The cavalry began their warm-up. In accordance with the standard configuration of an Order corps, they were arranged into three cavalry battalions—two main forces tasked with piercing and bisecting the battlefield, and the smallest assigned to guard the army's formation.
The undead warhorses beneath them were far more imposing and majestic than those of the present era, and the flames of undeath cloaking their flanks blazed with greater ferocity. When their hooves struck the ground, they made no sound, yet stirred a booming reverberation across the realm of the soul.
With the minor slip of the shield-bearers serving as a cautionary precedent, the cavalry made no mistakes, circling in their warm-up strictly according to orders from above.
Though they had not spurred their mounts into a charge and merely trotted at a slow rhythm, viewed from high above, it seemed as if three terrifying black earth-dragons had manifested across the plains, capable of pulverizing anything in their path.
After all, the essence of a military formation was to submerge the individual within the whole, multiplying the power of many individuals geometrically and projecting it outward through the array.
Thus, when the individual baseline was exaggeratedly high, the power displayed by the amplified formation would naturally reach an unimaginable degree of horror.
In the Garden of Life, Karen had stood beside Norton and witnessed firsthand the active knight order surrounding and butchering a Temple Elder of the Life Temple.
Under repeated waves of cavalry charges, that aloof and mighty Temple Elder had looked like a cornered beast being toyed with, in the end worn to death without ever getting to unleash his rage, while the cavalry suffered virtually no casualties.
Yet before the cavalry assembled here, on an identical scale and in the same battlefield environment, there would be no need for flanking maneuvers or repeated passes. Even a Temple Elder, among the absolute strongest beings beneath true deities, would never withstand a single standard charge—they would simply be trampled into dust.
Next, the array masters, priests, spellcasters, and summoners warmed up in turn.
Unless external enemies had already battered down the gates of the Holy See or the First Knight Order's encampment, this protocol was mandatory.
The greatest flaw occurred among the summoners. During an advanced mass-summoning spell, because the individual baseline was excessively high, the summoned "divine beast Basse" nearly materialized into absolute physical reality. Fortunately, they checked and adjusted their output in time, preventing the turtle shell of their own summon from crashing down upon their own ranks.
Officers at every level throughout the corps made rapid notes and reports, ensuring such errors would not recur once they set foot on the imminent battlefield.
Before long, the warm-up concluded.
All the awakening priests stood lined up on either side of the teleportation gate, bowing in formation.
"Advance!"
Therion Damon, the supreme commander of this corps, issued the order to march toward the battlefield.
There were no rousing cheers, no grand spectacles, and certainly no opportunity for speeches from Kred or Karen. At this moment, any unnecessary waste of time was an unforgivable crime.
The entire formation began passing sequentially through the teleportation gate.
Little Kanna lifted her dragon head and asked, "Are we going too?"
"Yes."
Only after the bulk of the corps had crossed over did the bone dragon descend, carrying Karen through the portal.
His field of vision broadened instantaneously.
Ahead should have been a boundless primordial forest, but it looked as if it had plunged into a winter where not a single flower petal could be seen and not a wisp of chill wind could be felt. Everything had withered.
Far in the distance, the heavens and the earth seemed glued together, where a vast blue river hung upright, undulating ceaselessly.
That was the epoch barrier—the very obstacle before which the God of Order had sat in solitude to hold back the encroaching divine.
Now, the God of Order was releasing his grip, and this wave of deities was about to descend.
However, it was impossible for any church forces to arrive here to receive them, as the other orthodox churches that had lost their main gods were waging war against them.
Standing upon the dragon's back, Karen could not help but sigh in admiration once more, compelled to marvel at the foresight and stratagems of the Exalted Ones from the previous era.
At the cost of their own sacrifice, they had dragged down the main gods who would have been hardest to deal with once recovered, resolving a catastrophic threat on behalf of contemporary Order believers. At the same time, they had laid down the primary sequence of operations, fashioning the most advantageous fighting environment for this era's followers.
Thus, as Tyrannus had said, tragic heroism was never suited to Order believers—where had anyone ever seen a hero who pre-chewed the meal and fed it right to your lips?
