Chapter 487: Ups and Downs
Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
Lucien’s face was grim. He did not say a word but lifted his left hand. His fingers stretched out straight, and his left arm and hand were like a sword.
Suddenly, the environment around him started to twist. The darkness retreated and cold moonlight enveloped him. The silver moon in the sky, however, disappeared.
“You’ve recovered to some extent after taking in Asin’s G.o.dhood of death, but it’s not enough.” Antanas’ harsh voice sounded like a sharp claw scratching a piece of rusted iron sheet. He lifted the warhammer covered in the grey flame of soul and fiercely swung it at Lucien.
The hundred-meter distance between them seemed to have vanished, and the hammer instantly came in front of Lucien. The realm of black, white and grey followed the track of the hammer and extended like a paintbrush, yet instead of adding colors, the realm took away the color and sound of all the objects on its way, burying them in everlasting silence.
Lucien watched Antanas coming for him in great calmness. All the motions were colorless and silent. Suddenly, a huge silver moon rose behind him. The moon was so big and bright as if it had descended from the sky. In Lucien’s left hand, black flame suddenly burnt up and formed a sword of black fire.
Lucien swung the sword at Antanas using all his strength. His robe fluttered up in the wind, while dazzling light beamed from the silver moon. The moonlight crashed together with the concrete black, white, and grey.
The whole world seemed to become obscure. There was no color, no sound, no time, and no s.p.a.ce.
The illusion lasted for less than a second. Natasha and the rest saw a small crack appearing on the color of black, white and grey, and then more cracks followed. As the cracks grew bigger and bigger, colors and sound came in.
All of a sudden, the world of black, white and grey collapsed. The world had recovered to what it was supposed to be. However, Natasha and the rest of them still felt great numbness and could not fully control their own movements.
They, however, had seen the result of the fight.
Antanas was floating in the air. The temple cliff below him was gone. There was a giant deep hole in the ground, and huge swirls of river water gushed into the deep hole of voidness, trying to fill it up.
Pieces of rotten flesh were falling from Antanas’ face and body. The bones revealed were covered in the color of rust and blood, which was dyed by the G.o.dhood of war. The light ball of black, white and grey now looked much more transparent and rigid.
Obviously, Antanas was badly injured.
However, compared to Lucien Evans, who had been blown away to the other side of the Solna River, Antanas’ situation was still much better. When Lucien got struck away, he crushed down countless trees and river rocks before finally hitting on the ground. Lucien was now not able to move at all, and his left hand now looked pale and grey.
“I told you. Not enough!” Antanas’ hoa.r.s.e laugh could drive anyone crazy.
When the mysterious existence from the World of Souls was still recovering, Alterna interrupted it. Therefore, now it was still the Lord of War’s side which was dominating. But under the influence of the mysterious existence, Antanas had become even crazier.
Antanas took a step forward. Looking at his enemy lying on the ground and struggling, Antanas’s mind was full of joy and pride. “Your power will help me recover. Although I can’t kill you now, I can send you to a long, long sleep. Alterna, take your time to come back!”
Antanas lifted the hammer, and the power of black, white and grey became contagious again.
Lucien could hear the death knell ringing for him.
Suddenly, the world of black, white and grey was lit on green flame and instantly collapsed.
Antanas appeared again, surrounded by a grey and white of death and silence, which was very different from his own black, grey, and white. It was the power of decay, and there were bitter souls and spirits howling and swirling.
“Ahh!” The bitter cry came from Asin. In great agony, Asin’s life force was taken away by the power in the air. Within several seconds, His face had become extremely pale and His two green eyes had now become two flickering cl.u.s.ters of red flame. The air of death was emitted from his body.
The same thing happened to Ell, whose head was broken like a crushed watermelon, Ell released several painful moans and then stopped bleeding. What was now coming out of his body now was the light yellow corpse fluid. But maybe it was due to his G.o.dhood, the speed of life force leaving his body was much slower. He had not yet been turned into a walking dead.
