Fight to the Bitter End
In the Spirit Realm War, it was blatantly strange for the Divine Realm Ego—a mechanical god devoid of all emotion—to stoop to flattery. Yet that attitude had no bearing on the scene. Seated in the place of honor, receiving questions and reports, was the Dimensional Provisional Creator God.
Gaiana sat in the newly prepared seat immediately to his right, the position of proxy for the Main God of the Divine Realm. The tension had finally drained from her face as she listened.
Judging by the overwhelming divine power radiating from the Dimensional Provisional Creator God alone, there is no cause for concern regarding the invaders. The data provided to me confirms they are allies. This conflict is merely a sanctioned act of vengeance stemming from old grudges.
The idea of waging civil war simply because both sides held grievances was absurd, yet the relevant information had already been delivered. Of course, their mutual hatred ran so deep that the fighting would not stop.
“Based on your assessment after receiving support from the Main Divine Realm, what is the difference in strength between the Divine Realm—excluding me—and the enemy?”
“More than four times greater. Even with my support, stopping them is impossible.”
“Impossible?”
The Divine Realm Ego’s answer made the Dimensional Lord’s divine power fluctuate slightly. He spat the word with a hollow laugh. His own calculations were off by roughly one and a half times. Naturally, the Main Divine Realm’s judgment—bolstered by the Creation Realm’s support—was more accurate. Yet an error of this magnitude meant the Dimensional Lord had overlooked something.
“As expected. It seems the Spirit Gods are still hiding some of their strength. But it doesn’t matter. The Divine Realm Management Gods will drag every last ounce of it into the open. Furthermore, I will no longer permit the Divine Realm’s self-destruction or the transfer of its data to the Main Divine Realm. If a similar situation arises again, we fight to the last. You too shall share the Divine Realm’s fate. This is a legitimate absolute command issued by the Provisional Creator God—the Main God of the Divine Realm—to the highest-tier Divine Realm Ego. No being may alter it.”
“Ap… approved.”
The higher-ranking Main God of the Divine Realm had inscribed an absolute command. The Divine Realm Ego could only tremble and obey. By nature, the Divine Realm Ego had no choice but to submit completely to the Main God of the Divine Realm. An incompetent one could be bound by forced orders, but when the Main God possessed a superior divine rank, refusal was impossible. Without such safeguards, no one would dare use the Divine Realm of the Main Divine Realm; this control had been imposed out of necessity.
‘Of course, a true Creator God could override it, but no Creator would bother directly tampering with the mere ego of a random Main Divine Realm. And if a Divine Realm Ego above the Creator rank took offense, the offender would be annihilated outright.’
The feeling was like being forcibly thrown onto a battlefield from which retreat was now completely impossible. The Dimensional Lord continued, as if the Divine Realm Ego’s displeased reaction were ridiculous.
“All you have to do is develop the Divine Realm until it surpasses my own divine rank. The suicide order will naturally be lifted then, so why the ugly display? I heard the Divine Realm Ego is formed from the Main God of the Divine Realm’s own ego. Am I like this? No, it must be traces of my predecessor.”
The Divine Realm Ego could not possibly say that every aspect of its personality had been recalibrated to suit him, and that the predecessor’s settings had been sealed away and shoved into a corner. Doing so would likely prompt the Dimensional Lord to demand it be replaced with that terrifying demonic brain at once. The Ego knew his temperament all too well.
‘No matter how artificial an intelligence the Divine Realm Ego may be—nothing more than a composite of data without body or spirit—it still wished to avoid vanishing to become someone else’s foundation.’
The Dimensional Lord, who had been muttering to himself in brief contemplation, connected the authority stored in the demonic brain to the Divine Realm Ego.
“First, add this to the Divine Realm’s defense functions.”
“This exceeds my capabilities. A Creator-rank defensive function cannot be applied to the highest-tier Divine Realm.”
“I have specialized it for defensive battles using my Dimensional Authority and made it usable for you as well. The computational load will be handled by this demonic brain rather than you, so you need only establish the connection.”
Without further explanation, he linked it directly to the Divine Realm Ego and activated it. Gaiana’s mouth fell open in shock.
A familiar authority. No—it was an even more vicious version of vitality absorption, and it was all too famous.
“The Spirit Realm’s Guerrilla Volcano?”
“That one only absorbs the vitality of physical bodies within its defensive perimeter. This extracts vitality and divine power from every impact and authority generated in both attack and defense. In other words, any battle occurring near the Divine Realm will have all vitality beyond what is perfectly utilized absorbed. Furthermore, combat within the absorption zone is suicidal, so it would be wise to warn against it. The moment even a single wound appears, the body will have every last drop of its vitality drained, and the spirit…”
Grade: Creator-rank Pocket Dimension
Effect: Seals all divine ranks and divine power of any being below Creator rank. Forces complete utilization of their abilities for the owner. Escape possible only by destroying the interior with Creator-rank or higher power.
