Chapter 96
Chapter 96
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 96
Chapter Title: The Snake that Swallows the Great Earth
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There is no superhuman on this continent who doesn't know of the 13 Reverse Heavenly Stars.
Commoners who aren't superhumans might not know them, but it's no exaggeration to say the Reverse Heavenly Stars are the ultimate goal for all superhumans.
It's not just about realms—superhumans follow in their footsteps in terms of training methods and techniques as well.
Those seeking transcendence through necromancy pursue the Bull of Unknown Origin, Tauron,
those seeking it through martial arts follow the Lion Heart King, Regulus,
and those aiming for it via transformation magic chase after the Nameless Twins, Gemini.
Among the superhumans who followed in their footsteps, some have left their own names on this continent.
Among those who pursued Tauron, the Warrior of the Underworld Hilly is famous;
among those who followed Regulus, the former Esiric King is renowned;
and among those who chased Gemini, the Wicked Woman of the Fallen Kingdom Isabella is infamous.
However, among those who pursued Opfir, there had yet to be anyone famous.
And that made sense, since no records remained of the circumstances surrounding his transcendence.
"That guy's an earth mage! Charge carefully and watch your feet!"
Thus, it was no surprise that Opfir's subjugation army devised such a strategy.
The paladin order that had revived Opfir earlier was said to have been buried alive in a ravine, so the subjugation army had no doubt he was an earth mage.
And so,
"Knight Commander! This isn't what we were told! They said he was definitely a mage!"
"I was informed the same by command!"
"Then explain this! What's the difference from a 6th rank warrior?!"
It was hardly strange for the knights to panic upon seeing Opfir massacring them with sword and spear in the middle of the army.
The slaughter began when Opfir smashed head-on into the first wave of charging cavalry.
He seized a cavalryman's lance, then swung the massive weapon to shatter the horses' legs.
Then, stomping the ground, he raised a mountain that blocked the volley of support arrows.
"Cavalry and archers against a superhuman? Are there only cowards left among this era's superhumans?!"
Opfir kicked the risen mountain, sending fragments sweeping through the camp.
While the army's eyes were drawn to the raining rocks, Opfir charged straight toward the camp.
Aaagh!
"Shield wall forward! Don't let him through!"
At an officer's shout, the soldiers formed a wall of shields and leveled their spears.
Even in the dire situation, it was a perfect phalanx formation straight out of the manual.
Then, as the soldiers wrapped their skin in mana to turn it to stone, they completed a wall sturdy enough to bind even mid-tier superhumans.
Opfir shifted his path diagonally into the phalanx.
Phalanxes were strong against vertical attacks from front, rear, left, or right but vulnerable to diagonal assaults—a widely known fact.
To compensate, the Holy Kingdom's phalanxes often planted intercepting landmine spells diagonally.
'Come on!'
The soldiers braced for explosion as Opfir charged diagonally.
But to Opfir, even that was an outdated response.
"Even after centuries, your tactics are still this primitive?!"
He stabbed the cavalry lance into the ground and vaulted over the camp like a pole vaulter, landing right in the center.
Then, delicately setting foot atop a spear pointing skyward in the phalanx's midst,
"Does no one tell you that the more rigid something is, the easier it shatters?"
With a sneer, he landed in the formation's heart, shattering the soldiers directly below into pieces.
The phalanx commander nearly cursed at this defiance of military doctrine, but before he could, Opfir's spear pierced his throat.
"You shouldn't have used stone skin magic. Doesn't it make you all so sluggish?"
Before the soldiers could revert from their stone skin state, Opfir struck their vitals and dismantled the formation.
The bald commander's face filled with horror at the sight.
Of course, he hadn't expected the phalanxes to stop Opfir.
He'd only hoped they'd buy time to regroup the unit thrown into chaos by the rockfall.
But dismantling it so easily with martial arts instead of magic was completely unforeseen.
"He's not a mage?"
As if affirming the mutter, Opfir finished the phalanx and began sweeping through the archers with his spear.
The Night Knight Order commander, unable to watch the slaughter any longer, hurled daggers at Opfir alongside his knights.
