Chapter 77: Cosmic Heart

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From having her chest pierced to her heart being crushed into pieces, severe blood loss, and the shattering of her vertebrae as well, Anna was definitely going to die. Yet, in the last seconds left of life she had before dying, her entire body was sealed by a powerful ice, as Baihe used the last bits of Mana she held to seal her entire body, stopping her from dying.

However, this only delayed the inevitable; her consciousness was slowly fading away.

"Ugh… I'm seriously going to just die now."

"After all I've done and tried..."

"For fuck's sake."

"Maybe I tried too hard to change things."

"Should I have just hidden instead of jumping into danger so recklessly?"

"But the people I wanted to protect..."

"I… Even if I were given a second chance... I probably…"

"Wouldn't change…"

[A Certain Item within your Inventory is reacting to your lack of a Heart!]

[The [Cosmic Crystal Core (S Rank)] is shining brightly.]

"H-Huh?"

Anna couldn't believe what she saw in front of her frozen eyes—a system notification.

The Cosmic Crystal Core was an item she got from subjugating Bael.

She didn't exactly know what it was for, but it was an extremely powerful form of crystalized cosmic energy.

The power that Constellations used to make all sorts of miracles.

[WARNING! Your Health Points are rapidly depleting!]

[Time Left Until Certain Death: 12 Seconds.]

[Do you wish to exchange 10.000 Plot Points to implant the [Cosmic Crystal Core (S Rank)] as a replacement for a Heart?]

[Success Chances: 0.7%]

"T-This is…"

[Time Left Until Certain Death: 9 Seconds.]

[Time Left Until Certain Death: 7 Seconds.]

[Time Left Until Certain Death: 5 Seconds.]

Anna didn't even have time to consider the odds or anything at all.

This was her last shot, an opportunity that arose from the item the Constellations themselves gifted to her.

The power of the mysterious Cosmic Crystal Core was gleaming brightly.

[You have exchanged 10.000 Plot Points!]

[Initiating the fusion of the [Cosmic Crystal Core (S Rank)] into your body!]

FLASH!

Suddenly, the crystal materialized right inside the hole left behind by Astaroth as her tendrils wrapped around the crystal. The cosmic energy started coursing through Anna's veins and body as the crystal started beating like a heart, sending this rich energy everywhere. Her entire body started overflowing with an incredible power it couldn't take.

[The Effects of the [Jester's Reverse Fortune (S Rank Privilege)] have been activated, and the chances of success have been increased to 100% due to your ridiculous Luck Stat!]

[The [Cosmic Crystal Core (S Rank)] has been placed inside your torso.]

[Your veins and other tendrils have been connected successfully.]

[The [Cosmic Crystal Core (S Rank)] is imbuing Cosmic Energy into your body to force its functions to begin once more!]

[Your mortal body cannot take the richness and power of Cosmic Energy.]

[Your body is beginning to tear down and regenerate constantly from the effects of Cosmic Energy!]

"Unngh… F-Fuck!"

Anna felt her entire body dying and reviving over and over again; it was such an agonizing experience that her entire mind was beginning to deteriorate constantly! However, this was her only option and her last shot. If she didn't succeed, she would die like the background character she originally was.

"I see you're still clinging to life, brat."

Suddenly, Sepa's voice echoed from outside the ice cube as her spiritual presence swiftly emerged from within the necklace Anna had, where she was truly sealed.

"It was your damn fault I was in this state... Normally, I would be damn glad you'd die, so I could free myself from your shit."

"The thing is, if you die, I'll share a similar fate."

"So don't go dying on me, brat!"

The gigantic centipede goddess of death, light, and insects flew inside Anna's body, mixing her essence with the Cosmic Crystal Core, and helping her regulate the Cosmic Energy! The crystal where Sepa was sealed quickly merged with the Cosmic Crystal Core, as Sepa used her own sealing stone to regulate Anna's surplus cosmic energy, replacing her own heart.

"You've got yourself one mighty replacement for a heart!" She laughed. "Ungh…! I can barely hold on to its power in my current weakened state! D-Dammit!"

["Such a pathetic wielder... I guess I'll have to give you a hand; I have yet to settle things down with that despicable dragon"]

The voice of Gram echoed as well, which Anna was still holding tightly with her hands. His divine power, surging from his body, which was divinely crafted by Odin himself, merged with Anna's body as well, repairing the damage dealt to her and supporting Sepa's regulation of Cosmic Energy.

[Cosmic Energy is being slowly regulated!]

[Your body is quickly adapting to the surplus of power!]

[Excess power has been materialized and transformed into a new Skill!]

Crack, crack…!

The ice encasing Anna slowly started to shatter as something else began to surge from within.

CRACK!

…

Henrietta vomited blood as she felt her entire body covered in terrible wounds; she couldn't even do as she wanted; her body no longer responded to her.

