Badge in Azure

Chapter 1532: Gods are Useless (Part 1)

The Star Shuttle's speed had noticeably dropped when it crossed into the divine kingdom, and that was a result of the craft being suppressed by the power of rules of the place. The nearer they were to the divine mountain, the more apparent the suppression became.

Saleen did not mind. He unleashed his lightning territory and negated the suppression from the divine kingdom's rules, making things no different than it would be elsewhere. Saleen's current lightning territory had electric snakes, thunder hawks, lightning ravens, and thunder dragons flying all around it.

All of the lightning creatures had balls of lightning of different sizes inside of them, and every single ball was imbued with different lightning rules.

Saleen had not been able to master level 17 lightning rules. The lightning ravens inherently came with the power of such rules, but they were out of Saleen's control. Even so, the attacks of the lightning ravens still would be far stronger than that of the thunder hawks.

The Star Shuttle was enveloped by thick mist, and its exterior was burning with raging fires. Lightning creatures danced in the center, making it so that no one would be able to make out what was going on inside.

However, the flames were a stark contrast with the divine kingdom, and all angels were able to tell that they were the enemy. However, that would suffice for Saleen. He slowed the craft down and countless angels clamored at the lightning territory like moths to a flame.

Nailisi thought of some nasty tricks and unleashed the power of the Purgatory of the Fallen, causing all the powerful angels who managed to escape being killed by the lightning attacks to be tainted before they were thrown out of Saleen's lightning territory.

All of the tainted angels had their snow-white wings tainted with dark grey colors. Their pitch black eyes were turned purple as well, burning with hell fire.

The fallen angels were unable to even tell how they had fallen. They only knew that they had fallen, and as such, were no longer part of the divine kingdom. The fallen angels launched attacks right away after coming to such conclusions, attacking their former comrades without mercy.

Nailisi laughed out loud, and Saleen shuddered at the sight.

He realized just how fragile their so-called faith had been. Once they lost their faith, they became sworn enemies to those they fought alongside with, without an inch of room for negotiation. He deemed such faith to be worthless. The goddess' faith, in contrast, was a lot more lenient and forgiving. Anyone who decided to renounce their faith only needed to leave, and none would end up being targeted for elimination.

All the disadvantages of renouncing faith would have emerged slowly in the days to come, but it still would not have cost them their lives right away.

Gods… Saleen sighed.

The frost dragon had a lot going on in its mind. The human mage indeed had a lot of tricks to deal with gods. If he had been born in ancient times, he would have had a lot to contribute.

Kings would have fought to recruit someone like Saleen back in the time of the First Dynasty, so much so that he might have ended up earning the emperor's approval and be allowed to wage wars in all divine kingdoms with the armies.

Nailisi did more than just play with the angels. The fallen powers that she unleashed were extremely polluting. Any angel who was attacked by the fallen angels would have over a 50 percent chance of falling as well. As such, more of the legion of angels was gradually turned grey, with the Star Shuttle being at the very center.

Their white feathers became bloodstained as they fell from the sky. Wherever Saleen ended up, he seemed to make the place in a doomsday for the angels.

Saleen said in a subdued voice, "Lord of Glory, I have once said that I would destroy your divine kingdom. I wonder if you regret deciding to take me on back indeed."

"Master, I don't think he has had any regrets doing so." The Winged Skull's senses had a greater range than Saleen, and that was the perk of being a spirit. Saleen followed where the Winged Skull was pointing and looked toward the right. The Star Shuttle closed in on the location within a few breaths, enabling him to see many powerful god creatures far away, flying at terrifying speeds.

The god creatures had yet to notice him, and it seemed that they were heading towards the entrance of the divine kingdom.

Saleen frowned, realizing the one at the center should have been the Lord of Glory. There were 64 god creatures. No, they were doubles!

It would be very difficult to take them on if all 64 of them were to be doubles. But if Saleen did not stop them right there and then, the Lord of Glory would have overlooked that Saleen was there, and he would have charged inside Baldur's Gate. It would have been difficult for Jason to take all of that all on his own. Jola and the others had not gotten to the point of being able to fight gods.

The frost dragon also caught sight of the doubles of the god. It said hesitantly, "Mage, you and I both are at level 17, but this is the enemy's divine kingdom, our levels are being suppressed…"

Saleen said with a smile, "Guffen, if you dare to take them on, so would I."

That triggered Guffen, who then said, "hmph, you're questioning my guts. That's just a level 15 god, a bug among gods, I'd say."

"You got that right, and killing bugs is really a piece of cake," Saleen's smile became rather sheepish.

Guffen's face reddened. "Mage, you shouldn't be teasing a dragon."

Both sides had gotten closer to each other as the banter went on, but they were not in the same line. The Lord of Glory used divine arts of glory to move, and such movements dropped his senses drastically. Even if he were in his own divine kingdom, he dared not change course without good reason.

"Are we going to ram them?" Saleen looked at the mass of doubles that had gotten closer.

