Chapter 107
Translator: uly
Chapter: 107
Chapter Title: Hypocrite
『Ah, my child.』
In the black and thick darkness, a bright blue light approached the boy trapped in sin. That refreshing blue light embraced the trembling child to its chest and stroked his wounded head.
With that single touch, fear vanished in an instant, and Saar, the progeny of sin, was forever sealed in this place by the very existence itself.
That was the plan laid by Yam, the Mir of Gae that symbolized life.
『Long ago, when Orga killed Saar, stole away life, and left only that existence in the deep sea, I never could have anticipated it. That my child would come to that deep sea and accept Saar's existence. I never dreamed of such a thing. That was why I sealed myself here personally-to stop Saar from spreading after Orga's death. Even if this world lost all life, I could prevent Maamark from spreading.』
Ironically, it had to be a dwarf, a descendant of both himself and Or. What a cruel twist of fate. Yet this tale was too profound even for Dapbag nel, the vessel that had contained the progeny of sin, to fully grasp.
『Now, rest in my embrace.』
The blue light, Yam, pulled Dapbag nel even tighter into her arms. Dapbag nel slowly opened his eyes.
"Hero..."
『It's all right. The fear is gone now.』
Yam resolved to entrust the remaining plan to the great archangels and devote all her strength to healing Dapbag nel.
The trials for the Hero were meant to strengthen him, and the great archangels would gauge his resolve through those tests. Yam planned to guide him while sealing Saar within herself. Right after he reached Or, the trial began, the Mir vanished, and the Hero's resolve was reborn. To truly inherit Or's will, he would have to pass every one of these trials.
『Only then... will he be able to follow the most righteous path.』
Only then would the Hero, even after learning all the truths, refrain from slaying the goddess Mifplas.
***
"Tell me. Have you broken every law of this celestial-or rather, this inverted world? Have you chosen the arduous path of saving the progeny of sin? For what reason have you abandoned good and embraced evil?"
The Archangel of Faith, Tehilla, sought to clarify the meaning of his battle with the Hero beforehand. Even if Cheret had chosen to join him, he believed it was not wrong but merely different-a righteous cause. But his words only provoked the Hero's fury.
"Abandoned good and embraced evil? Chosen the arduous path? Archangel, you truly think like a devil. The easy path you speak of is nothing but a shortcut to evil. Do you call it good when an angel slays a child, then slays the one trembling in fear afterward, and keeps on slaying? Just because it's a power you can't overcome, do you intend to slaughter all of us powerless ones simply because we're weaker and easier to kill? How can an archangel utter such words!"
The Hero pointed his sword and continued.
"I will no longer call that good, you hypocrite."
It was not another good, not merely different but righteous in its own way. Bulki, the guiding star for all, dubbed the archangel-who invoked celestial laws to mock him-a hypocrite.
"Hypocrite?"
But that only ignited the archangel's wrath.
"You deem me good simply because I am an archangel, just as you declared yourself good because you are the Hero. Even as you defend the progeny of sin that festers this world, even as you call my way wrong, I still called you good. Because that is what is right, Hero. But look at you now. On this night when we sacrifice to prevent the rotten flesh from Or's corpse from threatening the world, you have disrupted it all for the sake of a single child. You have bound other archangels as progeny of sin, and now you point your sword at me, the master smith of all angels, the Archangel of Faith Tehilla. I gave you ample time to cull the fear, but you only defile the celestial laws! Between the sacrifice of one child and the mission of all races, which is right? Who is more right? I sat at Or's right hand, you hypocrite!"
Tehilla folded his wings once more, drew Or's power to shine with a halo, and unsheathed his sword.
"You may think you're nobly dipping your hands into evil for the sake of good, but you're merely making excuses to prove you're a little more right. Righteousness without power is nothing but hypocrisy. I, the Archangel of Faith Tehilla, shall enact good once more."
Watching the archangel and Hero hurl accusations at each other, Cheret longed to laugh at them alongside his dearest friend Or but held back and stomped his hoof. Both sides were right in their words. There was no basis to claim either deviated from Or's standard of good.
Thus, the stronger one must lead the others.
