The World Tree's Wrath
The Magic God of Dimensions' thoughts stretched long, yet his reaction was lightning-quick. Papapapapap! The moment the High Elf Queens' pseudo-divine lights reached their peak, they hurled themselves at the Blood Big Bang from every direction, thrusting with all their might and discarding any thought of their own safety.
Sugagagagagagagagak! The sound of blades piercing the air surpassed the speed of sound itself. Their forward momentum tore through the wall of air. Hwoooooong! Udu-du-du-duk! Just as the sword tips reached the blood membrane, every queen's body began to spin. Pauuuuung! The rotation started at their toes, traveled up their calves and thighs, passed through their hips and waists, and halted at their chests as their muscles contracted to the limit. Udu-du-duk! Ujijijik! Their chests and hips swelled even larger from the extreme muscle tension. Using those as axes, they twisted their entire bodies to generate maximum rotational force.
For a split second, a ridiculous thought flashed through the Magic God of Dimensions' mind. So that's why the High Elf Queens' chests and muscles are so large and elastic—because of this technique. Wait—! Why am I thinking something so stupid right now? At this rate, I can't block it—! I have to dodge.
But the thrust was far too fast. Peo-eo-eo-eok! Kwaaaaaaaa! The rotation they had built up in one direction instantly reversed, sending their bodies spiraling like drills. Naturally, the ultra-high-speed sword tips shredded the Magic God of Dimensions' Blood Big Bang like paper.
My body's in terrible shape. I can't dodge. Kuaaak—!
Five massive swords carved into his flesh from all sides. Peopeopeopeo-eo-eok! Every blade pierced his chest and struck his heart with perfect accuracy. Taaang! The tips of the swords collided inside his heart. At that moment, the spirit-stone swords screamed and unleashed their spirit power in a frenzy. Kkiiiii-iiiii-! Opposing attributes clashed, pouring out power while ignoring their own destruction. Peo-eo-eo-eo-eok—! The inevitable explosion followed.
The blast that began in the Magic God of Dimensions' heart swallowed his upper body whole and tore his entire form to pieces. Even a Demon King would have fallen to this. Realizing this at last, his consciousness began to fade. He felt his body being ripped apart and was left with only regret. Damn it—! If this weren't a magic-null zone, it wouldn't have come to this!
Tatatatatak! The moment the High Elf Queens delivered their final strike, they leapt backward. The combined World Tree attack was so destructive that it warped space itself; they risked being caught in the backlash. Go-o-o-o-o-o! As expected, the repulsion of the five elemental spirit powers distorted space, swallowing the broken dark mage's corpse.
The High Elf Queens pressed down on their wildly pounding hearts, pushed far beyond their limits, and confirmed the dark mage's death. We'll need at least a year of treatment in the World Tree after this.We've used the World Tree's strike to deal with Demon Kings before, but never one this difficult.No demon has ever fought this viciously.
The 9th-circle blood magic the Magic God of Dimensions had displayed—offense and defense fused as one—showed an efficiency even Demon Kings had never achieved. For the High Elf Queens, who had lived their entire lives in a magic-null region, it was astonishing. He ravaged us, who have fought demons for eons while freely regenerating our broken bodies.When we borrowed the gods' power to drop his circle and block external magic manifestation, he still tried to kill us by offering his own body as the price.Honestly, we almost lost.Even Demon Kings can't use magic here and die to our swords.
Thinking of the damage they had suffered, the High Elf Queens grew gloomy. The wounds we took this time are worse than what the demons inflicted over a thousand years.If he had fought at his normal 10th-circle state, our defeat would have been certain.
Yet the ominous Survival Magic Tower belonging to the dark mage who had inflicted such terrible damage resurfaced in their minds. Buuuuung! The divine power they had released had just been neutralized by the World Tree's strike, and the dimensional barrier of the Great Cavity was reviving. As the demonic energy normalized, the reactivated barrier once again covered the entire cavity. Hwoooooong!
This century's war is over.For the next hundred years, no one will be able to cross or approach.Unless they're a Main God who can traverse dimensions.
The High Elf Queens, having paid the price of unleashing the World Tree's strike that surpassed the limits of living beings, were left in tatters. High Elves riding dragons hurriedly carried away their fading queens. The war had truly ended. Hwoooooong! The black tower's continued presence was ominous, but the surging demonic energy and restoring dimensional barrier forced them to retreat for now.
