Lustful Demon King: Summoned by the Demon Goddesses!

Chapter 290: Divine Intervention!

The question lingered heavily within the Star Sanctuary.

"...What the hell are they preparing for?"

However, neither of them had an answer for it, so there remained a strange silence lingering between them as they both were deep in their personal thoughts.

Above them, the artificial stars shimmered softly across the dimensional sky, though now Jax could see every flicker hidden beneath their beauty.

With every unstable pulse and strained celestial mana current, Jax could tell that the mana dimension was quietly suffering.

Willow folded her arms lightly beneath her chest as she watched him think, "You seem very confident already that the Church is behind this even without any hard evidence as of yet?"

Jax’s eyes remained fixed on the floating projections, just nodding, "Yeah."

His answer came without even a drop of hesitation, as he continued his explanation, "The patterns are too deliberate and I’ve seen some of these same mana designs when I was saving all the captured Demons and Merfolk at that secret Church facility,"

His fingers moved slightly through the air and several of the celestial pathways rotated into alignment.

"These disruptions aren’t random decay."

The projections connected together as Jax injected mana into them, forming a network, "Remember how I said before that they’re targeting support points,"

Willow nodded, her emerald eyes narrowing slightly, "You think they’re trying to collapse the dimension? Why? To capture us all here?"

Jax shook his head, "No."

That answer surprised her, "...No?"

"If they wanted destruction, this would’ve been done differently."

His golden eyes gleamed faintly as he continued analyzing the mana flow, "We know they’re siphoning energy carefully, which means the energy of this place is special enough for them to need for some reason,"

He pointed toward one of the weakened pathways.

"See this? The mana is being redirected, this plan must’ve been made a long time ago, maybe even before I arrived here,"

What Jax said made Willow feel even worse about the situation, as this meant an immense amount of patience and planning.

Whoever was behind this understood celestial magic enough to interfere with dimensional channels directly.

That wasn’t normal Church behavior. They usually weren’t this secretive and detailed when planning against their opponents.

Willow exhaled quietly, letting go of some of her tension, "Then what do you think they’re harvesting it for?"

Jax went silent briefly as he thought for a bit, but his mind came up blank for answers, "I don’t know yet."

That bothered him a-lot more than he’d like to admit. The Church capturing Demons, experimenting on divine bloodlines, harvesting Merfolk royalty and now siphoning dimensional celestial mana.

All of it connected somehow, but toward what? That part remained unclear and he’d need to gather much more information to actual figure out that answer.

Willow studied him carefully.

"You already have a theory."

Jax glanced sideways at her.

"I have several."

"...And?"

"None of them are good."

That immediately killed any remaining humor in the atmosphere. The sanctuary grew quieter afterward. Then finally Jax straightened fully.

"I’m going."

Willow blinked once.

"Now?"

"Yeah."

His eyes shifted toward the distant horizon of the dimension.

"If I can trace the interference directly, I’ll figure out how they’re doing it."

Willow hesitated slightly.

"Do you want backup?"

Jax immediately shook his head.

"No."

Her eyebrow lifted slightly.

"Confident."

"They won’t even know I’m there."

Still, Willow stepped closer.

"Be careful."

Jax smirked faintly.

"You sound worried."

"I am worried."

That made him pause briefly.

Willow looked away afterward, annoyed at herself for saying it so honestly.

"...This situation feels wrong."

Jax’s expression softened slightly.

"Yeah."

It did. The dimensional interference itself already required immense power and precision, but the fact the Church could even locate this dimension at all implied divine assistance somewhere behind the scenes.

A God, and usually they couldn’t directly interfere, which was the cause of Jax’s confusion. Still, he stepped backward slightly as mana began gathering around him.

"I’ll handle it."

Willow sighed softly through her nose.

"You always say that."

"And I’m usually right."

Before she could answer, space folded around him.

~WHUM~

He vanished completely and the sanctuary fell silent. Only the drifting petals remained.

Willow stared at the empty space where he had stood moments earlier.

Then quietly, she spoke.

"...Try not to scare me too much, idiot."

Meanwhile, far away from the tension surrounding dimensional collapse and celestial interference...

Seraphina was having the greatest day of her life.

"...THE FLOWERS GLOW?!"

The little Merfolk Princess spun in circles through a massive open field covered in luminous blossoms while several nearby witches laughed softly at her excitement.

The Witch Dimension truly looked unreal to her. It perfectly exemplified the beauty of her own home while also having its unique charm to it.