"Y-You bastard…"

CLASH!

Before she could even finish her words, Henrietta was kicked away once more by Astaroth, his laughter echoing across the desolate battlefield. Her body landed, completely tattered over the ground, several of her bones already broken, and her stomach perforated, bleeding out. It was only thanks to her strong body that she was barely alive.

"Hm, I've grown bored." Astaroth sighed, floating above her, his legs pointing down at her. "I'll just crush you to death and be done with it…" He yawned. "After all, I've got that whole city of humans to crush later... Ah, I wonder how the others are doing..."

Suddenly, Astaroth's surroundings blackened. The entire world around him became pure shadows. His eyes felt surprised, analyzing everything in a split second.

"What is this?"

"{Shadow Embodiment}"

Before he could react, thousands of tentacles made of shadows, wolf-like jaws, and monstrous claws wrapped around Astaroth's entire body, stopping his movements while constantly draining away his vitality.

"Ungh?!" Astaroth was left shocked; he couldn't even move! "Who is it-"

A massive fist made of shadows hit Astaroth, crushing him down onto the floor, just meters away from Henrietta! Astaroth felt his entire body gain several cracks as the enormous attack hurt him terribly! His fearful eyes glanced into the darkness, as the sole body of a young man surged from within, his shadows wrapping around Henrietta's unconscious body, as a healing power healed her wounds slowly. His Aura continued spreading and evolving, shapeshifting into countless appearances and forms. All the beasts and demons he had devoured emerged, channeling their might with his own.

"Y-You…! W-Who are you?!" Astaroth was surprised that a being of this caliber had been hiding within humans all this time! Until he realized who his incarnation was—or well, the one that had merged with him. "F-Fenrir?!"

"Took you long enough to realize, lizard." Fenrir's voice echoed from within the darkness.

Jack was no longer just an A Rank Hunter-level human. After undergoing the harsh third trial for his Job Class Advancement within his System interface, he acquired tremendous new powers and skills, and even a derivative skill of gluttony.

{Assimilation}!

All the powers, beings, and souls he had devoured before converged as one within the core of his body, granting him tremendous power. Perhaps before, he was able to combine up to three or at most four powers together.

However, now he had completely stepped further into his mastery over Gluttony, as he had developed the power to completely merge all powers and skills he possessed into a single wave of relentless, ever-growing might!

And that, combined with his even greater Shadow and Darkness Magic became something that even Astaroth, with his incredible speed and physical power, could not easily match. Especially when part of this "converged" power came from the Fragments of Archdemons Jack had devoured before, including Ouroboros and Lilith.

"S-So it is you…!" Astaroth groaned, his muscles beginning to grow larger and larger as he controlled the flow of his demonic energy, giving himself more physical strength in exchange for speed!

CRASH!

With sheer physical might, Astaroth freed himself from the shadows binding him, shattering them apart as his demonic aura turned them into particles of nothingness.

"I had heard from the other Apostles that Fenrir, the exiled Devourer of Constellations, has taken over the body of a human!" Laughed Astaroth. "To think we would one day meet... You and I share a similar goal, don't you, dog? Why are you fighting with me? Come and join me!"

Unlike humans, Astaroth treated Fenrir much differently. After all, Fenrir was a Demonic Beast of equal standing to Astaroth and the other Apostles of Death, to an extent.

However, in the last battle he had against the Constellations, the Ragnarök, he was defeated and had his soul and powers sealed within a "Ruined World," the source of the Dungeons that appear across Earth.

Until Jack, by chance, found him.

"SHUT UP! Don't compare me to the likes of you!" Fenrir barked furiously, having no empathy at all for the bastards. His power flowed across Jack, as the young man's entire body was wrapped by his shadows and demonic and divine soul. An armor of shadows emerged, covering his entire body.

"{Demonic God-Eating Berserk Armor}"

An enormous shockwave of might surged from Jack as he combined all his powers together and condensed them into a single temporary relic, an armor made out of the divinity of Fenrir himself.

He already knew the bastard in front of him was the source of all this chaos and despair, and perhaps the one behind his sister's life force was suddenly being cut off.

Before anything else, he had to kill him—no, devour him!

"I guess conversations are not enough to get into you, Fenrir?" Astaroth sighed.

"You're not talking to Fenrir right now, but to me, Jack, the human that'll beat the fuck out of you!" Jack roared, clashing against Astaroth with tremendous might!

His black armor was shaped in various ways, gathering the might of the monstrous beasts Jack had hunted and devoured. The powerful ones, such as Ouroboros, Lilith, and Fenrir, gathered the most. His armor took on the appearance of both snakes and demons, with a wolf-shaped helmet.

Swinging his massive Demonic Sword, Gram, which was almost the same as the Gram Anna held, Jack unleashed all his strength at once, the powerful sword glowing with demonic and dark energy, happy to be fighting a dragon!

