The swarm lunged forward in a monstrous tide. Their jaws split open into unnatural as they scraped against the surface, tearing gouges into the sanctified rock with every step and yet Vastarael did not move. Not until his glaive vanished. His lips formed a quiet phrase:
"Plenituse Technique, Second Form, Calm Gale."
Time didn't stop. It simply forgot how to function. To the naked eye, it looked like nothing had happened. One moment Vastarael was standing with his hands lowered. In the next, a gust of wind brushed the battlefield.
Then, bodies fell apart.
All of the creatures ruptured at once, their forms splitting instantly. Their limbs detached. Torsos twisted unnaturally. Heads rolled slowly, their eyes still glowing before they dimmed into silence. The scattered pieces hit the ground in eerie synchronization as if gravity had only just remembered to act. By then, Vastarael was already behind them, several meters away from where he had been. Not a drop of blood was on hm.
High above, Denisia and Natalis were almost too stunned to maintain their formation.
"What... just happened?" Denisia muttered, her voice breathless.
"Did he teleport?" Natalis asked.
"No," Denisia murmured. "I didn't even see a spatial distortion. That wasn't
Spatial movement."
They watched as Vastarael turned his head toward them and casually lifted his hand, giving them a calm, two-fingered wave, as if he'd simply finished brushing dust off his coat.
Both twins blinked in unison. Natalis exhaled, folding her arms as she chanted a segment of the divine array behind her.
"I'm just going to say it. Are we absolutely sure that Vastarael isn't actually the strongest among us?"
"I've been wondering that for a while, sister. Because I love Narisva to bits and she does radiate the whole unstoppable energy but Vastarael just made Divine-ranked creatures look like... sandbags."
"I mean, is he letting her have the role?"
"She probably just grabbed it like she does everything else."
"True."
They both paused, then giggled softly at the same time before returning to their Divine Purification chant. Below, Vastarael was already moving again. High above the shattered pillar, Vastarael's eyes glowed faintly. The temporary Sapphire Bond linking him to Peroncerea flared to life.
[Do you see it? The array of Mystic Circles?]
Peroncerea, breathless where she floated near the edge of her own battlefield, her demonic wings flapping, responded immediately.
[Yes. Clear as day.]
Vastarael nodded once, calmly twirling his glaive between his fingers as the silence thickened around the floating platform. The corpses of the Divine beasts lay in a pile around him. Some were still twitching, their bodies refusing to die properly even in ruin.
He sighed, gaze flicking toward his glaive's blade.
"Still not fast enough."
His voice was more disappointed than frustrated. The Calm Gale form of Plenituse was designed for acceleration and swift tactical engagement but even when he had tried to overlay his Time Divinity directly onto his Tethers, it had only resulted in marginal gains. There was no significant surge in destructive capability or elevation into a new realm. He wasn't aiming for brute force anymore. He was aiming for transcendence and this wasn't it.
Just then, Natalis's voice cracked the silence.
"It's done! The purification array is ready!"
Vastarael's expression shifted instantly, the sapphire glow intensifying. He reached out through the Bond to Peroncerea.
[Now. Give the signal. We only have a few seconds of sync.]
Peroncerea didn't hesitate. She pulled out one of her Demonic Pistols. She aimed it upward into the sky. The gunshot rang out like a divine bell toll, echoing across the entire trapped space. It was a shockwave that rippled through the sealed world like a heartbeat made of thunder. Even those who didn't hear it physically felt it. The moment it rang out, the sky cracked.
A golden brilliance erupted from the Divine Array created by Denisia and Natalis above the corrupted pillar. A beam of pure holy fire descended. The beam struck the crimson crystal at the center of the array. The pillar disintegrated. Particles of radiant dust scattered across the battlefield as a vortex of light consumed the remains. Even the monsters nearby, still twitching in death, were scorched into ash. Beneath the oceans, in the sunken gloom where Narisva had been waiting, a crack appeared on the pillar walls, then dozens more.
With a thunderous implosion, the entire underwater pillar collapsed in on itself like a black hole. Water surged in violently but Narisva was already gone. A flicker of Sight Teleportation burst just outside the waves as she appeared, drenched and utterly bored.
"That took long enough."
Far above her, the first pillar, where Adelasta and Eldrigan were still locked in battle, suddenly began to shatter. Adelasta turned mid-fight, her eyes widening.
"That's the signal!"
Eldrigan didn't even look. With a roar, he slammed his mallet into the base of the structure, just as Adelasta hurled a blade straight into the weakened core. The double impact was timed to perfection.
The first pillar fractured and detonated, sending waves of sacred light exploding outward in jagged lines. All three pillars were destroyed but the silence that followed wasn't peace. The floating reality began to shatter like glass under immense pressure. The sky cracked. The water lost its surface tension. The very laws of mystic stability warped as a horrific presence surged from the deepest parts of the broken realm.
A darkness older than comprehension stirred awake and from the center of it, it roared.
The sealed monster, the one who had been locked beneath the anchors of these three divine mechanisms, had been released.
Vastarael looked upward, his lips tight.
"Of course. There's always a damn 'next part. Why am I not surprised?"