Judgement

The Ruins of the Solomon Empire, Backlund.

Klein sucked in a deep breath after the Lady Despair left, his mind slowly connecting the dots after overhearing the Demoness. He cast a subconscious glance towards Queen Mystic, whose expression had practically crumpled, her eyes darting with a look of realisation.

The Fool immediately knew that the Queen of Pirates probably inferred the secret behind this whole event.

The Queen Mystic caught his gaze, tilted her head towards the altar where the ritual was about to commence, and they together ran out of the darkness.

The first thing they noticed was the altar, which was encircled by layers of light, and the tall, thin figure standing on it.

The figure took off its hood, revealing a beautiful, devilishly feminine face with a left chest, shoulders, abdomen, and thighs all covered in squirming, sticky, disgusting flesh and blood.

Beyond the altar, the four hooded figures were in genuflecting positions, and only their eyes were visible, which were filled with reverence and piety.

And at the top of the hall, rays of light pierced through the air, quickly entering the altar through the stone pillars, floor, and air that were filled with symbols and magic labels.

As soon as they emerged from his hiding place, Mr. A opened his eyes and looked in their direction. His pupils were dyed with blood, and an extreme madness was contained within his cold eyes.

The moment the Queen Mystic saw Mr. A, she instinctively clenched her right hand and conjured an ancient spear. The spear was ruby red from tip to handle.

Spear of Longinus!

This weapon had appeared in an unknown ancient era, stained with the blood of a great existence. At this moment, it had descended into the ruins of Solomon Empire through mystical re-enactment, emitting a terrifying aura that froze everything and everyone in the ruins for a moment.

Klein blinked, his back soaked in sweat. The crimson spear gave him a fatal feeling, as though if it were aimed at him, he'd be doomed no matter what he did.

And he was proven true, since when Queen Mystic launched the red spear at Mr. A, he instinctively tried to resist, even attempting to teleport, but it was as futile as trying to run from a tsunami.

The crimson spear accurately peirced his chest, and he let out a blood-curdling roar filled with such hatred and rage that even Klein flinched inwardly before his figure was drowned out by the red light that erupted from the spear, spreading outward into the altar, then stone pillars—briefly illuminating everything in the hall.

After a heartbeat, the red light faded away, filled in by serene silence, and Klein sucked in a sharp breath, looking ahead. 'Is this the might of a high-sequence beyonder?'

Before him, the altar had disappeared, along with all of its symbols and magic labels, into nothingness.

It was simple for him to infer what had happened—the Queen Mystic had completely destroyed Mr. A and his ritual in a single attack. This meant that she had entirely stopped True Creator's descent without breaking a sweat!

"It isn't as simple as you think." The Queen Mystic spoke up, her creepy purple eyes peering into him. "The ritual was doomed to fail. Even if I hadn't been present, someone would have stopped it." She paused, her brows pinched in thought. "Perhaps by you as well..."

Klein did not refute it. He knew he was foolish and stupid enough to have done exactly that if he had been alone here. Now the question was, Would he have survived in the end?..

"Leave this place." The Queen Mystic spoke as her figure faded into a palette of colours in space.

Klein hesitated for a while before nodding tightly, knowing that he would only be a burden in the approaching battle between the Queen Mystic and the Lady Despair.

The Queen Mystic then vanished.

——————————

The Loen Military Base, Kolian, East Balam.

Alfred Hall, the second son of Earl Hall and a brigadier general of the Loen Military, was going through his monthly inspection across the military base with his subordinates. It was tiresome task, to be honest, considering sheer size of the base and everything it held.

Alfred, though, did the inception dedicatedly, as he had done for the past two years since becoming brigadier general. In the military, duty always came first. It was a lesson he had learned the hard way in his chivalrous days.

He slowly walked to the edge of the watch tower, overlooking the military base with his azure eyes. For a moment, he took it all in, basking in the glory of Loen.

'The crown must win,' Alfred thought of the unofficial motto of the royal family, 'must always win.'

If he thought about it, it was certainly appropriate, reflecting everything Loen stood for. They may have faced numerous hurdles, losses, and defeats along the way, but victory was always theirs.

Always.

At the moment, there was a flash of light in the sky, prompting him and everyone else in the base to subconsciously gaze up. What he saw there froze him in his tracks, his face becoming pale as he faced the horrifying sight.

A gigantic bronze door rose vertically in the sky above their stronghold, and thousands of spirits poured out of it, like the legendary army of Death creeping out of hell itself—all crashing down towards the base, bringing with it darkness that threatened to consume everything and everyone.

It was the most terrifying sight Alfred had ever seen, but with terror came determination, pushing him out of a stupor, but before he could issue orders to his frozen subordinates in an effort to have them defend their base with all they had, something bright and stormy filled his vision.

And he felt light, all strength escaping him. He could somehow see a bronze arm reaching out to him from an endless height, plunging and claiming his soul for itself.

'It is Death.' Alfred realised in a last moment of harsh clarity, 'Death has come for me.'

"Mother, Father, Hibbert, Audrey." He managed, words escaping his withering lips as last and final whispers. "I'm sorry..."

And then all vitality left him, and in his place was no longer the smart and diligent young man but a withered husk, wilted and broken.

The harsh reality was that Death had arrived not just for Albert but for everyone and everything below demigods at military bases across the southern continent and seas.

In a single and untied event, the saints of Numinous Episcopate unleashed their twilight storms, which swept throughout the military bases within a moment, and everything it touched, from beyonders to mortals, ships to planes, buildings to towers, withered and rotted, all breaking and falling into the embrace of Death in repose and silence.