The battlefield environment had long since been prepared. Auxiliary apparatuses and primordial array carvings had been constructed across the terrain, all accomplished through the relentless, day-and-night labor of several regular corps.
As the First Knight Order entered the area, those corps began withdrawing, clearing the field.
Forward, forward, forward. Upon reaching the designated coordinates, the highest-ranking officer present issued the command to halt.
*Hum!*
The entire array froze into absolute stillness.
Even Little Kanna in the sky dared not soar about lest she make too much noise, quietly hovering in place.
A detachment from the War Academy arrived on the field. The one leading them was none other than Diknuo.
Diknuo first bowed toward the bone dragon in the sky, then held up his identity badge as he stepped into the formation, proceeding directly to the command platform suspended in midair.
Therion was the only person on the platform. His gaze turned slightly cold as he looked at Diknuo and asked, "What post is Cardinal?"
"A newly created post beneath the High Priest sequence," Diknuo replied. "Three Cardinals were established, one of whom founded the War Academy to oversee military affairs."
Therion shook his head. "I do not believe the War Academy is qualified to participate in command. This is a divine war. You have no experience."
Diknuo did not argue. Instead, he presented his identity token.
Therion reached out to take it. The badge looked intimately familiar, for one just like it hung outside every coffin of the First Knight Order, visible to everyone when they first awakened.
"Diknuo?"
"Yes, it is I."
Therion's expression turned solemn at once. "How long have you been awake?"
"A long time."
Therion stepped forward and placed a hand on Diknuo's shoulder. Diknuo voluntarily dropped his defenses to allow the probe.
Once the check finished, the verdict was clear: the body was in excellent condition, with only one flaw... it lacked a soul.
"How much longer do you have?"
"A very long time."
Therion paused. "You... My Lord?"
Diknuo spoke. "I have been awake for quite a while and have made extensive preparations. Therefore, I believe that having me direct this battle will yield far better results."
Therion nodded, gesturing to the space before him. "Stand here and issue the orders. I will relay them for you."
"Very well."
Diknuo took his position at the center of the platform, and Therion took a step behind him.
Within the blue river ahead, towering silhouettes began to surface, though it would still be a short while before their true descent.
Therion could not resist whispering, "Before waking, it felt as if I had a dream. In that dream, I seemed to feel the warmth of the Lord's embrace."
"The Lord's gaze is watching over us right now."
That was precisely the answer Therion sought. He raised his head, looking past the bone dragon above into the distant sky, convinced the Lord's gaze was descending from there.
He did not know that what he had bypassed was the very object of his yearning and devotion.
Having once been comrades lying together in the First Knight Order, Diknuo did not mind sharing a bit more: "Everyone likely had the same dream as you."
A smile crossed Therion's face. "How wonderful."
"Accept the Lord's inspection," Diknuo said softly. "This is a legion belonging to Order, and a legion only Order could ever assemble."
This was foundational reserve in the truest, most literal sense: the finest Order priests of every generation across countless eras gathered together. Other religions could neither achieve this in reality, nor could they theoretically ensure that after endless ages, these people would awaken and march straight to the battlefield for their faith without a single grievance.
Much like the Temple Elders of other pantheons—unless backed into a fatal corner, very few were willing to sacrifice themselves unconditionally.
For an ordinary person, if granted a brief chance at resurrection after death, a fleeting yet infinitely precious window, would you choose to visit your descendants, make amends for past regrets, indulge in pleasures... or would you choose to act as the last drop of tallow, burning yourself entirely down to the wick?
*Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!*
Ahead, gigantic figures plunged from the celestial river, many crashing violently onto the earth, while others hovered in the air.
Having experienced the descent of main gods several times before, Karen was no longer overawed by their appearance, yet their staggering numbers undeniably exerted a terrifying pressure.
Every deity looked horrific. When the main gods had descended, they had at least possessed enough presence to mask their condition, only exposing their withered, decrepit truth when pushed to exhaustion in battle.
Yet these deities before them were stooped and withered, their divine forms emaciated. Even a goddess floating in the air, though adorned in dazzling rainbow garments, could not hide the shriveled flesh and protruding ribs beneath her robes.
These were hardly aloof deities—they were starving ghosts crawling straight out of hell.
