Gregrace had to admit that her choice to believe in the Stars had been motivated by self-interest and forced by circumstances. Her faith was not particularly devout.
But thinking about it carefully, from the moment of her birth to overcoming her present difficulties, the Stars had always been helping her.
Although her faith had yet to reach a perfect score of one hundred in devotion, it was at least above the passing mark of sixty.
"I'll return to my room and rest first. You should do the same."
Azik did not linger. He had truly been put through the wringer tonight.
His forehead alone had been torn open three times, and half of his soul had been shaken and disturbed three times in succession, leaving even his spirit in a rare state of exhaustion.
On top of that, tonight's battle of gods had been far too thrilling and shocking. He needed to return to his room, lie down on his bed, and relieve his fatigue through sleep.
Gregrace watched Azik leave. After a while, she suddenly realized there was something else she had yet to do.
Sharron!
She had come to the Southern Continent partly to attend tonight's gathering and partly because she wanted to protect Sharron.
When she hurried back to Sharron's room, Sharron had already disappeared. There was no trace of Sharron's aura anywhere in the entire palace or even throughout the capital of the East Balam Empire.
There was no way she could have left this place tonight unless someone had taken her away.
"Chirp!" Gregrace cried out and hurriedly rushed into the spirit world.
She certainly did not want to lose Sharron right after receiving the protection of the Stars.
Fortunately, she had sensed another aura from the spirit world inside the room. Otherwise, she truly would have been frightened.
The spirit world was her territory. Although she could not control the spirit world or become its master, finding someone within it was still very easy for her.
Soon, Gregrace followed that aura and arrived before a black ancient castle floating amid a thin mist.
The castle had towering spires and was covered in vines. At its top stood a translucent woman.
She was nearly as tall as the castle itself and wore an elaborate, magnificent, yet gloomy black dress. She had no head, and her lowered hands held four identical heads with blond hair, red eyes, and strikingly beautiful features.
When Gregrace arrived, she blinked lightly but did not pay much attention to it. The spirit world was enormous, and all sorts of bizarre creatures existed within it.
Her gaze turned toward the interior of the castle, where Sharron lay peacefully asleep on a large bed.
"You're not bad. If you encounter any trouble in the spirit world, you can come find me."
Gregrace acknowledged the other party's actions in protecting Sharron tonight. A gentle force flowed through the castle's doors and windows into the room and carried the still-sleeping Sharron outside.
Seeing that Sharron was safe and sound, Gregrace relaxed slightly. Her gaze swept toward Reinette Tinekerr, who stood as tall as the castle. After looking at her for a while, a wisp of golden flame transformed into a feather shimmering with golden light.
"This can help you recover your complete form sooner."
"Thank... you..." Reinette Tinekerr bowed slightly.
Gregrace said nothing more. Taking Sharron with her, she left the spirit world and returned to the real world.
Reinette Tinekerr, one of whose heads was biting down on the feather, merely watched Sharron leave without interfering.
Even if she truly wanted to do something, there was nothing she could do before a deity who wielded authority over Death.
...
The starlight was dimming, and the night was drawing to an end.
The fall of the God of Combat sounded a warning bell for the other True Gods.
With the prophesied apocalypse drawing ever closer, more battles between gods would inevitably erupt in the future.
This time, under the collective witness of the Seven Gods, the God of Combat had fallen within His own divine kingdom. Although the one who had struck from behind was the Earth Mother, there was absolutely no way the Evernight Goddess was uninvolved.
The God of Knowledge and Wisdom, the Eternal Blazing Sun, and the Lord of Storms, three True Gods hostile toward one another, were now even more wary of each other. None of Them wanted to become the next God of Combat.
Among Them, the God of Knowledge and Wisdom directly sealed the gates of His divine kingdom, forbidding other True Gods from approaching.
The Eternal Blazing Sun drew in the God of Steam and Machinery and formed an alliance with Him in order to weather the dangerous situation ahead.
The faction of the Evernight Goddess and the Earth Mother was the most stable. Together with the Lord of Storms, who had always leaned toward Her side, they had already become the most terrifying force among the Six Gods.
When the will of the gods extended to their believers on the ground, it marked the beginning of a vast war.
Tonight, at the moment the God of Combat fell, the divine revelations of the Evernight Goddess, the Earth Mother, and the Lord of Storms had already quietly been passed down.
But none of this had anything to do with Hastur at the moment.
Inside the Hall of Stars, Hastur sat in the seat that belonged exclusively to him, his eyes closed as he wholeheartedly sensed the changes that had occurred within the Hall of Stars tonight.
As only a Sequence 5, even with the Hall of Stars under his control, he was still far from being able to participate in tonight's battle of gods.
However, the prayers from Gregrace, Bernadette, and the others generated an enormous power of faith. Gregrace's prayer in particular directly stirred the status and power of the Hall of Stars itself.
