339: The Underworld (2)

Chapter 339: The Underworld (2)

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Spiraling paths that led from the top to the bottom of this terrain, as if stairs, they rolled down in a circular motion. Each circle stretched for hundreds of meters and there were dozens of those circles.

However, the paths weren't plain and clear. It was wet to the feet, and it didn't seem like normal water. There was a smell, a stench in the air that made even Neji uncomfortable. 

On either side of the bridge-like road, there were cages. The cages all had a round blue light shining within them.

This was Babylon's Underworld, [Kur].

"Whoa…"

"Don't touch it."

Jaguarman was about to touch one of the cages, but Neji slapped her hand away.

"How clumsy, despite being a Goddess."

Neji shook his head while the Goddess' eyes went teary and withdrew her hand away. She didn't say anything in retort.

Neji turned to look at Fujimaru and Mash who just landed; he gave both of them a nod.

"Ereshkigal likes to keep the soul she takes a liking to, close to herself. In the past, there used to be a few. However, it seems she changed after allying herself with the two Goddesses. There are thousands of souls. They can't pass onto peace, and are just stuck here."

They needed to stop Ereshkigal. A battle head-on wasn't impossible to break out. They had to be prepared to risk their lives; because dying in the Underworld meant that even Neji wouldn't be able to revive them. Dying here would kill their soul, and so Tenseigan wouldn't help.

"If we bought Ishtar, she would have been as useful as an ant by the time we reached the end of this path. However, that doesn't imply we are well off now. An underworld is a place where Divine Spirits and Heroic Spirits lose a lot of their powers, so they are unable to flee once they get here. Though the nerf is weaker than the one placed upon Ishtar."

Neji explained, and everyone listened attentively.

"Let's move a bit forward; it'll be easier to explain the next part there."

Neji led the group forward, stopping Fujimaru who was about to ask why he did what he did back then. The group walked for quite a few minutes, before coming across a large stone gate. The gate was unique and had two animal engraving on each side of it.

Neji took two jewels out of his inventory and threw them forward. It was a sort of ritual. The two jewels banged against a barrier around the gate that stretched infinitely on all sides of the gate, so someone couldn't just fly around it.

– Boom!

With a loud boom, the two jewels exploded in the group's faces. The energy of the loud explosion traveled to the four animal signs on the gate and started to glow.



The group flinched in surprise, and that surprise only grew when an eerie voice spoke from every direction.

`"Answer me,"

The voice of a female, eerie and cold, spoke. That was she; Ereshkigal.

`"Answer me, you lot who have fallen to the underworld from the land of the living."

There was a short silence before the voice continued.

`"What must your souls be; evil or good?"

Neji dove into his memories and looked for this incident. Back when Gilgamesh had come here. Opening his eyes, he nodded at the girls.

"There are seven gates like these. It will ask you questions, and upon a correct answer, it will allow you to enter. After passing each gate, no matter if our answers were correct or not, the Heroic and Divine Spirits, meaning Vinci, Jaguarman, and me, will be weakened. Regardless, we have to answer."

"Ah… alright."

Mash nodded while Neji looked at Fujimaru.

"That's why I wanted you to tap into more power of the Sage Seal. So that you can fight in our stead. That seal is… powerful, and when added with the spells of this world, it's ought to get stronger. I didn't mean any malice or did it for fun."

"Uh,"

Fujimaru looked awkward and touched by that response. She gave a slow nod and said nothing.

Neji turned around, just as the voice from before started to speak.

Usually, it's supposed to ask questions to ask morally ambiguous questions that will test the purity of the soul. In the canon timeline, however, the voice asked who was more beautiful—Ishtar or Ereshkigal. That happened because Ereshkigal had a little crush on Fujimaru. However, such development hadn't happened in this timeline, so the questions should proceed as usual.

`"Brother Gilgamesh,"

Yet, the question was entirely different.

`"Are you here to eliminate me?"

"…."

Ishtar and Ereshkigal were essentially different sides of the same coin. It was one of those situations where a being is separated in two, and each part contains different qualities. That's why Ishtar and Ereshkigal were prayed to as the same Goddess.

Enough that she could switch her consciousness with the current body that Ishtar was occupying. That also meant that the Ereshkigal who was in the underworld wasn't a Servant Body. She was a true God in both body and soul, and that Ereshkigal was beyond Tier 12. When coupled with the fact that, in the underworld, she was much stronger and her enemies were much weaker, it was clear that this Goddess would be harder to deal with than Quetzalcoatl.

Now, that same dangerous Ereshkigal believed he was here to eliminate her. If she wanted, she could attack them now, using the entire underworld as a weapon. Then, he might actually die here. He needed to at least allow the group near her real body.

"Ereshkigal. You have teamed up with the foreign Goddesses to destroy humanity. As humanity's protector, its shield and weapon, it'd not be unnatural for me to come here to eliminate you."

Neji said, ready to launch into his full dragon form if she attacked.

"However, that is not the case here. I am here to speak. Can we?"

There was silence. Nearly a minute later, the ethereal voice replied.

`"You came just for a talk? Even though a Divine Spirit, two servants, and a strong battle-mage are accompanying you?"

The four girls behind him flinched in uncomfortableness. Though Fujimaru looked greatly delighted hearing the term 'Battle-Mage'. That was a title she never expected to see herself attached with.

Neji shrugged his shoulders; he had a chance to easily turn this around since she hadn't yet attacked.

"What can I say? I haven't seen my cute older sis in ages, and she seems to have changed a lot in that time. I had to be a bit more cautious, in case my lovely sis was being mentally manipulated by the other Goddesses."

Neji bootlicked her well; after all, Gilgamesh and she weren't close enough to call each other like this. They did call one another brother and sister, but it was more on a respectable tone than the one Neji was using.

`"…You too, have changed." The voice said. "Are you still the same Gilgamesh? Your hair is different, and I sense dragon energy within you."

"About that—I was hoping to meet face to face before we talk. Will that be possible?"

Neji tried asking her again. There must be a chance since she was yet to attack.

Unfortunately, that hope of Neji's was deemed false.

`"I don't think we can work with that. I am sorry, brother. I promise your soul will be all right… you and I will live eons together… but your body needs to die. I cannot trust you at all, with Humanity's Last Master by your side."

Danger.

Neji's senses flared up and he shouted for the girls to run—but it was too late.

With a loud earthquake, the road trembled greatly, before the small part beneath their feet crumbled down. Falling right towards the tall spiky rocks on the floor. As if to block his flight and stop him from trying to save anyone, the spiky rocks beneath them shot up—so did the spiky rocks in all the walls.

Suddenly, death was approaching from six directions. Neji's sixth sense flared in a great alert.

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