Chapter 336
Translator: crow
Chapter Title: A Part of the Void
The holy city of Radion.
A shadow loomed over the city of eternal light.
And a crowd of people.
Once, they had been followers of the White Shadow Church, each pursuing different darknesses.
Now, their eyes held a single shared darkness.
An absolute darkness that permitted no deviation or compromise—
The Will of the Void.
"Is it time—"
In truth.
Their original goal had nothing to do with the Will of the Void.
Their plan had begun before the Will of the Void awakened and continued unchanged.
But.
Thump!
The grand ritual performed by the church changed everything.
Thump!
The Will of the Void, which should have infested the church.
Thump!
Instead of scattering aimlessly, it sought a new vessel.
Thump!
As a deeper darkness.
Devil worshippers—
That was the moment they were reborn as apostles of the Void.
Eyes tainted by the Void gazed toward the light.
Radion's grand plaza.
There, under the church's leadership with the Saintess at the forefront, a massive ritual was underway.
The city's citizens had all been urged to participate without exception.
"What in the world is going on...? Even the Saintess is stepping up..."
"Well, it's church business, so we just trust and follow, right?"
"Of course! Getting to see the Saintess up close like this is a blessing in itself!"
Most citizens participated in the ritual on faith alone, oblivious to the reason—
But they were different.
The cause and purpose of the ritual.
The Void Apostles knew it all.
Even their own roles.
The woman leading the group stepped forward.
Terror Bishop Disor.
Once the bishop who served the greatest demon lord "Terror," she was now merely an apostle of the Void.
No matter how great the demon, it was but a part of Him.
"..."
She lifted her head, taking in the sky above the holy city.
A thick aura of divinity visible even to the naked eye.
It enveloped the entire city.
The encroaching shadow of the Void.
To escape it, the holy city had chosen the most straightforward and clear method.
In other words, the simplest and most brute-force way.
"Evacuating the entire citizenry's mental images elsewhere..."
The woman pierced the fatal flaw in that method.
The citizens mobilized for the ritual were all living beings with their own egos and wills.
No matter how feeble, they each carried weight.
Moreover, the church.
Most of its high priests, the leadership, had reached realms where they built their own mental image worlds.
For example—
Their plan was like loading an entire city onto a cart.
Could the cart withstand it?
That immense load?
A massive vulnerability was born in the being they revered as god—
That fleeting, misguided entity.
Thus, the apostles' duty was clear.
Reach the heart of light alongside them and plunge the final dagger into its weakened form.
With that, vain resistance would come to naught, and they would return to where they belonged.
"Faint light. You shone upon darkness in vain."
With the birth of light, darkness was completed.
The Void Apostles moved, feeling His vast presence.
"Sister!? Why are you with the citizens—"
"Wrapping up urgent business on my way back. Sorry for being late."
"...No, it's good you made it now!"
A cog in the long-prepared plan fulfilled its role.
The priest's mask crafted by Terror Bishop Disor.
The followers were deceived, accepting the Void into their midst.
"Here, place your hand. The Saintess will guide you all."
"..."
Disor inwardly sneered at the foolish light followers.
However.
She did not know.
"..."
That the Saintess's gaze had clearly swept over them—
Over the Void followers—as she passed.
The ritual proceeded.
At its center was the Saintess.
Vast power descended upon the site with her gestures and voice.
"Sister, you're not scared...!?"
Even as citizens and some followers were overwhelmed—
The Void Apostles alone remained calm.
Terror Bishop Disor smiled softly.
"Because the Great One supports me."
At that moment.
The Saintess quietly concluded her prayer.
"!!!"
Simultaneously, a sensation like being sucked into a massive pit engulfed them.
'No...!?'
Terror Bishop Disor momentarily lost her composure to the overwhelming power beyond expectations.
It was merely the beginning.
"...!"
The accompanying followers and citizens were nowhere to be seen.
Terror Bishop Disor frantically looked around.
What she saw was an endless world of pure white.
Filling the space was not light.
Something purer, more transparent—
No trace of the weakened heart of light anywhere.
Terror Bishop Disor fell into great confusion.
Trap.
The word flashed in her mind.
And questions followed.
'How— How did they know to trap us!? And with what did they trap us!!!'
The being worshipped as god by the brutes.
Replaced by something else.
Something even greater!
And—
Disor's confusion deepened at its declaration.
