The Innkeeper

Whether it was the corrupted armors or beasts, none of them were weak. With the sharpness of his blade accompanied by the strength behind it, not to mention sword intent, it should have easily sliced through them if they were ordinary, but it did not.

If there was one saving grace to being assaulted from all sides by powerful foes, it was that the diminished space prevented them from dodging and blocking his attacks effectively.

Inferno Blade: Clean Sweep! Inferno Blade: Judgment!

Those were the two close combat attacks from the Inferno Blade technique, Clean Sweep designed to hit many enemies and Judgment designed to overwhelm a single one. Transitioning between various moves from the same technique would gradually raise the attack power of each move. Moreover, it was easy to transition between moves from the same technique.

So Lex began to exclusively use these two moves, not bothering with the long range one. The entire blade turned molten red after a few moves, but that did not compromise the integrity of the blade - it just made it more lethal.

Those that had been able to survive his first attacks were now being burnt and cut through at the same time.

One of the feathery creatures attacked from above, its hands containing a black ball of living flesh, still thumbing. Lex would naturally not miss it, and his blade did not hesitate to deliver Judgment. The creature died, and Lex did not hesitate to transition into Clean Sweep to cut off a couple of armors closing in, but the black flesh exploded under the attack. Parts of it were seared, but nonetheless a revolting goo splashed the entire area.

Yet, somehow, not a speck fell on Lex. He naturally did not miss the flesh when he attacked, and by now Lex had thoroughly learnt his lesson. He took no enemy lightly, and no situation too easily. Earlier, he thought he had Ra contained, but the entire planet ruptured through space itself, preventing him from finishing him off. If back then Lex had killed him, he would not be in this situation.

So now, the one lesson Lex took very seriously and intended to enact forever was that he would never take an enemy lightly, and never dwell in his overconfidence.

Lex was all too used to his mindset changing, as that's what growing entailed. But this shift somehow enhanced him in ways he could not have guessed. Even without entering the state of Flow, he seemed to be in a perfect flow.

His skills, practiced and polished, melded perfectly with the warnings from his instincts. His spirit sense fed him information on everything that was happening around him for 300 feet (100 meters), so technically he did not need his instincts to guide him. That is why he was not being guided.

He used the information he got and reacted even more perfectly than his instincts could have. After all, his objective was different from his instincts, which only wanted to protect him. No, he wanted to wreak havoc.

But the sword, which was now encased in flames, was not his only weapon. The corrupted beasts had souls, and so wherever he looked, his eyes delivered Evisceration! Where the bodies were out of reach of his blade, he burnt the souls directly!

A glow suddenly illuminated the room as an array activated in the ground beneath them. Without looking, and without alerting anyone, Lex had used his feet to draw a massive array. Anyone observing him would have only thought that he was dodging the attacks around him when he moved in between the horde surrounding him. In a sense, he really had been. But more importantly, he was using his feet to draw a massive array.

The array started out with a soft glow, but continued to get brighter until it illuminated the entire room. It was not an attack, per se. It was a purifying light. But as it happened, while studying about how to defeat a deity under Cassandra, he had learned about corrupted divinity, and how anything pure was its bane. Ironic, considering how it had started out.

The black, putrid stench of decay that filled this entire room and encompassed not only Ra but also all its minions was nothing other than corrupted divinity.

Ra was experiencing what Cassandra called a 'Fall from Grace', but that didn't matter right now.

Lex had barely used any effort at all, yet the entire tide of minions was immobilized. The few dozen he slayed personally lay in broken, burnt and melted pieces around him, while the rest fell to the ground and began to writhe under the purifying light coming from his array.

Knowing the enemy's weakness made such a massive difference. If Lex had not studied, he would have relied on his lightning tribulation arrays, as he always did.

He ignored the cannon fodder and looked towards Ra.

It's body was more easily visible now, so it was much easier to tell it had been corrupted. It's once graceful feathers had been shed, and replaced by sickly flesh and jagged bones. But that did not make it look weaker, no. Falling from Grace only made the fallen stronger. After all, some considered this the true manifestation of divinity.

Nonetheless, even with its newfound power, Ra was nowhere near his peak. On top of that, his existence aggravated Fenrir in a way Lex had never seen before. The result was a massive Fenrir, returned to its original size, fighting barbarically against the avian deity.

Fenrir took a lot more damage than Ra, but that did not mean Ra was uninjured. For whatever reason, Fenrir's claws were especially potent against Ra.

Unhurried, Lex stepped forward, dragging the flaming sword on the ground behind him, his left eye forever focused on Ra, searching for a weakness. With his left hand now free, he began to draw another array. Simple tricks such as a purifying light wouldn't work on a full fledged deity, so Lex would have to be more creative.