Overgeared

Don't trust Amoract. Don't be hurt by 'me.' Finally, fear the Specter.

Grid took Beriache's three pieces of advice to heart. He had been suspicious of Amoract from the start. In the first place, wasn't she the Great Demon of 'Conflict'? She was someone who made him feel tense even with her face covered with a cloth. She was insidious in many ways and lacked grounds to be trusted. This was why the proposal to cooperate was pending. He just couldn't refuse it directly because he was in a bad position.

'Of course, I am aware that I shouldn't be hurt by Beriache.'

Marie Rose had the power to use the abilities of the targets whose blood she sucked. She proved it in the battle against the Evil Dragon. She seemed to prove that there was no limit to the target as she wielded the power of Dragon Slayer Hayate. It would be the same with Beriache.

Of course, Marie Rose was Beriache's ideal, so Beriache would be relatively inferior. Additionally, the Beriache in front of him was just a corpse, not the real one. This didn't mean that the power of a vampire could be ignored. Grid wanted to avoid the experience of being hit even once by the ignorantly powerful six fusion sword dance.

'I don't want to become sick from the side effects.'

He didn't express it in front of people, but the mental power consumed just by operating the Realm of the Absolute was too much to bear. His body moved as desired beyond the user's perception, so his brain was quickly overloaded. There were gaps in his consciousness.

Allowing a powerful attack from an Absolute at that time without any preparation? He had experienced it before in the battle against Zeratul and he almost screamed and cried. The pain of his face being crushed and his arm being cut off was horrible. It was to the point where he forgot how to distinguish between reality and the virtual world for a moment. It wasn't an exaggeration. It was hard to ignore even a small wound. The rankers who used expensive capsules and set their sync rate higher reacted more sensitively to pain.

Just then, the tip of the canyon that formed the Sanctuary of Metal shook. It was the aftermath of being hit by Beriache's kick that Grid had evaded. If it was a canyon made of ordinary metal, not Greed, it would've gone beyond shaking and collapsed.

'This tremendous power… in terms of strength, she is a step above me or Baal.'

Was it just pure physical ability? It was hard to believe. Beriache's body was as small as a real middle school girl.

'Maybe it is the default setting.'

The Specter might've raised Beriache's corpse already in the state of 'sucked blood and took the power'…

Chill.

The hypothesis he devised to convince himself of the corpse's strength caused Grid to feel goosebumps. It was because the Specter depicted in his head was too omnipotent. Well, it was understandable enough. This was an apostle of a God of the Beginning. The Specter was a being who served the 'god of the gods' and accumulated an enormous amount of years.

Let's assume that Braham had accumulated thousands of years.

…It was terribly scary. It was only natural that the Specter was an object of fear.

'I have to subdue Beriache's corpse before it arrives.'

Grid had no intention of avoiding the Specter.

From Marie Rose to Yeo Yulan to Beriache—high status transcendents and Absolutes who moved the world warned of the danger of the Specter. Grid empathized with them, but he had a duty to understand the purpose of the Specter. They had to meet despite the risk.

'It is just a corpse. I can win easily as long as I don't get hurt.'

Grid called the hundreds of God Hands to his side. They were armed with swords and shields and escorted him. The hundreds of thousands of barbs that made up the dragon armor were smoothly adsorbed on Grid's hard body and the mental images of the Sanctuary of Metal were projected and overlaid with Valhalla.

Using the authority of the Yellow Dragon, he exhaled the Breath of the White Tiger. At the same time, he also used defense-related skills like 'Automatic Transformation' along with the power of the runes. It was Grid's self-proclaimed Overgeared tortoise mode. It meant he wore items like a tortoise wore its back shell. He ignored the skills that were comparable to the items. In any case, he was confident that he wouldn't shed a drop of blood.

'I definitely learned from my fight against Zeratul.'

His attack power was already sufficient. It was even more so now that he could freely activate God's Command using the authority of an Only One God, i.e. 'Designate Skill.' Maximizing his defense to the point it was excessive was balancing things from Grid's perspective. It was even more so against an Absolute.

Grid wielded the five fusion sword dance. It was used reflexively. It was to respond to Beriache's flamboyant technique of reaching out and grabbing at him. If he failed, he could link it with an immediate blow. Beriache's attacks never ended with a single blow. It would be linked, no matter which route she took. The fusion sword dance was a must if Grid wanted to counterattack as well as defend.

'The pressure is amazing.'

The strength of the corpse was clear.

A body that didn't need to breathe—Beriache's spectacular combo was used in a way that ignored physical restrictions. She didn't need to breathe, so there were no interruptions in her movements. Additionally, she was very tenacious. She thoroughly attacked the opponent's vital points, regardless of whether her joints were twisted or broken in reverse.