Compared to them, even Kevin when he had first reverted to Raniedal with less than thirty percent of his strength could have been called plump and well-nourished for a hound.
Groups of "hungry ghosts" began striding outward, but after advancing a short distance, those in the vanguard involuntarily ground to a halt.
No matter how weakened they were, they retained divine perception. They sensed that the silent legion standing ahead possessed the power to destroy them.
This filled these freshly escaped gods with dread. They craved fresh blood, craved the worship and sacrifices of believers, craved a hearty feast to restore themselves—the last thing they wanted was to be slaughtered here, the moment they stepped past the gates of this epoch prison.
Diknuo began issuing orders, and Therion helped convey each one with absolute precision.
In an instant, the previously motionless legion stirred, like an awakened beast.
Right from the start, the approach was fiercely aggressive.
The entire formation surged forward at high speed, abandoning any concept of steady, methodical consolidation in favor of an outright assault.
Karen understood the reasoning. The goal was to secure maximum breakthrough results at the opening stage, preventing a stalemate that would grant the gods time to reflect and unite.
"Flying knights," Diknuo commanded, "activate coordinate beacons by squad sequence and enter target zones."
Flying knights were the predecessors of today's falcon knights. In the past epoch, the proportion of dragons and formidable winged beasts among aerial units was exceptionally high, with falcon knights serving merely as auxiliaries. In modern times, however, falcon knights had become the mainstay, causing the broader term to gradually fade into the specific title.
The aerial units took flight, fanning out in three-man squads. Broadcasting identical targeting coordinates, they plunged into the divine host ahead in an act of near-certain suicide.
Without the shield of the main array, without the cover of cavalry, surviving such a dive was nearly impossible. It meant confronting gods as mere individuals, and no matter how powerful they had been in life or upon awakening, none possessed the standing to face a deity alone.
"Summoners," Diknuo continued, "initiate staggered life-sacrifice summons by squad order. Summon attack-type divine beasts and lock onto coordinates!"
Within the summoners' ranks, a line of priests stepped forward, pooling their life force in sacrifice to execute taboo-tier summons.
Moments later, a black dragon was called forth, its form bordering on absolute solidity as it roared and hurtled toward one of the flying squads.
The instant the summon manifested, the bodies of that entire line of summoners began crumbling into ash, drifting away on the wind.
The second line stepped forward, treading through the smoke and bone meal of their comrades, and initiated their own life-sacrifice summons.
A colossal fire phoenix materialized, screeching as it surged toward another flying squad.
Shortly after, their bodies also fractured rapidly and dispersed.
Then came the third rank, the fourth, the fifth...
From his vantage in the sky, Karen took in the entire scene, and the bone dragon shrank its skeletal frame in sheer horror.
These people had slept for countless ages, had only just awakened, had barely caught sight of the descending enemy, yet they followed military commands without hesitation, executing the ultimate summoning arts at the cost of terminating their "lives" on the spot.
From a commander's perspective, this was undeniably the most cost-effective path. They had only three days of borrowed time anyway and could not possibly survive past that window. In such circumstances, taboo and sacrificial magic systems offered the greatest yield.
Yet for these priests, it was undeniably cruel. They had not even been granted the time to take a proper look at the world.
Diknuo's orders did not waver. "Spellcasters, execute life-sacrifice arts by squad order. Offensive-attribute spells, lock onto coordinates!"
The spellcaster ranks mirrored the summoners precisely. Line after line queued up to unleash devastating area-of-effect spells fueled by their own lives.
Such spells demanded lengthy preparation, yet yielded far greater destructive radius and power, traveling vast distances upon completion.
Range, however, was no obstacle. Following orders, they locked onto the coordinate arrays activated by the flying knights surging ahead.
Massive, ferocious silhouettes of divine beasts leaped forward continuously, while devastating spells rained down upon the field.
The flying knights served as living targeting beacons, drawing the summoned beasts and descending spells toward individual gods.
This coordination prevented the deities from evading, ensuring pinpoint accuracy without wasted energy.
Even when flying knights were obliterated by deities upon closing in, the bombardment trailing behind them struck the target all the same. Other knights were destroyed by the very allied power crashing down behind them, but that mattered little—the general coordinates had already been locked.
