L7 The Lord, Avenged
“Ariel! What the hell is that thing?!”
Potimas’s voice rings out in mounting panic.
At the same time, the vicious attacks from the Omega suddenly stop.
“Hmm? What ‘thing’? You’ll have to be more specific. I have no idea what you’re talking about…”
I shake my head and shrug my shoulders in an exaggerated, mocking gesture.
Normally, I imagine he would’ve just ignored my attitude, but he seems especially on edge right now: I can hear his teeth grinding over the speakers.
“That thing you call ‘White’! What is it?!”
Riiight.
Yeah, I figured as much.
I was only messing with him when I said I didn’t know what he meant.
No one but White could possibly get Potimas into such a panicky state.
He seems to be seriously freaking out, too.
When was the last time I heard him yelling with so much actual emotion? Probably that time when White literally tore him a new one…
Potimas usually looks down on other people, never showing any emotion.
He thinks he’s too superior to be affected by what any lesser beings might do.
I bet he thinks it would be disgraceful to let his feelings be moved by such creatures.
But now, he’s totally losing it.
That must mean something far beyond Potimas’s wildest imagination must have happened.
Yeah, sounds like White’s work to me.
“What’s up? Did White do something wacky?”
I doubt he’s going to answer me, but I might as well ask.
“I’m the one asking the questions here! Just hurry up and tell me what it is!”
At this point, he’s basically shrieking.
Aww, man.
I dunno, I kinda wanted to be the one to make him do that…
But I guess White beat me to it.
“I don’t know what happened, but it sounds to me like White got you good, huh? Well, isn’t that a shame? Serves you right.”
When I give him a well-deserved mocking, the frozen Omega suddenly swings back into action.
I jump back, avoiding an obvious, anger-driven punch.
“You mad? Ooh, you mad? What a short temper you have. Maybe you need to get more calcium? See, this is the problem with you scrawny shut-in types.”
The more I taunt it, the more the Omega comes at me way too directly.
“Damn it! Blast it all! Where did my calculations go wrong? That accursed thing defies all logic!”
Potimas’s cursing echoes in vain.
Such a fragile ego.
This man is a weakling, though I already knew that.
The only reason he seemed strong is because he had only ever fought opponents who were weaker than himself.
It wasn’t that he was strong, but that they were less strong than he was.
That’s why he was able to stay on top.
And why he was able to flaunt his confidence for so long.
But I know the truth.
Deep down, he’s weaker than anyone else.
Because he was always weaker than everyone, he wanted power more than anyone else.
That’s how he ended up here.
He thought he was strong, that he had gotten stronger than anyone, but he’s still just a weak little man.
Now that he’s fighting White, someone who’s stronger than him, the façade has slipped away to reveal the same weakling he always was.
“What a weakling.”
“Excuse me?”
Potimas picks up my muttered words and answers sharply.
“You’re weak, Potimas.” I didn’t really mean for him to hear it, but since he asked, I might as well let him have it.
“Bold words from someone who is content with the temporary power granted by the system.”
That isn’t the kind of strength or weakness I mean, though.
Not that he would understand even if I explained it.
“Ah, yes, the system. What happened to the power to become a god? I have not become a god at all! But what about that thing? How can this be? Ah, damn it all! Curses!”
At this point, Potimas is just ranting nonsensically. I don’t even know what he’s saying anymore.
The Omega is moving erratically, too, perhaps influenced by its master’s sorry state.
The drill closes in on my face.
I catch it with my teeth.
It makes an unpleasant crunching noise, but I put my strength into my jaw and chomp it to pieces.
“Wait. Wait just a minute! It makes no sense. Why? Why are you still alive?”
Oh?
He finally caught on?
“Why have your wounds healed? How are you evenly matched with the Gloria Ω inside the anti-technique barrier? What’s going on here?!”
Took you long enough, dude.
The Omega’s drill gave me a serious beating.
It tore into my stomach, pierced my chest, took off an arm, ripped up my legs.
But those wounds have already healed.
“How can this happen?!” Potimas screams. “It cannot be… Or have you become a god now, too?!”
After he’s looked down on me for so long, now he thinks I’ve gone and achieved his dream of becoming a god before him.
That would probably be the worst humiliation imaginable to Potimas.
“Nope.”
But unfortunately, that’s not the case.
I haven’t become a god.
I can’t.