"Assassins in open war? Interesting. What tactics will you show me?"
But Opfir caught the dagger between his fingers and began pursuing the Night Knights in turn.
He precisely tracked down the stealth and infiltration experts, dispatching them one by one.
"Is hide-and-seek all you've got?!"
Invisibility, burrowing, transformation—whatever techniques they used, he pinpointed them and slit their throats with their own daggers.
By then, Opfir's level was 66.
"Kaikus! Not yet?!"
The bald commander shouted at the Lightning Hero.
The hero, charging lightning into his body behind the commander, replied,
"If I charge in half-cocked, we're all dead! Wait!"
"Damn it!"
But Opfir was closing the distance to the commander in real time.
Then, for the first time, a hero blocked Opfir's advance.
Radiant pillars of light rained down over Opfir's head.
Judging it dangerous, even Opfir fled from the pillars.
The hero, who had been in prayer stance toward the fleeing Opfir, shouted,
"Your rampage ends here, ghost of the past."
"Have you forgotten that you lot summoned me?"
"We didn't know you'd be this much of a lunatic."
Pillars poured down unceasingly as the hero prayed.
Opfir gradually distanced himself from the hero.
The hero kept tracking him with his eyes, summoning pillars to keep Opfir from closing in.
But when the pillars naturally formed a fence and Opfir vanished beyond it, the hero realized his mistake.
"Oh no!"
The Pillar Hero had let Opfir slip away.
Immediately after, he thrust his hand toward his blind spot on the left.
Thud!
"Going for the blind spots, as expected."
The hero and Opfir's palms clashed.
Even with his palm blocked, a smile rose on Opfir's face.
"Hah. You've seen real war, have you?"
"I'd appreciate it if you didn't compare me to greenhouse flowers. I'm a hero, after all."
"Just another name for butcher."
"And you?"
"I'd prefer 'forerunner'."
"Madman."
The hero recoiled in disgust, gathering mana in his left hand.
Then, an ominous word came from Opfir.
"?!"
Immediately, pillars shot out in the opposite direction from where the hero extended his palm.
They pierced the hero's upper body and scattered like buckshot into the soldiers behind him.
As the hero's lower body crumbled, a fan-shaped bloodstain marked the pillars' path.
The bald commander muttered, nearly in tears.
"Mana backlash...!"
A foundational principle of magic passed down from the Empire era.
Just as water backflows if you block a hose nozzle, so too did mana.
Of course, no one used it in actual combat, but Opfir wielded it nonchalantly.
There was an even more despairing fact.
"Level 69..."
The commander's eyes grew moist.
The Pillar Hero was a 7th rank hero.
If not for the fully charged Lightning Hero, he could be called the Holy Kingdom's strongest.
Yet he died from mana backlash.
This implied one thing.
"Is it possible to master both magic and martial arts simultaneously?"
Opfir had achieved mastery in two domains impossible to handle at once.
In other words, they'd erred from the start by taking his visible level at face value as his full power.
The commander's terror infected the entire camp.
The snake, scenting fear, flicked its tongue.
"Well then, now I'm 7th rank. What's your plan to survive, remnants of the Empire?"
The momentum shifted.
The moment the subjugation army realized their doom.
"How is that 7th rank anywhere...?"
Even fellow 7th rank heroes and knight commanders backpedaled.
They sensed instinctively that their own ranks, achieved through elixirs, exploits, and killing intent, were of a different league.
Opfir's 7th rank was forged purely from enlightenment and experience.
The army's morale began to crumble.
"Holy King! Protect us!"
"Your Holiness! Please!"
Far away in the capital, the Holy King sending the binding force bit his lip.
The soldiers' prayers reached him, but this was his full power.
The binding was gradually weakening.
The bald commander Nihil shouted at the Lightning Hero.
"Not yet?!"
"It's over!"
With those words, the Lightning Hero Kaikus sortied.
Spreading wings of four pairs of lightning, he slammed thunderbolts down on Opfir from above.
Rumble...
Golden chains bound Opfir's electrocuted body.