Amid the roars of divine beasts and the detonations of apocalyptic magic, divine bodies cracked and splintered under the onslaught. Gods crashed to the earth, or watched vast fissures tear through their divine domains.
Everything in sight was swallowed by a blinding tempest of raw energy.
The cost was absolute: the summoners and spellcasters of the corps had been reduced entirely to ash.
"All cavalry, initiate perpetual charge," Diknuo commanded. "Pierce the gods. Do not halt."
"All priests, bestow perpetual blessings upon the cavalry. Do not halt!"
The entire cavalry force, including the battalion originally designated to protect the formation, charged forward. With the array steadily emptying, there was no longer anything left to guard.
Giant black blades began carving through the field. Knights pierced divine bodies in cohesive battle lines, then surged ahead without pause toward the next deity.
The freshly bombarded gods were thrown into profound disarray, creating the ideal conditions for a cavalry breakthrough.
Towering phantom idols were conjured by the priests, channeling blessings through these divine effigies onto the charging knights.
Among the manifestations, the likeness of Tyrannus's beloved appeared with the highest frequency.
As the charge pressed forward, divine corruption breached the collective defenses of the knight lines, tainting individuals or small clusters. To prevent the contagion from spreading and to ease the strain on the priests behind them, the infected knights broke formation voluntarily, silently dissolving into puddles of putrid fluid.
Many priests ran dry of power and ignited themselves to keep fueling the idols.
Gradually, more and more priests burst into flames. Once the fire burned out, nothing remained where they stood except mounds of white bone ash.
There was no weeping, no commotion, no farewells, no tears. There was only the profound fulfillment of a duty accomplished.
The same had been true for the spellcasters and summoners who had dissolved into dust. They had ended their "second lives" with utter composure, devoid of regret or lingering attachment, for they had waited for this day for far too long.
"Main array, advance!" Diknuo ordered.
Led by the shield-bearers, the core of the army surged forward once more.
"Array masters, activate the Living Array!"
The array masters began weaving spell arrays across the shield-bearers and other comrades, effectively treating their physical bodies as foundation keystones.
The shield-bearers, who possessed the sturdiest frames and greatest individual might, began swelling and twisting, subjected to agonizing torment.
Simultaneously, the outer perimeter formed by their bodies transformed into a gruesome winch.
First came the bombardment of summoned beasts and spells, followed by the surgical butchery of the cavalry. Now, this dreadful beast wrought of flesh and blood moved in to reap the heavily wounded and dying deities.
Wherever the formation advanced, deities were trampled into the dirt, falling one after another.
The siege engines within the army were pushed beyond their maximum output limits. With every discharge, the operating priest was pulverized into a mist of blood by the overwhelming recoil.
Through this brutal mechanism, the formation gained ever sharper fangs, tearing into the gods with even greater savagery.
In the sky, Karen's breathing slowed to a crawl. Though he had personally directed massive armies and devised strategies against divine entities, he had never imagined Diknuo would operate like this from the very outset.
Yes, combat against gods was inherently an art of throwing away lives.
Yet through countless deductions and analyses within his mind, Diknuo had distilled that tragic, epic artistry down to a cold, textbook formula.
Even Therion, the original supreme commander, trembled slightly as he relayed the orders. Clearly, such ruthless decisiveness had shaken him to his core.
After all, when the God of Order had relied upon the First Knight Order during ancient conquests, the Order's reserves had been nowhere near this immense. Strictly speaking, no one in this world possessed experience commanding a corps of this specific nature.
Generations of remarkable heroes served not only as the common foot soldiers of this army, but actively stepped onto the board as pawns eager to be sacrificed.
This was the price of overthrowing divine rule.
Perhaps the God of Order had known all along how fragile and pale humanity was before true gods. Thus, the Awakening Art he created allowed humanity to continually accumulate its foundational strength, until it could coalesce into an unstoppable deluge.
This was... using humanity's own history to grind down the history of the gods.
Karen reached out and gently stroked the dragon horn before him, asking softly, "Before long, we will face this exact situation and make the exact same choice. Are you afraid?"
Little Kanna's bones were still rigid with tension, and her voice carried a faint tremor, yet she replied:
"Well... it's what we ought to do... Only then is it fair!"
Chapter 949