If it were that easy, I’m sure Potimas would have become a god by now, too.
“I haven’t become a god or anything. But now I can get strong enough to fight a god, if only for a short time. You know the method, too, don’t you?”
The Omega backs away.
It’s like Potimas himself is recoiling away from me.
“Surely not.”
“You guessed it.”
“Have you gone mad?”
Well, that’s not very nice.
I guess it does seem like an insane thing to do from Potimas’s point of view, though.
That’s why I said he’s a weakling.
I’m generally quite weak myself, but I’d like to think I’m at least brave enough to put my life on the line to achieve my goals.
“Humility.”
That’s the new Seven Heavenly Virtues skill I recently picked up.
Its effects temporarily give me the ability to fight with the power of a god.
When the piece of White’s soul known as “former body brain” merged with mine, it increased my soul’s capacity accordingly.
Until then, my soul had long since been filled to bursting, like a cracked vessel on the verge of breaking open.
But then, White’s soul came in as if to mend those cracks.
Thanks to her, I was finally able to acquire new skills for the first time in so long.
I picked up skills like Telepathy, which I had never needed because I’d always been alone… And the last one I acquired was this skill: Humility.
My ace in the hole, which I’ve kept secret from everyone but White.
And I won’t hesitate to use it now.
Even if it means burning out this soul of mine to nothingness.
<Humility: n% of the power to reach godhood. Allows the user to temporarily gain strength on par with a god in exchange for consuming the user’s soul. In addition, the user will gain the ability to surpass the W system and interfere with the MA field.>
I grab the Omega’s head as it tries to regenerate the broken drill and sink my teeth into it.
The bitter taste of metal fills my mouth.
But after a moment, the chewed-up pieces are broken down and dissolved into pure energy.
My Gluttony skill still works just fine inside my mouth.
That means I have to get it into my mouth first, but once it’s there, I can break anything down into energy and absorb it.
And although there’s only so much energy I can steal with a mouthful, it’s probably still more effective than punching the damn thing over and over.
See, I’ve already figured out what this Omega thing was most likely built for.
At its core, it’s designed to fight a god—specifically, Gülie.
It’s loaded up with tons of energy in preparation for a long, drawn-out battle.
The sheer amount of energy does most of the talking, and it’s tough enough to keep regenerating in an instant no matter how many times you take it down.
That’s its whole focus, without any unnecessary features.
Not sure what’s up with the drill thing… Potimas’s weird tastes, maybe?
…No, I suppose when it comes to physical destruction, a drill is fairly effective.
Then you throw in the anti-technique barrier, and poison gas to exhaust the opponent.
A god is basically just a being with a ridiculous amount of energy.
If that energy is what makes a god a god, then all you have to do is attack it with something that can keep fighting until it finally runs out of that energy.
Yeah, I get it now.
It’s a pretty roundabout method, but it does make sense if you were trying to defeat a god with whatever you’ve got on hand.
Even with the effects of Humility, it’s still giving me a decent fight.
I don’t know if this thing would really work against Gülie, but I can certainly tell that Potimas put a ton of thought into this strategy.
But because he’s using it against me instead, it’s gonna end in failure.
I thrust my hand into the Omega’s torso.
And then I activate magic inside its body.
The anti-technique barrier isn’t all-powerful, you know.
It doesn’t work inside the bodies of living things, most especially allies who need to be able to use conjurings on the inside.
I mean, the Omega’s regeneration is a conjuring, too, and if you block that it’d just be a hunk of metal.
So I can still activate magic…inside the Omega’s body.
I’m using a level 10 Heresy Magic spell.
It’s called Rend Soul.
Heresy Magic directly affects the target’s soul, and Rend Soul is a spell that destroys souls entirely.
And I’m hitting the Omega with it from the inside.
The Omega struggles wildly, smacking me in the side.
I hear the unpleasant snap of a cheekbone breaking as I’m sent flying away from the Omega.
Immediately, I land on my feet, braced for another attack.
But instead, it’s keeping its distance too, on high alert.
Looks like my attack worked, then.
I knew it would, of course.
Energy is stored in the soul.
Without the vessel of the soul, the energy would leak away.
Gods have especially large souls that can hold massive amounts of energy.
In order to kill a god, you have to either destroy the vessel of their soul or get them to use up all the energy within it.
Potimas chose the latter method.
Or rather, he didn’t have any other choice, I guess.
