Chapter 1325: Purification (Part 1)
A weak voice said, “Master…”
Saleen looked and saw the Violet Angel. He had no idea when it had sneaked into his Lightning Constellation. It still held onto the War Drum of Fear.
The Violet Angel looked at Saleen in fright. One of its hand was holding the bone hammer.
That thing was very good at running, but that was hardly surprising. It was a puppet controlled by Saleen. If he felt danger, it would also feel lit. It had quickly run before the explosion took place.
Saleen was unable to bring himself to berate the puppet. Furthermore, it had brought back the War Drum of Fear. Although the drum was powerful, if it was caught in the blast, it would have likely been destroyed.
He was not in a mood to console the puppet. He commanded the Floating City to attack in all directions.
The Oracle Corps suffered heavy losses. The targets Saleen attacked were all where level 10 holy masters. He had over 1,000 enchanters using level 10 magic attacks on the holy masters.
After several waves of attacks, the six level 10 holy masters were wiped out, and 6,000 enchanters were in a coma.
Highland City was in shambles. With more than 1,000 magic spells thrown below, even the ground itself was razed. With powerful volleys of fire magic being cast below, half of Highland City was burning.
There was no soldier capable of surviving the burning elemental fires. Only high level holy masters were left. They were struggling to hold on
Saleen possessed the Elemental Eye, which enabled him to locate holy masters who survived the fire. He had enchanters bombard any left above level eight. Not even he would have been able to withstand getting bombarded like that.
The lines of defense at the north and west were completely obliterated by the Floating City. Over 20,000 enchanters lost combat capacity. Not even a single mid-level magic nuclei was left on the Floating City.
Seeing that Grand Duke Iron Blood had retreated, Saleen took out the mid-level magic nuclei he had and threw it into the magic power furnaces. He brought the Floating City up to an alt.i.tude of 60,000 feet and headed east.
After that, Saleen began to check on his own internal parts. The Figure of Fate was completely shriveled. He became somewhat fearful. He hadn’t thought he could be killed back then, so he had stood before Jola.
The Figure of Fate had limits of how much damage it could take. When the damage caused exceeded the capacity of absorption, he would have been damaged.
He wondered what kind of G.o.d that finger bone belonged to since it exploded with such a force.
“Master…” The Violet Angel called out again.
“What is it?” Saleen asked.
“Finger bone of the Heretic G.o.d,” the Violet Angel said.
“What do you mean?” Saleen asked.
“Abominations, the Heretic G.o.d, ancient wars…” The Violet Angel began to think after blurting several terms. It had no memories of anything until it saw that finger bone of the Heretic G.o.d. The item managed to shake something out of its mind.
Saleen was reminded that the Violet Angel’s existence was related to the angel of fear. That face at the abdomen of the angel of fear was seen on the armor of the abominations. It seemed that was the appearance of the Heretic G.o.d.
His astrology managed to do its calculations without any trouble. That face had indeed belonged to the Heretic G.o.d, but there were no records of the Heretic G.o.d. Saleen had no way to continue doing his calculations. His level of astrology was too low.
At level 10, it was almost impossible to acquire information of some powerful being like that. Saleen had no intentions of continuing to train in astrology even though he was unable to calculate anything further. Still, the Heretic G.o.d was unable to make it to their plane. One finger bone was already terrifying.
If the Heretic G.o.d had made it to Myers Mainland, Saleen would have been killed right away. His intuition told him that since the Heretic G.o.d was unable to get to their plane, he was more or less done there. The Oracle Corps was totally unprepared. With six level 10 holy masters gone, Fycro had to have suffered quite a heartache.
The intense attack ended up exhausting all mid-level magic nuclei supplies on the Floating City. It caused over 20,000 enchanters to fall into comas and killed more than 100,000 Hole See warriors.
The over a million-strong army of the Oracle Corps was almost obliterated by Saleen. None actually dared to pursue him after his Floating City fled. The surviving holy masters were busy fleeing themselves. With Fycro absent, there was no one capable of stopping the taint of the Heretic G.o.d.
The Floating City did not return to Metatrin City. Instead, it headed straight for Nature City. Metatrin City was an impregnable fortress. Even if Fycro was extremely p.i.s.sed, he would have dared to fight Jason.
The reason Saleen chose to return to Nature City was because he was afraid that Fycro would destroy that city. It was worth noting that Nature City was the key to Saleen’s efforts in resurrecting the G.o.ddess of Myers.
Although Nature City’s construction had been comprehensive, there were too few powerful ones around. Myers the Water Fox’s level dropped due to having to save Nailisi. She was only a level 10 and unable to take on Fycro.
As for Daliang City, it had reached an agreement with Golden Plains that Arbola was to support Lex to ascend the throne and become empress. If Fycro were to look for trouble with Lex, Arbola would deal with him. Lex was also a level 10 mage and had G.o.d’s Ring. As such, Fycro would not have been able to kill her.