Surrounding the Temple of War, within the radius of two hundred meters, countless Husum trees withered and rotted. The power in the air was absorbing their life force. The rich and moist soil had instantly lost all of its moist and become full of cracks. As soon as the water of the Solna River flowed into this area, it became deadly pale and awfully smelly.
One of the senior-rank priest exclaimed, “Life Ritual? The DemiG.o.d-lich?!”
As soon as he finished the words, the divine light surrounding him attracted the attack of the power of death. As if there was some kind of horrible alchemical reaction between the death power and the pure light, a horrible explosion occurred. This at lease level-eight red robe cardinal exploded, and his life force was thrown into midair.
The death power also attacked Danniel, the Fire of Purification. The s.h.i.+eld pf white flame surrounding him was now much dimmer. He had to lean against his sword to prevent himself from falling down, and his life force was also quickly leaving his body.
Natasha was the first to realize what was going on. She ran to Camil and lifted her duplicate of the s.h.i.+eld of Truth in front of them. There were already tiny cracks on the s.h.i.+eld.
But even the black s.h.i.+eld was losing its color, as if it was losing life force as well. Natasha knew that the s.h.i.+eld would become decayed in a minute or two, but she had no other choices.
Bero the G.o.d of Sun’s eyes lost their focus. While His life force was being taken away, Bero’s whole body was slightly twitching.
Lucien struggled to stand up. His left hand now looked completely grey, and he was having a hard time breathing.
Francis, lying on the ground and unable to move, tried hard to turn his neck. Looking at the area which now resembled the Skeleton Land, he felt lucky that the mysterious knight just threw him so away from Antanas that he was not in the cover range of the dreadful power.
Within the range, filthy dark clouds gathered in the sky. A black bolt of lightning lit up, and then it started raining. The horrible rotten smell made the severely injured Ell directly pa.s.s out.
The polluted greyish-white raindrops fell onto the ground, and the ground suddenly turned pale. Countless skeletons and bodies buried deep underneath broke out from the soil and slowly stood up. Showering in the rain, their death power became greater and greater.
Anything that the raindrops touched, including Daniel’s fire of purification and Natasha’s s.h.i.+eld of Truth, started rotting. But fortunately, they were not the main target, therefore, the raindrops falling on them were not heavy. However, the rain poured over Antanas, polluting everything and eating into his realm of black, white and grey.
Antanas lifted the hammer again, but his power had been reduced.
However, as the mysterious existence in the World of Souls, Antanas’ hammer could still make the spirits, specters, and walking deads acknowledge allegiance to him.
When Antanas was almost out of the confinement, a cold voice came from the sky,
“Spirit Confinement.”
The broken souls and spirits surrounding Antanas twisted into the flashes of soul light and quickly sneaked into Antanas’s body. Antanas’ whole body swelled bigger and bigger. Grey and white liquid flowed out from the corners of his eyes, and Antanas could only stand there still like a stone statue.
“Life Ritual.” The cold voice came, again.
The polluted clouds collapsed onto Antanas. Meanwhile, countless undead rushed towards Antanas and became part of the clouds.
Antanas’ life force was fiercely pushed out of his body. Losing the inner support, Antanas’ tall and strong body became saggy. The warhammer dropped onto the ground, and Antanas’ skull snapped into pieces.
The solidified light ball of black, white and grey went out of his eye socket, fell onto the ground, and broke into a few equally-sized pieces.
The pieces still had the almighty power of eternity and supremacy, but it felt that the pieces had lost the soul and will within it. The black, white and grey slowly spread out from the pieces, dyeing the surrounding objects, but now the process was totally meaningless and purposeless.
An illusionary Mage’s Hand appeared in the air, trying to pick up the light ball pieces. However, the hand directly went through them, as if the pieces were not in this dimension.
“Hm?” The voice sounded confused.
A lich in a black cloak appeared in the sky. His head had no flesh at all but just a white skull. In each of his two hollow black eye sockets, a fine, needle-like red light spot was flickering.
It was him. Congus, the DemiG.o.d-lich. Lucien released a sigh in his mind.
Congus was not in a rush to collect the broken pieces from the mysterious existence in the World of Souls. Instead, Congus turned to look at Lucien. He would never leave the chance to Alterna to recover. Alterna was his only threat on the spot.
