Myths Reawakened

Gauche’s pupils contracted. From his demigod-level senses, Wayne’s energy vanished all of a sudden. In shock, he hurriedly extended his vitality domain to give himself the sturdiest defense he could create.

Boom!!!

Following the loud explosion, the propelling currents sent a black star flying. Wayne stood where Gauche had been. The space around him reacted a beat late, making crackling noises like shattered glass only after he regained his footing.

The turbulent black currents couldn’t shake Wayne in the slightest. He slowly turned around to face the gaping group. “Don’t worry. My relationship with the Goddess of Darkness... Well, we’re quite close, so I’m not going to make things difficult for you. That guy will live.”

He meant they were close in the literal sense.

The twins of the Abyss and Sid lost their composure. They extended their vitality domains to place Wayne in an oppressive veil of darkness. When they saw how his life essence had remained unaffected, their shock compounded.

Was he really a legendary mage? Why couldn’t they, as demigods, break through his vitality field with their domains?

Solsknar’s expression turned complicated. He had long witnessed Wayne’s strength. His ridiculous progress rate inspired deeper despair. As a veteran demigod, though, Solsknar quickly calmed himself.

“You’re strong and far more talented than I am. In half a year, I won’t be your match. Now, though...”

“The goddess has chosen me!”

Snarling, Solsknar took a step and unfolded his vitality domain, overpowering his three teammates and dragging Wayne into his world.

It was a domain of crimson abyss and infinite darkness, with thick shadows enveloping the sky like a perpetual veil of night. There was no sun, moon, or starlight. Only the occasional crimson lightning would tear through the heavy darkness.

On the ground, the crimson abyss growled like a giant beast that had just awakened, opening its fanged maw and showing the scorching lava roiling inside.

Thick blood permeated the air, mixing the smell of rust and sulfur while projecting oppressive death and destruction. It was suffocating—it wasn’t an illusion. Anyone who stepped into the domain, even demigods, would be unable to use their full power because of the strange oppressive power.

Wayne made a questioning sound. It wasn’t a simple vitality domain, but a Divine Domain that had been injected with faith. The giant python had a bright future. Did Ines really have the heart to kill him?

Also, Wayne smelled the Abyss. If he played his cards right, he might get a taste.

Boom!!!

Space exploded ahead of him. Solsknar had teleported right to Wayne, standing tall and strong. In this true vitality domain, he was almost omnipotent. With a simple wave, he dragged Wayne toward himself. His right fist was raised in preparation for a punch to send Wayne into the crimson mouth of the Abyss.

Wayne didn’t resist the pull. Instead, he used it as momentum to charge at Solsknar, with his right hand raised. White foam agitated in his body to transform him into the Pale Knight, concealed underneath a human skin.

Their fists collided. A bolt of crimson lightning split the sky before they passed through each other. Wayne slowly turned around with blazing fire wreathing his fist, burning away the blood. Solsknar, on the other hand, fell into deep thought as he stared at his now missing right arm.

Who am I? Where am I? Why am I thinking about those questions?

Was the punch that had taken out Gauche not his full power, but this...?

Solsknar couldn’t be certain. His rival’s prowess always caught him by surprise, and judging by how relaxed Wayne looked, it didn’t appear that he had gone all in. Solsknar questioned whether he could win.

But! This was his last chance. If Solsknar didn’t defeat Wayne now, he would never be able to do it. He had to put everything on the table and go all in! He might still have a chance!

Roooar—

Solsknar roared at the sky. Crimson lightning hit his body and restored his severed arm. His vitality domain contracted fast to wrap around his body and limbs, transforming into pitch-black armor gleaming with crimson light.

Two horns protruded from his head. The vicious crimson light conjured images of wartime and shook heaven and earth with its sheer aura. He seemed like a god of war who had fought his way out of Hell.

The twins of the Abyss and Sid unleashed their vitality domains without hesitation, wrapping around Wayne and Solsknar to stop them from destroying the legacy of the Life Alliance in the ensuing fight.

