Defiance of the Fall

Chapter 228: Descent

Zac furiously defended with both his axe and his swirling leaves from the onslaught that came at him from all angles. It was as though he was caught in the middle of an agitated hornet swam where a thousand attacks kept angling for him.

Wounds started to accumulate over his body, and he was spending cosmic energy at a tremendous pace. However, the furious defense wasn’t for nothing as a thick mist was rising above him from the expended silver river.

After having fought a bit Zac started to get a decent idea of what was going on. Salvation turned people into these silver things and then used the stored energy inside their bodies to launch extremely powerful attacks.

However, each attack would deplete Salvation’s storage of soldiers, as the attack spent the stored energy and the corpses dissipated. Zac estimated that a couple of Silver Guards were destroyed by each and every clash judging by how much the silver river shrank afterward.

In just a short bout Zac had destroyed at least fifty corpses, and he felt a bit nauseated at the thought of destroying innocent people. It was an extremely wicked method to fight, and Zac wondered just what kind of evil Salvation had committed to gain access to a class that could do something this messed up.

“Despicable,” Zac couldn’t help but growl at Salvation who controlled the silver liquid from the distance.

“All crusades require sacrifice for the greater good. They will forever stay part of the Cosmos, all overseen by The Great Redeemer,” Salvation said with a calm smile, no remorse or guilt on his face at all.

Zac realized there was no point to keep talking with this madman, and tried to decide on a plan. The thought of destroying people every time he clashed with Salvation was revolting, and he wasn’t sure that his endurance would last through destroying the whole army in any case.

A better method would be to bring the fight to Salvation himself. [Inquisitive Eye] didn’t work on the man, but Zac felt his attributes should be more aligned with a mage judging by how he fought. That meant high Intelligence but low Endurance.

Killing him directly would be more efficient than grinding down the army of silver corpses, and it would also feel a lot better. Perhaps there was even a way to save these poor people and turn them back. The ground cracked under his legs as Zac used [Loamwalker] the moment he saw an opening in the silver river swirling around him and he flashed toward Salvation. But he was ready for the assault, simply putting hands in a praying position.

“Sanctuary,” Salvation said, and the next moment he was completely enclosed in the silver liquid, creating a huge ball five meters across.

Zac wouldn’t stop from just that though and with a determined face summoned a five-meter fractal edge and imbued it with the Dao of Sharpness. The last clashes he didn’t utilize any Dao, and the difference it made was clear as he cut through the ball like butter.

However, Salvation was nowhere to be seen inside the ball, until he Suddenly appeared back behind Zac, reaching for his head. Alarm bells went off in Zac’s mind, telling him he would die if Salvation reached him. He desperately pushed away, while simultaneously trying to cut off Salvation’s arm.

At the same moment a huge whirlwind erupted in the middle of the silver army, where Thea suddenly appeared. Everything within fifty meters from here was shredded into ribbons, and over a hundred silver corpses dissipated in an instant.

However, she wasn’t done there and immediately moved toward a thick group of guards to keep whittling down the defenses. While Zac had felt a bit hesitant about this tactic she clearly had no such compunctions.

For the first time since the start of the battle Salvation’s calm face changed, turning into one of unbridled rage.

“Apostasy!” he screamed as he pointed at Thea.

The next moment another hundred silver corpses liquefied and turned into a hundred swords that all tried to stab Thea, who had to use all of her agility to escape the encirclement unscathed. Her plan to keep destroying corpses had to be abandoned since she was busy just dodging the innumerable blades gunning for her life.

It was clear that Thea had found a solution to reduce the power of Salvation. It was starting to become more and more apparent that Salvation was needed to control these things. She was able to destroy a tenth of the army without any resistance due to Salvation being preoccupied with his battle with Zac.

It was far more efficient than trying to destroy the silver river, as it was clearly more resilient when it was actively controlled by Salvation. Perhaps he infused some of his own Cosmic Energy into the metallic liquid that floated about in the air, whereas the Silver Soldiers were just energy on standby.

Zac could only grit his teeth and follow the same plan as Thea, even though he felt it was a bit distasteful. But the man was simply too elusive. It looked like he could somehow freely move within the silver liquid, making it nigh impossible to strike him down.

He immediately summoned five huge fractal edges as he frantically dodged or bore the damage from the innumerable attacks from the silver rivers all around him. But he didn’t use them to harass Salvation who had emerged from his protective bubble.

Instead, Zac shot them at various clumps of silver guards who were still just mutely standing in the distance, and each blade was imbued with the Dao of Sharpness. His goal was to continue Thea’s work while she was keeping the hundred silver swords busy.

The next moment Zac heedlessly charged Salvation, hoping to occupy his attention.

A storm of lightning-quick swings blanketed Salvation, who had to desperately create barrier after barrier of silver shields to protect himself from Zac’s onslaught. The silver river around him was shrinking at a noticeable pace from Zac’s frenzied swings, with each Dao-infused strike destroying a noticeable part of it.

It looked like his plan might actually work as the silver guards were still standing completely immobile, not making any attempts to defend against the incoming blades. But it appeared that Salvation wouldn’t take it lying down as his eyes lit up with an almost blinding light, and the chaotic aura inside him increased manifold.

“DESCENT!” Salvation roared, and before the fractal edges could reach the army over six hundred Silver Corpses liquefied, causing a silver storm that covered the whole summit and rose fifty meters into the air.