It was the complete opposite of Zeratul's martial arts, which pursued orthodoxy, which was separate from his personality.

The God Hands scattered in all directions.

Beriache's limbs fluttered as she approached with the momentum to fall into Grid's arms. It was in the direction where the God Hands and battle gear were falling. It was an unreal sight. The shockwaves that belatedly occurred in concentric circles looked beautiful as they were dyed with orange divinity and red blood.

-Marie Rose looks just like my mother-in-law.

The Divine Wood Coffin trembled.

He seemed to recall his struggles against Marie Rose when he was alive.

-Of course, mother-in-law is stronger. In the past, Marie Rose fought with suppressed strength because she liked my good looks and honest personality. Looking back, it was a sincere game. We interacted across races.

'How can he beautify the fact that she was weakened by the Curse of Sloth?'

Chreshler's nonsense broke Grid's immersion.

It helped him. Beriache emitted a formidable presence like other Absolutes. Now her figure in Grid's field of view was restored to normal. Grid's consciousness had been focused only on Beriache, but now he started to look at the entire battlefield.

-It should be like this.

Chreshler's voice, that was laughing happily for some reason, shook Grid.

-The object you need to see isn't the person in front of you, but yourself. You are the one who is the center of this world. How could you be conscious of something else?

At this moment, Grid was helped by a good man. The experience that had been relatively lacking due to this compressed growth over the years was adequately fulfilled through enlightenment.

-All flows are made according to your will. Put the whole situation under your control.

The Rebecca Church was the center of the world and Chreshler was the pope. People all over the continent worshiped him, regardless of status. Even the kings knelt down to him and called him Your Holiness. Nevertheless, he was below a god. A pope was nothing more than the servant of a god. An Only One God? Even the pope couldn't step on his shadow.

It was more like turning away. It was because believing in a god other than the Goddess as an Only One God was blasphemy in itself.

-Don't get immersed in insignificant individuals. That is your position.

[The most powerful pope in history, 'Chreshler,' has acknowledged you again.]

[Your existence has become more distinct.]

It was different from a rise in status. There was no growth such as the addition of stats or skills, but Grid's divinity had become thicker.

The body of the Yellow Dragon swelled up. If the original was the size of a large serpent, then it now looked like an imoogi. It completely covered Grid's entire body even when coiled, and the head was positioned in a high place. It felt like it was looking down in the direction Grid was facing.

Nothing changed. Beriache's momentum still remained. Just like a corpse, she seemed to have no interest in divinity from the beginning. She didn't even pay attention to the Yellow Dragon that breathed out divinity like fire and just attacked Grid relentlessly. There was a loud and seemingly unstoppable offensive like a waterfall.

So what?

'It doesn't hurt.'

The barrier built by Automatic Transformation and the God Hands was mercilessly peeled off, but it just looked like a crisis from the outside. Grid's true self-defense was the Breath of the White Tiger, the dragon armor, and Valhalla overlapped with mental images.

Grid was safe. He could bear it even if Beriache's attacks never stopped. The problem was that in order to get rid of her before the Specter arrived, he had to penetrate through the attacks and fight back…

'Let's wait.'

Grid decided not to be nervous. He didn't use the fusion sword dance and waited for the right time. The moment he was waiting for came quickly. Beriache showed some changes. Once the blood flowing through the cracks in the space reached a certain amount, it triggered new blood magic.

It was different from the field magic that she used so far. It wasn't even making battle gear using blood as the medium. It was summoning magic. It was magic that summoned the direct descendants who were trapped in the labyrinth and unable to arrive in time.

It was an opportunity.

The blood that surged like a raging wave every time Beriache swung her hands and feet, and killed the momentum of the sword, stopped flowing for a split second. Grid aimed for this gap and swung Twilight. The direct descendants who arrived just in time were swept away by the sword energy of the six fusion sword dance and their heads cut off, but he didn't care at all. This was what he had been aiming for from the beginning.

'They will be resurrected anyway.'

They didn't die as long as they belonged to him. He would rather not have them if they were under Beriache's control.

"Don't get too attached to a corpse," Grid whispered as he made eye contact with Beriache, whose upper body was cut in half and whose neck was bent to the side. He judged that he had completely grasped the victory.

He wasn't conscious at all of the fact that Beriache's blood splattered on his face and he just wiped it off. This was a mistake. The problem was that he didn't fully understand Beriache's power.

[The blood of the progenitor, 'Beriache,' has penetrated your body.]

[Various blood cells have been destroyed.]

[The abnormal status of 'fatal bleeding' has occurred. You will lose 5% of your health per second.]

