Chapter 479: Same Essence, Do a Favor

“……”

The massive fortress crushed down upon Sura’s body, which had been severed from the material world, its absolute "mass" ensuring that even if Sura manifested, he would be unable to take any action. Roland understood perfectly that this entity was the crux of the matter; only by restraining Sura could the Utopia organization’s plans be thwarted.

“Boom!”

The sphere of light, representing the God of Light, radiated a brilliance summoned by its own power. Though the essence of this energy could still be considered Void energy, under the influence of a deity, it had taken on a distinct form—what one might call divine power. The God of Light’s power was this radiant, holy golden glow, soft and warm, yet to his enemies, it was a terrifying, scorching sun that melted all it touched.

“Roar! Light… Brightness…”

“Trap…”

“Run… away…”

“Kill… Him!”

The Void gods, besieged by the power of the God of Light, suffered destruction that reached into their very depths. Each Void god let out chaotic, discordant roars, their content varying according to their nature—some filled with the panic of realization, others with the reactionary rage born of their wounds.

The power of a Void god is formidable enough to be considered omnipotent before mortals, but before the God of Light—the leader of the Seven Heavenly Fathers and the most powerful deity worshipped by the intelligent races of the continent—they were weak to the point of insignificance.

As the holy and brilliant radiance projected onto their forms, these chaotic, disordered beings, filled with malice toward the material world, began to melt and dissipate. Unlike ordinary injuries, these beings were suffering irreversible destruction; the power consumed by the holy light would never be restored.

At this very moment, in the lower reaches of the Void, an entity watched everything unfolding above. Sensing a dull ache from a scar upon its own body, it halted its stride and, without hesitation, abandoned the pursuit of its tempting prey. This was the Undying Lord, an "old friend" of Wang Yu.

The power and nature of the Undying Lord included the quality of "immortality." This term could be deconstructed in many ways: being so powerful that nothing could kill it, or simply avoiding anything that might cause it harm.

When facing ordinary beings, the Undying Lord could rely on its incredibly powerful flesh to remain indestructible, but before the God of Light, the only way to avoid being killed was to retreat.

It is a strange thing: Void gods are almost entirely chaotic and devoid of logic. Their so-called thoughts are merely a mass of specific malice, driving them to destroy and ruin in ways that please them.

But the Undying Lord—whether because it had been attacked by the God of Light before and not completely annihilated—possessed a simple intelligence other Void gods lacked. While its mind was usually a blank, mushy void, when it came to the material world or the God of Light, it knew enough not to face the deity head-on.

Without lingering, the Undying Lord sank into the depths of the Void. As long as the God of Light remained, it would never return.

The other mindless gods were not as fortunate as the Undying Lord. Under the burning, melting divine power of the God of Light, their bodies were rapidly obliterated, their shrill, frantic screams echoing throughout the region.

Logically, the destruction of these Void gods, who constantly endangered the material world, should be a good thing. In fact, the God of Light had once plunged into the depths of the Void to slaughter a great number of them, though he usually remained here. The Void is vast, and no Void god had ever wandered here to be killed by the God of Light’s automatic defenses; yet, this time, they were being killed in succession…

However, the face of the Pope of the Church of Light held no relief or satisfaction, only profound gravity. He knew exactly what Sura intended to do, and what the Utopia organization was planning.

Even as the Pope of the Church of Light, he was merely closer to the deity than others; he could not interfere with him. In other words, the God of Light extending his power outward was exactly what Sura and the Utopia organization desired.

Kiran was not a powerful being. For many years, he had been bound to the God of Light. Aside from his exaggerated mental resistance, the accumulated Void energy he possessed had been exhausted in his recent confrontation with Sura. This was different from how wizards used Void energy; once it was gone, it was truly gone…

For years, his efforts had been aimed at changing the world’s perception of the God of Light, blurring his definition so that he could not be captured by a single precise adjective. All of this was in preparation for this very moment.

To be honest, as an Archbishop of the Church of Light, Kiran had nothing left to do. The rest had to be left to Roland, who was suppressing Sura, and that final trump card—a move that could be described as a desperate, mutual destruction.

“Click, click, click…”

Sura’s body, suppressed by the fortress, trembled slightly. The duration of the Tier 8 spell, Beyond the Firmament, was coming to an end. Sura would return from outside the material world to a realm where he could be harmed, and Roland would never give him the chance to escape and complete his plan.

“Clang!”

The solid "body" completely collapsed. Sura returned from his state of invulnerability, but Roland, who had been waiting, crushed the fortress down without hesitation, leaving Sura no opportunity to cast a spell.