Astaroth couldn't take too many hits; his new body was powerful yet frail. He swiftly changed his stat bonuses constantly with great mastery, manipulating the fluctuation of demonic energy flowing across his body.

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

However, the power of this second Gram was just as mighty, a powerful Demonic Sword Jack had acquired from the System itself, a relic that Fenrir had devoured from one of the many gods he once fought. It wasn't just a knockoff of the real Gram, but its other half.

"Ungh…! Why is that sword- Agh! D-Don't tell me, Gram's other half?!" Astaroth thought, as his entire body was covered in several deep cuts.

The Legendary Heroic Constellation, Sigurd, never had the complete sword. His sword, which once belonged to his father, the Ancient Heroic Constellation, the Hero King Sigmund, was the complete Gram, which was shattered into two pieces by Odin himself once Sigmund died by his hand trying to defeat a god with their own creation.

"This is ridiculous!" Astaroth thought. "How come those two humans living in this same world have both of Gram's pieces?! That Damn Bael!"

Astaroth was well aware of Gram's history. When it was divided by Odin, one of these halves was given to Sigurd, while the other was gifted to Thor by Odin himself. In his battle against Thor in the Ragnarök, Fenrir managed to tear apart Thor's right hand before being defeated, swallowing the other fragment of Gram and corrupting it into a Demonic Sword with his powers; later on, Jack acquired it as a System Reward.

Meanwhile, the Gram Anna acquired from Bael was stolen from Sigurd once he lost against the Ancient Apostles of Death while trying to defend his original world, Midgard, from the Demons' Invasion.

FLASH!

Jack quickly noticed that Gram was shining brightly, gaining more and more strength!

[The [Corrupted Dragon-Slaying Demonic Sword: Gram] is reacting to its other half being close by!]

[Its total Attack Power and Bonus Stats have temporarily increased by +200%!]

"T-This is… It's the other half?!" Jack wondered; although he wanted to find it, he had no time to take breaks.

Concentrating his energy and mana into the sword itself, Jack moved swiftly, reaching the shocked Astaroth and striking him ten times in a single second!

"{Dragon Slaying Sword}!"

Gram glowed with demonic energy, and even a hint of celestial, divine power mixed with it, as ten strikes reached Astaroth's entire body, covering him with ten holes! Blood and guts splattered everywhere.

"N-No…! Impossible!"

Astaroth, without being able to believe his luck, fell to the floor, vomiting a mouthful of blood while glancing at his own, destroyed body! Landing over the ruins, his powerful body left behind a massive crater.

"T-This is… Ungh…!" Astaroth vomited more blood, incapable of regenerating his wounds.

Jack slowly walked towards him, his sword overflowing fiercely as it drank and tasted the blood of an evil, demonic dragon.

"It is over, Astaroth!" Fenrir roared. "Jack, finish him off quickly!"

"Very well…" Jack nodded. "…Huh?!"

However, he suddenly stopped moving, as he sensed a tremendous danger coming from Astaroth out of nowhere! As if his deepest instincts told him to step back.

It was a presence- no, several presences suddenly popping out of nowhere, all within Astaroth's body.

"Ugh…! Wait! I can fight some more! I can still fight- AGH!"

Astaroth's body started to shapeshift, trembling and struggling, as the head of a large red tiger emerged from his left shoulder, roaring angrily.

"Enough of your tomfoolery, useless lizard! Let me take them all on my own! RAAH!"

And then, a third head popped out of his right shoulder, this one in the shape of a crow with sharp red eyes.

"CRAAAH! This body is made up of all three of us! You can't go losing it, bastard!"

Astaroth groaned in agony as the will of these two other Demons took over his body.

"S-Stop! Neberius! Aim! I am the owner of this body! I contributed the most—UAAAGH!"

Suddenly, his entire body began to mutate, and dozens of new limbs surged. The wings of crows, the claws and fangs of tigers and cats, and a mutant, chimeric form were created!

"Enough of your shit, CRAAAH!" Neberius roared. "We'll crush this damn human and then set everything to flames! Burn it all!"

"Now that your mind has grown weaker, we'll take over… Don't worry, gahahaha! We'll do a good job killing the humans too!" Aim laughed.

"T-There were two other Apostles inside of Astaroth's Manifestation?!" Fenrir was shocked. "I see… So this is how he's so damn strong, even when he's a manifestation that was only born a few hours ago! The way he finished his manifestation creation so fast was because three of them joined together as one…"

"We'll lay waste to your world, human! CRAAH!" Neberius laughed.

"This world shall belong to us DEMONS!" Laughed Aim.

"For fuck's sake." Jack sighed. "Give me a break…"

…

Crack, crack… Crack!

Meanwhile, the ice that froze Anna's entire body continued to gain more and more cracks as a bright, cosmic light surged from the small cracks.

FLAAASH!

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