Soul of Searing Steel

Panda Novel

Imagine that you are alone in a sea of darkness, a turbulent sea with man-eating monsters. You would be attacked if you stayed here you were, but should you continue forward, the toxic seawater and pressure would incessantly crush your body and spirit.

There was no telling the direction, objective, whether you should move or pause. All was such blankness that prevents one from mustering the courage to keep exploring the borderless darkness, or to stop and hover in panic.

That was what Joshua and Goliath were feeling at present.

As a native of the Abyss, Goliath the Demon King could faintly sense the core position of the Abyssal Paradise—in other words, the place all powerful demons could feel.

It was their final destination: being a species which had lost everything—their worlds perished, their civilizations fallen, their birth were not blessed but cursed instead. The consciousness of all demons were combined out of endless fragmented souls, and they are born with a spirit that brought them powerful talents and strength, but those spirits originated from the dead who found their end in the Abyss.

Countless perished souls that should have returned to the Vortex of Creation.

Every demon would have some degree of that impulse, desiring to follow the Nether River downstream and explore the edge of the black waters. Goliath had certainly been no exception—it had imagined that it had done that out of curiosity, but now it appears that its soul wished for a return to the cycle of all things and to truly ‘die’.

Furthermore, it was an Abyssal Liege, and the presence of the Abyssal Will within it magnified its greed. That was also precisely why that virtually all powerful archdemons and Abyssal Lieges before would want to explore the depths of the Abyss.

Nonetheless, the soul shard of the Demon King was not dejected despite having guessed that. Using its sense of the Abyssal center point, he guided Joshua—that instinct meant something if it could be of help.

However, that guidance disappeared after Joshua and Goliath passed through the black hole traps.

After they had moved past the formations, space itself appeared to have lost all meaning: the warped space was clearly right behind them, but the traps all vanished with just a step forward. They could not even feel the black holes’ presence even when they took a detour.

One human and one demon wandered back and forth in the infinite darkness, unsure where they should go.

“Maybe the position we are now is within the region of the former Vortex of Creation itself.”

Despite the divine blessings around his body shattering layer by layer—the outermost layer gifted by the God of Order and Destruction utterly dissipating, Joshua was still thinking calmly amidst the direness of the moment. He shielded the Demon King’s soul shard in his left front arm, blocking the murmurs of innumerable dead worlds. “If the Vortex of Creation is still here, you would have torn into pieces in this location—dead demons certainly would not need any instinctive navigation.”

It was a rare diss from him, but the Demon King regrettably was not one for humor.

“No, I really can’t sense a thing!”

In contrast to Joshua’s calm, the Demon King’s soul was swirling in fretfulness. Its shadowlike form would bloat into a cluster of spikes or contract into a little dot, but no matter how much effort it exerted, Goliath could not feel the ‘yearning’ in its own soul towards the center of the Abyss.

The warrior was right: they were definitely at the centermost part of the Abyss. The fact that surrounding divine powers were being rapidly eroded and there was no light at all in sight made it clear that the negative energies and Chaos concentration here was simply beyond imagination. Even if a dozen stars would explode now, the supernova radiance would never illumination the distance of one light second.

Crack!!

A sound clearer than glass breaking resounded—it was the pale-emerald divine energy blessed by the God of Law and Freedom shattering, completely consumed by darkness. Even if Joshua had used the ‘Feather of Freedom’ gifted by that deity to buff it, the divine barrier did not stay up any longer than a few more seconds.

Feather symbols appeared on the pale-emerald divine mark on his armor, slowing Joshua’s speed for fractions.

But now, what the warrior needed was not speed but the something that could point him to the direction of the core seal of Project Rebirth!

“Six layers of divine barriers left… it would probably last another dozen minute.”

Joshua frowned after estimating the rate of Chaos corruption. He watched as dense formation of cracks began to appear over the pale golden barrier of the God of Wisdom and Choice, and knew that pausing is futile. “Well, let’s pick a random direction and move. If the Chaos corruption is faster, than it’s the right direction, and the opposite if it slows.”

The warrior hence moved at full speed. Even if his mass was astronomical and cumbersome, his speed was certainly not slow. By controlling gravity, distorting space and intermittent psionic warping, he was moving forward at a galactic scale speed.

Soon, the pale- golden divine power barrier was broken, with the shards consumed by surrounding darkness. That was when Joshua slowed down, his brow tightened—the Giant God looked around, sensing no change in Chaos concentration.

“This won’t do, huh… looks like it’s the same principle with the Void—physical speed is meaningless, and what determines coordinates shifts are energy levels or something else similar…”

If the first plan failed, he would think of the next. Joshua was not dispirited since he already knew that the most difficult matter here was not to break the seal core or cleanse the Chaos—he had become proficient with such acts of destruction, and at least seven to eight drafted plans for that.

