CHAPTER 93: | THE DESTRUCTION OF ATLANTIS | 13

  ---

  I watched Varuna.

  His eyes were closed, a final act of turning away from the painful memories he refused to speak of.

  His time as a denizen of this dungeon would remain a secret even in death.

  "You're a terrible storyteller, Varuna. Look at Tellus, with his thick, simple skull, he didn't feel a single thing."

  Tellus puffed out his chest, his indignation a visible ripple.

  "What do you mean, Summoner?! I, Tellus, understood his pain and his story, unlike you... a cold, unfeeling machine that only kills to reach its goal!"

  His words were surprisingly well-chosen, but then again, how could this dimwit even begin to comprehend anything?

  He couldn’t even win Celeste's heart, a failure so pitiful that it almost earned my nonexistent sympathy.

  I smirked, and Tellus, seeing the shift in my expression, nervously averted his eyes.

  Before he could turn to Varuna for comfort, I cut in with a question veiled in sarcasm.

  "Then, with a mind as wise as a sage's, tell me, why is Varuna's storytelling skills so lackluster?"

  Tellus chewed on his imaginary lips, his eyes darting frantically before landing on Varuna in a desperate, silent plea for help.

  Varuna sighed in disappointment.

  "You’re just as foolish as the true one… my brother’s fragment. I never wanted to linger in those memories."

  Tellus’s imaginary chest rumbled with a sigh of his own.

  "Perhaps. A fragment like me can’t help but inherit the flaws along with the rest."

  He looked at me, a sad smile on his lips, his face half as handsome as my own, then closed his eyes and spread his arms.

  "Kill me, Outsider… end my suffering and let me reunite with my daughter."

  I met his gaze, a smile mirroring his own.

  "Why do you so desperately wish to die by my hand? You know your soul will be assimilated into mine, just like your daughter's… so why do you so futilely seek refuge inside me?"

  He opened his eyes, a flicker of human-like pity in them that stared straight into my own.

  "It's not futile… but for you, it is… so please, let me reunite with my daughter and protect her for eternity."

  I smiled at his words.

  My maw opened, a cavern of pure darkness, a void that pulled at the very currents around us.

  But he merely glanced, watching his skin turn to dust and fragments as the void swallowed him whole.

  He felt liberation through the pain, gazing at the Outsider's stomach as he forgot to ask for his glorious name, the name of the one who had granted him the liberation he longed for.

  He smiled, feeling the familiar presence of his brother's remnant nearby.

  "Tellus… I, your brother, pity you for continuing the very journey you once hated…"

  Tellus heard his brother's voice, filled with pity, and a smile of his own formed in response. He shook his head.

  "I, Tellus, don't regret a thing… It is you, dear brother, who gave up too early when we had the chance to escape… That dragon, Venus, who ruined our lives, will meet his fate at my hands."

  His words were as calm and stable as the earth itself as he gazed at the imperial palace and chuckled.

  "Summoner, it seems we have two more intruders."

  I, too, nodded, having felt their presence deep inside the palace.

  From Varuna’s account, I knew two intruders had arrived, one, a Grandmaster, the other, a Supreme God.

  The first radiated a blinding purity, so bright it screamed for attention.

  Its light affinity didn’t inspire awe, but only arrogance, like a spotlight desperate to be seen.

  The second… was worse.

  It was too twisted, its essence feeling like a funhouse mirror of my own soul, a corruption so deep that its very existence seemed to poison the air around it.

  Its strength rivaled Ashin Sae Acoustine herself.

  Varuna’s presence vanished into silence.

  The void he left behind lingered for only a heartbeat before my gaze shifted downward, toward Solia in meditation.

  And there, breaking the fragile calm, came Ishtar’s cry…

  "M-mister! Where are you?! B-big sister Solia! Where are you…?! Hic… hic… why is this happening to me again… a-are they abandoning me just like my mommy did?"

  If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  I smirked at Ishtar's frantic rambling.

