Chapter 654: Price of Allegiance
Alarmed, devils scrambled, some still attempting to put up defences, others fleeing as they realized the devastating scale of the attack.
The Elder Spirits continued their attacks, forcing even the Transcendent devils back on their heels and making their presence known with their powerful attacks.
Other Spirit army generals charged in after the Elders, slaughtering their way through the lower-ranked Infernal Devils who had been caught off guard.
Amidst the chaos, Arthur had already reached the ground, casually walking through the base with his hands in his pocket, cloak billowing in the wind.
Any stray attacks that managed to reach him were bent out of the way by the distortion of gravity around him, so he moved unbothered by the pandemonium.
[Sir Arthur, I have confirmed the presence of exactly 47 Outsiders who have sided with the Infernals here.]
Charisse’s voice rang out in his ears and the boy nodded casually, stepping over a devil’s corpse as he kept moving forward.
Many Cultivators had chosen to side with the Spirits in this conflict, and likewise, many had sided with the Infernals for whatever reasons.
Arthur didn’t care what reasons they had, but since they were with the Infernals, then they were enemies.
Enemies were to be killed. End of Story.
That was his first order of business here. To take out those guys.
He’d already locked onto their base and had held out his hand, closing one eye and aiming through his circled fingers when Charisse’s voice rang out again.
[Sir Arthur.]
"What is it?"
[Please, for the duration of this attack, do not be wary of ’Creation’.]
"..."
Arthur halted the flow of energy into his attack, his eyes narrowing. Charisse’s warning had to stem from something she’d divined. Though the urge to glance into the future with his time powers was tempting, he restrained himself.
’Better not to complicate things by chasing after a fixed outcome. I’ll keep those glimpses limited to moments when they’re necessary.’
Sighing, Arthur dropped his hand and cancelled his attack. If Charisse’s words were to be followed, then he couldn’t unleash the Gravitation Maelstrom he was about to.
After all, there was a very obvious source of Creation law energy in the area he was about to crush.
As a person who comprehended the law of Destruction, it was kind of hard for him to miss it when it was so obvious.
Celestia appeared in Arthur’s hand and he launched off the ground, shooting like a bullet through the battlefield, weaving past fighting spirits and devils.
His target: A Cultivator aiming a deadly blow at a Spirit he recognized.
"Hello, there."
"?!"
The Cultivator’s eyes widened, but before he could respond, Arthur’s hand flashed, and in an instant, the man’s head was severed, spinning through the air.
Arthur landed, barely pausing as he set his sights on the next Cultivator. A quick burst of gravity energy pulled his next opponent toward him; he drove his blade into the Cultivator’s chest, twisting the blade as a surge of destruction energy detonated, caving a smouldering hole in his chest.
He tossed the corpse aside and turned, ready to end another person when he sensed a sudden surge of energy from above.
Spinning around, he raised Celestia, blocking the attack of the Transcendent Cultivator who shot down from the sky.
**BAAAM!!
Arthur met the descending blow head-on and the ground buckled beneath him, cracking under the impact.
"Why!?"
The man bellowed, unleashing a shockwave that forced Arthur back. He drew his hand across his blade and ignited it in flames, charging again as he shouted.
"Why are YOU attacking us?!"
His question was met with a raised brow from Arthur. Clearly, this man recognized Arthur, perhaps one of those more knowledgeable about the Interstellar Stage.
As the Cultivator lunged, Arthur sidestepped easily, throwing a side kick that nearly knocked the man down.
"I should ask you the same."
Arthur retorted, punctuating his words with an upward slash that graded the nose of the Cultivator who barely dodged, leaving a faint red line in its wake.
"Why are YOU siding with the devils?"
Their blades clashed again and sparks flew in the air. The man sneered, his eyes glowing with flames as he shouted.
"The devils bring better benefits! As a Cultivator, one must pursue the best resources to push their boundaries!"
Hearing him, Arthur laughed, ducking to avoid a sweeping slash before delivering a sweeping kick that made the man stumble.
"Benefits? Then it’s the same for me."
The man scoffed, narrowly deflecting Arthur’s follow-up attack and shouted back.
"What benefits could the Spirits possibly offer you? I weighed their offer and took a good look at the state of things. The devils dominate this planet; other continents have fallen.
The Spirits are on the losing side!"
He swung again, forcing Arthur to sidestep.
"I heard you were one of Gozon’s Generals, but any real General would see the obvious!"
Arthur’s laughter echoed through the clash of metal, his silver aura surging from his palm to coat his blade.
"Dominance? That doesn’t mean a thing to me.
You think I’m after resources like you? I was minding my own business when the Infernal Archdevils tried to kill me. I’m here for payback."
The man’s expression darkened when he heard this, and Arthur pressed forward, the speed of his strikes increasing.
"The same devils you side with have slaughtered hundreds of Cultivators since they arrived. Cultivators like you.
Who knows how many from your allied sects, your friends you haven’t reunited with were killed by them?
The Infernal Devils have a long hitlist, and you might be on it next."
Arthur’s silver energy surged and he unleashed a sweeping slash, using his Sword of Victory technique to blow away the man’s fiery aura.
"Bu-!
"Enough talk."
Arthur cut him off and activated his Pseudo-Authority of Gravity. Celestia’s weight multiplied by twenty-five, crashed down with overwhelming force.
