Godslayer Yaxiu

Five wings. Its graceful, radiant silhouette shone with such brilliance and sanctity that one dared not look upon it directly, so exalted that one dared not raise one's head. The sky was crumbling and pouring forth black mud, the earth had overturned and spilled a sea of blood, yet this figure was the world's only light—holding back the trembling collapse of the heavens and mending the shattered abyss of the earth. A demigod angel? No, a Five-Winged god. Igola realized this with absolute certainty—even though he had never seen an angel, and both angels and gods were inhuman existences beyond human imagination. Yet based on the descriptions in legends and myths, one thing was certain: angels were sorcerers who transcended humanity, whereas gods were merely rules endowed with personality. Whoever laid eyes on this entity tinting the world with color would never believe it possessed a shred of humanity. After all, if the sun baked you on a scorching day, you wouldn't think it was sticking out its tongue to lick you. Watching it stand tall amidst the apocalyptic world, Igola felt as if he were watching the sun rise from a grave. What were its rules? What was it trying to do? What was happening to this world...? And more importantly—what did it have to do with him? Igola's final question was soon answered. *Thsk!* A blade pierced its chest. The entity seemed to let out a soundless shriek, but that did nothing to arrest the ongoing brutality—it was pinned to a ruined stone monument by a longsword, while snake-like black sword light whipped across its wings and coalesced into dark steel chains, binding its body tight and shackling it like a slave! And at the other end of the chains stood a man clad in a dark red trench coat and wearing a mask. He was... slaying a god! With the body of a mere sorcerer, hunting a Five-Winged entity! The silhouette was clearly familiar, yet the man felt so alien that Igola could barely recognize him. For this godslayer stared fixedly at the god he had shackled, his eyes radiating a hatred that chilled Igola to the core. He was neither an evil-doing "cult leader" nor a world-destroying "source of disaster." Both descriptions diverged far too wildly from the person Igola knew, like seeing a Lalafell dressed in warrior's armor or dancer's garb—thoroughly dissonant. He would never associate that person with those two villainous labels, dismissing such ideas as tasteless jokes. But this was different. This god-slaying brute, resembling a vengeful wraith, gave Igola an unsettling illusion: as if... this was a latent possibility hidden deep within that man. The godslayer suddenly turned his head, his gaze locking onto Igola. The hatred in his eyes receded slightly, replaced by a cutting chill. Leaving the god pinned to the stone slab, he dragged the chains with his right hand as he walked over. With every step he took, the chains pulled tighter, and the god's wail seemed to stretch a little longer. He stopped right before Igola, then reached out his left hand toward him. Unexpectedly, not a shred of fear arose in Igola's heart. It wasn't because he believed the man wouldn't harm him, but rather something closer to relief. Like sitting through a wretched buffet and finally having someone pull you away. * "Hmm?" Igola opened his eyes to find Yaxiu touching his head, a warm green glow flickering in his palm. At the far end of the bath, Harvey was soaking in the water while wolfing down Lalafell. With every bite, teal vital energy rippled across Harvey's body, and the Lalafell vanished swiftly into his mouth. Over a dozen empty plates were already stacked to his right, while a dozen more dishes of various meats waited to his left. "...How long was I asleep?" "About ten or fifteen minutes." Yaxiu drew back his hand and smiled. "That's the first time I've ever seen you sleep so soundly. This is a public bath in a foreign land, yet you looked right at home." "I never slept that deeply even back in Blood Moon," Igola said, pausing. "Besides, I don't have a home." "You do now. As long as someone is thinking of you, you'll always have a place to return to," Yaxiu said. "Are you just exhausted? But Lisi originally meant to send you out of Gospel—she should have given you time to rest, right?" Igola rolled his eyes at him. "I used the Rust Crow's Seven-Colored Tail Feather. After exploring the Distant Sky Realm for a while, I'll inevitably die. I can't enter the Void Realm right now." "You could still have slept." "Departing Gospel for another unknown journey—did you think we didn't need to prepare? Lisi opened an express shopping channel for us. My spatial card was crammed with emergency supplies, which I thought might never be used... As for Harvey's spatial card, don't count on it; his coffins took up almost all the room." "Yet Harvey told me he took a nap. There was plenty of time." "My nerves are on the delicate side. I'm not like