Chapter 56: Leo’s Turn
The knife used for awakening now lay neatly in Michael’s palm. The tear in his outfit was also immediately restored because it couldn’t be destroyed. And just like Raphael said, there was no wound left on his chest.
"So this is what awakening feels like? Just a few seconds of pain at the start, and then it’s absolutely amazing."
He kept opening his hand and then closing it while jumping back and forth. His body now felt more refreshed than ever.
"Don’t use your ability for now. Wait for Leo to awaken, then we’ll check everything all at once."
Raphael spoke up to stop Michael from using his ability. Honestly, there was no huge purpose behind it. He just wanted all the surprises to come at the same time.
"Fine."
Now that the awakening was successful, Michael’s life on this continent was already half complete. He didn’t have anything left to rush for. In the future, as long as he worked hard, he’d become a god no matter what. Even if he wasn’t lucky enough to take the ’shortcut.’
"Alright, my turn."
Without any hesitation, Leo grabbed the knife and stabbed it hard into his heart. His face didn’t change expression at all, like this was something totally familiar.
The single stab... was nothing compared to the injuries from his final battle in his past life. So it wasn’t even worth worrying about.
Leo felt dizzy for a moment. In the blink of an eye before he could notice, the space had completely changed.
At that moment, he felt like he was floating in midair. But unlike Michael, who got to use his grown-up body, Leo was still in the form of a three-year-old kid.
This place also wasn’t like the place where Michael met Heaven. It was more like the place where Michael once met Cook God. Of course, Leo couldn’t feel any familiarity with this place at all.
"Where is this?"
He tried wriggling his body to see the full scene, but his range of motion was limited because he couldn’t fly and couldn’t walk on air.
Suddenly he heard a very loud noise up in the sky. Looking up, he saw the strangest sight he had ever seen in either of his two lives.
He actually saw a panda wearing shorts patched all over, furiously punching a black dragon. Its movements were clearly not random. It was using martial arts with extreme proficiency.
"A giant panda that knows martial arts???"
While Leo was still processing what was happening, the dragon seemed to get dizzy from the beating and wobbled as it fell. That giant panda actually used the dragon as a ’skateboard,’ riding the wind and diving straight down to the ground.
Those two massive bodies looked no different from a giant mountain plunging toward the earth at extreme speed. Even though Leo knew he couldn’t die here, saying he wasn’t scared would be a lie.
He had killed plenty in his life, but he had never seen such a majestic sight. If this happened in his era, calling it ’God’s Punishment’, neither nobles nor commoners would disagree.
If he didn’t know this world had gods, even he might’ve actually thought that way. Right now he was a bit shaken but mostly excited because meeting two giant creatures here wasn’t a coincidence.
With the current situation, he’d most likely inherit the power of that giant panda. Based on what Michael had said, its strength was at least at the demigod level.
Both of them slammed hard into the ground, creating a terrifying shockwave. Dust and smoke billowed, and rock fragments flew everywhere—even reaching the height where Leo was floating.
At this point he just had to close his eyes. There wasn’t much else he could do. Use his hands to punch those big rocks away? If in his past life he might’ve tried, but now? Forget it.
Suddenly, something unbelievable happened. The countless dust and rocks that had shot up into the sky from the impact abruptly stopped.
Then, all of them were pulled straight back toward the ground by something that seemed like an incredibly strong gravity.
In just a short moment, the thick dust cloud that should’ve taken a long time to clear got pulled entirely down to the ground.
Leo felt something was off and opened his eyes. Before him was a clean, open space with no dust at all.
That giant panda was striking a pose. One foot stepping on the dragon’s head, one finger pointing straight at him.
"You are the one chosen by me, Eat God, as my successor. Wanna try the best food ever on the continent?"
"Huh???"
The joy came too suddenly and was too great. Leo never imagined that just by standing there doing nothing, a god would come and hand over power to him.
As long as Eat God agreed to pass on the power, he’d be fine with staying and partying or whatever.
As for the name Eat God looking just as ridiculous as Cook God, Leo didn’t care. That terrifying power from earlier was the only thing that mattered to him right now.
With two gods on their side, what did they have to fear from the nobles on the continent?
...
Michael, watching from the side, could clearly see Leo’s movements. Just a few seconds after he stabbed the knife into his heart, his hand immediately pulled the knife out on its own. Asking Raphael, he learned that he had done the same thing earlier.
Suddenly, Leo’s drool started flowing nonstop. His expression, for some reason, turned greedy like that. More precisely, he looked like a glutton who’d just found the most delicious thing in the world.
"Was I like that too?"
Michael frowned and looked at Raphael suspiciously. His eyelids could be seen twitching a few times. He even used his hand to check if there was any drool at the corner of his mouth.
"No... definitely not. This is the first time I’ve seen anyone make this kind of expression during awakening. Honestly, having no expression at all would be normal."
Raphael also stared wide-eyed at Leo. At this moment, he was even considering getting paper and pen to record this rare phenomenon that only happened once every tens of thousands of years.