“Hum!”

However, simultaneously with the end of the Beyond the Firmament spell, another spell was triggered—the Phase Gate. These two spells overlapped, having been cast in tandem. This spell, which Roland knew, had been modified into a different form over the years.

The Phase Gate, a spell with the effect of ignoring tier limitations, once again displayed its formidable power. Sura’s body was forcibly vanished from the bottom of the fortress even as it crushed down, reappearing in the surrounding Void.

“It is a pity that this spell is no longer what you once knew…”

Sura spoke with a faint smile, but he stopped mid-sentence. The "God-Slaying" daggers he had been carrying were all gone.

Looking back at Roland, three daggers had been ground to dust by the fortress. Though he had failed to capture Sura, he would never let those daggers go; destroying the key tools used to complete the plan was one way to solve the puzzle.

“Ding!”

Yet, what happened next exceeded Roland’s expectations. Sura did not appear where the main sphere of the God of Light was, but in the periphery, some distance away.

Originally, it would have been impossible for him to touch the God of Light, but just moments ago, the God of Light had projected his power to attack the Void gods. Sura had moved to a location where a portion of that extended power resided—a region where Roland could not intervene in time to stop him.

“I think you can understand now, right? Although those daggers were tools to accomplish what I desired, in essence, I am the same as those daggers. I can also accomplish what those tools could.”

As the words fell, Sura’s hand plunged into the extended power of the God of Light. The massive aggregate of consciousness within his body flowed upward, beginning to interfere with the deity. Just as he said, if the vast consciousness sealed within those daggers was prepared for this, why couldn’t Sura’s own body contain the same?

“……”

Roland did not speak; he simply proceeded to trigger the trump card he had planted long ago.

……

High above in the Sky Mechanical City, an ordinary scholar organizing books suddenly noticed a book in a shelf compartment that had been empty since he arrived. Curious, he stood on his tiptoes to reach for it, trying to see what it was about.

“Thwack!”

At that moment, a wooden board struck him on the head. The scholar turned to see his teacher, who wore a look of deep dissatisfaction.

“What are you doing? Have you found the Void data I asked for? Is this a time to be doing irrelevant things!”

The teacher scolded his apprentice with a tone of frustrated disappointment.

“But, Teacher, look at this book. It seems, it seems… it just suddenly appeared…”

The apprentice was terrified of his strict teacher, but his curiosity compelled him to point at the book and stammer out his thoughts.

“Thwack!”

The teacher’s response was another strike of the wooden board.

“Tell me, is that area meant for books about the Void?”

The cold question, accompanied by a squinting gaze, made the apprentice tremble.

“N-no…”

The apprentice stammered.

“Thwack!”

“Then why are you still talking to me!”

Another strike and a ruthless reprimand followed.

“Yes! I was wrong, Teacher!”

The apprentice dared not harbor any more curiosity; he abandoned the mysterious book and ran off to find the Void literature.

This was merely a microcosm of what was happening across the Sky Mechanical City.

……

“I’m sorry, Roland. The news isn’t ready for the world to know yet. These powerful entities—we still have use for them. You have your trump card for mutual destruction, and I have my own for delaying the process.”

As Roland’s move was triggered, nothing here changed. The only things that continued were Sura’s words and his body, which was gradually merging into the power of the God of Light.

I can only hope that the efforts I have poured into these years were not in vain; a God of Light whose image has blurred to such an extent will not be as easily manipulated as the other deities.

The Archbishop of the Church of Light watched Sura as he gradually dissolved into the power of the God of Light, speaking with a weary resignation to Roland at his side.

We never intended to manipulate the God of Light in the first place, Kieran. Your long-standing efforts have not been wasted; you have forged Him into a deity so formidable that even the sum of our existence could not sway Him, yet to implore Him to perform one act of justice remains within our reach.

Before he was fully subsumed by the divine power, Sura uttered these final words to Kieran.

Within the Theocracy of the God of Light, a colossal rift in space tore open, and the Sky City surged forth, its power conduits pushed to the very brink of overload as it reached the target coordinates.

Extremely potent void energy fluctuations detected—could that be... the God of Light?

The observer aboard the Sky City gazed upon the scene at the target point, his fluid report faltering abruptly as the reality of the event took hold, his voice choked with disbelief and profound shock.

At the heart of the Theocracy, the immense silhouette of the God of Light descended, His form radiating an infinite golden brilliance as He plunged His arms deep into the earth, piercing the veil between the material world and the void.