You can also use Rend Soul to destroy a soul directly, like I just did.
But you need the power of the system to do that.
Rend Soul doesn’t work without the support of the system.
Even White hasn’t been able to recreate its effects.
Potimas can’t reproduce Rend Soul without the system’s support, either.
That’s why he had to take another approach.
Potimas could theoretically use Rend Soul, too, if he just had the elves learn Heresy Magic.
But he would never choose that path.
Because Potimas doesn’t even trust the elves.
To him, they’re just convenient tools.
And you have to use tools safely.
So he would never let them learn anything that might threaten him in any way.
Heresy Magic is too much of a double-edged sword for him.
The fact that it’s working on the Omega is proof of that.
If it works on his ultimate weapon here, I’m sure it would work on Potimas himself, too.
Plus, if he wanted to use it against Gülie, teaching Heresy Magic to one or two elves wouldn’t be nearly enough.
He’d probably need several hundred elves to use it together for it to come anywhere near taking Gülie down.
What if he let that many elves learn Heresy Magic, and they rebelled against him?
He would never choose such a risky option.
They say it’s lonely at the top, but Potimas takes it to a whole new level.
In his case, he’s alone because he wants to be.
He’s perfectly content to be locked away in a little miniature garden of his own making.
As long as he can be in charge and do whatever he wants.
Truly, such a small-minded man.
And such a lowlife, too.
“Potimas. How many people’s souls did it take to make this Omega thing?”
I’m not expecting much of an answer from Potimas, who’s still muttering senselessly over the speakers.
But I still couldn’t help asking.
Energy is stored within the soul.
Since the Omega has energy, that means it must have a soul.
There’s a limit to how much energy a single soul can save up, too.
Even someone like Potimas or me can’t cross that line.
Meanwhile, this Omega is loaded with enough energy to theoretically fight Gülie.
One person’s soul wouldn’t be able to hold that much energy.
If he could do that, Potimas would’ve already become a god long ago.
So this Omega could be infused with several…no, dozens, or maybe even hundreds of people’s souls.
All those living souls, reconstructed into this single metal body.
I do pity them.
But I won’t show them mercy.
Destroying those souls with Rend Soul means reducing them to nothingness, never to return to the cycle of death and rebirth.
Truly a heretical magic, just as the name suggests.
But I still won’t hesitate to carry that out.
I can’t afford to spare them, even if I wanted to.
Gluttony, Rend Soul, and the time-limited effects of Humility.
I’ll push my way through with these.
“I’m sorry.”
Murmuring an apology to the poor souls who were made into this terrible weapon, I take a step forward.
How much time has passed over the course of our back-and-forth battle since then?
It feels like it’s been a fairly long time, but I can’t say for sure.
For all I know, it only felt that way because my sense of time has been stretched thin, and it was actually just a few minutes or hours.
I’ve long since lost count of my attacks.
My hand once again strikes the Omega’s chest, and my Heresy Magic eradicates another soul within its mechanical frame.
The Omega’s metal body spasms once, then stops moving completely.
Even after I pull my hand away, the hole doesn’t close up this time, and its body falls to the floor lifelessly.
The clang it makes is surprisingly quiet, like that of a husk that has lost the weight of souls.
It’s over.
No…not yet.
This Omega may have been Potimas’s last resort, but it wasn’t Potimas himself.
None of this is over until I say my parting words over the real Potimas’s dead body.
Oof, that was rough, though.
On the outside I still look totally unharmed, but inside I’m a total mess.
The effects of Humility have been wearing away at my soul.
I was able to use the energy I stole from the Omega as a little bit of cushioning, but while it’s better than nothing, it’s still not much.
What’s going to happen when I turn off the effect of Humility?
They say a candle burns brightest right before it goes out, and all that.
Please, just hang on until I finish off Potimas.
“If you’re done, come outside.”
A voice echoes directly in my head.
A message from White, maybe?
I wish she wouldn’t casually do things like that when the anti-technique barrier is still in effect.
You’re gonna give me an inferiority complex here.
At any rate, if White went out of her way to call me, I guess I better go outside.
I force open the door that closed when I first came in.
Since it was meant to shut in a literal god, it’s no easy feat to move the damn thing.
I wheeze as I finally pry it open, then keep wheezing as I ascend the long slope and step outside.
The sight before my eyes is crazier than I could’ve imagined, to say the least.