“Life Depri…” Congus said two strange words. They were the most primitive magic words.
Congus was not going to underestimate Alterna by any chance. He directly used a legendary spell to eradicate Lucien and his left hand.
However, before Congus could finish the second word, a flash of bright light hacked at him from behind. The light possessed this very positive power that reminded Lucien of all the good characteristics including order, honesty, kindness, and so on.
The magic defense spells automatically triggered dissolved under the light. But Congus had flas.h.i.+ly moved to another spot. As a legendary sorcerer, he was constantly prepared for sudden attacks.
The two needle-like red spots turned to look at the attacker. It was Bero, the G.o.d of Sun, who supposedly had lost all his power under Life Ritual.
However, now Bero was standing up straight in the air and spoke in a commanding tone.
“This is just a reminder.”
“Who are you?” Asked Congus. He felt the power coming out from Bero rather familiar, but it wasn’t Bero’s own power, and Congus could not recall who it belonged to.
Bero did not answer the question. Countless white wings spread out behind him. Bero said to Congus in a solemn tone, “anything that dies must fall into the eternal sleep. This is the order of life. You filthy, evil creature, face this sentence!”
Then a scale, the left side white and right side black, appeared in front of Bero. After several swings, it reached its balance. The grey and white and horrible pale clouds then instantly disappeared, but the polluted land and the dying trees still remained the same.
“The Scale of Justice! You’re Rudolf II!”
Congus did not have a clue how Rudolf II came here, but nevertheless he quickly cast the legendary spell on Rudolf II.
“Life Deprivation!”
Congus believed that this was just a projection of Rudolf, so he was positive that even though Rudolf had brought the Scale with him, the projection was still not a match to Congus himself.
Silently, Bero’s face aged as if time pa.s.sed by on him very fast. The wings behind him closed, converging into a streak of light.
“Comply with the order, Congus.”
“The Light of Order!”
The streak of light rapidly expanded, filling in every corner of the world, carrying the power to dissolve anything that was unnatural in the s.p.a.ce.
Meanwhile, Congus opened his mouth big and let out an awful howling — DemiG.o.d-lich’s Howling!
Natasha’s eyes lost focus again, and she had also lost the ability to hear or smell. The s.h.i.+eld of Truth in front of her cracked rapidly.
At this time, under the cold and bright moonlight, Lucien rose up into the air across the river. Wearing his long black coat, Lucien lifted his left hand up high, the flame of destruction twining it.
Francis and Camil thought that Lucien and Alterna had used up all of their power.
However, this was not the case. Before taking in the G.o.dhood of the Lord of Underworld, Alterna was already able to launch a full round of attack. Now, after absorbing one more G.o.dhood, plus the half-month sleep, how could Alterna lose the ability to fight after only one single strike?
Lucien came to the Temple of War on purpose. To get out of the trouble, he was trying to make the legendary archmage who had been watching him all the time and Antanas fight against each other. Before this fight, Lucien had taken Congus’ arrival into his consideration, therefore, he did not use Alterna’s full power.
Facing Alterna who had been severely injured, and the mysterious existence from the World of Souls who was still able to fight, Congus would definitely deal with the latter first.
Lucien would let them fight first.
Also, since Lucien happened to see Sophia around, and he knew that the Emperor had touched the secret behind the seven ancient demons, Lucien had also expected that Rudolf II would also get involved in this.
The power of silver moon had quickly repaired Lucien’s body. When the huge moon rose again, covering the real silver moon in the sky.
Shocked, Congus and Rudolf II saw Lucien bow slightly. And then Lucien dropped his left hand down, and the moons.h.i.+ne suddenly expanded and filled up their vision.
Was it because Lucien was smarter and more sophisticated than them?
No, it was simply because Lucien knew much more information than Antanas. Lucien knew that there was a legendary hiding around and that Rudolf II was able to arrive at any time. Therefore, he could draw up the best plan.
The information gap was Lucien’s advantage!
The silver moon tonight was so bright that Congus and Rudolf II would never ever forget this scene.