Chapter 217: Body of Divine Remains, Tearing the Domain

The earth beneath his feet was rising at a pace that was not swift, yet possessed an unsettling, absolute stability, hurtling toward the vaulted ceiling of the Shadow of the Royal City above. Wang Yu stood at the edge of this rising land, watching the events unfold in its center.

Wang Yu tentatively called the entity—born from the Abyss Will being inverted by the reflection of the stars—the Perfectionist. At this moment, the thing was walking toward a colossal body embedded deep within the soil.

Most of that frame was buried, with only the head and one arm exposed. There was no decay, no sign of ruin; it was smooth, fair, and unimaginably vast. By Wang Yu’s estimation, the arm alone exceeded ten meters in length.

"So this is the divine remains of the end. Is this what a god’s body looks like? I don't think I’ve ever truly seen the form of a proper deity before."

Wang Yu pondered. This was likely his first time witnessing a genuine divine shell. The Lady of Night and the God of Light lacked physical forms, and the Source of Life, Elfin, had been an incomplete existence. This massive corpse before him was the first true divine body he had ever beheld—and it was, by all appearances, a relic.

"Who killed this thing, and why is the corpse so pristine?"

As Wang Yu mused, the Perfectionist reached the head of the remains. It was clearly a woman’s face, though buried too deeply in the earth to discern her features.

Reaching out, the Perfectionist touched the head of the remains with a hand that lacked any flaw. With a ripple of inexplicable energy, the Perfectionist vanished from Wang Yu’s sight.

The next moment, the ground began to shudder. Wang Yu was forced to condense blood into a longsword, driving it into the earth to maintain his balance and prevent himself from falling off the fragmenting land.

"Well, damn."

Watching the scene, Wang Yu sighed in genuine awe. After the Perfectionist disappeared, the body buried in the earth began to stir. The arm tore through the soil, the head lifted from the depths, and the torso gradually revealed itself.

As the divine remains moved, the earth shattered completely, transforming into floating boulders of varying sizes that surged toward the ceiling above.

"Flap..." The sound of wings beating. Wang Yu clung to a floating rock, staring at the body that had fully detached from the earth.

A pair of enormous, snow-white wings unfurled behind the female form. As they beat, countless brilliant, pure ribbons of light swirled around wings nearly as vast as the body itself, illuminating the perpetually pitch-black environment of the Shadow of the Royal City with blinding radiance.

"What is this? An angel?"

Wang Yu instinctively made the connection. The divine remains looked remarkably like an angel: a face of exquisite, unbelievable beauty; a posture that balanced resilience with grace; and eyes that held an indifferent gaze toward all things.

White, translucent veils draped over a figure that was both voluptuous and athletic, covering only what needed to be covered. It did not hide a shred of feminine beauty, yet it stirred no profane thoughts in the observer.

"Why did Alastair hide something like this beneath the Abyss? It’s undeniably powerful, but where did they get the confidence to control it?"

Wang Yu frowned slightly. There was no questioning the strength of this being—whether it was a god or an angel. The sheer power required to lift the earth beneath the Abyss without the slightest effort spoke for itself.

But would this thing truly help Alastair? Was it truly controllable?

"The Star Reflection is spent; there’s no way to bury this thing back into the Abyss now. I hope whoever gave this order had enough confidence to use this thing to kill the God of Fear and then dispose of it properly."

Feeling the Star Reflection—that strange object hovering in the void above his head—Wang Yu knew it could not be used a second time in the short term. In other words, this holy, powerful angel could not be turned back.

"But one thing is certain: this thing has a major grievance with that hideous God of Fear. Their natures are diametrically opposed. It’s likely going to slaughter that god created by Sewentan."

Wang Yu released a large amount of blood, which pierced into the rock beneath his feet, forming external limbs like those of a spider. He used them to shift his position to the underside of the rock, hanging there to stay away from the side facing the ceiling.

The angel had already raised its hand toward the vault. Pure white light erupted from its palm, and cracks instantly appeared across the ceiling of the underground world, through which blinding holy light poured.

The massive chunks of earth were nearing the ceiling. Soon, they would collide with the base of the plaza above. Wang Yu did not want to be crushed into a pulp, so he had to ensure the rock absorbed the impact.

"Boom!"

Countless boulders, driven by the angel’s power, slammed into the ceiling of the underground world.

There was no earth-shattering tremor. The ceiling, already riddled with cracks leaking white light, simply shattered. It turned into a sky full of debris, just like the rocks colliding with it. Accompanied by a pillar of holy light that shot toward the heavens, it breached the surface of the Royal City—the plaza where the God of Fear’s domain resided.

The angel raised its head. Its perfect, beautiful face remained expressionless, its eyes filled only with indifference.

It raised an arm, fingers splayed. Light flowed, and the ribbons circling its massive white wings converged into its hand, forming a spear of light.

With a slight pull back and a throw that lacked any visible exertion, the spear transformed into a streak of light invisible to the naked eye. It pierced through the floating debris and shot directly toward the giant shadow looming over the God of Fear’s "Divine Kingdom."

As expected, this angel—the embodiment of flawlessness and perfection—had struck out against that hideous, coalesced mass: the God of Fear.

...

"Is this the target Wang Yu intended to release? How beautiful. Where does such power come from?"

Evie stood at the Nightfall Church’s station in the Shadow of the Royal City, gazing at the holy angel in the sky, marveling at the beauty and power of that form.

There was a touch of envy, a hint of admiration, but mostly curiosity. As a scholar, Evie maintained an unquenchable desire to explore the unknown.

