immense and perfect machine had jammed.
That pause lasted only a one in a billionth of a second.
But for Rowe, that was enough.
The sword light flashed.
His body swept past Cthulhu's colossal frame.
And as they passed one another, the sword in his hand did not remain in his grip.
He threw it.
He hurled the blade straight into the yawning abyss inside the Evil God's mouth.
Threw it.
And then let it bloom.
Darkness was swallowed whole.
The next instant, layer upon layer of shimmering light burst from within Cthulhu's body itself, as if its skin were splitting open from the inside.
Cthulhu was startled.
Startled because...
"Besides you, there is actually another human who can break through my nightmare."
"Interesting. Very interesting."
Cthulhu had lost, yet it seemed even more delighted.
"This body of yours... I will take it."
Rowe turned and looked at the swaying colossal body behind him.
He did not take this chance to kill Cthulhu.
He merely used the sword in its body to pin it in place.
Pinned within this Singularity.
Pinned so its existence would stabilize the Singularity.
Pinned so the Singularity could expand its sphere of influence.
Pinned so this fragment of the universe's dark side could become the first bundle of kindling used to ignite the world's vitality.
Cthulhu no longer struggled.
Instead, ever since awakening from its slumber, it had only found itself more and more pleased.
As long as it was pleased,
that alone was enough.
"It succeeded."
Rowe let out a quiet breath.
Then he lifted his head and gently extended one hand.
His long fingers rose into the air.
And with a soft motion, he flicked them forward.
Snap.
A crisp sound echoed through the sky.
Rowe smiled.
"As expected of humanity's last Master."
"As expected of the last savior."
The clouds above R'lyeh boiled. The black clouds and storm still roared without end.
"Senpai...?"
"It looks like it worked!"
Between Mashu's startled voice and Martha's slowly rising smile, Fujimaru Ritsuka opened her eyes.
"Ah... of course it did."
"I am Chaldea's last Master, after all."
The red haired girl's voice rang out with clear confidence and spirit.
Then she looked at her palms.
"As expected of you too, Mr. Rowe."
"Or rather... humanity's first savior."