someone who can sleep soundly on graves and treat life so lightly," the Swindler snapped testily. "With them around me, there was no way I could relax enough to rest." He paused, then quickly asked, "Why were you touching my hair?" "Healing." Yaxiu summoned his Healing Sword. "Did you have a good dream?" Igola recalled the scene from the dream. Though much of it had already faded, he still vividly remembered the hatred in the godslayer's eyes. Was it merely a dream, or the influence of his Revelation sorcery spirit? The prophecy faction! Anyone who had experienced the Weaving Ceremony would inevitably harbor a yearning for sorcery factions like Prophecy, Fate, and Truth, especially someone like Igola who possessed a prophecy-faction sorcery spirit. It was like reading a mystery novel where a character proclaimed, "I know who the murderer is," only to drop dead immediately afterward, followed by the author dropping dead as well, leaving the rest of the story nonexistent. That was precisely how Igola felt right now. Far more agonizing than being unable to see the future was catching only a fleeting glimpse of it. Yet if Igola had to choose, he would still choose the latter. Ignorant bliss was far too easy for him to attain—Amy, Anfiel, or even any random stranger off the street. Who could resist the Swindler's feigned affection? But he was precisely the kind of madman who would rather sink into confusion, chasing genuine emotion amidst the absurdity. Setting the dream aside for now, Igola glanced around and arched an eyebrow. "This is the back hall of the Calamitous Fire Sanctuary, isn't it?" "That's right." Yaxiu submerged himself completely into the bath, stretching beneath the water. "We've got about half an hour of rest left." "Let me sort through our current situation," Igola said, quickly shifting into gear. "First, the Calamitous Fire Sanctuary summoned us here, taking us for the First Gospel." "The First Gospel and two useless attendants," Yaxiu corrected. Igola chopped the water with his hand, splashing a sheet of water right into the cult leader's face, before continuing, "In other words, the Calamitous Fire Sanctuary firmly believes the First Gospel will help them. The reasons could be manifold—perhaps a divine order from a god or angel, or perhaps the intrinsic nature of the First Gospel itself... In short, they haven't doubted our identity. This was supposed to be an opportunity we could exploit. If played right, I could have run off with the Calamitous Fire Sanctuary's assets and walked away in broad daylight. "Yet the moment we arrived, the Sanctuary's enemy—the Four Pillar Cult—breached the perimeter. The Calamitous Fire Sanctuary firmly believes the First Gospel can resolve the Four Pillar Cult, thrusting us straight into a trial. Whether we're willing to accept the mantle of the First Gospel or not, the Four Pillar Cult is a problem we have to deal with—unless they're willing to listen to our explanation and spare our lives." Yaxiu splashed water over his face and sighed. "Much as I'd like to hold out hope for the Four Pillar Cult, given the lesson Everlasting Presence taught me, we'd better treat them as heinous villains through and through." "I never pin my hopes on others either, but is that resume of yours truly that useless?" the Swindler grumbled. "Never mind failing to win trust at branch offices—how is it that wherever you go, your industry peers always track you down first? Did you offend your company's four managing directors or something?" "The Four Pillar Cult came after the Calamitous Fire Sanctuary! What does that have to do with me?" Yaxiu protested, feeling thoroughly aggrieved. "You saw Everlasting Presence's attitude toward me. Every branch of the Four Pillar Cult is greedy and territorial, terrified someone will steal their business. They have zero love for dispatched workers like me. If I exposed my past work experience, I'd probably die even faster." Igola let out a sigh. Accustomed as he was to handling emergencies, caught in a chaotic vortex of such immense scale and high stakes without a shred of preparation time, even the Swindler felt out of his depth. He submerged himself in the bath, held his breath for a moment, then surfaced and slicked his hair back. "I still can't believe you had the gall to say 'I want to take a bath' at a time like that." Upon receiving word from the red-robed priests that the Four Pillar Cult had breached the gates, Yaxiu hadn't panicked in the least. Steady in the face of crisis, he asked how long the Sanctuary could hold out. The moment he heard the minimum estimate of sixty minutes, he actually demanded a bath. Perhaps Yaxiu's composure was truly convincing, or perhaps the First Gospel held supreme prestige, but the red-robed priests raised no objections whatsoever. They scurried to prepare a bath for them, allowing Yaxiu and the other two to snatch a moment of leisure amidst the crisis.