Fycro appeared in Highland City several hours after Saleen’s Floating City took off. His expression was grim. Highland City was shrouded by black mist. It continued to spread outside, yet it never got further than 15 miles in diameter.
There was almost nothing left of his army. Only a little more than 100 holy masters remained. They led about 100,000 Bug Angel Warriors to await his return.
“What happened here?” Fycro patiently asked.
The holy masters were relieved by his demeanor. While Fycro was overbearing, he was not someone who vented his anger on others. None of them had been responsible for the incident.
A level nine holy master described the situation to Fycro.
“It seems that this Saleen has far better luck than I do,” Fycro said with a smirk. “I was wrong for trying to take his Floating City. We’ll head back and summon the souls of those who died in battle. We’ll see if they can be preserved in the Divine Abyss.”
The holy masters were exasperated and returned to the Chaotic Swamp with Fycro. The Battle of Highland City was over. No abominations had been able to escape alive, yet Highland City was corroded by evil aura. Any living beings near Highland City would gradually turn into abominations.
Fycro was unclear what would happen from then on out. Having failed to acquire the Floating City, he did not waste his powers to purify Highland City. It was fortunate that there was still the Pivotal Council. Their holy masters would take care of things.
It was exhausting to clean up the aura of the Heretic G.o.d, so much so that it would have affected the combat prowess of the one doing so. If one were to endure the process, it was a good way to enhance one’s level at divine arts.
If there was no enemy around, Fycro would have stayed behind in Highland City, figuring ways to completely clean the place up. At the very least, he would have been able to raise his power by another level.
Fycro did not seek revenge from Saleen. He failed in setting him up, and a huge portion of his troops were obliterated. It was hardly about who was right and who was wrong since it was impossible for mages and believers to be friends in the first place.
However, Fycro did not know that Saleen had evaded the bone’s explosion and even bagged the bone’s fragments for further research. He thought Saleen had actually evaded the calamity by chance and did not know of the finger bone of the Heretic G.o.d.
Saleen invited Grand Duke Iron Blood to stay behind when he returned to Nature City. The Grand Duke refused. He had lost over half of his forces and needed to recuperate back at his place. Saleen did not ask any further. As soon as the Grand Duke left, he called the pope, the leader of the knights, and the oracles of Nature Faith.
Baudelaire, Don, and Myers the Water Fox came to the Floating City. Saleen showed them magic projections. Baudelaire told him that he did not know what the finger bone of the Heretic G.o.d was. Myers the Water Fox did not know either. Only Don seemed steeped in thought.
After seeing Saleen looking at him with inquisitive eyes, Don said, “My lord, the Heretic G.o.d is the enemy of all G.o.ds. That’s all I know. I’m unable to understand why Fycro possessed the finger bone of the Heretic G.o.d.”
“Enemy of all G.o.ds?” Saleen asked.
“I saw that being written by a prisoner on the walls when I was jailed back then,” Don said.
Nailisi snickered. Don had no choice but to elaborate and say, “That prisoner had been pope for three days. No one outside knew of that.”
“That means it isn’t nonsense then. Don, write down everything you’ve seen.” Saleen realized the information was important.
“Alright.” Don asked for a pen and paper and began to write down the contents of what he recalled.
Saleen sealed the magic tower and dismissed his level nine subordinates. He took out a piece of the bone’s fragments, which he had sealed within a piece of crystal. He etched layers of lightning magic patterns on the exterior of the crystal. Electricity glittered on it.
The grey-whitish bone fragment continued to emit an evil aura despite having been blocked off by lightning magic patterns, intending to taint the ones within the tower. Saleen cast his Lightning Territory and suppressed the bone’s aura using territorial powers.
The energy of the bone fragment was exhausted in the explosion. It had no way of destroying Saleen’s territory with the power it had left. Finally, its aura was contained within the crystal.
Saleen breathed a sigh of relief. Over 100,000 lightning warriors were destroyed while collecting the fragments, requiring them to slowly recuperate. The fragment was able to taint anyone who touched it and would have gradually abominated those lightning warriors.
If it had not been for the fact that the Lightning Constellation had a powerful weapon spirit taking charge, those lightning warriors would have either died or turned into abominations.
The Water Fox and the others felt a chill run down their spines. It was lucky for them that Saleen was to contain that thing.
“Are any of you three capable of using Purification of the G.o.ddess of Nature?” Saleen asked.
“We do!” All three of them nodded.
Saleen was pleased and said, “From here on out, leave the matters of propagating the faith to others. All three of you are to take turns purifying this piece of bone.”
“As you wish.” Baudelaire was the first among them to agree to it.
Doing so had great benefits to him. Every time he used Purification on the bone fragment, he would acquire more power. That was the power of rules. Purifying evil for their G.o.d would earn him rewards.
Purification was a simple divine spell. Baudelaire could acquire powers over 100 times faster by purifying the bone than training on divine arts the usual way. Furthermore, he had no intentions of training in the divine arts of the G.o.ddess of Nature since he no longer had intentions of becoming believers of any G.o.d.