Chapter 656 - Down from Olympus

Sofia was not the kind of person who would fall to the same trick twice in a row, the asterite chest she had gotten from the coin-thrower dwarf appeared between her back and the demon’s four blades. The demon’s weapons shattered and that extra time was all it took for Pareth to teleport to Sofia again and catch the demon like a grappler.

Give me five seconds! She ordered Pareth as two glowing human skulls dripping with blood appeared around her..

Meanwhile Kuli survived the same predicament in a much different manner, she back-flipped, her tiny frame slipping through two of the incoming blade as she spun in the air toward the demon. As her extended hands reached the demon’s chest, she grabbed a thorny outgrowth and both herself and the demon suddenly flipped in a way that defied all physics, slamming the demon head first into the glassy ground.

It only took an instant before two new demons appeared, surrounding Mornn, who had been channeling something. An array of orichalcum swords appeared around her, perfectly deflecting all the blows as she continued her channeling.

It’s as I feared…

“Try not to kill it too often!” she shouted to the others, “It multiplies every time!”

At the same time, the one Pareth had grabbed was slowly freeing himself from the skeleton’s grasp.

Kuli jumped up at an impressive speed, unleashing a familiar move at one of the two demons attacking Mornn, a punch that created rippling shockwaves in the air. It did nothing to the demon.

“They have no soul!” She yelled, as the demon she attacked suddenly turned around and sliced her up. She barely saw it coming with her signature skill, but her mobility in the air was subpar at best, she twisted her body like a falling cat, avoiding three of the blades while the fourth struck her left leg, slicing off her ankle and foot.

The demon Pareth was holding was about to free himself, so rather than to let it throw itself at Sofia again, Pareth used [Gravity well] to keep it there and crush its bones against his armor of light, rendering it unable to struggle without killing it.

At the same time, Mornn finally finished channeling her spell. Hundreds of swords of fire appeared in the sky above the battlefield. They started raining down, killing the two demons near her and Kuli as they were impaled by dozens of fiery swords.

Four more demons appeared around them.

“I’ll just kill them all!” Mornn screamed, as the fire swords kept raining down and the demon multiplied again and again.

Kuli did her best to take some distance, returning to the ground where she had better mobility as the rain of fire continued.

Sofia could feel Mornn’s mana plummeting, Sun’s saintess would not be able to keep that up for long, but it did buy Sofia enough time to finish her own channeling.

Sofia’s own skulls in the [Skull Choir] copied her spell casts even if it still used her mana. As she had learned during the last trial, this was the perfect tool to apply the rot faster. Using 900 000 mana, herself and her skulls each channeled a 300 000 [Saintomancer’s Star] as the rain of swords ended.

Three bright spheres of radiant light appeared above Sofia and her skulls, like three brilliant suns dispelling the night. 

The hundreds of demon copies rushing at Mornn all instantly turned in unison. 

Their gazes were fixated on the suns. They had a new target. Many of them simply disappeared and reappeared closer, teleporting to be as close to the suns as they could, the warmth of its light burning their skin.

Sofia activated the skill again. The balls of light seemed to implode and invert as their light turned sickly and gray. The world seemed to lose its colors as the light touched it, and that was for only a moment, as the rot soon started to spread.

From the demons to the mountains and the plains in the distance. Everything was getting rapidly covered by a destructive layer of black manavore rot.

Sofia did not stay behind to see if that was enough to suppress the demons. The suns would hold for about one minute, so this was how long she had.

Pareth! Stay here unless I call, defend the others two. She ordered as she plunged straight down into the fault.

These fuckers have too little health. They run on low mana. They have no core and no soul.

The original must still be down there! The first demon we killed was already a copy.

Sofia rapidly sunk into the darkness, without the rot-covered demons even noticing. Though her mana was almost empty, she still had many cards to play. She discovered the rift at the bottom, in the middle of a giant lake of magma, and adjusted her trajectory towards it without a second thought. When she felt it was about time, she activated the skill.

The nice thing about sending a huge explosive plasma bolt at an army was, it counts as a lot of lightning damage.

Sofia’s forehead split open as she traversed the rift in space. On that day, the demon world experienced its first thunderstorm.

[Avatar of Zeus]: Reality inspires myth, myth inspires reality.