The forest is on fire all over the place.
Most of the flames are coming from these giant round sphere things scattered on the ground.
In the midst of this hellish scene, an even bigger shadow stands out.
It’s a huge, disc-shaped thing, blocking out the sky as it flies through the air.
I’m reminded of the ancient weapon that Potimas, the Pontiff, White, and me, among others, had to miraculously team up to bring down.
Potimas is the one who designed that thing, so I guess it makes sense that they look similar.
In short, it looks like a UFO.
You know, the kind from the made-up-sounding stories about aliens or whatever.
But it’s probably a fairly accurate way to describe this thing—because it really is a spaceship.
Potimas knows the shape this planet is in, of course.
He only stays in a place that’s essentially a house built on sand because of the system.
I know he was talking down about it just a few minutes ago, but that’s only because it failed to meet his expectations.
Potimas had high hopes for the system.
He thought it could make him into a god.
Potimas never became a god, but he still stayed on this planet in the faint hope that he might still be able to do it one day with the help of the system.
But I’m sure he knew that the chances of that were slim.
So of course he would have something prepared.
A means of escaping from this planet.
Potimas could leave the planet anytime he wants.
That’s why he’s able to stay so calm even if the world is on the verge of destruction.
And obviously, the thing floating up there is his escape plan.
However, the escape plan in question is currently being held in place by white threads.
It looks just like a fly that’s been caught in a spiderweb, and can do nothing but wait to be devoured.
In fact, that’s so on the nose that I can’t help but grin.
You’re really something else, White.
This is what you were up to while I was messing around with that Omega?
It’s so impressive, “good job” doesn’t begin to cut it.
I have no doubt that the real Potimas is in there.
He must have realized that things had gone south beyond any possible recovery and abandoned the Omega to make a break for it.
No matter how much time and effort it took to build, the Omega was still just one more tool to Potimas.
If he had to choose between that and his own life, he wouldn’t even think twice about it.
One of the threads holding the spaceship in place is attached to the ground right next to me.
It’s thick enough that a person could walk on it without a problem.
I glance around, but I don’t see White anywhere.
Still, since this thread looks like an open invitation to walk up it onto the spaceship, I’m sure that’s exactly what she intended.
So I climb onto the thread and use it to start ascending.
I feel like I’ve been doing a lot of ascending in the past few minutes…
I was worried that the spaceship might shoot at me or something, but soon I reach it without incident.
Maybe White has rendered it powerless already.
Hopping on top of the spaceship, I look around for a hatch.
Before long, I find it, pull it open with yet another show of force, and go inside.
It’s shockingly dark inside the spaceship.
There’s no light at all.
Not that it matters, since I’ve got the Night Vision skill.
I walk forward.
Since this thing is so huge, the corridors are stupidly long.
I keep walking.
Behind panes of glass, there’s an area that looks like a factory, and another that looks like a farm, and so on.
It’s probably set up so that anything a person might need can be provided within the spaceship.
After all, it could easily be roaming through outer space for hundreds of years.
Maybe Potimas stayed on this planet not just because he had hopes for the system, but also out of fear of the unknown future that awaited beyond it.
Gülie is the only god on this planet, but there might be much more of them on other planets.
That’s not something you’d want to mess around with.
I keep walking.
Some robot guards pop out, but they’re ridiculously weak compared to what I fought underground not long ago.
I take them down easily.
Fighting these other robots, it’s even clearer to me that the Omega I fought was a specially made model.
I keep walking.
A Potimas clone attacks me, bellowing oddly.
Its handsomely chiseled features are twisted grotesquely with fear and panic.
Until now, even if one of Potimas’s clones was killed, its composed expression never wavered like this.
He didn’t care how many clones he had to give up, but I guess having his real body killed is a different story.
I mean, obviously.
I quickly finish off the clone that attacks me.
At this point, even if it’s strengthened with mechanical parts, I’m long past letting a mere clone stop me.
“Basically, you’re screwed.”
I keep walking, and when I finally reach the end, I find it.
An elderly elf, inside a transparent cylinder.
Countless tubes are attached to the elf’s body.
The old elf doesn’t move at all; maybe it’s somehow frozen with special materials inside the cylinder or something.
But while the body doesn’t move, the speakers are spewing out desperate screams.
“Stop! No, no, don’t do it! I don’t want it to end! No, it can’t end here! I must go on living eternally! I beg you! Please stop!”