The man’s sword buckled under the strike, the blade shattering as Arthur’s attack broke through, snapping the man’s arm in the same movement.
He staggered, eyes wide with shock and pain and Arthur didn’t give him a moment, following up with a kick to his stomach that sent him crashing into a wall.
"Hopefully, you make better decisions in your next life."
Before the man could even utter any more words, Arthur swung his blade and his head fell from his shoulders.
Without a second’s delay, Arthur stepped forward, leaving the dead man behind as he headed towards the ’Creation’ he sensed earlier.
More Infernal Devils swarmed his way, their eyes filled with rage but their threat barely registered to Arthur.
"I don’t have time for small fry. |¬Pseudo-Authority of Gravity: Gravitational Maelstrom¬|
An invisible force seized the devils, even an unfortunate Intermediate Stage nearby. Faster than the Archdevil could react, Arthur marked them with his divinity, making them the central point of the Maelstrom.
The bodies of all the devils nearby hovered helplessly in mid-air; held by Arthur’s gravitational pull, orbiting toward the Archdevil he’d marked as the centre.
As they crashed towards the Archdevil with a force of 10 times this planet’s gravity, bones splintered, their cries lost in the rising whirlwind of bodies as Arthur layered destruction energy into the Maelstrom, turning them into a sphere of crushing, destructive pressure.
"You should join the others."
Arthur spoke to he called to the Elder Spirit who was fighting him and the man nodded before going off to assist the other Elders.
With the Spirit out of the picture, Arthur intensified the gravitational force, with his destruction energy creeping through the crevices, setting the mass of bodies aglow as the trapped devils howled in pain.
Arthur pushed his palms together, and the force increased, making spines snap and spraying blood everywhere. At this point, only a few Sovereigns and the Transcendent at the centre clung to life—everyone else was already dead.
The teen Progenitor grimaced as he pushed harder, tapping into cosmic energy to bolster the press as he felt the Transcendent’s active resistance against his gravitational power.
"Attribute Resonance + Law Resonance: Gravity. Arcane Blessing: Blessing of Destruction."
Arthur buffed himself and pressed his palms harder, a grin appearing on his face as he heard the felt the life signs of the Sovereigns vanish, leaving the Archdevil in the centre as the only one alive.
The Archdevil was taking most of the damage, since Arthur’s destruction energy was concentrated on him, and all the bodies were pressing down on him.
"Seems I can’t crush you all at once...a pity."
Even for Arthur, it was a bit difficult to kill an Intermediate Transcendent actively resisting this, so he sighed and summoned Celestia.
"Cataclysmic Divide."
The slash cleaved through the mass of flesh, igniting the destruction and gravity law energies. Space broke down and a localized singularity was born in the Maelstrom’s centre.
Its unstable gravity caused it to explode in just a second, blasting what was left of the Infernal Devils there to pieces.
A shower of blood and viscera rained down from the explosive blast, but Arthur raised an energy shield around him, deflecting the gruesome remains with barely a second glance.
"Ah, that was a workout."
He spoke with a yawn, then, he kicked off the ground, rocketing upward before plummeting back down.
He crossed hundreds of metres in an instant and crashed into the heart of another Transcendent skirmish, hitting the ground with the force of a bomb.
Dust and smoke erupted in all directions, rising like a thick cloud. As the haze settled, Arthur stood in the centre, gripping a woman by her throat, his hand coated with dense, crushing gravitational energy.
"You still wore the same robes, huh?"
His eyes drifted over her body, not for her figure but for the uniform she wore—identical to Hibiki’s.
The woman’s eyes widened in recognition upon seeing him. Through choking breaths, she managed to rasp out broken words.
"...th...with...hib...ki..."
Arthur’s brow lifted as he studied her more closely. This was Hibiki’s Senior Sister, one of the Cultivators who sided with the devils, as well as the ’Creation’ Charisse had cryptically told him about.
"What did Hibiki say your name was again? Xini? Xinyi?
I wonder why..."
From the corpses littering the ground around her, this Xinyi had killed a good number of spirits and was about to kill another if he hadn’t interfered.
So why would Charisse of all people, someone who had personally gone out to avenge spirits killed by other cultivators tell him NOT to be wary of her?
"Leave Senior Sister alone!!!"
The sudden voice cut through his thoughts and Arthur turned, spotting a second woman sprinting towards him with a spear in hand.
As she lunged, Arthur simply rotated Xinyi’s body in his grip, positioning her as a human shield. The woman froze, eyes wide as she realized her attack would skewer her comrade.
She forced herself to cancel the strike, gasping as her law energy rebounded, sending waves of backlash through her body.
Before she could recover, Arthur’s left fist shot forward. His punch connected with her chest, the impact cracking her ribs audibly. She doubled over, only for his hand to seize her neck, fingers tightening like a vice.
"You’re wearing the same robes as someone I consider an ally in this dimension."
Arthur remarked as he looked between the two women, noting the Sect’s insignia on their uniforms.
"So, why would disciples from the same sect as Hibiki—especially a sect that’s lost two of its own to these Infernal Devils—be fighting alongside them?"
He raised a brow, his voice filled with curiosity.
"Were you enemies in your sect, or is this just a new brand of idiocy?"
[IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE]
