Son of the Hero King

Chapter 772

Lilith commented in an idle, thoughtful tone. As though she were making an observation, not the blasphemy of bleeding a goddess. Her purple eyes shimmered with a hint of gold. Her concept was based on cutting, severance, paired with her art of God Slaying. However, even though she reached for such lofty and blasphemous heights throughout her whole life… she had never faced a true god, until now.

This chance was a boon tailor-made for her. An opportunity she could not let slip through her fingers. This could act as the foundation of her future. And the benefits were already showing. The imperfections in her blade were being burned off in real time, and her conviction continued to ascend higher and higher… to a plane that was fit to challenge the very concept of the gods and goddesses themselves.

The gods and goddesses may seem lofty and untouchable, but if they could bleed, just like any other mortal man or woman, they could be killed. Such was her realization and the crystallization of her conviction and resolution.

At that very moment, Lilith had been enlightened by that simple truth.

The goddess staggered back, disbelief crossing her perfect features. The wound was shallow, but it should not… could not exist. “That… should have been impossible.”

“You have been repeating this sentence a lot, goddess. I guess gods are truly not all-knowing either. Just what even do you have, goddess?” Lilith tsked with disappointment. She had missed the perfect occasion. Though the sword had managed to resist, it did waver for an instant, and that instant was enough for Euphoria to put her distance.

Lilith steadied her stance, dragging the sword free of the energy field surrounding Euphoria. The weapon vibrated in her grip, hungry and alive, its blades glinting faintly crimson and gold— Sol’s Dragon Scales, forged with his blood and mana.

This sword was a natural mage slayer. A sword that was nearly unaffected by mana and could erase most phenomena. For Lilith, it would not be exaggerating to say that it was the perfect weapon. For Euphoria, the blade was her worst nightmare.

The fight started anew, and Euphoria continued to prove why she was a goddess through and through, even though she was unable to go all out in the current situation— devoid of her Divine Kingdom and the requirement to not strain the Mortal Realm too far, lest it might break from the sheer intensity of her divinity.

Her aura pulsed again, like the beating of a new world, stronger this time, and the very Mortal Realm itself appeared to be singing in her favor. The ground folded in on itself to block Ambrosia’s rapid advances— a hurricane of different spells surging around her in a tsunami of destruction; gravity twisted, forcing Lilith’s footing to slide just out of alignment; even the all-incinerating heat of Ambrosia’s Genesis Flames curved and mellowed as they came into contact with the goddess’s shields, forming whorls that refused to scorch her skin.

“Do you see now?” Euphoria’s tone was serene once more, confident about her victory at the events against coming in tune with her control. “The world loves me. Every strike against me births a miracle just to protect me.”

Ambrosia snarled, her mature, beautiful face twisting in malice and wrath, pressing her palms together as her Genesis Flames spiraled into a miniature sun of malevolent heat. “Then let’s see how much the world can love you before it burns to cinders itself.”

Her words were like Law— a command forced upon reality as she let her flames bloom out of her hands.

｢ Genesis Flames —::— Third Verse -::- Origin Collapse ｣

The golden inferno roared – pure creation through all-encompassing destruction – collapsing the very fabric of reality itself on its path, surged toward the goddess. A spell born from the fusion of her mastery of the concepts of Time, Space, Fire, and Destruction. It was one of the most powerful spells in the arsenal of the Thousand Spells Witch. And it was primed to make the goddess pay the price for arrogance.

Euphoria countered instantly, her pink-gold aura flowering into complex geometry. The attack should have missed entirely – space itself folded in adoration of the goddess to guide the blast aside, to narrowly make the attack miss her form and keep her safe – however, Lilith moved before that could happen.

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“Like I said. You are nothing but a pale imitation compared to him.” She had been observing the fight and analyzing it from the start. It did not take long for her to understand that this power of Love was nothing but an inferior version compared to Sol’s ability to control the strings of Fate and influence Causality itself, bending them to his whims.

With a single leap through the twisting grounds and disorienting gravity, she saw through the strings of Fate working to keep the goddess safe and immediately slashed her sword once, the concept of Absolute Severance blooming and cutting through the support of Fate that Euphoria was coaxing with her power of Love. The Dragon-Scale Sword sliced through the distorted air, restoring its natural flow, forcing Euphoria to meet Ambrosia’s flames head-on.

The explosion hit like the collapse of a titanic sun. A hypernova that threatened to consume, incinerate, and annihilate every piece of particle and piece of existence in its path.

A destructive wave of air ripped through the battlefield, flattening everything for dozens of kilometers. The air itself caught into golden ribbons of all-consuming flames and disintegrated, turning into a suffocating haze that would have burned any person below the level of a bona fide Demigod in the vicinity of the explosion to utter cinders and ash, perhaps, not even leaving that single trace behind. Every sound vanished beneath the roar of the collapsing void of reality and the blooming of an abyss of nothingness in its place, and even the clouds above ignited into wreaths of golden ribbons of fire, leaving only a blinding white sky, radiating golden brilliance.

