Chapter 117
Chapter 117
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 117
Chapter Title: The Mad Pope's Ritual
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The Pope of the Night God's Cult.
Eractus Gardan.
He was currently darting between Tendar's buildings at breakneck speed.
'Monster.'
In truth, he was all but fleeing.
Others hadn't noticed.
But he had served the Night God for ages.
So the instant he laid eyes on Havel, he knew.
The calamity pouring from his body wasn't of any living creature.
An existence beyond dimensions.
Nothing else explained it.
Yet he was the Pope of the Night God's Cult.
So he put on a strong front, at least outwardly.
He couldn't let the cultists see him back down.
Once the cultists engaged him.
The Pope slipped away from the scene in a flash.
In the midst of his escape, he spotted Havel and realized one key fact.
He saw a possibility in him.
'With him, we can hasten the Night God's descent.'
The moment that thought crystallized.
He immediately drove the Night God's cultists into a frenzy.
And bolted to execute the next phase of his plan.
A chill ran down his spine!
It was then.
He sensed an immense, unknowable presence at his back.
A dread so overwhelming he feared even turning around.
That chill engulfed the Pope—engulfed everything.
In a single instant.
The raucous street plunged into utter silence.
Tendar's nights were relentlessly hectic.
The city center churned ceaselessly on capital and power.
Night offered no respite; every building blazed with light daily.
Beneath it all, salarymen and countless others toiled through overtime.
Some drowned the day's exhaustion in booze.
Hence the perpetual clamor of the urban heart.
Yet in that moment, the entire city center went as quiet as if everyone had rehearsed it.
Screeeeech! Crash!
Right then, a nearby magitech vehicle slammed into the one ahead.
Before the roaring flames.
Everyone remained frozen, rooted in place.
Cold sweat poured from their faces in rivulets.
Their primal instincts screamed one thing.
Move now, and you die.
"Gasp!"
The first to snap out of it was the Pope.
He who bore the Night God's power.
He recovered quickest, heaving ragged breaths.
He scanned his surroundings in haste.
A halted world met his eyes.
The city's frantic movers and shakers stood stock-still.
A homeless man harassing a passerby was frozen mid-swing, arm aloft.
A promoter handing out flyers halted with a smile etched on her face.
A harried office worker stopped dead, as if robbed of all haste.
In this tableau where all but him seemed paused.
Weee-ooo-weee-ooo!
A siren wailed from a police magitech vehicle nearby.
Cold sweat beading, the Pope turned slowly.
Now he knew the terror's source.
'The main temple.'
None other than the Night God's main temple building.
The site of the frenzied cultists and Havel moments ago.
The very place he'd fled.
And something caught his eye.
From between the structures, an inky, ominous blaze rose like black flames.
The sight sent every hair on his body bristling.
His face drained to ghostly white.
Bad.
Dangerous.
Wrong.
Death.
His mind flooded with every danger signal imaginable.
It was then.
Step—.
A single footfall reached the Pope's ears.
In a world frozen still.
One person approached.
Step—.
In the silence, those echoes hit like thunderclaps.
Step—.
Thump—.
His heart hammered in sync.
Death's fingers grazed his nape, teasing.
The Pope's eyes quivered toward the sound.
In the stalled city, beneath the traffic light.
A man strode this way.
Streetlamps gleamed off silver hair nearing white.
That shine shook souls to the core.
Like a sightless moth drawn inexorably to the sun.
Eye contact locked the Pope in place.
Step—.
No words escaped his throat.
Yet suddenly, the man loomed before him.
Drip—.
His hair tumbled loose.
Not just hair.
Every follicle on him shed.
The man eclipsed all norms.
"If you meant to run, you shouldn't have let yourself get caught."
The Pope couldn't reply.
Sticky sweat and shedding fur—that was his full response.
"Too noisy here."
Havel clapped his shoulder.
"Let's relocate."
His vision inverted.
Surroundings warped in a blink.
Body protesting, he tumbled across the ground.
"Kuhk, kehk!"
Air rushed back; he hacked violently.
Bald and barren, his skin cracked and dry.
Like glimpsing the abyss.
The chill haunted him still.
He jerked his head up.
A wooded expanse unfolded.
A park near the city, by the looks.
Deserted at this hour.