It caused the Hall of Stars to truly manifest within the initial barrier, exposing it to the gaze of all.
There was only one thing Hastur had actually done. He merely borrowed the power unleashed by the Hall of Stars to subtly alter the Supernova Dominator's attack.
He made the planets compressed into spheres of light rush into the divine kingdoms of the God of Combat and the Eternal Blazing Sun, borrowing the Supernova Dominator's hand to shatter Their divine kingdoms.
As for everything else, it was the power of the Hall of Stars itself.
When faced with the sudden attack of the God of Steam and Machinery, Hastur, who was inside the Hall of Stars, had indeed been startled and felt somewhat uneasy.
Although he believed the God of Steam and Machinery could not break through the Hall of Stars, he figured he himself might still be affected.
When the Hidden Sage joined in as well, Hastur became even more worried.
Yet They could not even cross that stretch of starry sky, much less affect the Hall of Stars.
Only then did Hastur's anxious heart finally settle. Thinking about it carefully, even the Son of Chaos sealed within the Magic Wishing Lamp was difficult for True Gods to destroy, let alone the Hall of Stars.
This was different from Mr. Fool's Sefirah Castle. The Sefirah Castle left behind by the Lord of Mysteries seemed to possess only its status without sufficient defensive power.
Even Amon, who had yet to become a god, could shake Sefirah Castle.
This might have something to do with the Lord of Mysteries' schemes. After all, He did not care who became the new master of Sefirah Castle.
He might even have deliberately opened the door wide for high-Sequence Beyonders of the Seer, Marauder, and Apprentice pathways.
Because by doing so, He could awaken and return more quickly.
The Hall of Stars, on the other hand, possessed complete power in itself and formidable defensive capabilities. It was a heavily guarded fortress capable of protecting its master.
Even though Hastur's Sequence was low, it had no effect on the Hall of Stars. Advancing to higher Sequences would only affect the degree of control he had over it.
It was like being only level fifty in a game but obtaining a level-one-hundred divine artifact. Although he could not yet wield the divine artifact skillfully, a divine artifact was still a divine artifact, and its might remained unchanged.
When Gregrace's prayer shook the Hall of Stars and activated its true power, it was like feeding him an experience pill. Mm, more accurately, it was like temporarily removing the level restriction for using the divine artifact, similar to a one-hour divine-artifact trial pass.
At that moment, Hastur truly experienced the authority of the Stars' Returner.
So The Stars really could gaze upon everything!
This was not merely an empty phrase he constantly repeated, but a genuine authority that truly existed.
The Mother Goddess of Depravity, Mother Tree of Desire, Supernova Dominator, Son of Chaos, High-Dimensional Overseer, Circle of Inevitability, Primordial Hunger... and a great many other Outer Deities and Great Old Ones scattered throughout every corner of the cosmos.
They were all like stars, continuously radiating multicolored light, waiting for him to awaken Them.
He was clearly inside the Hall of Stars, within the initial barrier and beneath the starry sky overhead.
Yet at that moment... His perspective was one of looking down from high above, with everything beneath his gaze.
As long as he wished, he could use the authority of the Hall of Stars to draw Great Old Ones such as the Mother Tree of Desire and the Supernova Dominator inside the initial barrier.
This discovery gave even Hastur a tremendous fright. If he accidentally drew in an Outer Deity or a Great Old One from beyond the cosmos, then the apocalypse of the entire world would descend tonight.
He hurriedly steadied himself, keeping as far away as possible from the Outer Deities and the Great Old Ones entrenched beyond the cosmos, then silently guided the Supernova Dominator's attack.
This was likewise an application of the authority of Return. It only appeared so inconceivable because of the enhancement provided by the Hall of Stars.
He had also witnessed the death of the God of Combat, clearly seeing how the Earth Mother, when the severely wounded God of Combat needed to recover from His injuries, thrust the dark-brown wooden staff in Her hand into the God of Combat's heart from behind.
He also saw how the Earth Mother and the Evernight Goddess completed their transaction, each taking what they needed.
After everything settled, the Hall of Stars underwent quite a few more changes as a result of this activation.
New knowledge continuously poured into Hastur's mind.
The most important piece of knowledge was that he had come to understand a Beyonder pathway belonging to the Stars!
However, this Stars Beyonder pathway only had Sequences 4 through 0.
It did not have the earlier advancement route from Sequence 9 to Sequence 5.
This gave Hastur reasonable grounds to suspect that this pathway might have been specially tailored for him by the Hall of Stars tonight, a Beyonder pathway exclusively his own.
Sequence 4: Lost One
Sequence 3: Enlightened Saint
Sequence 2: Attendant of the Stars
Sequence 1: Singer of the Stars
Sequence 0: Restorer
=========
* Seq 0 - not sure if it is Restorer or Return to Zero, will update it based on future chapters.