The hill roared like a wounded beast. Rocks split, dust rose, and chunks of flesh still smoldered from the explosion. What remained of the priests was nothing but shredded meat painting the altar red.
Elian was no longer nailed to the cross. Her hands were free, her fingers buried deep in a man's throat.
"Three," Adrian rasped, choking, his voice like glass dragging against stone.
"Three thousand… Illusory Wind-Lightning Movement… you actually cultivated a skill equal to SSS rank!" Adrian's eyes widened, disbelief spilling into fear.
Even with Elian's hand crushing his throat, he could not stop the envy clawing at him. A skill of that level could crush mountains, split oceans, and he was staring at it in the hands of his enemy.
Thunder cracked around Elian's body. Lightning burst out, not once but again and again, wrapping her in a storm. Gusts of wind carried her upward until she seemed to float, untouchable, as if the world itself bent to her rage.
"How…?" Adrian struggled to speak. His voice rasped, broken under her grip. Each word tore his lungs. Another syllable would have been enough to end him.
"You fools," Elian said, her tone steady, almost calm, though her eyes burned with a fury older than the battle. "You will never understand what it means to hate. I hate you to my core. I would give half my life just to see yours end."
Her grip tightened. Fingers pressed into his flesh. Blood ran from his neck, sliding down her hand like red rain. Adrian gasped, choked, but his pride fought to live even as his body failed.
"You think hatred makes you strong?" Adrian coughed, blood spattering his lips. With sudden desperation, his palm lit up with a fiery flare, striking Elian's chest.
She staggered but didn't let
Elian's smile didn't fade. Lightning coiled tighter around her like a serpent. "Weak," she whispered.
She raised her arm, lightning exploding outward. Bolts rained down like judgment into Adrian's body . Adrian screamed as one tore across his shoulder, burning through flesh and bone .
Elian's lips curved into a savage smile. "One moment you bragged about killing me. And now?" She squeezed. His cartilage cracked under her fingers, his trachea collapsing with a wet crunch. "Now you dangle like prey in my hands. Tell me, Adrian the Weak—how does it feel?"
Her eyes burned red, the veins spiderwebbing as if hell itself had claimed her gaze. She looked less human than a demon wearing skin.
Adrian tried to laugh. "Aha—" Blood sprayed from his mouth, bubbling down his chin. The sound was half-choke, half-cackle.
"Pathetic." Elian yanked him higher, until his feet kicked uselessly above the ground. Then she hurled him like discarded trash.
His body slammed into the cross. The sharpened tip tore through his abdomen, punching a gaping hole through his torso. A geyser of blood erupted, splattering across the altar, dripping down like crimson rain. His scream broke halfway into a gargle as his organs twisted around the wooden spike.
Elian descended slowly, her toes brushing the ruined earth. She did not look at him immediately. Instead, she walked to where the cardinal had once stood.
There, she knelt in the blood-soaked soil. Three times, she bowed her head.
"Even though I never showed you the love that a sister should show his brother," she whispered, voice trembling, "you still gave your life for me. Even in my darkest nightmare, I will honor your sacrifice."
Only then did she turn her gaze back to Adrian.
The Pope writhed against the cross. His blood sprayed with every twitch. His once flawless robes were ripped open, soaked black with gore. His lips frothed red as he tried to form words.
"How's the view up there?" Elian sneered. "Do you like the sky as your last sight?"
"Y-you… still… not satisfied…" he wheezed, each word bubbling with blood.
"I'll never be satisfied." Elian's voice was jagged steel. "Not until I erase you, and burn your Glorious Church of Light down to its foundations."
She stooped and picked up his fallen staff. Its weight settled into her hand like it belonged to her. The crescent and crucifix gleamed faintly in the gore-stained light.
"The staff has chosen," she said, coldly amused. "And the dying… don't matter."
Adrian's eyes glimmered with defiance, though fear twitched beneath. "You… can't kill me. I am indestructible. I am eternal. I am—"
"You're nothing."
Her words lashed harder than blades.
His false youth shattered. Wrinkles carved themselves across his face in seconds, gray hair spilling from his scalp. His flesh sagged, skin rotting and splitting like parchment. His teeth, once polished white, crumbled into jagged stubs dripping blood.
He was no longer a god. He was an old man nailed like a rat to a spear.