"We ram them!" Guffen was hardly fettered. The frost dragon had got used to Saleen being lavish. Saleen never seemed to care about the cost so long as he was able to take the enemy out. For instance, ramming the Heretic God with the Star Shuttle caused the entire craft to be taken out of commission, and the overhaul cost him a good number of materials.

"Ram that ba**ard of a god!" Saleen seemed to be taking it all out on the Lord of Glory. He took personal control of the craft and told everyone to brace for impact, getting ready to be sent into his magic amplifier.

The Lord of Glory blitzed by in a beam of light, guarded by 64 doubles. He was not using flying skills, but movement skills resembling Rainbow instead.

Power of faith was practically inexhaustible in the divine kingdom, so he could have kept moving in such a state without having to worry about drops in power.

All 64 of the doubles were forces that the Lord of Glory never deployed. They were also the strongest among all the doubles, so much so they were almost equal to him in terms of power.

Even if the doubles were only level 15 in the divine kingdom, the combat prowess that they were able to bring exceeded level 16. Rules of the Lord of Glory were stronger in the divine kingdom, and also very resistant to being repelled by other rules.

Saleen's Star Shuttle rammed into them without any warning. The Lord of Glory's doubles were unable to evade them. However, four of them transformed into hard metallic forms and braced for impact.

Four pieces of metal with a diameter over a dozen meters clashed with the Star Shuttle like three-dimensional shields. They were the equipment of the four doubles.

All four huge metal slabs were filled with holy prose, which glittered with white holy light, enabling the hardness of the metal to exceed divine crystals.

However, when the Star Shuttle neared, the power of the lightning territory burst, negating the divine power of the four doubles. All four of the huge metal slabs were reduced to scrap metal when the craft hit them. The doubles within spit golden blood and dropped to the ground.

"Huh?" The Lord of Glory saw that the four were surprisingly unable to stop the fire dragon-like monster. He immediately held his scepter and pointed at the Star Shuttle.

Holy light was fired, and Saleen felt his lightning territory being cleaved. A beam of intense holy light destroyed all the lightning creatures outside of the craft.

The Star Shuttle's speed dropped drastically right away. The destroyed lightning creatures were restored shortly within the lightning territory.

Saleen knew that it was not due to the Lord of Glory's rules being able to negate his lightning territory. It was just the result of his lightning territory being scattered. The Lord of Glory's attack worked like a sword, focused on a single line.

Saleen released the frost dragon and his two other bonded creatures.

"Guffen, looks like battle in human form no longer suits you. I'm sorry."

Guffen snickered bitterly after seeing 60 doubles surrounding them. It put the Star Shuttle away and returned to its original form in the air.

A 200 meter-long frost dragon emerged, which almost froze the Lord of Glory's holy light.

"Arrghh!" A double shouted. His powers were not quite up to par. With the divine might of the Lord of Glory being negated, dragon might from a level 17 frost dragon almost drowned the god's mind in utter fear.

"Prepare to take the dragon's wrathful fires, bug!" Guffen did not forget to tease its opponent. It had actually been doing so to lighten the mood. It had to deal with 60 doubles after all. As for the Lord of Glory, Guffen decided to let Saleen deal with him.

Guffen speculated that Saleen's other two helpers would not be able to spare any effort helping it out.

The Lord of Glory was startled at the sudden emergence of a frost dragon. His mood quickly calmed. There were only four enemies. While there were two who were level 17, making them difficult to deal with, it seemed to him that the levels of tse two were far from stable, meaning that they were only able to use level 16 powers in such a place.

The Lord of Glory, on the other hand, was able to use level 16 powers as well, and he had 60 helpers with him…

The Lord of Glory had fought countless divine kingdoms and was a seasoned veteran. He was able to tell right away that he had the advantage of numbers.

He commanded without making a sound. The four grievously injured doubles on the ground healed themselves right where they were, summoning the legion of angels nearby to surround their enemies.

The Lord of Glory was irked enough to swear to definitely keep the mage behind. A mage capable of bringing such a high level dragon into a divine kingdom was simply too terrifying. If he were unable to kill the mage and let him return to Myers Mainland, then there would never be a chance for him to destroy that plane anymore.

Seeing how the frost dragon and the god doubles were gauging each other using magic and divine arts respectively, Saleen was in no hurry to fight the Lord of Glory. He eyed the Lord of Glory from afar. "You should know my name, Saleen Metatrin. I killed your saint in this plane, and I've destroyed your Holy See in this plane."

"No matter, you will soon become my most loyal believer, but you will be able to keep your mind intact doing so. You shall learn of the price of angering a god soon, mage."

"This is boring." Saleen looked at that arrogant god and continued, "you will never ever understand why humans hated you gods so much. I know that you still have many doubles around, and I'll kill every single one of them. I'll make your divine kingdom into my personal garden."

Saleen unleashed Dante from his magic amplifier. Dante bowed to Saleen and paid no attention to the battlefield. It became clad in lightning as it flew straight for the divine mountain.