"Dangaleon...!"
Disor knew it.
The high demon named Burning Black Flame.
"Why are you here—"
This was the final bastion of divinity.
Why was a high demon guarding it?
Moreover— the demon's state was abnormal in every way.
"Dangaleon—"
Disor stared at it.
"...No! You're not Dangaleon!!!"
As far as Disor knew.
The being named Dangaleon was not like this.
"A being not even fit for the lowest seat of the Seven Thrones could possess such dignity!!!"
Once servant to the greatest Terror, now to the greater Will, Disor found the name Dangaleon weightless.
Yet look at the entity before her now.
"Ugh...!"
Behold the nobly blazing gray-white sun.
Its fierce presence alone seemed to incinerate earthly impurities.
The sun descended.
The eye within the gray-white fireball fixed on them.
Roar.
Gray-white flames clung to their bodies.
As all writhed in agony, only Disor endured.
But even she could not maintain her calm—
"A miracle beyond imagination..."
Dangaleon's words were true.
Disor could not even fathom it.
How a mere high demon like Dangaleon had transcended its fate to reach this state—
At that instant.
Boom!
The earth shook.
A giant capable of touching the gray-white sun in the high heavens—
A giant unreachable by earthly worms—appeared.
It was bizarre.
Vaster than any being Disor had seen, yet in the form of a young girl.
Dangaleon's attitude, which had spewed endless contempt, flipped.
It spoke in a friendly yet servile tone.
Ber.
Disor mulled the name.
Her eyes darted left and right rapidly.
At the end, she took in the giant's form again.
The form nobly rising, eclipsing the gray-white sun.
"Sand mountain that eclipses the sun, Berbandes—"
Thus.
The moment Disor uttered the high demon's name again.
The sand giant shook its head violently.
Hunching its body with all its might—
It leaped up and shouted.
A scene that might draw smiles from some—
But to Disor and the Void Apostles, it was merely grotesque.
Demons.
Beings that were mere parts of the Void had shed their fated roles and been reborn.
Thump!
Disor's breath grew labored.
She could clearly feel it.
Something transcending the false god worshipped by brutes—
Perhaps something comparable to the Will of the Void.
Clatter—
Some apostles turned tail and fled in panic.
Those with relatively faint Void Wills compared to Disor.
They felt the space-filling energy invading them.
Felt it driving out the Will of the Void sustaining them.
Panic descended.
They ran and ran and ran.
"...Ah—"
When their footsteps stopped, they realized.
There was no escape in this space.
Fleeing the giant led to a colossal tree opposite.
A distant place unreachable in a lifetime of running.
At the horizon's edge, a massive tree too vast for the eye grew, devouring the world.
And a mountain range.
The mountains suddenly began to crumble.
No.
Began to uncoil.
The serpent's coiled body writhed, closing the distance.
All sense of perspective and sensation collapsed—
Its gaping maw surged toward them.
"..."
Disor closed her eyes before being swallowed.
A more familiar darkness welcomed her.
"Will of the Void, your—"
Boom!
The serpent's maw snapped shut.
Thus, Disor's words seemed cut short.
The serpent thrashed wildly, twisting its body.
Its pure white form slowly darkened.
The darkness spread in an instant—
Swallowing all the demons present.
"...!"
Rishir's eyes widened.
It happened amid the ongoing mental image transfer.
Lindal and Lu-Rah voiced their concerns.
All the holy swords, including Wellak, were lending power to Rishir, but it wouldn't be strange if the limit hit anytime.
Embracing the mental image of an entire city was like that.
"It's not that."
They sighed in relief at Rishir's words, but—
The relief didn't last.
Rishir's expression was steeped in profound confusion and worry.
"My spirits—"
Rishir muttered lowly, hand to his forehead.
"Suddenly vanished somewhere."
Dangaleon's voice, plunged into chaos—
Was soon swallowed by the Void.
The world inverted.
The gray-white sun that had reigned nobly in the pure white world was gone.
A Void world that devoured even darkness.
There, his flames were infinitely feeble.
The gray-white flames flickered feebly like a candle on the verge of extinction.
Something more primal than emotion manipulated Dangaleon's mind.
The Void spoke then.
The flames' momentum weakened.
Like a frightened beast.
Dangaleon didn't know it.
Its thoughts and cognition held no memory of its existence.
Yet its existence reacted to the voice.