Meanwhile, at the center of the expanded Survival Magic Tower, an architectural structure identical to the old two-story tower had been created in the middle of the air. Light flashed atop it, and a blood-soaked grey robe along with severed limbs and dripping blood fell. Thudududuk—! Tuk! It was the remains of the Magic God of Dimensions, shattered by the High Elf Queens' World Tree attack.
Though the fragmented corpse looked undeniably dead, nine circles on the robe emitted black light. Hwoooooooong! In an instant, the black magic circles all vanished, dyeing the body fragments black. The severed limbs were sucked into the robe as if drawn by force. Thudududuk! Huk! The grey robe suddenly swelled into a human shape. From within the robe draped over a human form, rough breathing and screams began to pour out.
“Krrrrgh—! Aaaaaagh!”
Enormous magic power began burning the robe. Flames engulfed it entirely, and the screams grew louder in proportion. Watching the process, Demon King Amon and the demons frowned.
“Resurrection from death through divine authority? That's impossible with magic alone.”
“What a high-ranking dark mage can achieve is corpse revival. Even the greatest cannot perform a perfect resurrection. They only become liches.”
Demon King Amon shook her head at the highest-ranking demon's respectful reply. She had fought the highest gods of the Divine Realm multiple times. Such unusual experiences made her acknowledge exceptions to common facts.
“That's divine power. And an extremely enhanced form of creation power!”
“What? A dark mage using creation power?”
“If he's a Magic God, it's not impossible.”
The black magic flames burned even fiercer, heating the entire tower. Puhahahahaha—! Bingbingbingbing! The magic engraved throughout the Survival Magic Tower activated in linkage, reviving him. And finally, he appeared in a perfectly resurrected form.
“Whew! I almost died there.”
Under the gazes of the demons, who could not approach due to the layered dimensional barriers connected to the outside that had been placed around the tower, the dark mage examined his own body.
“Let's see. Did I resurrect properly?”
Though slender like a High Elf's physique, it was a body honed to the extreme for maximum agility. A well-trained body should have looked beautiful from the effort, yet it appeared wretched due to countless scars. Cuts, burns, and wounds covered every inch of his limbs without a single gap. The most numerous were circular arrow wounds, scattered all over his body.
What terrible wounds.The only clean parts are the hands he sacrificed and regenerated with body magic.
The Magic God of Dimensions' face was hidden beneath the grey robe, mouth invisible. Yet beneath his black-gold hair, his lips ground his teeth nonstop.
“Grind—! Grind—! I thought I was dead again. What kind of state is this, reduced to this by mere sentient beings?”
While grinding his teeth, he checked his newly acquired wounds. Five red lines encircled his heart—the exact spots where the High Elf Queens' greatswords had pierced. His black eyes, staring at them, began to seethe with rage. The robe that had turned to ash and vanished around him also pained his heart.
I've lost the Robe of Black Darkness, one of the symbols of the Root School that Master left me. Thanks to it I resurrected, but it hurts. Still, what's lost can be reclaimed.
The Magic God of Dimensions began a light incantation.
“I Exist as Myself, So Shall You.”
A new Robe of Black Darkness was restored from the ashes and draped over him. A massive circle of light spun at high speed around his head. It was unmistakably the creation power of a god of light.
“He really is a Magic God.”
“Divine power is the authority of dimensions!”
The number of divine power circles—ten—proved he was a Main God-level Magic God. Once fully manifested, his magic power was restored as well. Paaah—! Ten magic circles once again shone on the back of the grey robe. The Magic God of Dimensions had completed his perfect resurrection. Or rather, since he had never truly died, it was complete recovery.
“Seems I survived again, more or less. Good thing my head wasn't hit.”
Most mages have their mana circles in the heart, but the Root School places them in the head. That is why their magic power rarely depletes and they are nearly immortal as long as their heads remain intact. Of course, there are drawbacks. If a Root School mage fails their advancement, their brain is damaged and they become an idiot.
The chance of the head exploding and killing them before they turn into an idiot is higher. That's why the Root School becomes more dangerous the higher the circle compared to ordinary mages. This is because the Root School's black magic was born on the battlefield.