The Lightning Hero seized the moment.
He drop-kicked Opfir's solar plexus, sending him flying beyond the horizon.
His voice boomed like thunder across the clouds.
"Fear not, all! The Cherubim is with you!"
The soldiers were dumbfounded at the sudden appearance of the thunder angel.
But recognizing him as the Holy Kingdom's top hero, Kaikus,
"Waaah!"
They dredged up strength from their dantians' depths, roaring to forget this hopeless situation.
The facts that Opfir bore Seraphim blessings superior to Cherubim, and was already level 72, didn't matter.
At least this moment, the hero outranked him.
The hero's rank overwhelmed Opfir's growth speed.
The gap between 8 and 7 was that vast.
Thus, the soldiers forced out hopeful cheers.
But when Opfir reappeared from beyond the horizon, their hope shattered anew.
Opfir, sent flying far by Kaikus's kick.
"Hm..."
He muttered, eyeing the clear bootprint on his solar plexus.
"As expected, beating 7th rank at 6th is impossible, huh?"
At 6th rank, he could overcome 7th with full technique.
But at 7th, technique alone couldn't topple 8th.
No wonder pure killing intent struggles to raise levels in the late game;
the chasm between 7 and 8 was that profound.
Opfir drew the Necrolite from his bosom, emitting the binding force.
'Time to discard it.'
If revived by this Necrolite, escaping its binding would be impossible.
But strictly speaking, Opfir had permitted the Necrolite's binding.
He could sever it simply by tossing it away.
The issue was the theatrics.
'I need a plausible show to break free from this Necrolite's binding...'
Otherwise, the Holy King linked to this gem would notice something amiss.
'How...'
Then, a memory flashed through his mind.
'Come to think of it, these angelic blessings... they're techniques discarded in the Empire era?'
Opfir's lips curled up.
He rose and revealed himself before the army once more.
"Not alchemy, not pill forging, playing at immortal arts. Thanks for the entertaining show."
Opfir, who moments ago had flushed with war's thrill, burst into mad laughter—no one could stay calm.
His speech continued.
"I played along with your childish 'angelic blessings' game, but now a worthy opponent has appeared. Before that, you there with the lightning. What's your name?"
"Kaikus."
"Right, Kaikus. You must've lived through the Empire era. Why didn't you use this immortal art on others back then?"
Kaikus answered with lightning instead of words.
Another thunder mark scarred Opfir's solar plexus.
But the wound regenerated instantly.
Opfir muttered, watching it heal.
"I think you said this body belongs to a Seraphim. With 90% of my memories restored, that must be what they call the Primordial Merchant."
"Primal... Merchant?"
"You don't know? Were you a novice back in the Empire era? The Holy King seems aware, since he embedded this binding rite, but didn't tell you, huh."
At Opfir's words, the Holy King praying in the capital flinched.
Meanwhile, the on-site commander and hero still couldn't comprehend.
"Thinking you can keep putting off the truth forever."
Opfir began writing red characters in the air.
"Allow me to enlighten you. This technique you call 'angelic blessings' has a fatal flaw. If the revived one casts a higher immortal art on themselves, the binding automatically breaks!"
"Impossible! Blessings above Seraphim..."
"How could an immortal art preserving only 90% of memories be top-tier? Your Holy King just doesn't know any better!"
As Opfir wrote in the air, cold sweat beaded on the hero's forehead.
Sizzle—the sweat vaporized amid the lightning.
Meanwhile, Opfir completed the inscription.
Mirror Moon Cannot Be Grasped, Emptiness Can Be Clutch.
⟨ The moon in the mirror cannot be grasped, yet I clutched the void. ⟩
With the sentence complete, the characters absorbed into Opfir's body.
"Watch closely! This is the enlightenment of the Present Pure True Man!"
Crack!
The Necrolite in Opfir's bosom shattered with a clear ring.
"Ah..."
The disconnected Holy King sighed in the capital.
In the Empire era, the Holy King had learned of immortal arts.
From a singed manual salvaged from a burned scripture warehouse.
He'd rebranded the immortal arts as 'angelic blessings' for use.
