Chapter 438
Chapter 438
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 438
Chapter Title: Racial War (77)
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For Park Chan-woo, it was nothing short of baffling.
Arcana's resurrection was a joyous event, but it deviated from his calculations entirely.
'Surely, they must have offered up the Original God Arcana as tribute.'
The soul and will of Arcana dwelling within the Original God Arcana—everything—had been offered to the Demon-Sealing God's chalice, paving the way to Sepiro.
In that case, Arcana's soul should have been trapped inside the chalice, just like the Heavenly Demon of old.
Yet the being standing before him now was no empty husk.
It was a perfect lifeform, possessing a distinct ego and a noble soul.
Where on earth had his soul come from?
That was when it happened.
Swoosh.
From the shadow behind Park Chan-woo's back, Chronos emerged.
"It's understandable to be puzzled."
As if reading Park Chan-woo's thoughts, Chronos murmured softly.
"But you're misunderstanding the Demon-Sealing God's chalice, my contractor."
Chronos continued, gazing at the newly born Dragon of Hope, Arcana.
"The Demon-Sealing God's chalice doesn't seize even the soul as collateral."
What did that mean?
"The Heavenly Demon's soul was merely sucked in alongside his body because it was so deeply intertwined with it. Normally, the soul is contained within the vessel of the flesh, so when that vessel is absorbed into the chalice, the soul as its contents gets dragged along too."
Park Chan-woo's eyes wavered at Chronos's explanation.
"But what if..."
Chronos pointed at Arcana.
"...there was an empty, perfectly compatible new vessel right beside it for the soul to transfer into? With such a reliable conduit present, the soul can leap into the new vessel the instant the old one shatters."
The new body of Arcana, forged by expending Sepiro's ticket and the entirety of the Ruined Truth Station.
It was the most perfect conduit imaginable for housing Arcana's soul.
The moment the outdated vessel known as Original God Arcana was offered up, his soul had chosen not the Demon-Sealing God's chalice, but his newly born flesh.
Only then did Park Chan-woo understand it all.
It was the inevitable result of all conditions aligning perfectly.
Chronos, too, had likely grasped this truth more clearly upon ascending to godhood and claiming the 'Vessel of Souls' that held the gods' souls.
After all, the Vessel of Souls was akin to a chalice itself.
But the astonishment didn't end there.
The newly born Dragon of Hope, Arcana.
His body began to shine once more.
He drew in every last remnant of the Ruined Truth Station, absorbing it all into himself without leaving a trace.
Forgotten tales of gods, fragments of falsified history—he melted them all into his own divinity.
Golden divinity scattered endlessly from his form, his very existence swelling beyond physical bounds into something conceptual.
At last, Arcana bowed reverently toward Park Chan-woo.
His will resonated directly within Park Chan-woo's soul.
Arcana had fully accepted Park Chan-woo as his god.
Arcana turned his head.
The golden path created for Park Chan-woo was fulfilling its purpose, slowly dispersing into particles of light.
As the great war scenario drew to a close and all returned to nothingness, two entities remained unvanquished.
Diaar, once the Dragon of Radiance, now corrupted by Sepiro's tainted divine power into a grotesque outer god.
And beside him, another presence.
From the rift torn open by Sepiro's rampage, a colossal angel had slithered forth.
It was the great archangel outer god from long ago—the one that appeared after the clash of the three evil gods, bearing hundreds of wings.
Arcana's golden eyes turned toward these two incarnations of despair.
The Dragon of Hope charged at despair itself.
But before his sacred flames could reach the outer gods, the great archangel outer god reacted first.
Its massive form burst like a soap bubble with a 'pop.'
The body that hadn't vanished even under a great demon's assault now deconstructed itself, proliferating infinitely.
One great archangel split into hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of tiny angels.
Like a swarm of locusts, they filled the empty void in an instant.
This was the great archangel outer god's true nature.
Indestructible division and proliferation.
Cleave one, and it becomes two; cleave two, and they become four—an endless legion of despair.
Yet Arcana did not retreat.
His golden majesty showed no faltering before billions of outer god soldiers.
He was truly worthy of being called a god.
On the contrary, the light of hope emanating from his body burned ever more fiercely the greater their numbers grew.
And as Park Chan-woo watched, he finally realized.