The real problem here is finding their target. The warrior could not help clenching his right fists at the thought.

There was not much time left. The barrier blessed by the Seven Gods and the Dragon God would not last long, with the Pentashade Dragon God’s blessing becoming warped and swaying under the erosion of the darkness. Like rain pouring over the clear surface of a lake, endless ripples unfurled.

The power of True Gods was unbreakable and invincible in both physical and spiritual realms. All of them peaked in terms of energy attributes, complexity and standard, and it would take a thousand times the ratio of ordinary mana to a single divine spell if one wanted to nullify divine powers.

Now, however, what surrounded Joshua and was Chaos energies a thousand times, or perhaps trillion times more concentrated than his divine blessings.

It was such an outrageous level that even godly forces would be consumed by the Chaos.

“So this is a galactic-class Evil God, huh… the Chaos effect from the murmurs before birth, its instincts before awakening could affect all beings in a galaxy…”

It was precisely because Joshua was aware that he was now actually inside what was essentially the Evil God’s body that Joshua could not help be in awe of that entity’s might. If it had truly awakened, it would consume the entire galaxy—even the Evil God of Fertility, a monster that could create a galactic fissure just by making a passing and create the Void Vortex was inferior to it.

They have to destroy it before it awakens!

Joshua felt an abrupt alertness. Not only was he suddenly in awe of his foe’s power, he was even having emotions of dispirit… there was no doubt that it was the Chaos! The closer he moved toward it, the Chaos effect of the unknown Evil God grew. While he had no such thing as a soul that it could influence, the Chaos could still eat away at matter, leaving his mind in disharmony, creating erroneous judgment and choices!

At the very thought, the warrior at once took out the Future Compass, the sacred object gifted by the God of Wisdom and Choice. His other divine gifts include the ‘Sandglass of Cycles’ from the God of Order and Destruction, the ‘Feather of Freedom’ from the God of Law and Freedom, the ‘Photo Frame of True Love’ from the God of Love and Death, the ‘Tome of Conservation’ from the God of Conservation and Reformation, as well as the ‘Cocoon of Life’, given by the God of Life.

The six sacred items gifted by six of the Seven Gods had extraordinary power, but apart from slightly refilling the energies in his divine barrier, it could also improve certain abilities for Joshua. As an example, the Sandglass of Cycles could provide Joshua armor with a restoration capacity virtually resembling time reversal, while the Feather of Freedom would free the user from almost all seals while accelerating them.

On the other hand, the effect of Future Compass was very unique—using divine power for one super processing, the user would receive omens of a future and its outcome… Who knows if it would come true.

“There’s no telling if Zerming’s divine powers would directly show me the position of the seal core… such a thing that depends entirely on luck is simply unsettling.”

Joshua did not favor delegating future to so-called luck. He had always been a man who held fate in his hand, but now, with lack of a better choice, the warrior would not insist on such pedantry.

With that thought, he was about to crush the Future Compass in his hand.

“Wait.”

That was when Goliath’s soul shard suddenly spoke, having stayed silent throughout since a while ago. “I think I know the way to find the Abyssal center.”

“Tell me.”

Joshua did not utter nonsense such as ‘Really?’ or ‘I don’t believe you’, and asked at once, “What solution?”

“Simple. Give me the Future Compass.”

The Demon King’s soul fragment held on the warrior’s palm was calm. Somehow, starting from a while ago, Goliath was no longer fearful or thrilled, but very confident, even speaking with a deep voice, “I need it for strengthening… a feeling.”

Goliath had already understood the effects of the six sacred items from the information flow when the warrior collected each item, while itself was being held in Joshua’s palm. The Seven Gods did not hide the items’ effect either, and while they appeared precious, they were consumables that could be prepared with a little effort.

Joshua certainly hesitated at the Demon King’s request. He did not believe in luck, and while the Future Compass appeared to be an object of fortune, handing it to a demon was still… Even if there was no reason it would lie, it appeared very confident albeit doing that was a little questionable.

However, Joshua was not one to be stopped from doing anything over ‘questionable’. With him alone with the demon at the deepest reaches of the Abyss, he chose to believe it.

Joshua handed the Future Compass to Goliath, which did not hesitate to lunge at it. Thus, shadows spread, and the divine needle was hence controlled by Joshua with the quiet permission of the previous holder.

“…You actually trust me that much.”

When it was done, the soul fragment of the Demon King that now turned into shadow said softly and bewilderedly, “and not for the first time.”

