Chapter 21: The Hero’s Life, It Will End (1)
Back then, Augustus felt nothing for the position of Pope, his heart only held Loseweisse Phyllis.
Harboring wonderful fantasies about their future, they entered the temple for their final service to the deities.
At that time, neither Augustus nor Loseweisse Phyllis knew that this step marked the beginning of a nightmare.
As the great temple doors closed behind them, they did as before – first cleaning the deity statues, then kneeling devoutly before them to pray for their blessings.
Everything proceeded just as it had before, no differences at all.
But in the depths of that night, the most horrific scene unfolded.
A faint light suddenly flickered from the deity statues. Augustus and Loseweisse Phyllis were even excited, thinking it was a sign of divine revelation descending.
They pressed their foreheads firmly to the ground, loudly chanting prayers.
However, the situation soon took an eerie turn.
The light from the statues gradually transformed into grotesquely twisted limbs, long tentacles undulating like giant serpents, ensnaring Loseweisse Phyllis’s body.
Augustus’s body was suppressed by a mysterious force, immobilized, his crimson eyes bulging as he let out anguished howls like a wounded beast.
Seven distorted beings deliberately tormented Loseweisse Phyllis for an entire night before Augustus’s eyes.
They seemed to deeply enjoy the wails of human despair.
The deities they believed in were more terrifying than demons.
Before this, he had always thought the deities were sacred, great, benevolent, immaculate – to be revered yet untouchable, doting on their faithful like children.
But in that moment, he understood that these so-called deities were merely beasts filled with vulgar desires, wielding tremendous power.
The next day, Loseweisse Phyllis was pregnant.
Three years later, Loseweisse Phyllis gave birth to a baby – Loseweisse.
Towards Loseweisse, Augustus always harbored an odd mix of feelings. On one hand, she was the only bloodline of the woman he loved most. On the other, filthy deity blood that brought him searing despair and pain still flowed within her.
Although Augustus did not know which of the seven deities Loseweisse was the descendant of.
When looking at Loseweisse, Augustus felt both compassion and revulsion, hatred – an extremely contradictory set of emotions.
Loseweisse Phyllis had utterly broken down. That once pure and beautiful girl went completely insane from the brutal torture of that single night.
The chaste Holy Maiden incessantly craved intimacy, her eyes now hollow and devoid of their original luster.
Augustus knew this was not Loseweisse Phyllis’s true nature. She was a very strong woman – even if subjected to hellish cruelty, he believed she could have stood back up.
But the power of the deities was truly too immense.
Just witnessing it caused Augustus’s soul to be violently shaken, his eyes bleeding profusely, his consciousness nearly shattering.
Loseweisse Phyllis directly endured the full brunt of the deities’ essence, her body implanted with their seed – forces she could not withstand.
The Holy Maiden’s will was utterly shattered in that instant.
From that day onwards, the faith deep in Augustus’s heart completely collapsed.
The deities they had devoutly worshipped treated them as pitiful playthings, trampled and toyed with at whim…
His devout faith transformed into flames of vengeance. He madly pursued power by any means, no matter how vile, eventually clawing his way to the position of Pope.
He would raise the banner of rebellion against the deities.
He wanted to deicide!
But the more he understood about the deities, the more Augustus felt his own insignificance.
He came to know the truth of this world.
Humans could not defeat deities.
Only powers from outside this world could oppose them.
Realizing this, Augustus nearly fell into despair – until the hero’s arrival.
The hero from another world commanded forces beyond the Heavenly Continent. He was Augustus’s only hope.
However, after that experience, Augustus’s will had become extremely stubborn and crazed. If even the gods treated their devout faithful so, how could he trust anyone from another world? He would only feel secure grasping this power completely in his own hands.
He would control the hero, make the hero his puppet to use against those lofty deities.
Perhaps this would take many years, but no matter – he was willing to wait.
On the other side, Loseweisse gazed at Augustus’s departing back, her expression grim.
She had overheard the entire conversation between Augustus and Angelica.
To make Angelica the next Holy Maiden?
What a joke. Only she was the Holy Maiden – no one else could seize that position from her hands, no one at all.
Loseweisse felt an unprecedented threat, and it was all because of that damned Qin Chu.
An adoring smile appeared on her face. Indeed, only Lord Jie Luo was the true hero. Qin Chu was utterly unworthy.
After a long while, Loseweisse suddenly took out a scroll from her bosom. This scroll was given to her three days ago by a mysterious and powerful being.
Clearly recorded on the scroll was an esoteric form of magic never before seen on the Heavenly Continent – the Resurrection Technique!
The blood of a successor can open the door to reviving the hero.
As long as she could gather Lord Jie Luo’s soul fragments, she could use Qin Chu’s blood and life as sacrifices to revive Lord Jie Luo.
Madness and rationality flickered in Loseweisse’s gaze. She knew she could not accomplish this alone.
“Information!”
Loseweisse activated information magic.
“Hey, Ekaterina, it’s me. Come back here immediately. I’ve found a way to revive Lord Jie Luo through magic.”
She began contacting her comrades from the Hero Squad scattered across the world, intending to summon the members to the imperial capital.
…
Auville Empire, Imperial Capital, Commoner District.
Qin Chu still sat at the counter, lightly drumming his fingers on the table surface.
The demon beast’s aura was drawing ever nearer.
On the back of his hand, a diamond-shaped mark was flickering with a faint glow.
That was the imprint left by the Phantom Demon on his body. This mark could guide the demon beast assassin lurking in the imperial capital to come and kill the hero.
Under the silver moonlight, it cast an elongated, rigid, puppet-like shadow.
Its form appeared no different from a human’s – with a head, torso and four limbs.
Viewing it from behind, no one would think it a demon beast. But upon seeing its face, one would feel an indescribable sense of distortion.
What a twisted face it had – half the skin rough and stubbly, half smooth and tender, the two completely mismatched halves fused onto one being.
One side glaring wrathfully, the other bashfully demure.
Not just the face, but the chest, arms and legs too.
The entire being was starkly divided down the middle, as if pieced together from the halves of a male and female corpse.
The Yin-Yang Demon, also called… the Corpse Demon!
One crimson eye, one azure eye, fixated on the hero’s back.
It slowly parted its grotesque mouth in a clown-like grin.
The hero’s life, it would end!
This glory belonged to the great Matrasa!