That was Or's direction, the absolute will of good. Cheret acknowledged the grown Hero and resolved to help him defeat the archangel before them. He knew through Yam that the archangels were testing the Hero.
"Come."
"Praise the mute one who dwelt in the lowest place."
The Hero and archangel pointed their swords at each other. Now they would face the final trial together. In the first trial, he had proven the path of protecting all would never waver. In the second, he had proven his resolve to dip both hands into sin to achieve it. In this third and final trial, he must prove the power to see it all through. The archangel charged.
"Praise him!"
Boom!
With speed incomparable to before, Tehilla swung his sword through the temple. The vast open space at the center-where Or's sacred blood endlessly flowed from the central fountain, watched over Or's waist-was the temple square where angelic choirs once resounded in ancient times. Its floor crumbled under the archangel's fury. Cheret had dodged the attack faster than the archangel.
"Hup!"
Bulki instinctively pulled the reins to the right with his left hand to shift Cheret's body, maintaining balance, then struck down at the archangel with his sword in his right hand as he charged forward.
Crash!
But the archangel's wings blocked the attack in an instant, while his other wings pursued the lightning-fast Cheret, causing massive blasts of light against the temple walls and pillars.
Boom!
Cheret abruptly halted and charged at Tehilla again. He leaped and slammed down with his massive forelegs to pin the archangel, but Tehilla was no pushover.
Crash!
With his lower two arms, he seized Cheret's neck, formed a sword with the other two, and struck straight down at Bulki.
Boom!
"Urk!"
Immense weight bore down, but Bulki counterattacked in the same instant.
[Judgment of Glory].
Boom!
Tehilla was hurled far away amid the cascade of flashes. His movements flowed gracefully, guided by light like swimming through water, but damage was clearly accumulating. Now, a counterattack was possible. With Cheret, it could be done.
Both the Hero and archangel realized this. Tehilla charged again, generating swords in all his arms as before.
"Praise him!"
He had to dodge not only the four swords but the wings as well. Cheret handled the dodges as if they were one body, but for unavoidable attacks, Bulki parried directly with his sword. Amid the relentless onslaught, Cheret circled Tehilla, widening and closing distances to create openings for Bulki.
[Formation - Rock Guarding the Sword].
"Hah!"
The fierce exchange continued, and as Bulki seized an opening to strike, he activated a symptom allowing him to press the attack even if Cheret couldn't dodge, blocking the archangel's assault. Of course, Bulki's light barrier shattered like glass before the archangel's swords and wings, but Cheret calculated its position and the shards obscuring Tehilla's vision, worming into the gap.
[Judgment of Glory].
Boom!
Finally, a solid hit landed on the archangel. His shoulder armor shattered. The upper right arm beneath was rendered useless, yet Tehilla pressed on.
"Praise him!"
At last, the Archangel of Faith Tehilla drew his final sword.
It was a greatsword of light, incomparably massive compared to the others, gripped fiercely with his two left arms instead of the ruined right. Like Bulki, he exploded light from his wings for an unbelievable burst of speed. He seized Cheret's neck with his sole functional right arm and swung the sword with his left two.
Bulki barely crossed his swords to block, but he was torn from Cheret and smashed into the space between the temple ceiling and wall before plummeting down.
"Gah!"
Thud!
The impact felt like every bone in his body had shattered, but in that split second, Bulki used a symptom to force light into the cracks of his broken bones. Barely rising, he saw the archangel pinning the struggling Cheret with a foot, raising his final sword high as if to cleave through even a Mir. That last sword resembled the mythical blade of Or himself-could even Cheret withstand it?
But he couldn't stop now.
"Ngh!"
Bulki crawled forward, extending his sword hand toward Cheret. If he couldn't prove his power now, the path he had walked, those who followed it, and the path ahead would never connect. He needed some symptom, anything to overcome this crisis.
"Yerutsa... Rahav!"
For he was the Hero, the guiding star to save them all.
"Huh? Cheret, hurry over here..."
In that moment, Bulki locked eyes with Cheret. And like when manifesting his sword, something surfaced in his mind. Something etched into his soul from Or spread from the Hero's heart to his fingertips.
"It's over!"
As the archangel brought his sword down on the Mir's neck, the Hero murmured quietly.
"Mir, come."