Originally, mages are almost defenseless while chanting, so without protection they die easily. Yet lowborn black mages receive no protection. Black mages must survive on their own.
Thrown to the front lines and occasionally forced into close combat, they could never match knights enhanced by aura with a mage's body. In the end, their training purpose had to become singular. Possess both a knight's speed and a mage's magic power.
The heart was excluded because higher-ranked mages' bodies grow weaker. So the head was chosen. Low-circle black mages, dying countless times like expendables on the front lines, chose an extreme method. They used the two hardest bones besides the heel—the skull—as circle coordinates and engraved circles into their brains. And nearly all of them went mad or died from brain explosions.
The few who succeeded in engraving circles into their heads were astonished by the enhanced calculation speed and magic power from brain stimulation, and delighted that their bodies suffered no adverse effects. Thus was the Root School born.
The Root School mages passed the secret of creating circles in the brain to their disciples, attempted to engrave additional circles, repeated trial and error, and died in droves. Those Root School mages who survived obtaining these circles carried the successful creation process and roamed battlefields seeking new disciples. Only battlefields could provide disciples willing to choose this life-risking secret and allow research to continue.
In the gaps of racial wars, those with talent but no power or status were dragged to the front lines as shields. They gladly became black mages to extend their lives by a single day. That was how powerful and accessible Root School black magic was. For the Root School, advancing a circle was a gamble with life and death, so they transferred everything to themselves via memory transfer. Disciples inherited all magic and gritted their teeth watching their masters die—either from heads exploding or from going mad and firing magic wildly.
The Root School continued research by dissecting the corpses of masters whose heads had exploded while trying to advance circles. Such horrific scenes branded them with the stigma of vicious black magic, drawing ever greater wariness.
The time for the Root School's leap forward arrived. Through countless sacrifices and repeated research, a special constitution allowing easy engraving of circles in the head was identified, and they began selecting targets.
Since there were so few mages with the constitution to safely learn head circles, no matter how powerful the magic, they remained a minor school. After many ages, when 5th-circle Root School mages first appeared in racial wars, the world was shocked. Root School black mages tore through the front lines at speeds surpassing knights and unleashed magic at several times the chanting speed of ordinary mages.
Moreover, the sight of black mages fully recovering no matter how much their bodies were mutilated made every race shudder. Of course, if the head is destroyed, it's over. But would they ever easily offer up their only vital point? Especially while dodging attacks at knight-level speeds.
Even while fighting the High Elf Empire countless times, the Magic God of Dimensions had never offered his head or face to attacks. If a Root School mage allows a face attack, they deserve to die. Thanks to that, only the body and limbs below the neck end up like this.
The Root School had risen to the pinnacle of black magic through tremendous sacrifice, and the number of magic circles proudly engraved on their robes became both their pride and their final lifeline. The magic circles on the Robe of Black Darkness exist to engrave emergency escape magic. They're not mere decoration. This time too, the spatial transfer magic engraved on the Robe of Black Darkness saved me by sending me to the Survival Magic Tower.
The Magic God of Dimensions had used the “Looking Back at Oneself, Past and Present Are the Same” prepared in the Survival Magic Tower to achieve perfect resurrection. Except that due to insufficient innate magic power, it activated imperfectly, forcing him to repeatedly experience near-death situations.
This is the first time I've been put in such a wretched state by black mages and newborns. He had to endure the process of having his heart pierced by five greatswords, burning, and exploding dozens of times.
“Revenge. I'll show those High Elf Queens what an enraged black mage is capable of.”
The moment he tried to storm outside in fury, an excruciating pain surged through his body. But the situation isn't good. After hurriedly examining his body in detail, he found that while he could operate 10th-circle magic power, his recovery was incomplete and precarious. I overused body magic to discard both hands and used far too much blood beyond lethal amounts, so recovery is insufficient?My mind is 10th-circle, but my body is below 9th-circle.
If he were a demon born as a spiritual being, he could fully reconstruct his body and return to normal. But the Magic God of Dimensions was a Transcendent who had evolved from a sentient being. Even for him, natural recovery was necessary to some degree. Right now, am I only 10th-circle inside the tower? The thought of fighting those vicious High Elf Queens again in this restricted state made his anger subside as a chill ran down his spine.
For now, I'll rest.