Everywhere she looked felt magical. Floating lantern spirits drifted lazily through the air. Rivers sparkled with silver-blue mana.

Massive crystal butterflies fluttered between enormous glowing trees. Even the breeze itself smelled sweet and fresh.

Seraphina’s violet eyes sparkled continuously as she ran ahead along one of the elegant stone pathways.

Serika followed nearby much more gracefully, her fox tails swaying behind her as several witches guided them through the dimension.

One witch with long crimson hair smiled warmly, "We usually don’t have visitors, yall are quite fortunate to experience this,"

Seraphina nodded rapidly, "Thank you, it’s amazing,"

Another witch laughed softly, "That’s usually the reaction."

The witches themselves were incredibly welcoming, far more than Seraphina expected for people who were said to be an incredibly closed off group.

Instead, most of them were teasing and beautiful, and weirdly affectionate toward Jax. That part still confused her slightly.

"...Why does everyone like Jax so much?" she finally asked curiously

That immediately earned several amused looks, but no-one told her the exact reason as she was still too young.

Instead, Serika smiled knowingly, "Because he’s reliable."

Seraphina listened quietly afterward while continuing to explore the dimension. The more she saw, the harder it became to connect this beautiful place with the lies she’d heard growing up.

Demons weren’t monsters and Witches weren’t evil.

A small smile appeared on her face unconsciously and Serika noticed immediately, "What are you thinking about?"

Seraphina jumped slightly, "N-Nothing!"

The fox-woman looked deeply unconvinced, but let it go for now as one of the witches guided them toward a nearby riverside marketplace filled with magical crafts and floating enchanted decorations.

"This district specializes in keeping the various artifacts we have created and collected over the years," the witch explained.

Seraphina immediately became distracted again, "...Pretty..."

Tiny star-shaped lights floated through the air around the market while witches sold enchanted jewelry, magical fabrics, potion ingredients and strange glowing fruits.

One floating orb drifted toward Seraphina curiously before circling around her head, she gasped.

"It’s alive?!"

A nearby witch giggled softly.

"Only a little."

Seraphina looked absolutely fascinated and Serika smiled quietly as she watched her. The difference between yesterday and today felt almost surreal.

Yesterday this little girl had been traumatized and terrified inside a cage, now she was running through magical flower fields smiling brightly.

Jax really had changed everything for her in an absurdly short amount of time.

And somehow, Serika wasn’t surprised, because Jax did that to everyone.

***

Meanwhile, far from the peaceful sightseeing districts...

Jax stood alone atop the edge of one of the damaged regions. The difference here was immediate. The beautiful vibrant mana saturating the rest of the dimension weakened significantly near this area.

Flowers wilted beneath his feet and the air itself felt thinner. Above him, several artificial stars flickered intermittently like dying lights.

Jax’s eyes scanned the landscape silently and then narrowed at a particular area, "...Found you."

Tiny traces of foreign mana lingered here, extremely faint, almost impossible to detect, but Mana Refract allowed him to trace mana disturbances backward through time itself.

Golden light flickered faintly behind his eyes and the world around him shifted temporally. Brief echoes of past mana movements began appearing around the region.

Broken fragments, residual traces, all like ghostly afterimages.

Jax stepped forward slowly while observing them and then he finally spotted several figures hidden by cloaking magic moving in and out the dimensional boundary itself.

His eyes sharpened immediately.

"...Church operatives."

But not ordinary ones. Their mana signatures felt strange, and judging by the fact they kept fading out of the Dimension, whatever magic they were using to break into this place was very unstable, and unable to sustain them for a long time.

This is probably why they had such a convoluted plan, and didn’t just send a full-frontal attack on the Witches.

One of the echoes raised an object toward the sky. A black crystalline spike covered in holy runes, the moment it pierced the dimensional current—

The celestial flow warped and Jax’s expression darkened.

"...Anchors."

Now he understood.

The Church wasn’t directly siphoning mana themselves. They were inserting foreign conduits into the dimensional channels, like parasitic hooks.

The stars fed power into the dimension, and the anchors redirected portions elsewhere

Jax crouched slightly near the ground.Then reached down. His fingers brushed against faint residual energy.

Immediately, a pulse of unfamiliar divine mana surged briefly against his senses, cold and sharp.

"...This feeling..."

His eyes narrowed harder as it felt very similar to the Divine energy he felt from the Church and Kayle, but with strange differences.

"Things just keep getting weirder,"