  The noise of the world outside faded.

  My transformation dissolved, the distortion of my form rippling back into a normal human shape.

  I appeared before her, my feet silent on the rubble, wearing a gentle smile.

  "Ishtar… what are you doing here?"

  Ishtar’s eyes lit up and she threw herself into my arms.

  Her tiny weight clung to me with a desperation that stung deeper than any blade.

  I kissed her cheek, an unfamiliar warmth tugging at my face until I realized that I wasn't faking it, I was genuinely smiling.

  “Were you scared your big sister would leave you?”

  I asked softly.

  Ishtar touched her cheek in a daze, a new, unwanted hunger for my attention and closeness flickering in her eyes.

  She nodded hastily.

  "Mister… pat Ishtar, please? Ishtar is scared of being alone…"

  I smiled, then gently, patted her head.

  She rested her head on my shoulder, and I felt a flicker of genuine relief as she calmed.

  The silence between us was profound.

  "Ishtar… Ishtar will be a good girl… so don't leave Ishtar, okay?"

  Sorrow filled her voice, echoing the pain of being repeatedly abandoned by the adults she had trusted.

  I understood that pain.

  I felt a kinship with her, having grown up alone with my sister, relying on each other to rise in the first age of the multiverse.

  "Hmm… as long as you're a good girl, this Mister of yours will never leave you behind… so be a good girl, okay?"

  Ishtar's face lit up.

  She looked into my eyes and smiled like the silly child she was, her toothless front teeth a funny sight.

  "Really?! You promise, Mister, that you will never leave Ishtar?!"

  I smiled at her words and extended my pinky finger.

  Ishtar, too, interlocked her small finger with mine.

  "Yes, I promise that I will not abandon you…"

  She peered into her future subconsciously and knew I was telling the truth.

  A blindingly bright smile spread across her face.

  "Mister, Ishtar loves you!"

  I smiled at her cute words and patted her head.

  "Hmm… love me forever, like your real father."

  Ishtar smiled and clung to my neck, her tiny arms tightening as if afraid to let go.

  She nodded once, then drifted into sleep against my shoulder.

  Tellus gazed at me, shocked, as my demeanor switched to a cold, calculating mask.

  "I didn't know you could feel human emotions, Summoner… I'm quite shocked by your change."

  I looked at him, then closed my eyes and sighed.

  "The chances of us winning against the second Outsider are slimmer than a percent, but the one who possesses the affinity of light… I could guarantee a hundred percent victory if I awakened my race."

  Tellus looked at me, then shook his head, his gaze shifting to Solia.

  He was amazed at how she was devouring the monster core of his sibling, whom he'd deduced to be Surtr from Varuna's account.

  "Summoner… this woman is quite impressive on her own. Absorbing Surtr's monster core is no big deal… but she isn't just absorbing it. She's infusing her mid-grade lightning affinity with the remaining fire affinity in Surtr's core, thus creating a new affinity."

  "That's why I appointed her as my first apostle… to become my maid. She's fairly capable once I've drilled the basics into her."

  Solia, hearing the words 'drilled' and 'basics,' subconsciously trembled as memories of her training with her master flashed through her mind.

  But before she could get distracted, I pressed my palm into her back and guided her mana in a more efficient way, a sneer on my lips.

  "Truly, this girl can't even focus on her task, being disrupted by outside influences… I think I'll have you under my tutelage again for a decade after I've killed that bitch."

  Tellus looked at his summoner and sighed, then shifted his gaze to the castle.

  He reshaped into a humanoid golem, joints gleaming like a grotesque cybernetic puppet.

  "Summoner… not to insult you, but you know… we are not a match for that bitch, nor that terrifying being whose existence is as disgusting as it can be."

  Tellus was visibly nervous as his Summoner stayed silent.

  He knew that even though his Summoner had said he would take care of that woman, he had to remind him, just to be sure.