The swords that were harassing Thea also stopped their chase and instead joined the other energies to infuse the storm with even more power. Zac immediately got an extremely bad feeling as he sensed the rampant energies that were gathering in the air, and he tried to quickly kill off Salvation before it got any worse.

He even activated [Hatchetman’s Rage] while he started gathering energy for his ultimate strike, [Nature’s Punishment]. But Salvation was suddenly swallowed by the silver storm, and Zac had no chance to unleash his ultimate attack since he was unable to locate his real form any longer.

The danger sense in Zac’s mind was going haywire, and Zac heedlessly flooded the fractal in his arm with cosmic energy while he looked up at what was happening. The silver storm had created a huge cloud up in the air, and something nefarious was brewing inside.

Suddenly two enormous eyes that seemed want to judge the world opened from within the silver clouds. They held the same silver luster that Salvation’s eyes shone with before he disappeared, but Zac didn’t feel that the huge eyes were an avatar of Salvation.

Salvation’s eyes shone with madness, but the huge globes up in the sky looked down at the mountain peak like a god staring down at a pitiful ant. There was a boundless arrogance and disdain within it as well, but Zac wasn't sure if it was an actual person since the eyes were completely unmoving and unblinking.

The pressure from just the gaze was enormous, and the next moment a gigantic face emerged from the cloud, increasing the pressure even further. The face was at least fifty meters across, a huge monstrosity that covered most of Zac’s field of vision.

The face was of a young human man, and not someone Zac recognized. His face was extremely handsome, apart from the condescending eyes. There was also an extremely intricate fractal in his forehead that radiated an immense power, and just by looking at it Zac felt like his soul was going to get sucked out of his body.

The face didn’t stay up in the clouds, but soon it started to descend toward the summit at a measured pace. Zac’s brows rose in alarm as he looked over at a pale-faced Thea who stood some distance away.

“Get away from the summit, I can handle this,” he shouted as he kept infusing his arm with Cosmic Energy.

The pressure upon Zac was mounting as the enormous descended, and his instincts told him to get down on knees in subservience. But ignored those voices as he grit his teeth while he pushed his right hand upward. The space above him cracked and the familiar enormous hand rose to meet the incoming face.

The wrath of god clashed with nature’s punishment, and the two forces meeting caused such a shockwave that the barrier protecting the palace was completely destroyed, and the shockwaves caused the palace to get ripped to shreds as it was pushed down the mountain.

Zac felt as though his whole body was breaking apart from the collision, but he staunchly kept pushing forward while allocating some energy to summon [Nature’s Barrier] to blanket him from at least some of the errant energies that were ripping the whole summit apart.

The hand was barely five meters across and it almost looked like a child that was trying to push away an adult as it pressed on the enormous fractal that adorned the forehead of the enormous head.

However, inside that seemingly small hand, a boundless force was contained. It possessed everything Zac was able to utilize, from his Dao of Trees to the infusion of [Hatchetman’s Rage], its power was unmatched even by what most E-Grade evolved could muster.

For a few seconds the two forces were at an impasse, with neither face nor hand giving in, but soon a jarring crack echoed across the mountain. A large scar could suddenly be seen across the fractal on the huge head as the fingers from the wooden hand dug inside the forehead.

The moment the fractal cracked it was as though the force that held the hundreds of silver corpses together came undone. The head started to ooze torrential amounts of silver clouds, and it almost looked as though it was burning from the enormous plume that was rising from it.

Normally Zac would have deactivated the hand by now, but he staunchly kept feeding the hand with everything he possessed, even his lifeforce. He wouldn’t relent until the face was completely destroyed so that he could crush Salvation.

Zac wasn’t the only one who was running out of energy as the face was almost translucent by now with silver clouds spreading far enough to even reach the neighboring mountains. Finally the head cracked into innumerable pieces, the last energies coming undone.

A mangled body fell down from the skies with a wail and caused a large crater when he slammed into the ground on the other side of the summit. But Zac knew he was alive, as some remaining droplets of the liquid river blanketed the fall at the last moment. Zac’s whole body felt like it was on fire but he wouldn’t let this opportunity go.

He was already out of Cosmic Energy, but he squeezed his body to activate [Loamwalker] once more, speeding toward the mangled body of Salvation. But he frowned when he saw Salvation crush his token with a shaking hand. Still, all was not lost since there was still a window of opportunity to kill this raving lunatic before he was sent away.

They had already confirmed that the power of someone dictated how long the delay was before they were sent back, and someone like Salvation should take at least ten seconds. He couldn’t let this man get back to the Cradle of God. Who knew how many Silver Guards he had there to empower himself.

He immediately moved to close the last distance, his axe already falling down with finality.

“Lord Redeemer, please save me!” he shouted in desperation, and in the next moment a man actually appeared next to him.

Zac first planned to ignore him to strike the finishing blow, but a terrifying aura suddenly exploded out from the man, eclipsing anything Zac had ever felt before.

Every cell in his body told him that if he moved just one step closer he would die without a doubt, and he unhesitantly stopped his assault as he jumped back a few steps. Zac’s couldn’t help looking over at the figure silently standing next to the crater with Salvation still inside.

And the man who looked back at him was none other than the owner of the face in the clouds.