The shattered wreckage of the [Ark] plummeted from the starry sea. Everyone stood dumbstruck.
Even the Lord of White Night and the Halloween Queen, who had trusted that Riku could break the [Ark], were shaken. They knew better than anyone how absurd that vessel's defence was, and how hard it would be to pierce it, let alone blow through it by brute force.
In that instant, they gained a far sharper sense of how terrifying Riku's current power truly was.
From amid the raining debris, three figures burst out in sorry shape, exposed beneath a heavenscape torn open by the aftershock of the light-lance.
They were Yuan Shi Tianzun, Shakyamuni, and the World Dragon, now reduced to roughly the size of an ordinary drake.
Only by relying on Yuan Shi Tianzun's potent immortal tools at the final moment had they escaped. Otherwise, they'd have been annihilated with no second outcome.
"Even the [Ark] got broken… What is that monster?" the World Dragon said, face grave.
As a World Dragon, a World King, a Two-Digit Full Authority, it was usually others calling her the monster. She had not expected to say it about someone else.
"If his true body had awakened and come instead of a mere avatar piloting the [Ark]…" she muttered, unwilling.
But the First Avatar of the solar pantheon [Avatāra] would not awaken unless the world truly reached its end; under normal circumstances, he could not appear.
This time, if not for the stimulus of [Perpetual Motion Engine]'s return and the anomaly of Riku's surge, she would not even have been able to congeal an avatar to steer the [Ark] and deploy a Simulated Star Map.
"No… even if the true body came, that strike couldn't have been fully stopped. At best, we wouldn't have ended up this miserable." The picture of that world-upending light filled her mind again, and her heart tightened. As much as she hated to admit it, this foe could not be beaten head-on.
Under a sky full of gods and buddhas staring up, Riku looked to the World Dragon again. That placid gaze alone cast a shadow of death over countless beings.
"The [Ark] is gone. One fewer trump card," the World Dragon transmitted swiftly. "But I did think of a way to deal with him. Leave the outside battle to you."
"World Dragon, don't tell me you're…!?" Shakyamuni's face changed.
"No time to argue." The World Dragon's eyes hardened. She invoked her Host Authority.
In a flash, both the World Dragon and Riku vanished from the corpse-strewn battlefield.
"As expected, Host Authority. World Dragon, please don't let this go wrong," Shakyamuni said, face paling.
As a Two-Digit Full Authority, a so-called World Dragon, it was easy for her to drag a target into a Gift Game by force.
But Riku Dola was too strong, too anomalous. If she lost inside a Gift Game, the price would be catastrophic, just like when the greatest "War God," Indra, forcibly drew the Two-Digit Holy Son Jesus into a game and, upon losing, had his divinity stripped away.
Here and now, even Shakyamuni could only pray that the World Dragon had truly found a way to face the God-Slaying Demon King.
"Heh. World Dragon just made the worst possible choice," the Lord of White Night said, snapping her fan shut with a smile.
"Looks like we're about to welcome a new comrade," Perpetual Motion laughed, baring his teeth.
"In this Little Garden, using Host Authority on our leader is the most foolish move you can make," the Halloween Queen murmured.
That sentiment clearly resonated with the Holy Son, the Lord, Athena, Poseidon, Heavy Tank, and the others.
No god or demon king could afford the price of targeting Riku with Host Authority.
On the Lord of White Night's side, the Twin Goddesses, Shakyamuni, and the Three Pure Ones held their tongues. It was too late to say anything now. At this stage, their clashes could no longer sway the war. The true decider would be the result of that Gift Game.
So the myriad gods could do nothing but hunker down on defence, waiting anxiously for the end.
[Disboard]'s devils, from the top brass like the Lord of White Night down to rank-and-file fighters, surged forward in a crushing offensive that left the gods, buddhas, and immortals gasping for breath.
In an unknown oceanic world, Riku appeared.
The World Dragon manifested several kilometres away.
At the same time, a sheepskin scroll unrolled in Riku's hand.
That tugged his state back from perfect Ultra Instinct to its initial activation, and the silver in his hair dimmed. But should he will it, he could return to that peak in an instant.