Endless pleas for me to stop flow from the speaker, mingled with wordless screams.
I guess you can keep screaming forever if you don’t have to breathe.
As far as Potimas is concerned, a body is just a receptacle for life, so it doesn’t matter what state it’s in as long as it’s still living.
If he wants to move, he can just use a clone.
The flesh inside of this cylinder, living but not moving an inch, is Potimas’s actual body.
I had imagined it might look something like this, but seeing it with my own eyes, it’s really quite pitiful.
The lifespan of an elf is long, but it’s not infinite.
Potimas has lived far, far longer than an elf’s natural lifespan.
So I figured he was probably keeping himself alive through rather extreme methods.
And now, the man who has so desperately pursued eternity for the sole purpose of clinging to life…is about to meet his end.
“I don’t want to die! I don’t want to die! Noooo! I don’t wanna diiiiiiie!”
“Sorry, Potimas, but I’m afraid you’re going to meet a fate worse than death.”
I have no sympathy for Potimas as he continues shrieking.
But I’m not quite in the mood to rub it in his face, either.
I always imagined that I might be overcome with some feeling or other when the time came, but I’m actually shocked at how little emotion I feel.
“Abyss Magic.”
Hearing my quiet murmur, Potimas screams even more madly.
Abyss Magic is quite unique.
While Heresy Magic destroys the soul, Abyss Magic dismantles the soul and returns it to the system.
Just killing him wouldn’t be enough.
I’m going to make him pay this world back with his very soul.
I start preparing Abyss Magic.
Unlike Heresy Magic, Abyss Magic spells require a complicated construction.
I’m sure the great D made it that way on purpose.
Heresy Magic was designed to oppose gods.
But Abyss Magic was made for the people of this world to pass judgment on one another.
It steals away the option of being reborn and sentences the transgressor to be returned to the system.
In essence, it means that person has been judged to be more use to the world by being restored to it as energy than by being reborn.
Personally, I think that’s why it takes so long to activate, making it a poor fit for use in battle.
This man has lived a very long time indeed.
He must have saved up a great deal of energy, enough that returning his entire soul to the system would be of some use.
At the very least, I’m sure he has the Immortality skill.
There’s no way he wouldn’t, since his ultimate desire is eternal life.
Immortality costs an insane amount of skill points, and therefore requires a lot of energy.
It would be a waste not to put that energy to good use.
Not that I think that could possibly begin to atone for all his sins.
“Damn it! Damn it all! If only I could have unlocked the secret to your perpetual youth! Damn you! Damn yoooou!”
Potimas unleashes a bitter volley of screams.
For some reason, I don’t age.
I don’t know if it’s because Potimas’s experiment succeeded, or an effect of the system, or something else.
But whatever the case may be, I somehow attained perpetual youth, the primary goal of the eternal life Potimas always desired.
Maybe that’s why he’s always been especially cruel to me.
Jealousy, I guess.
But it doesn’t make much difference how eternally youthful my body might be.
Because I’m reaching the limits of the lifespan of my soul, not my physical body.
And I’m sure I’m not the only one.
…Most likely, Potimas has been feeling the limits of his soul, too, just like me.
It looks like he succeeded in artificially keeping his body alive, but the soul can’t be fooled so easily.
Like mine, his soul has probably been weakening under the weight of the overgrown skills and stats we’ve accumulated over far too many years.
His physical body might be reaching its limits, too, but either way, Potimas sensed that his time was growing short.
So he started to panic.
I’m sure that’s why he’s been particularly active these past few years.
He must have agreed to take in the reincarnations in the hopes of finding some clue to extend his lifespan.
Maybe he thought one of their unique skills would be able to grant his wish.
Unfortunately for him, it’s not that simple.
But he still refused to give up, kept struggling, and ultimately ended up like this.
Running away from death, always running…
“……”
Suddenly, a question occurs to me, and I open my mouth.
But judging by the endless, meaningless yelling coming from the speakers, I doubt Potimas would be able to give me the answer I want.
In fact, there’s probably no point asking the question at all.
“Was there really any meaning to a life you spent fleeing death?”
I guess it’s better not to ask…
“Goodbye, Father.”
As the real Potimas goes on screaming, no longer forming any words with meaning, I direct the Abyss Magic toward him and activate it.
Then all that remains is silence.
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