Why the great archangel outer god couldn't directly attack Arcana, merely circling and threatening from afar.
'A god is the natural predator of an outer god.'
That was it.
Outer gods hailed from beyond Abyss's laws—chaos and foreign matter incarnate.
Their power defied explanation or resistance through existing physical laws or magitech.
But gods were different.
Gods embodied 'law' and 'order' themselves.
Their divinity wielded the primordial force to purify chaos and reject foreign matter.
Just as fire drives out darkness and light erases shadow.
The hopeful divinity pouring from Arcana was, in itself, an impenetrable wall to the outer gods—and unbearable agony.
'So that's how it was.'
Flashes of Abyss's forgotten history raced through Park Chan-woo's mind.
The reason demons had persecuted and hunted all of Abyss's gods.
It was said to be mere greed for their power and to eliminate threats to their dominion.
But perhaps the true reason lay elsewhere.
The existential threat of outer gods, liable to invade through great rifts at any moment.
The only beings capable of countering them were 'gods.'
The demons had castrated their own strength against their true enemies, the outer gods.
Foolish beyond measure, yet entirely plausible for their arrogant kind.
The delusion that they could control everything with their power alone.
It wasn't only the great nine lords who could slay outer gods.
All gods were, by their mere existence, the deadliest poison to outer gods.
Park Chan-woo was certain.
Perhaps the real reason gods were forgotten, lost their names, faded, and suffered persecution lay elsewhere.
After eons of peace, even the gods had begun to forget their own purpose.
A god who forgot why it was born, what its power was for, was no longer a god.
Merely a lost being with immense strength.
Thus, they crumbled from within, perishing pathetically to the demons' vile hunts.
But Arcana was different.
He had been reborn from the depths of despair, embracing hope as his singular raison d'être.
His purpose was clear.
To erase all despair blocking his god, Park Chan-woo's path, from this world.
Kwaaaaaaargh—!
Arcana's colossal wings unfurled.
With a single flap, a vast curtain of light swept away all surrounding chaos, expanding across the entire battlefield.
The billions of tiny angels split from the great archangel outer god recoiled, shrieking as the sacred light touched them.
Within the curtain of light lay an absolute sanctuary permitted only to hope.
And into that sanctuary poured countless particles of light.
The very authority of hope, shaped by Arcana himself.
Each one a pure purifying force akin to a miniature sun.
At last, by Arcana's will, the light particles stirred.
Transforming into billions of spears of light, they rained down upon the outer god legions wailing beyond the curtain.
Fssshhh...
There was no deafening explosion.
The tiny angels touched by the light particles simply dissolved soundlessly into dust, cleanly purified into ashes.
The outer god legions that once merely proliferated in response to a great lord's spear were now undoubtedly 'vanishing.'
Chaos yielding to order, darkness to light—a manifestation of inexorable providence.
The despairing horde that had filled the void moments ago was being wiped out in an instant.
Kaaaaaargh!
Diaar finally moved.
He could no longer stand idly by as the great archangel outer god was unilaterally purified.
From his torn maw erupted a black breath filled with despair.
But Arcana did not evade.
As if he had been waiting, he unleashed his own breath in kind.
Kwaaaaaaargh—!
It was a golden barrage of authority, hundreds of divinities compressed and unleashed.
The roar of storms, the rumble of earth, the light of wisdom, the clamor of war—all fused into one colossal breath that pierced Diaar's despair head-on.
The black breath was purified without a trace, and the divine bombardment struck Diaar's body squarely.
"Kaaaaaargh!"
The outer god Diaar screamed, engulfed in sacred flames.
The 'errors' comprising his existence splintered and shattered before the overwhelming divinity spat by the Dragon of Hope.
His noble memories as the Dragon of Radiance clashed violently with the despairing authority he wore as an outer god, his very being unraveling in contradiction.
It didn't end there.
As Diaar began to dissipate, the anomaly spread to the great archangel outer god.
The billions of endlessly multiplying tiny angels halted in unison, like machines deprived of power.
Then, along with their progenitor, they faded like mirages and began to crumble.
At last, the two outer gods vanished utterly, without a single trace.
With their departure, the massive great rift that had torn the sky...
Slurrrp.
...slowly sealed shut and disappeared completely.
In the face of that indescribably awe-inspiring spectacle...
"……."
"……."
All were left speechless.