And the storms all but destroyed any fight the troops tried to put up against the descending army of spirits, allowing them to deafeningly touch down on the collapsing bases, and they brought Death with them, leaving nothing but Destruction in their wake.

Ultimately, the truth was that Alfred Hall was nothing but another insignificant soul mercilessly claimed by the surging trend of the times.

———————

With the element of surprise, the strategic planning of Lucien and his angels, and the covering of the Angel of Imagination, the first stage of the assault was extremely successful.

Within moments of the assault, the military bases throughout the southern continent and seas were enveloped in the veil of Death. Nothing below demigods managed to escape the initial attacks from the Numinous Episcopate, which almost turned the bases into wasteland filled with ashes and debris, devoid of life and vitality.

It was a dreadful and harrowing sight for all the survivors to behold. The military might of the world's most powerful countries was wiped out just like that.

Nevertheless, the assault was far from over; in fact, it had just begun.

A copper light shot out from the ruins of Kolain to the bronze door, pausing right in front of descending legions of spirits and unveiling what appeared to be a colossal judgement scale flickering with mythical specks of light that emitted a strict and harsh aura.

And from within it, a regal and majestic voice resounded far and wide with suppressed rage and fury.

"Weaken Mysticism, Enhance Reality!"

Immediately, a suppression descended throughout the Southern Continent.

All beyonders below the level of angels felt their powers decline along with other supernatural forces, while things based in the material world became more effective. However, the suppression was not evenly distributed, focusing on the wrecked military bases, particularly on Numinous Episcopate members who were now infiltrating the bases to cull the last survivors as well as the powers they had unleashed, though the level of suppression each bore differed depending on their sequences.

This was one of the most potent skills of the Justiciar Pathway. It was obtained when one ascended to the level of demigod, and as one ascended further, the power and effectiveness of this ability increased with them to the point where the Justiciar, the Sequence 0, could use this ability to deprive every single beyonder in the world—who were not mythical creatures—of their abilities or increase the power of conventional weapons to the point where they could even kill mythical creatures.

The Night Emperor used this ability when he betrayed the Seven Gods in the War of Four Emperors. That day, he alone nearly brought down all of the orthodox churches.

Now, the one who executed this ability was none other than Silvia Augustus, Field Marshal of Loen Military and an Angel of Justiciar Pathway, who had entered her mythical creature form.

And the results were immediate. Leaving aside the suppressed beyonders, the bronze doors that hung above the bases began to darken and wane with the army spirits, as if they were going to vanish into nothingness.

But before that could happen, something interrupted. It was a heavy and severe bam, like a judge slamming his gavel and passing a judgement, which wouldn't be the wrong way to describe what had happened, for literally a judgement was passed here.

A judgement to bring death upon the order that brought suppression throughout the southern continent.

It was enacted by Haiter. As a Death Counsel, he had the authority to judge something or someone to their death, though it wouldn't be completely effective against others of his level, and those above him could completely ignore his judgement. The Death Counsels had to judge the dead and guide them to the underworld while the Underworld Emperor was still alive.

The Judgement was imposed on reality as Haiter appeared before Silvia in his mythical creature form—the feathered serpent—and the suppression over the beyonders and all supernatural powers on the southern continent dissolved into oblivion, bringing everything back to normalcy.

As the saints and demigods continued to battle in the ruins, Silvia and Haiter faced off in the dim and dark sky.

"Haiter…" Silvia's voice resounded from the floating judgement scale like a raging tsunami, "You and all of your people will pay for what you have done."

"I doubt that." Haiter merely said, his vertical eyes cold and indifferent, and then immediately he attacked Silvia, holding nothing back.

The feathered serpent let out a roar that pierced Silvia's spirit body, but she tuned it out with her balance authority, which dispersed it evenly among her surroundings to the point that it was no longer a burden for her to endure.

When she felt the darkness around her thicken and richen to form a "curtain," she realised she had made a mistake—Haiter's roar, which was actually formed from the language of Death that only those beyonders of the Death Pathway could detect and understand. He disguised it as a spiritual attack in order to pray to an unknown entity. And, by dispersing his onslaught throughout his surroundings, she had even assisted him in successfully getting a response—and wanted to rectify it, but it was too late.

The "curtain" revealed an image of a dark-green giant black snake with a bronzed skinned face; its closed eyes opened, burning with flickering pale flames.

The Artificial Death!

————————

At the same time, in Bayam, Sia Palenque Eggers floated above the Loen's destroyed navy base, glancing in the direction of Kolain with fretting eyes for a moment before returning her attention to the battles between saints and demigods taking place below, overseeing them. She wasn't assisting her army; she was preparing for someone to arrive, someone as powerful as her. Her senses suddenly tingled, and she looked up, her posture dignified and primed.

Stormy and gloomy clouds engulfed the darkness and azure of the firmament in a single heavy moment, obscuring the sky above all of the Rorsted Archipelago. Then there came a light that seemed to illuminate the entire sky, followed by catastrophic thunder that slightly shook the city of Bayam, spreading fear and awe among everyone.

And in the midst of it all, a young man with a dominant and flamboyant demeanour appeared. His blue hair was dark and thick, and he had long earlobes. His azure eyes seemed to constantly suppress lightning and storms within them.

Sia immediately recognised him.

Harrow Gaunt, an angel of the Lord of Storms!

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A/N : Okay, I just want to say this: I am just a beginner in writing, so I don't have much experience in writing battles, but I will try my best to make it fluid and gripping.

And as always, stones will be appreciated; they keep me motivated.