  His golden eyes clicked in their sockets, grinding like ancient gears as they locked onto my face.

  "Hmm… thanks for the reminder."

  I said.

  "That's why we can't just recklessly charge over there."

  Tellus nodded.

  He looked at Solia, a hint of interest in how her affinity would evolve, but then shook his head.

  "Then let us think of a way…"

  BOOM!

  The world turned a blinding gray.

  A jagged, smoking hole ripped open in the imperial palace. An ink-like snake appeared.

  Then a massive ice seal.

  Tellus watched the fight, seeing a leviathan and the famous signature of Ashin Sae Acoustine, a spell infamous for its ability to infinitely increase its weight to crush anything in her way.

  "Summoner, it seems that some crazy bastard… has earned the ire of the Emperor."

  I watched the leviathan. As it became a flash of brilliance. My perception picked up its speed, it moved like light. A section of its body was bruised.

  "You damned coward! How dare you annoy me!"

  Ashin Sae Acoustine shouted, leaping from the hole. ?A thousand-meter trident, forged from pure abyssal frost, formed in her hands.

  ?"Ascension V Skill: Trident of the Abyss."

  She roared.

  ?As the thousand-meter frozen trident shot through the currents, as it carved through the water, leaving a trail of ice in its wake.

  Then the visage of an ice dragon appeared for a moment, as it vanished.

  Then in the next instance it reappeared hundreds of meters away from the radiant leviathan.

  ?But the leviathan ever arrogant only smirked.

  As its brilliant white eyes tracked the trident's trajectory, calculating its speed and velocity, searching for a way to dissolve it.

  Then in the next instance the world turned into a freezing stillness as the leviathan's gaze sharpened, its brilliant white eyes locking onto the trident now a hundred meters away.

  The leviathan slowly coiled its massive body like a spring, and the water began to shake violently around it.

  In the next moment, motes of light rose from nowhere like fireflies, gathering at the brightest point to form a vortex of radiance.

  From the vortex of radiance, something could be seen coagulating into existence.

  A sharp tip of what seemed to be a sword appeared, then the rest of its body followed.

  Then, a wave of violent energy blasted the surrounding water as a tsunami formed under the abyss, spreading everywhere.

  In the next second, the sword released a wave of energy as it menacingly pointed at the trident.

  Then it vanished, as the radiant leviathan waved his tail.

  Then it reappeared tens of meters away from the icy trident, and the radiant leviathan muttered coldly.

  "Ascension IV Skill: Sword of Judgment."

  In the next instant, the Sword of Radiance appeared inches away from the blade of the Frozen Trident.

  For a moment, the unmistakable visage of a radiant leviathan could be seen charging menacingly, crashing into the frozen trident that bore the visage of an ice dragon.

  ?VRRRRRM!

  ?The impact of the two monstrous silhouettes sent all of Atlantis trembling from the sheer aftershocks.

  The pillars of jagged mountain peaks crumbled into rubble before pulverizing against the ground as the world turned frozen in radiance.

  "So, you are Ashin Sae Acoustine! I am Lumicor, and I will show you what it means to face a true god!"

  ?The radiant leviathan proclaimed.

  Lumicor smirked as the motes of light that gathered around him slowly formed into stars, shining brightly like a constellation in the night sky.

  He waved his tail, and the world turned a shining white.

  The hundreds of thousands of stars vanished, then reappeared as swords inches away from Ashin Sae Acoustine.

  ?But she wasn't the slightest bit bothered by them.

  She flicked her hands as time seemed to be frozen by her will.

  Bzzzzzzzzzt...

  ?"Impressive... to think that a mere leviathan wet behind his ears could project such spells."

  She muttered coldly, tapping the tips of the blades.

  Tap... Tap... Tap!

  Lumicor's eyes followed her movement, but he couldn't move.

  He was too slow.

  ?"I could forgive you for the disrespect... yet you dare to attack me?!"

  Maybe give it a try? ??