[Resistance has failed.]

"Keuk…!"

Grid felt impatient.

He could feel the fluid rising up his nasal passages. A nosebleed would soon occur. It would be dangerous if his blood was sucked. He made this judgment and hurriedly adjusted his helmet. He pressed it down deeply enough that his vision became a bit difficult.

It was meaningless. A vampire's most basic power was to 'handle blood.' The blood spilled by Grid moved according to Beriache's will. It floated toward her red tongue, but it didn't reach in the end.

It was because a stronger binding force took away the blood that was heading toward her. There was a man in the direction where the blood was spreading like fog.

It was Katz. Currently, he was on a class quest.

Beriache's soul—in other words, Beriache's main body granted him an 'authority' that a corpse couldn't compare to.

"Don't worry about getting your blood sucked and fight to your heart's content, Grid."

Grid trusted Katz. He lifted his restrictions without inquiring about the circumstances. The 310 God Hands around him spread out like wings in unison. They abandoned their shields and armed themselves purely with weapons.

Grid's feet had been fully attached to the ground throughout the battle in order to fully enjoy the effect of the White Tiger's Breath. Now they rose into the air. He abandoned the spatial constraints that he had been forced to care about before He even used his health, which was falling in real time due to bleeding, as a weapon. He entered a fluidization state and accelerated after activating King of the Mountain. This maximized the power of 'Serve Dragon Pinnacle Wave Kill Link.'

Beriache's corpse was slow to respond. Twilight pierced Beriache's small body and cut it. However, the opponent was a corpse. She fought back without any reaction despite being fatally wounded. The 'Blood Field' that she had been maintaining earlier was repairing her wounds in real time.

"……"

Her small hand reached out toward Grid's neck. It was intended to break his neck bone. It was a speed equal to a flash of light. It was so fast that the air around it condensed. The wind hovering in the space abruptly stopped and made a strange sound. It was a sound that wouldn't reach an ordinary person.

It was literally in an instant—Beriache's hand changed its trajectory dozens of times. Following her hand gestures, the red blood whirled and ate away at Grid's divinity.

Finally, two small hands dug through the gap in Grid's armor and spread them apart. The sight of the corpse maintaining its expressionless face while all ten fingers bent in a strange direction gave Grid goosebumps.

Flash!

Then a spear of light pierced Beriache's hands. The storm from the sword dance occurred one step late. He said it was one step late, but it was less than 0.1 seconds. Subsequently, the falling meteorites repeatedly crushed Beriache's small body and sank it into the ground. Additionally, a lot of battle gear poured down. The hundreds of God Hands went on the offensive in an instant.

Eventually, the Blood Field repairing Beriache's wounds faded. It was magic using artificial blood created by the Specter. The body's low-grade resources were being sucked into Katz' outstretched hands. It was a phenomenon caused by Beriache's will.

The target of the corpse changed. The moment she popped out silently from underground, the place where she appeared was behind Katz, not Grid.

"No!" the startled Grid shouted.

Just then, a pillar of orange light fell onto Katz' body from above and the position of the Yellow Dragon wrapped around Grid was shifted to Katz.

"……?"

"……?"

Both Grid and Katz were stunned. Beriache's hand, which had already dug halfway into Katz' chest, was bounced off by a repulsive force. It was the repulsive force from Grid's divinity.

[The 'Yellow Dragon Myth' that is a part of you is derived from the wishes of the guardian gods.]

[If you want to protect someone, the Yellow Dragon will respond to your wish.]

[The cooldown time before it can be used again is 12 hours.]

"……"

Did the evolution of divinity happen like this?

'It is a bit… a bit fraudulent?'

It was the moment when Grid had a bit of a guilty conscience…

Step.

He heard unfamiliar footsteps. He could tell just from this. There was an overwhelming presence that transcended Beriache. It was the Specter.

"Beriache. You gave up your heart out of your own free will. Why are you interfering…?"

The Specter's voice was like scratching metal as it expressed its doubts and this caused the people in the space to stiffen. Grid hurriedly turned and was agitated when he saw the Specter. Surprisingly, the Specter wasn't an undead. For some reason, it was wearing a mask made from split up skulls.

The problem was the long blonde hair that peeked out from the robe that deeply covered it. It was blonde hair that seemed to be made of light. Grid remembered seeing such a 'color' that couldn't exist in the human world. It was from some heavenly gods.

"You… what are you?"

"I am the apostle of God Yatan. You must've seen it in the 'past'?"

The Specter took off its mask and all the Overgeared members, including Grid, held their breath. Even Chreshler was frozen like ice. It was because the Specter's face resembled Rebecca, the Goddess of Light.