Gift Game: Contest of Divinity
Host: World Dragon
Challenger: God-Slaying Demon King Riku Dola
[Rules]
Both sides' divinity is elevated to the same tier. Powers outside those granted by one's own divinity are forbidden. The true nature of both sides' divinity is concealed.
[Challenger's Victory Conditions]
Solve the riddle of the World Dragon. Defeat the Host. Repent one's own karmic sins.
-
The instant Riku's eyes skimmed the parchment, his Ultra Instinct switched off on its own.
Rule 2: You may not use any power other than that of your own divinity.
Right after, his Perpetual Motion Engine divinity surged, elevated by the game, to match the World Dragon's tier, rising straight into the Full Authority realm.
"World Dragon, what a blunt little game," Riku said, back in his normal state, lifting his gaze toward Kūrma in the distance.
"Heh. Blunt, yes. But a blunt game that neatly restrains an outlier like you, don't you think?" the World Dragon laughed.
Riku's power, she could tell, didn't belong to the usual taxonomy of divinity. She had no idea how someone without relying on divinity could wield strength that terrified even the gods, but this wasn't the time to unravel his truth; it was the time to find a way to beat him.
Little Garden's beings are complicated, and miracles abound, but the simplest yardstick for power is still divinity. However overwhelming Riku's other strength might be, the divinity hidden beneath it was not on the same scale as Kūrma had bet on that, and thus dragged him into a Gift Game.
Of course, Little Garden insists on balance. If she nerfed his "outside" power, the game wouldn't also allow her to keep a higher-tier divinity. Hence, the rule bumping them to the same level.
Bug-like as the Perpetual Motion Engine's "infinite energy" is, she still felt the odds favoured her. The Full Authority realm was ground she knew far better than he did.
"Restrain me, hm? That's just your assumption," Riku replied, voice calm.
"Then show me what justifies that confidence," Kūrma said, eyes narrowing as her body swelled to proper size, sprawling across the star-sea. Sunlit radiance poured from her divinity, imperious and absolute.
Against that colossal mass, Riku's figure looked smaller than an ant.
"There are plenty of ways to crack your game," he said softly, tilting his chin, "but I don't feel like wasting time on you."
GRAAAAH!
The dragon's bellow shook the world. Feeling seen through, she grew testy. Scales sloughed from that vast body like rain, each one splashing down and swelling into legions of titanic tortoises, great serpents, and dragonkin.
It was an ability beyond even the strongest species, akin to a Humanity's Final Trial, which creates clones from blood. At the same time, sun-bright power gathered in Kūrma's maw.
The tortoises, serpents, and dragonkin surged in a tide to pen Riku in, to slow him, to limit his moves.
"How tedious." Riku shook his head. He did have multiple routes to victory here, but they'd all cost time. And because the opponent was the World Dragon, the "no power beyond your divinity" clause bit harder for him than for a normal god. If he limited himself to only the Perpetual Motion Engine and the Simulated Star Map—Third Stellar Particle Body, he could grind Kūrma down, but not in a day or two. Solving the "World Dragon riddle" would be just as long.
"…Looks like it's finally time to patch my last gap," he murmured. He flicked his fists; shockwaves erased the onrushing tortoises, serpents, and dragonkin in a blink.
But more scales cascaded from Kūrma's hide, birthing fresh armies that closed once more.
"When I first drew this card, I thought I'd save it for dealing with some kind of last boss," Riku said, and drew a card from his storage.
The Light of the End and the Light of Hope.
He chose to use it.
In an instant, the card ashed away. The Perpetual Motion Engine divinity inside him thrummed; a column of light wrapped Riku whole.
"…?!" A strange aura spilt off him enough to make Kūrma's pupils contract. An unpleasant premonition crawled up her spine. Instinct screamed: stop him.
GRAAAAH!
She didn't hesitate. The breath of a World Dragon silver, sun-hot, lanced down like a beam that could pierce Little Garden itself.
Boom.
The breath swallowed Riku. It punched straight through the ocean below, and even this fabricated game-world built to withstand Full Authority strikes shuddered and keened.