Clang!!

Solsknar manifested two black scimitars. The blades pulsed with blinding crimson light.

With a wave, Wayne retrieved the Abyssal Sword, which he had taken from the Papal State.

Solsknar snarled as soon as he saw the weapon, “Demon from Hell, you’re not human. You’ve deceived the goddess!”

“Hey, that’s not fair. This sword is—”

Before he could finish, Wayne had to raise his sword to block the scimitars. His face tightened at the collision. It felt as if he was fighting an entire world. The tremendous pressure almost knocked the Abyssal Sword out of his grip.

He learned another thing today. One could equip their vitality domain!

As they clashed, the black scimitars cut a crimson net into the air. Its red light poured down on Wayne from all directions. Wayne’s Abyssal Sword moved so swiftly that it left afterimages in the air, blocking every attack. The incredible counterforce sent him staggering back.

It wasn’t easy to take the force of a world head-on. If Wayne didn’t have a solid foundation and hadn’t given up on being human a long time ago, he would’ve been sent flying at the first collision.

A few seconds later, Wayne flew a thousand meters away. Sensing that Solsknar’s momentum had plunged suddenly, he grumbled about the man going flaccid after five seconds, sweeping his sword horizontally to knock the two scimitars back.

Behind him, two six-armed figures folded space to grapple Wayne’s limbs and head with a total of twelve arms. The twins of the Abyss held down Wayne’s head from his two sides, leaning down to bite his neck.

Their mouths opened to an unnatural degree, their insidiously stunning faces distorted. Their fangs sank into his flesh and sucked...

Nothing came out.

“For the Goddess of Darkness’s sake, I won’t corrupt you. Stop making trouble, or I’m going to fill you up with white foam.” Wayne shook his body, transforming his shoulders into bulging black cannons that fired at the twins.

Failing their sneak attack, Sai and Haynor retreated without hesitation.

Wayne wasn’t going to let them. Since they had approached him, they should walk away with some gifts. Two rays of red light shot out from Wayne’s back, locking onto the twins’ retreating forms. Then his shoulder blades opened up to launch two missiles, which course-corrected automatically and vanished into the darkness at unbelievable speed.

Boom! x2

Brilliant orange fireworks bloomed, casting the dark world in warm light. From within the burning fire, two charred, smoking figures plunged.

The vitality domain surrounding Wayne weakened further. Sid was the only one of Solsknar’s investors who still remained. He tried everything and still couldn’t do anything to Wayne's vitality field. He cursed at the absurdity of it.

“Law of Mechanical Augmentation...”

Solsknar recognized the Law. He had seen it in Prussia, and it had become popular in Hell. The Law was brutish and aggressive. He would’ve gotten a taste if it weren’t at odds with his nature.

“Do you want to learn it? I can teach you!”

“Ha, swallowing everything will only do you harm!” Solsknar scoffed. With two scimitars in his hands, he rose to five meters and unleashed everything he had ever learned on Wayne.

Ten seconds later, Sid collapsed from having his domain shattered. The demigods who had invested in Solsknar didn’t even get to see the legacy of the Life Alliance before they dropped like flies.

Thirty seconds later, a giant black python fell from the sky, slamming into the courtyard and toppling a circular pillar. Solsknar had gone all in but still failed to endure for a minute. The gap between him and Wayne was so great that he had to question whether he was fighting a subordinate god.

Was Wayne not a rival, but the Listener or the Avenger in disguise? Had they, under the goddess’s order, come to knock Solsknar down a peg for being too prideful, showing him what being a true subordinate god meant?

That was impossible. Solsknar wasn’t stupid enough to believe that. He speculated that the goddess had given Wayne a private lesson, which widened the gap between them.

Darkness had chosen Wayne as the third subordinate god, not him.

He fell into despair, losing all his fighting spirit.

Oh? Something smells good!