The ground ceased to exist. Rock, sand, and metal were stripped of form, erased into molten glass. For miles in every direction, the world was reduced to a smooth, glowing wasteland where no shadow could survive.

Lilith landed first, her boots skidding against the vitrified earth. The heat was nearly unbearable even for her, yet her sword stayed steady. Ambrosia hovered a few meters behind her, her staff trembling from the recoil of the blast, golden flames still flickering along her shoulders.

“Do you think we got her?” Ambrosia asked, her voice hesitant, unsure.

Lilith did not even glance up at the Cardinal Witch of the Center, who brought forth such wanton destruction upon the Mortal Realm. “Sol says that if someone asks that question, it usually means they didn’t.”

Ambrosia could not stop the grimace that formed on her face at those words, but she knew in her heart that Lilith was right. It had been a very draining attack for her, but from the power they felt radiating from the newly ascended goddess, they just knew that it would not be enough to take down Euphoria.

When the rippling golden light of annihilating heat cleared, Euphoria stood at the center. Her pink-gold aura flickered, and the perfection of her form was reduced to nothing. Her left arm half-dissolved to light, and her once-immaculate hair was scorched black at the tips. She was completely disfigured, and pain was seared into her very mind.

The Flames of Genesis were born from Ambrosia's very desire to bring destruction to the reality that made her suffer, gave her the illusion that her pain and misery were perfectly normal— it went without saying that the power had some… nasty effects for the one experiencing being against it firsthand.

Anyone else in her place would have been mortally wounded, or rather, reduced to nothingness from the all-annihilating flames that even broke down the very fabric of existence.

However, Euphoria was a goddess. Divine power filled her broken body, and her wounds all vanished in nearly an instant.

“I have near-unlimited divine energy. Do you think you can truly harm me like this!?”

Euphoria screamed. Gone was her leisure.

They were going to pay!

She pointed at them with an outstretched finger. Her power shifted colors and form— the beautiful pink of her Love transformed into a crimson hue of billowing Hatred.

“May the world hate and reject you for all eternity.”

｢ All Encompassing Hatred ｣

Her hatred was a blessing to herself and a curse to others. The two immediately took their distance. Yet the curse of the goddess was instantaneous, and as Ambrosia tried to deploy a spell, she understood what it truly meant to be hated by the very world itself.

After all, for the first time in more than a thousand years… her spell had failed her.

“Mana is rejecting me.”

She gritted her teeth as blood flowed unbidden from her lips. Her internal organs were hurting, twisting, breaking down. It had been far too long since she had received a backlash from casting a spell. A backlash she had not made any preparation for. And it hit her insides like a barrelling truck.

Ambrosia was not the only one affected. As a swordwoman, Lilith did not need to manipulate the mana from the air. Her own intent was enough to fight and actualize her concept.

Yet, while she did not need the world for her power, she needed it for her perception.

The very senses of reality became twisted for her. Distance no longer matched what her eyes saw. Light seemed to betray her, bending at odd angles, showing images where there were none. The smell of ash turned to sweetness. The faint hum of Euphoria’s power came from everywhere, all at once.

Her senses by themselves were not affected, yet the information they relayed to her was all wrong, dissonant, twisting.

It was as if the world itself wanted her to stumble and fail.

She understood the goddess’ power in an instant. Really, it was hard not to.

Euphoria was not just making the world love her. She was making it reject everything that opposed her.

For Ambrosia, that meant her mana, the very foundation of her abilities, was rebelling against her. For Lilith, it meant her reality was starting to warp and twist, barring all of her senses from functioning as they should. If she could not perceive, she could not cut, and if she could not cut and sever… she was nothing…

Truly, a troublesome goddess, and all Lilith could say was that, thankfully, there was no one to fight alongside Euphoria at this moment.

Clearly, her danger level would skyrocket if she had someone who could support her. Or rather, a combat-oriented god or goddess that could be the vanguard while she supported them. It would have been the death of them.

It seems like Anubis and Echidna are doing their jobs quite well. So we should do ours.

Lilith exhaled slowly, steadying her grip on the sword. Her mind was cold, but the dissonance gnawed at her focus.

Then again, it isn’t all that bad. She thought, and a smile formed on her face.

“I guess I should treat this as a new kind of training,” she said in a lighthearted tone, fully intending for the goddess to hear her.

Euphoria’s expression twisted into disgust, an expression she did not bother hiding. For the first time since the battle began, the goddess genuinely questioned what kind of lunatic she was fighting.

From the look Ambrosia shot Lilith’s way, she clearly was not the only individual asking themselves that very same question.