Watching the battle of the Eternal City was an interesting experience. Almost out of body. With three of the elemental lords freed, they were cutting a swathe through the defenses of the Eternals. I stayed in place, afraid that they might prioritize freeing the fire elemental first; therefore risking the girls while they were retreating.
However, to my surprise, not only did the Elemental Lords ignore the plight of the Fire Elemental, but also they attacked each other whenever they drifted closer.
They were not exactly friends.
Unfortunately for Eternals, their enmity didn’t help their defense efforts. The elemental lords, even in their weakened state, were walking embodiments of destruction. They attacked each other, but as their powers clashed, the side effects were enough to eviscerate large parts of the floating city.
As their elemental attacks clashed, the resulting explosion had been enough to destroy large swaths of the city. At a distance, I could see many Eternals trying to reach to the ships, only to fail halfway. A tragedy, but considering everything they had done, hardly undeserved.
I wanted to avoid the chaos, but the mystery of the System was still at the center of the city. As much as I wanted to stay safe, I didn’t want to risk the system to fall into the hands of the elemental lords. They looked far too determined, and based on the scenes I had seen after the words of the fire elemental, I doubted that they would be merciful after gaining power.
I might have picked a simpler strategy if we had been able to discover the real location of the System in the material plane, but that was still ongoing. Instead, I took a deep breath, pulled my mana into a tight shield that could handle the aftermath of those great explosions, and rushed forward.
Some of the Eternals were strong enough to notice me, and I had no doubt that, if it wasn’t for their focus on escaping, dealing with them would have been very difficult.
It was good to see that my enemies had their own troubles.
Luckily, the elementals didn’t share that concern, allowing me to rush to the center of the city, where there was a central obelisk surrounded by a shocking number of wards. Even though quite a bit of them had been shattered under the attacks of the elementals, there was still enough to create some trouble.
I connected with Helga and pulled an Avatar of hers. “What’s going on—” she asked.
“A mess,” I said as I pointed to the collapsing wards. “Help me with them,” I said, not really having enough time to talk. Instead, we started dealing with the chaotic mess of the wards with the assistance of her unique Knowledge Spark. With that, I passed those wards … and entered the room.
Only to be teleported into a unique mental space … I could have resisted it, but instead, I chose to use my magic to blind the entity that pulled me to Helga’s presence, which would allow her to track the location of the System core more efficiently.
“You’re finally here, my champion,” a voice arrived to my ear. A gentle, soft voice, preceding the arrival of a kind, beautiful woman, who also radiated a sexy aura like she wasn’t aware of.
I might have fallen for it, if I didn’t feel her Divine Spark trying to dive against my System to take control of it. I recognized what she had been doing. She was looking for the traps that I had long removed.
She was competent, but luckily for me, she was powerless. If I were to measure her raw power, it would be merely five points for each stat, maybe even lower. However, even with the disparity of power, if the traps were still in place, I would have been defeated.
I created a few clones of those magical traps, but intentionally jumbled them, giving her the impression that the traps just needed to be repaired. After all, the more she focused on me, the longer Helga would have to track the location.
“Who are you?” I asked, trying to keep her talking.
“I’m the goddess of creation and the System,” she answered. Lies, on both accounts, but not unreasonable ones. If it wasn’t for that cursed angel forcing me to travel among the planes, I might have even believed it for a time.
Luckily, delaying the talks worked to my benefit. “How could I believe you?” I asked, acting like I was inclined to believe her in the first place, but kept back.
“Watch,” she said as she touched my temple, and many scenes flooded my mind. It was similar to what that elemental had shown, but also different. They lacked the vividness of the other scenes, along with an artificial feel.
They were lies, so I didn’t pay much attention. I still faked it, giving the impression that I was fascinated, while the mysterious goddess still continued to try and activate the traps she had buried in the System.
At the same time, I was communicating with my girls, who finally arrived at the Material Plane, and currently dealing with an attack from the elementals, whose determination to invade Material Plane increased several times.
A trouble, or, it would have been a trouble, if it wasn’t for a message from Helga, informing me that she had discovered the core of the System.
She teleported with a clone of me, which I used to tap into the stores. Considering everything, it had been an easy victory, but I was happy with it. It was much preferable to a merciless, endless battle that cost us our lives.
There were a lot of reserves in the system, enough to be counted in hundreds of millions … yet, in a way, I felt the amount was too low. After all, it was supposed to represent the reserves collected across hundreds of years.
Eternals must have been using them more than I expected … either that, or their connection with the other universes was stronger than I expected.
A troubling matter, but it was for the future. Right now, I have a simpler challenge. First, I turned off the System’s constant absorption of Divine Spark. I might activate it in the future, but for the moment, it allowed the girls to defend against the Elementals much more easily as they established their domains.
Then, the next problem. What I would do with the Spark in storage. I could devour them to strengthen myself, which would increase my stats several times. Tempting, but still not enough to defend the material plane against the sudden elemental attack.
Luckily, that was not my only option. Instead, I used our connection, and started to channel my power to my girls, using my power to allow them to bond with the excess Divine Spark smoothly.
With that, their speed to establish their Domain got much faster, and the Material Plane was safe. At least, temporarily.
The stores of the System were almost completely depleted when the goddess realized that her traps had been removed long ago. “You!” she shouted in anger, attacking me.
“Me,” I said with a chuckle as I grabbed her hand. “What about it, miss inter-dimensional invader?” I said with a chuckle. Then, while maintaining my grip, I dispelled mental space, and forced her into a physical body.
It was made of mana, essentially an inferior avatar I could dispel just as easily. “You know,” she said, her voice resigned. “Kill me,” she added, opening her arms.
I chuckled. “No hurry,” I said with a chuckle as I grabbed her, and finally teleported away from the Eternal City, leaving the place for the battle between the Elementals and the Eternals, ignoring the temptation of trying to deal with the Elementals when they were weak.
I doubted that it could be achieved easily.
“What are you going to do with me —” she started, but before she could complete it, I sealed her again. No need to complicate things further.
Instead, I teleported to the System core, leaving my girls to deal with the Invasion.
I had a System to assimilate … and then.
The future was limitless.
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