Note: Currently modified into a honeycomb-like structure of countless chambers.
The light snap of his fingers produced the Creator God’s gem that Jinmyeol—the Creator God bearing the title of Annihilation—had passed to the God of Mercenaries. It had already been modified; countless chamber-like rooms now glowed within it.
“Hic!”
The hiccup was a genuine reaction of pure shock. She could never forget that familiar sight. Back when she had been confined in the Spirit Realm Waiting Area, those horrific honeycomb-shaped prisons had filled the sky.
“Is that… not the Spirit Realm’s prison?”
“No, nothing so grandiose. I have simply named it the Origin Spirit Realm. The interior space is not limited to the size of a coffin; it is large enough to hold a small temple. Any being trapped inside who has not reached the Creator rank will have all their divine ranks and divine power sealed and be forced to serve. There is only one method of escape without my permission: possessing Creator-rank or higher divinity and destroying the interior directly to break free. Still, I wonder how many beings could possibly manage that.”
With a sharp smack, he drove the extracted Origin Spirit Realm hard into his forehead. He connected it to the Guide of the Origin already embedded there, as if slotting the Creator God’s gem—no, the Origin Spirit Realm—into place, then leaned his head back lightly from the seat of honor.
‘Everything is proceeding according to plan. I have analyzed and acquired all of the Spirit Realm. There is no reason I cannot create both the Guerrilla Volcano and the Spirit Realm myself.’
Although this form had been forced upon him because the advancement conditions were nearly two circles higher, the Dimensional Lord still took pride that his computational power surpassed even the Creator Gods.
‘The Spirit Gods belong to the Main Divine Realm, but everything I have experienced is mine. The Guerrilla Volcano’s vitality absorption authority and the Spirit Realm that imprisons spirits while forcing the utilization of their authority and divinity are, to my knowledge, the finest authorities in existence. By reinterpreting them through magic and applying them to myself, I grow stronger. With this, I will definitely surpass the Provisional Creator God stage. I will surely defeat the Demon King candidate and the Substitute Gods’ Provisional Creator Gods.’
In the Dimensional Lord’s mind, this more or less concluded everything.
‘It truly was a long recruitment of Spirit Gods, and many things happened, but I have finally returned.’
Although the seat of the Main God of the Divine Realm had felt burdensome and irritating, sitting in it once more brought a sense of stability. The relief was so great that even the desire for sleep—something his divine body, overflowing with vitality, should not have felt—came rushing in.
But that peace was shattered almost immediately.
The entire Divine Realm shook with a massive impact. Veins bulged on the Dimensional Lord’s forehead.
‘I obviously know who is disturbing my peace. The Spirit Lord Gods and Divine Realm Management Gods must have been briefly startled by the suddenly deployed Guerrilla Volcano authority. When they realized it had little effect on them, they immediately clashed.’
Perfection did not exist in any authority, and every defense had its weaknesses. The location where they fought was the straight passage directly before the main gate. The other Spirit Gods had fled outside the area the moment they identified the Guerrilla Volcano’s authority. Only those above the Main God rank remained on the straight path before the gate, unaffected.
Looking at the screen, countless wills clashed, but ultimately only two forms of intent were expressed.
“If we defeat you, the Divine Realm Management Gods are ours.”
“A rolling stone that’s weaker than us sure talks big. We’ll send you straight back to the Spirit Realm.”
As expected, though fewer in number, the battle goddesses were completely overpowering their foes. The conclusion had come far too easily to make sense, yet the giant mobile fortress that had been Fenrir was already nearly destroyed and incapacitated. Jormungandr, the so-called Divine Realm Annihilation Fortress, had been shattered into pieces and had almost lost its materialization.
No matter how equal their ranks, Spirit Gods who had only just escaped that realm could never defeat battle goddesses who had trained their bodies to the extreme limits of spiritual forms.
‘They may have been equal once, but that was by past standards. It cannot apply now. Still, this is too fast. Lokina truly is strong.’
Torina and Granraha, who faced Lokina, were among the strongest of the battle goddesses. In pure combat power, not even Main Gods a rank above them could defeat the pair. Yet Lokina was pushing them back using the authority of the Lord of the Flipside with her complete support.
From the flaming sword she swung poured countless runes of magic that strengthened herself and weakened her opponents.
‘That is the standard way the Lord of Magic fights. Even in close combat, her physical abilities show almost no weakness.’
The two did not stop at merely opposing her; they struggled to change the tide of battle by reinforcing their Dimensional Authority, but an upper god’s body that had not fully recovered could not draw even one-tenth of the Dimensional Authority that had reached the Provisional Creator God stage. Moreover, the Dimensional Lord’s magic was a special product he had provided; even with full Main God divinity, half was the limit.