Elian sat on the ground, the staff across her lap. Tears streaked her blood-soaked cheeks.
"Tell me, Adrian. Did you feel powerful when you burned my parents alive? Did you feel like a god while they screamed? Did you think this day would never come?" She laughed bitterly. "A true god sees the future. You… you saw nothing."
She raised her face to the sky. The light above was dim, filtered through the barrier. Still, the sun tried to burn through.
"Even the sun shines on the dying," she said. "Look at it, Adrian. Let it guide you to death."
She glanced back. His eyes were wide, glassy. He was nailed to the cross like a grotesque icon, his blood soaking the wood, his organs hanging from the wound that skewered him.
Elian lowered her head, whispering, "Mom… Dad… I'm sorry it took this long."
Even after seemingly making Adrian suffer for his sins , Elian felt nothing change. The weight in her chest did not ease. The air smelled of ash and burnt prayers, and the silence that followed was worse than any scream.
All that awaited her now—was death.
"Normally, I would give up and await my fate," she whispered, her voice trembling between madness and exhaustion. "But today… I'll destroy one last pillar before my life ends. I don't even know if I can survive another day with this pain—and this guilt."
Her grip on the staff tightened until her knuckles turned white.
"How can a sister stand by and watch her brother self-destruct? Watch her parents burn alive—and do nothing? All because of you, Adrian."
Adrian's laughter was hollow, broken, but still defiant. Even with a cross impaled through his chest, he looked up with the arrogance of a man who had never known defeat.
"Do you think you can destroy the glorious Church of Light?" he roared. "Pathetic!"
Elian's body trembled from the storm caged inside her. The lightning that had once cracked across her skin was gone now, leaving behind only a faint radiance, a human glow that felt more like sorrow than power.
"It's hard for you to die," she said softly. "But it's not hard for me."
Adrian spat blood, laughing through it.
"Elian… you were the most promising
candidate for the next Pope. And yet you chose your pitiful past over a divine future. Just wait—soon the Four Guardians will come. Once they sense my fading vitality… you'll see death in the eye."
Elian tilted her head back and laughed, the sound wild and sharp—half grief, half hysteria.
"The Four Guardians?" she mocked. "Those pathetic fools have been missing for three days. Don't worry—they'll come. Just in time to witness your funeral."
Adrian's smirk faltered. The silence that followed said everything. He exhaled, his gaze drifting toward the blazing sun.
"If I had known this day would come," he muttered, "I would have killed you with your parents."
"And yet," Elian whispered, rising slowly into the air, "you couldn't."
Her staff shimmered beneath the light. She raised a single hand, and Adrian's heartbeat began to quicken.
Thud !Thud! Thud!
His chest rose violently, blood bursting from his mouth as he clawed at his ribs. Elian watched, unmoving. The revenge she had longed for was finally here—yet there was no joy, no triumph. Only an unbearable quiet.
"It hurts to see you suffer, Adrian," she said, her voice cracking. "I'm no saint—just a human with feelings. I can hate, I can forgive. But your sins don't deserve either."
She closed her hand into a fist.
Adrian's heart tore free from his chest, landing in her palm. He didn't even have the strength to scream—his head simply bowed as life left him.
Elian stared at the heart for a moment, then crushed it. It turned to soft tissue and blood, slipping between her fingers.
When her feet touched the ground again, the silence was unbearable. She didn't look at Adrian's body. She simply turned toward the cliff, staring down at the city below. The illusory barrier that had shrouded the Holy Capital was fading—the Church's light unraveling into dust.
>"It's done," she said quietly.
A voice echoed in her mind .
[Congratulations descendant of The God of madness . Do you wish to continue the creators assessment?]
Yes or No
> "No," Elian answered sharply. "Go tell your god—I am not his apostle. If he's so powerful, let him descend and do his own will. I am not his puppet."
The voice faded.
There was only silence now,the kind that stretched forever.
Everyone she loved was gone. Her brother, her parents, her faith. Even the light she once served had turned its back.
Elian could feel death approaching—the void calling her home. The wind grew quiet and when her eyes finally closed, she welcomed the silence.
She knelt slowly, the world around her dimming. The warmth left her body in waves, replaced by a strange, peaceful calm.
> So this is death, she thought.
Maybe this time… I'll finally rest.