Dazed, staring at the river inches away, a voice sounded.
"Back with us?"
"Hiiik, eek!"
He shrieked on reflex.
Who else? The one who'd shown him oblivion.
Shuddering violently, he whipped around.
Havel stood there, gaze flat.
The Pope who'd belched Night God power moments prior.
Now a withered husk.
No trace of his earlier swagger.
'Calamity and evil tune truly differ in scale.'
To think mere casual calamity did this.
Transcendents played by different rules.
'And he feels primed to grow even stronger.'
Human bounds shattered.
"Ha, haha, hehehehehe…."
It was then.
The Pope erupted in mad laughter, solo.
Staring, he cackled like a lunatic.
"What's the joke?"
"Heh, hehehe, how could I not laugh."
Havel's brow twitched.
The Pope spilled the reason freely.
"You may not know what you did… but your power surged then, leaped dimensions."
He lifted his head slow.
Eyes pierced the night sky.
Beyond it, precisely.
To the being there.
"Power swelling on Tendar's soil hastens the Night God's advent."
Havel's aura had masked it before.
Now clear-headed, the Pope sensed it sharp.
Beyond the heavens.
The Night God's drop accelerated.
Descent pulled forward.
"Hehehe, He comes…!"
Unchanging truth.
How not to laugh?
"A world for Tendar alone dawns!"
The Pope howled skyward in frenzy again.
Havel got it now.
This one was certifiably unhinged.
Other cultists chased selfish gains.
Pope Eractus Gardan craved true purging.
Kaboom!
It was then.
An explosion rocked the city core.
Blasts chained across spots without pause.
Havel scowled at the din.
Night God's calamity pulsed from there.
Seeing Havel's face, the Pope gazed serene.
Fear fled; only purifying rapture remained.
"The Night God descends not just on cultists."
Havel grasped it late.
The Pope flung arms heavenward.
"Today, I give my all!"
Across long years.
He'd woven a grand rite over the city heart, invoking Gardan.
A descent rite for Night God's might.
Now it fired wildly across the streets.
Which meant.
The Night God's arrival leaped ahead.
His gaze fixed on Havel.
"Havel, night lion, calamity's your feast."
Pope's eyes and maw stretched grotesque.
"Feast freely. Night God blesses you…."
Crunch!
No more words.
Head imploded inward; his corpse crumpled.
Havel turned from the wretch.
Such fools act sans aftermath.
No contingency plotted.
Barely worth the effort.
'Real issue now.'
Havel eyed the night vault.
Irksome, but true—the descent quickened, as claimed.
No denying it.
Thus, halt the Night God's drop.
Or unmake the Night God outright.
Havel quitted the park, scaled a city edifice.
The city stirred back to life—pure pandemonium.
Here, there: Night-descended lost souls mauled neighbors.
Cops mobilized; military too, it seemed.
Total mess.
Tendar barreled toward ruin.
Then, a figure caught Havel's eye.
No hesitation; he vaulted toward it.
Thud!
"Eek!"
Familiar cry on landing.
Elasia.
Thwack!
Snap!
Phayod and Baria nearby pinned a possessed berserker.
Situation grave.
The trio mobilized swift.
"Havel?"
Gasping Phayod spotted him.
"No time. Baria, Phayod—subdue rampagers max."
Havel pivoted to Elasia.
"Elasia, with me: find Tendar's princess Valera."
"P-princess?"
"Aye. Baldoran's Tendar blood. Kin scent matches; your nose'll track her."
Finding's her forte.
"On it!"
She knew, voice bold.
"Lord Havel!"
A light orb bloomed in Elasia's grip.
Pathfinder sphere.
Havel hoisted her piggyback swift.
"Phayod."
To him:
"Rescue max. All this ties to 7th hierarchy's close."
Tendar spanned 76th to 78th floors fused.
Thus 7th's finale: 79th.
Undeniably, culmination of below deeds.
Linked to floor clear, no doubt.
"Roger."
Phayod thumped chest, eyes afire, all in.
'Matured solid.'
Safe to entrust.
"Elasia, grip firm—you got this."
"Yes!"
Havel consigned rear guard to Phayod, crushed the earth.
Thud!
Launched, he tailed Elasia's beacon in a flash.
76th-to-78th's endgame loomed.
That crux neared.