Your blood progressively charges up with divine lightning as you inflict lightning damage in combat, you may only activate this skill when fully charged.

Become the Avatar of Zeus for a short duration, fully replenishing your health, stamina and mana, while unleashing a lightning storm around you.

For as long as the Avatar form lasts, you gain:

-Immunity to all negative status effects.

-Immunity to lightning.

-50% increased healing received.

-50% increased lightning damage inflicted.

-All your damage is lightning damage.

-Limited lightning authority.

-Lust.

When the Avatar form expires, for the next hour:

-Receive 20% increased damage from all sources.

-Effective magic range decreased to 1 meter.

-All mana costs are doubled.

In a spectator room full of actual gods, the sight of Sofia’s new form raised some questions.

“Is that… That’s something they can do, now? The avatar of a fake god?!”

“Come on, Love,” Sun replied, sipping on a drink through a straw, “She’s currently carrying nineteen divine essences. That’s more than anyone in this room. And two of them are from the Lords themselves. What did you expect? You know full well how fucked Stebron’s magic is.”

“But he’s a dragon…” Love replied, a confused expression on her face full of of makeup.

“Shouldn’t we do something about her?” another god asked, “Not that I side with Scripture, but this could end up badly…”

“You don’t have all the information, Wealth,” Sun answered, “yes it could end up badly, and trust me, I don’t want another leviathan either… But if I read all the signs correctly, we really need her to perform. More than that, I would say we need more people like her. Moon’s Oracle and my Saintess show good potential also… I just wish I’d understood Anna’s warning earlier…”

“What? The issue with the core should be long fixed by now,” another god said, “There are more than enough ascended already.”

Sun shook her head. “No, Progress. You all really don’t get it. The core was never the real problem… “

“Then, what is?” Peace asked from a corner of the room.

“Listen… I wanted to keep that for the end not to ruin the mood, but… I know I can trust all of you here. Information about what I’m going to be showing you must never leave this room. Understood? This is something only the High-Scribes, Death, Moon and Myself are privy to at the moment.”

After everyone acquiesced an image appeared on one of the room’s walls under Sun’s command. It was the image of a vivid midenicite mural. At the top, written in cursive old Fae language, the more knowledgeable gods were able to decipher a few words.

‘The great tapestry of fate.’

In the field of ash Sofia’s bolt had left in the demon world, the demon was sitting cross-legged on the ground, looking at the rift, as if he had been waiting for Sofia’s arrival.

He watched as her muscular Avatar form, still only half as tall as he was, emerged from the rift and landed heavily on the glassy ground, kicking up a cloud of ash.

Lightning formed overhead and struck the demon dozens of time, but none truly reached him, stopped by multiple layers of mana shields. Besides that, he had no visible weapon. He slowly stood up as Sofia recovered from her forceful landing; black ash fell from his upturned palms, flowing through his clawed fingers.

“My army…” the demon said, “turned to ashes.” What his voice communicated was not pain or sadness, merely disappointment.

The sound of his voice barely reached Sofia, whose sense were altered and warped by Zeus’ lust.

“You shall join them soon, filth,” Sofia answered before her brain could even process her words, a stake of lightning appearing in both of her hands, and four more appearing nearby, two for each of her choir skulls.

“You think you stand a chance against me with your measly lightning and explosions? Pathetic,” the demon answered, summoning his own weapons. In truth this demon ‘lord’ was no warrior, he was a pure mage, two of his hands holding a scepter tall like a tree, while in the others he held massive tower shield engraved with the screaming faces of a thousand humans. “Let me show you true magic,” he said as he unleashed lightning magic of his own, a streak of red electricity shooting straight from his staff to Sofia’s head.

Sofia charged straight at him. The red lightning hit her squarely on the head without doing any damage, and affecting her with several curses and status effects she was immune to. She reached the demon’s raised shield, slamming a piercing bolt into it. Her bolt was stopped by the mana shields before it even reached the physical one, and the demon teleported hundreds of meters away. He instantly started to channel a frost spell that spread cold air through the underworld as a massive white crystal formed above his head..

Really a pure spellcaster? Sofia wondered as she charged at the demon again.

As long as his clones all stay on the surface, this is going to be easy.

I’m a pure mage’s worst nightmare.