“You never lied, why shouldn’t I?”

Joshua answered calmly, watching his own palm. “Tell me then, what’s your solution? You’ve even mentioned that you could no longer sense the center of the Abyss.”

“…Indeed I can’t, but I realized the reason I can’t sense it.”

After seconds of silence, a single demonic eye appeared in the shadow that Goliath had turned into, staring into the Giant God’s own. “As a lifeform, my mind itself would affect certain exceedingly small things. It’s like how a god’s stare could affect a person’s fate, and in the same way, my existence as a demon affects many things.”

“…and your point is…” Joshua paused for a moment before asking quietly.”

“Yes, if I die—when this soul fragment destroys itself, this piece of spirit that belongs to the Abyss would naturally fly towards the real center of the Abyss.”

As if revealed its plan, the shadow that was the Demon King’s soul fragment slowly burned, and Goliath’s rather elated laughter could be heard from the dark red hellfire. “Now, I’m nothing less than a piece of my true form’s soul, and it doesn’t matter if I die. Indeed, I should even thank the Chaos corruption that allowed me to understand that as I am now, unable to guide you would be a burden. It allowed me to think of death and the reason for it.”

Death is not frightening, Goliath thought. It is dying a worthless death.

Burning itself, the Demon King’s soul raised its power to its very limits.

There are many times when the eyes of all life would only see what was in front of them. Like beasts that are only concerned with their hunger and desire to procreate, it was the same for demons, although demons possess greater power than beasts. Still, in the end, the shallow eyes of beasts could only permit them meaningless fates.

Be that as it may, were elves, dwarves and intelligent beings of other worlds or even gods any better than demons? Were their fates more important than that of demons?

Of course not.

The Demon King Goliath had seen too many little gods in barren worlds. They placed themselves above all else, and yet only saw a single world even as they oppressed civilization and controlled the development of technology, preventing civilization from growing so that it remains in their control perpetually—life and death meant nothing to them, and they only existed for its own sake.

Goliath had killed several such gods itself. They were so weak and dull in vision of that power.

However, the world of Mycroft was different.

Or, in the very least, the gods of Mycroft and the person before itself was unlike those dull little gods.

Their eyes see the entire galaxy, even the Multiverse. They looked upon the sky of stars, holding not ‘wonder’ but ‘desire’.

They—even the gods—were willing to offer their eternal lives for countless worlds and civilizations that never knew their names.

It was perhaps such a death that holds value.

“Many demons—including Helm and Saluka—had said that I’m greedy and selfish, never once hesitating to destroy other worlds for the Sixth Abyss.”

The Demon King’s soul fragment watched the impassive Giant God and laughed softly. “They are right, I am a greedy and selfish demon. However, where would the Sixth Abyss end up without a galaxy?”

Future Compass, sacred object of the God of Wisdom and Choice.

If you could indicate the future.

Allow my dead fragment to lead the man before me to his destination by wafting toward where my soul belonged!

As the Demon King chortled, its soul ignited. A powerful Shadow force activated the Future Compass.

The pale golden needle of divine power began to whirl powerfully.

Possible futures, the will of the users… now the compass that originally had to calculate endless complicated information, noting infinite outcomes for the user and others around him only had to measure a single possible, a single future.

The empty Chaos devoid of anything and the future ‘death’ was so distinct and simple. It did not have to waste much time to obtain an answer.

Thus, the golden needle enshrouded in Shadow whirled wildly before stopping, pausing on a 12 o’clock direction where it once circled counter-clockwise.

Crack.

In that instant, the Future Compass broke.

It indicated arrival.

Meanwhile, Goliath’s soul fragment broke as well.

Faint specks of gold, compounded with the red-black soul fragment of the Demon King wafted over the Chaos. They were set ablaze in the lightless Chaos before turning into one huge arrow, tearing apart the abnormal spatial construct of the Darkest Abyss to ‘prophesize’ the warrior’s future path.

Goliath diminished.

Thus, the path towards the seal core of Project Rebirth was pointed out clearly.

Without becoming emotional, sighing, pausing or anything else, Joshua, who was already prepared, darted at once at his quickest speed at his target, along the path of soul that was breaking and melting without stopping.

As the Giant God stormed forward at full speed, the dark ocean of vagueness rumbled. Vortices raged, and the once dead silent oceans of chaos surged. Even so, the warrior fearlessly embraced the profound Chaos and boundless pressure head-on, bursting at full power to overcome the obstruction ahead.

Indeed, the Seven Gods had left, and the Demon King’s soul shard vanished.

He no longer had any burden or obstructions.

This is the moment to destroy the seal and reclaim the future.

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