"He didn't dodge… what is he playing at?" It should have pleased her to land a clean hit on someone like him, but the ease of it chilled rather than thrilled. Even a Full Authority deity would be gravely wounded by that breath. And yet… with this opponent, nothing about that felt right.
A thunderous blast rolled out just as unease crept into the World Dragon's heart.
The silver dragon-breath was suddenly blown apart. Shockwaves tore the world, whipping up apocalyptic gales and tsunamis. At the eye of the storm, a lone figure emerge, Riku. Even after being engulfed by the breath, he didn't bear so much as a scratch.
His face and posture were unchanged, but the aura he exuded was entirely different.
"The scent of the end… Humanity's Final Trial—the Perpetual Motion Engine!?" The World Dragon stared at Riku in disbelief.
Humanity's Final Trial, the Perpetual Motion Engine, was already out there, part of [Disboard]. So how could Riku, the leader himself, also be the Perpetual Motion Engine!?
"No… it isn't just the end. That's the light of hope!" Another jolt ran through her. "Humanity's Final Hope!?"
Becoming a Final Trial was already absurd, yet to be, at the same time, Humanity's Final Hope? Even miracles had no language for this. The World Dragon's worldview shattered to dust.
Humanity's Final Hope exists for the sole purpose of opposing Demon Lords, a guardian for mankind and the gods.
The Final Hope and the Final Trial are natural-born nemeses. Only a Final Trial can defeat a Final Hope; the power of gods and buddhas cannot harm it, cannot even bind it.
If the Final Hope did not stand with the gods, it would be their greatest bane, not their greatest ally.
And now, someone embodied both Humanity's Final Trial and Humanity's Final Hope at once. The World Dragon had no frame of reference left.
"How did you do this?" she demanded, face dark.
The Trial's god-slaying nature was poison to her. The Hope's properties meant she could not harm Riku couldn't even influence him.
There was no fight to be had. No path to victory. Not for her, and perhaps for no one in the Little Garden. Maybe a future Final Trial could do it, but to have a Final Trial aid the gods? Don't make her laugh.
"You only need to know this much: my birth has nothing to do with the Little Garden," Riku said evenly.
Behind him, a banner flared terminus and hope entwined.
"…!?" Her pupils tightened; her heart heaved like a storm-tossed sea.
"Do you still intend to fight?" Riku's voice was a calm recital of fact. "You should already know you have no chance at all."
"…" The World Dragon fell silent, then shrank down, taking human form.
Most of her silver-white hair cascaded to her waist, gleaming faintly; a few locks were tied at both temples. Petite about Poseidon's height, her features were exquisitely beautiful. Amethyst eyes sparkled like stars; skin like porcelain glowed with a soft sheen.
With a flash in those eyes, an elegant dress clothed her bare, delicate frame.
"Oh? So that's your true face?" Riku took her in with an appreciative glance. "Not bad."
"Hah… I may not beat you, but I can still buy time." She didn't bother with modesty; her tone had gone steady again.
The Trial's nature swelled his divinity; that alone tilted the scales. Add in Hope's protections, and her sunlight could not pierce him. Better to stay agile in human shape and stall.
"Stall, is it? Sorry, I'm not planning to play along." The corner of Riku's mouth quirked.
He vanished, exceeding light, and arrowed for the World Dragon.
The game-world howled, though calling it a fight was generous. One sided destruction was closer to the truth.
…
Outside, the larger battle had frozen in a wary deadlock. Both sides were, to greater or lesser degrees, "sandbagging," waiting for Riku and the World Dragon to reappear.
A crack of space split the air. Two figures were hurled out, and all eyes snapped over.
One was the World Dragon, clearly worse for wear now in a girl's body, yet still unmistakable by the sunlight that haloed her divinity.
The other wore a mask of pure shock, then terror, then disbelief expressions even more vivid than the Dragon's earlier confusion.
Lesser gods could sense only the Final Trial in him. Those at the summit, like the World Dragon, saw further:
Humanity's Final Trial. Humanity's Final Hope.
The battlefield fell deathly silent.