Hide the flaws thoroughly, and he could puppet countless angels.
And after a century with no such cases,
he dismissed the flaw as mere rumor for intimidation.
But putting off the truth demanded payment at the worst moment.
"Now, spread the word to the world! I have returned as prophesied!"
The Holy King despaired.
At the fact that the snake's leash was now fully off.
The hero gave up.
Wings of lightning torn, plummeting to earth, he squeezed his eyes shut, sensing his end.
The bald knight commander fled.
Right after Opfir's level surpassed 90, he sprinted full-tilt toward the citadel.
Soldiers and knights alike discarded weapons, scattering in all directions hoping it wouldn't be them.
"Heh heh heh... Just like the Empire's end."
Opfir chuckled lowly at the dispersing army.
"Good! Now let's switch to hide-and-seek."
Opfir inscribed characters in the air.
The ground quaked, and the horizon before the routed soldiers writhed like a snake.
The undulation from the horizon reached the ground beneath their feet.
The heaving earth couldn't endure, fracturing into countless fissures.
The ground tilted, soldiers plummeting into the cracks.
Those who could fly soared skyward, but
Whooo—
A mysterious downdraft from the fissures swept them down.
The snake devouring the great earth burst into laughter.
"Well, Commander! Where to flee now?!"
Opfir shouted at the receding bald knight.
The bald commander gritted his teeth, propelling his legs toward the citadel.
'If it's a citadel built in the Empire era...'
It might have earthquake countermeasures.
Clinging to that faint hope.
But as he neared his final sanctuary, the walls inexplicably lowered.
When the citadel sank below ground level,
"Hahaha..."
The commander collapsed there.
Only then did he recall a senior knight's advice before the war, when he'd submitted his resignation and been imprisoned.
- "What do you need to fight a snake? Ha, snakes are monsters. Sword? Magic? Walls? Grace? Those aren't what humans facing snakes should rely on."
"Madness..."
Without madness, none could stand proudly before the snake.
Watching the citadel fall into the greedily gaping earth, the commander let out a wry laugh.
"Heh heh heh... God..."
Soon, the laugh turned to sobs, then to mania.
"Hahaha!! Haha!! The snake! The snake has revived..."
Splat.
The headless commander's body crumpled.
Opfir grimaced behind him.
"Tch. Broke. Ruins the fun at the end."
Standing calmly on the tilted ground, Opfir kicked the corpse toward the fissure.
He snapped his fingers, and the earth sealed shut.
Leaving awkward scars on the surface, Opfir continued toward the Holy Kingdom's capital.
Interlude.
The Holy Kingdom's earth convulsing far and wide reached other kingdoms too.
"Oh my. That one has..."
A squinting woman knitting in a peaceful pasture gazed out the window.
"Tsk. Insurance stocks are gonna tank hard."
Belphegor, the goat-horned man in a sharp suit, gravely rubbed his chin.
"Turn the ship around."
"Pardon? Captain?"
"Turn around, I said!"
The captain of the forest-navigating fleet berated his crew to reverse course.
And in the Providence Kingdom...
"Us? To stop him? That one?"
The project to elevate the twins as saviors was in full swing.
"Did we sisters offend Your Majesty? Is this Providence-style rhetoric?"
"Sis... mind teaching me how to write a last will?"
"Sis~ No, Rosa will be fine no matter what. Just remember me, sis."
"If sis goes, I'll follow."
"Rosa...!"
Rex sweated bullets at the melodramatic sisters.
"Saintesses. Lady Rosalyn. It's just acting... Your retainers will assist..."
He side-eyed his retainers as he spoke.
But,
"Ahem. Khm. Ugh, my back..."
"Sir Peter."
"I can't even see! Sob! And my heart! I overdid it at the dragon vein last time!"
"..."
"I'll go! I'll join Opfir..."
"Lady Sneria, you stay."
"Why!"
"Sigh..."
"M-Master? Could it be me...?"
"You're all I can trust... Ari."
In the end, the two would-be savior saintesses, escorted by Ari (the queen), were dispatched to the Holy Kingdom.