Defeat was already a foregone conclusion. The battle goddesses were not opponents who could be dealt with so easily using temporary realms recovered through loopholes.
‘What a pointless stubbornness. If she had simply become my concubine and regained her Main God divinity, she could have overwhelmed at least one of them. She refused, so she may very well lose. But that doesn’t matter either.’
The Divine Realm’s vitality absorption was functioning perfectly, and the conversion to divine power was flawless. The increase extracted from battle was more than twice the consumption. The more these beings above the Main God rank fought, the more vitality and divine power the Divine Realm could grant its gods would increase infinitely. At this point, the conflict was practically something to encourage.
‘A Divine Realm of the God of Battle that encourages fighting and struggle, where the stronger one prevails—it suits me perfectly.’
When dozens of beings above the Main God rank rampaged across a single battlefield, the destructive force and waves of authority combined until the Divine Realm—despite being near the Provisional Creator God level—could not absorb all the battle shock. Shockwaves began to form.
The Dimensional Lord lightly added a defensive barrier of Dimensional Authority to block the continuous battle impacts. Yet even with the added authority, the reduction in shock to the Divine Realm did not disappear completely. It meant that the Dimensional Authority, which created laws themselves, could not fully block the authorities of lower Main Gods. An impossible event was occurring.
“This…? My Provisional Creator God-rank Dimensional Authority is being pierced by the battle goddesses’ attacks?”
The situation made no sense. The Dimensional Authority that had reached the Provisional Creator God stage was truly powerful. But the answer came from Lokina’s furious roar beyond the screen. Seeing the penetration wounds everywhere, it appeared they had trusted the defensive power of the Dimensional Authority and been struck all at once.
“Why do the Divine Realm Management Gods have immunity to the Dimensional Lord’s Dimensional Authority? What are you trying to do by gaining immunity to the Main God of the Divine Realm while being his concubines? Just what exactly are you all doing? What the hell have you been living for—! Are you all planning to rebel?”
At Lokina’s scathing words, the other battle goddesses could not even respond properly and only offered excuses.
“It just sort of happened, so let’s not nitpick.”
“What do you mean, what? We’re helping like this, aren’t we?”
“Why are you making a scene in public! You’re putting us in such an awkward position!”
“As a newcomer you should have stayed at the bottom. Who told you to challenge us?”
“These people are so persistent—! Let’s just move on from the past already!”
“Revenge is pointless.”
The battle goddesses, whose immunity to the Dimensional Authority had been exposed, seemed to have nothing more to say. They offered only single sentences each before attacking even more fiercely. On top of that, Lokina instantly healed her wounds with magic as if injuries meant nothing and resumed combat.
‘Two against Lokina, four against the Spirit God Kings, two against the Spirit Lord Gods. The primordial God of Battle is locked in close combat with the Spirit Gods below the Main God rank.’
With their eyes rolled back in pure hatred, the battle would not end easily. The truly absurd part was the battle goddesses piercing through his Dimensional Authority as if it did not exist. They attacked with complete freedom, as though the Dimensional Authority were not even there. When Lokina had restricted their divine power with the Dimensional Net, they must have revealed their hidden card.
‘Immunity to Dimensional Authority. That is fatal to me, whose primary power is Dimensional Authority. If Dimensional Authority does not work, I have only magic, but I cannot fight properly in close combat.’
The Dimensional Authority was the means to buy time for incantations and suppress enemies. It seemed they had obtained immunity during the previous Devotion Pledge ritual.
‘I understand the logic, but it makes my head throb.’
In a way, it had been preparation for rebellion against the Main God of the Divine Realm. Yet when considering the upcoming authentication battle, he could not dispose of these powerful battle goddesses—who could sweep away dozens of Main Gods with a small force—nor could he ignore the Devotion Pledge and the Karma Contract. Unconsciously, a mutter escaped him.
“Just let it pass. It’s easily fixed by slightly altering the divine power wave of the Dimensional Authority.”
The moment he spoke, he changed the divine power wave of the Dimensional Authority. The Dimensional Authority now properly blocked the battle impacts, completely eliminating the shock to the Divine Realm and restoring silence.
He let out a deep sigh, pulled tea and a kettle from his subspace, and began brewing a bitter cup.
Seeing the Dimensional Lord sigh, Gaiana—who had been fidgeting anxiously after hearing about the gained immunity to the Main God of the Divine Realm’s divine power—hurriedly prepared a cup. He closed his eyes gently at the sight.
‘It seems there will be no rest after all. Well, from the moment I ascended to the Divine Realm I came prepared to fight a desperate battle, so this is unavoidable.’
The Dimensional Lord had only resolved to struggle with all his might to survive as the highest-tier god. He could only sigh at how he had somehow ended up as the Main God of the Divine Realm and reached this state.