The black python tilted its head, looking at the blue glow that had slowly risen after the pillar collapsed. It smelled like a Law!

He believed the pillar represented the Witch of the Ocean, a powerful demigod.

Bam!

Someone fell from the sky, landing right on top of the python’s head and slamming its head deep into the ground, making its open maw slam shut.

Wayne jumped out of the crater and put away his Abyssal Sword, walking toward the Law. “Don’t you know whose table this is? If not for Her, I would add you to the stew, too.”

Cackling, he rubbed his hands together while the Book of Greed rubbed its tentacles together. It swallowed the Law in one bite.

It was time to feast. Wayne brought down every pillar with a punch and let the Book of Greed swallow every Law in one gulp. Like a swarm of locusts, he left nothing behind wherever he passed.

Solsknar transformed into his human form and sat against a broken stone pillar, his mood foul as he stared ahead blankly. He could feel Wayne growing stronger and stronger. He might have reached the Demigod rank, just like Solsknar.

If Solsknar couldn’t defeat a Legendary-ranked Wayne, he had an even lower chance once Wayne became a demigod.

He felt a despair he had never felt before. He suspected that Wayne had only spared him to make him a subordinate, forcing him to invest and help Wayne become the third subordinate god, the Devourer.

That would be worse than death!

Solsknar’s expression tightened as his ire grew. Wayne should just kill him rather than humiliate him like this.

If he had such a humiliation kink, he would subject Wayne to the same humiliation!

Thinking of the Abyssal Sword in Wayne’s hands, Solsknar resolved himself. He remembered that once a demon fell into Hell, they could never return to the human world.

“I need to use my head. Goddess, it must have been your guidance!”

Solsknar came to a realization. At that moment, he developed a newfound respect for the Goddess of Darkness and once again concluded that the goddess had chosen him over Wayne.

You’re lucky to meet me, kid!

“I’ll send you home today...” Solsknar murmured, his eyes glowing with red light. A strange disturbance rippled from his body and stirred up the space around him. The air started to smell sulfuric.

The disturbance was subtle and had no direct relation to Hell. It technically came from the Abyss, but since the Abyss had become Hell’s back garden, it was now connected to Hell!

Solsknar murmured in an indecipherable language under his breath, his body quickly shrinking and deflating. He seemed severely weakened, like his body was being emptied.

Meanwhile, Wayne was observing the statue of the Sovereign of the Underworld. He strongly suspected that it had been the Goddess of Death’s title.

“Tsk, She claimed the name already. I was going to use the name once I became the master of the Underworld!”

He crushed the pillar and swallowed the impure Death. The Book of Greed didn’t care about corruption. Knowledge was precious and shouldn’t be left to collect dust just because it had some dirt mixed in. Just swallow it and be done with it.

Soon, Wayne reached the last pillar—or half of a pillar. Inside lay the Law of Darkness. The statue before the pillar had been moved away, and the divine name on the base had been erased.

Ines, the Plague of Stars, had not left Her name in the Life Alliance. Wayne wondered if it was the doing of the three goddesses, or if Ines had erased Her tracks when She left.

It didn’t matter! Again, he just had to swallow it.

Gulping, Wayne felt a heavy weight in his stomach. He was full. Satisfied, he sat down to observe the changes to his body. Before he could do it, though, the world spun around him, and he was projected into an unknown world along with the space around him.

The sky was black, and the air was smothering with the smell of sulfur. He heard the occasional cackle...

(一`´一)

Although it was his first time here, he was pretty sure this was Hell.

“No, no. It can’t be. Someone like me doesn’t deserve to go to Hell...”

“And it’s so sudden!”

Wayne took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Then he opened his eyes again to look differently.

The sky remained unchanged, and the smell of sulfur lingered.

“...”

He didn’t run into demons, but he did go straight to Hell!

“On the bright side, I was wise not to make a bet with Mona...”

After all, there was no shortage of demons in Hell.