Beneath the Shadow of the Royal City, this underground world that had lacked light for ages was now illuminated by the white glow radiating from the angel.

All the gang members who had been fighting in the underground city ceased their combat, their gazes drawn to the figure that had shattered the vault of the Shadow of the Royal City.

"Thud..."

That was the first sound. A gang member dropped his weapon, abruptly falling to his knees and bowing his head until it touched the ground.

"Thud, thud, thud..."

Then came more sounds of kneeling. A multitude of gang members collapsed to the ground, pressing their foreheads against the earth with clear, rhythmic impacts. Their eyes began to fill with reverence, slowly turning into fanaticism.

"Oh, God, you have finally descended! You are so perfect. Please accept the faith of my humble, filthy soul; wash away my sins and purify my corruption!"

"My Lord, you are so great, so powerful! You bring eternal salvation to us lowly mortals. Please, let me follow in your footsteps and spread your gospel!"

They spoke words of praise. For some reason, these gang members, who usually lacked any faith, began to entrust their souls to this holy being the moment they glimpsed its form.

"So powerful, so majestic, so perfect. Even though I serve another god, I am still willing to offer you my highest respects."

Some who already held faith did not change their allegiance, yet they too knelt, offering the highest tribute to the holy shadow.

"Something is wrong. What is happening? I have to see."

Evie looked at the followers of the Lady of Night with surprise. Some believers were clutching their heads in confusion, sensing something in their minds influencing them.

Others, who had been observing the situation, quickly realized the problem.

"Something is affecting our souls. These things are twisting our will. The prayer network is helping us disperse some of it, but it’s increasing! We need protection!"

Evie did not feel her own will being affected, but she reacted quickly, entering her mental space.

Standing within the castle of her mind, Evie looked toward the boundary—the edge of her mental space, which was shrouded by the mental protection Wang Yu had provided.

Outside the girl’s mental space, it was "raining." Droplets of white light fell from nowhere, striking the outer layer of her mental shield, then sliding down to continue their endless descent.

"Is this... mental energy? I’ve read about this form of manifestation in books. It should be something projected unconsciously by a powerful entity, affecting the souls of those around it. It’s normal."

The light rain the girl saw now was very similar to the red rain from the academy incident; both were things that affected the souls of sentient beings.

Evie had learned from the texts she studied later that this rain-like form was an unconscious act—a radiation and influence exerted by a powerful consciousness upon weaker ones nearby.

"It’s that thing above. This can’t go on; the members of the Nightfall Church will be affected."

Evie was worried. She quickly prayed to the Lady of Night, asking for her protection to drive away the things influencing the believers' wills.

As Evie prayed, flowing darkness appeared at the Nightfall Church’s station, gradually covering an area and forming a patch of shadow that looked out of place in the brilliant light.

This area was similar to the darkness the Lady of Night had previously cast over the church, but much smaller in scale. With the Shadow of the Royal City having lost its characteristic of merging the void with the material world, it had become difficult for the Lady of Night to exert her power.

"Everyone, get inside the Lady of Night’s protection quickly!"

Evie called out to the believers, then cast her gaze toward the rock fragments rising alongside the angel.

Having used a spell to enhance her vision, Evie spotted a figure clinging to a rock. She was certain it was Wang Yu.

"Stay safe, please! Good luck!"

Across the vast distance, the girl made a gesture of encouragement, then joined the other believers within the Lady of Night’s domain.

...

On the surface of the Royal City, the plaza covered by the God of Fear’s "Divine Kingdom" was now crowded with a multitude of black silhouettes, indistinguishable by gender, age, or stature.

They drifted across the domain of the God of Fear, wandering aimlessly, their movements steeped in bewilderment as if they themselves could not fathom why they had been summoned to this place.

Some of the shadows took notice of the Alestler citizens who had met such grisly ends within the divine realm, kneeling beside the corpses to gently close eyes that remained fixed in a final, horrified stare.

Their true nature was not difficult to discern; in a world where the soul is a tangible reality, the concept of death becomes a delicate, shifting thing—does a man truly die when his heart ceases to beat, or only when his soul is shattered into nothingness?

If the soul is pulverized, yet the consciousness is reconstituted within a divine realm, can one truly say that death has claimed them, or have they merely transitioned?

Liches find resurrection through their phylacteries, and the undead possess souls of their own; in this world, the boundary between life and death is far less absolute than it was upon the Earth.

These shadowy figures haunting the God of Fear’s domain were the very residents of the Sewintan capital who had "died" during the divine descent.

In a sense, they had been reborn, reclaiming their own kingdom—a terrestrial divine realm built upon the ruins of the doomed city of Alestler.

To the people of Alestler, this was a realm choked with bottomless terror, yet to these shadow-born entities, it felt little different from the world they had inhabited in life.

Some of the figures seemed to have accepted this new existence, drifting into the vacant homes left behind by the city's former inhabitants, observing this strange, altered world with a flicker of curiosity.

Then, in the next heartbeat, the ground of the divine realm fractured; the plaza’s surface splintered into a web of fissures, and blinding, holy radiance erupted from the depths, piercing the sky like pillars of light that tore the God of Fear’s domain asunder.

Countless shadows were reduced to ash in the sudden, violent surge of power, vanishing into oblivion.

The plaza collapsed entirely, the light piercing the shroud of darkness to shatter the pervasive fear, as the form of an angel ascended from below, hurling a spear of light toward the colossal shadow of the God of Fear looming at the zenith of the realm.

For the first time, the titan of fear, which had remained motionless until this moment, stirred.