The Harvester

Chapter 441: The Star of Hope

Chapter 441: The Star of Hope

Astraea gasped as she dodged one of the stray slashes Bhumi was firing off at whoever dared to approach. She gritted her teeth, trying to catch her breath; she was quickly running out of power.

Summoning Odin had barely left her with anything. Nothing that could contend against someone like Bhumi. And Ranka could not afford to help her either. At this rate, she would burn through her Records, essentially the equivalent of life energy on an Egregore scale.

She sighed and clutched her stuff, infusing mana into it. At the tip of her magic instrument, a seed began to grow. "{I will retreat momentarily to recover some strength. I won't be able to provide support.}"

Her message was transmitted to everyone, but the main recipient was Tarasque, who had been receiving most of her buffs until now.

"{It's fine. We will finish this now,}" the large beast responded and leaped, casting a shadow that stretched to Bhumi. Dark purple light seeped through his fangs and sparked around his horns.

He roared with all his might, shooting a sphere of concentrated gravity. However, it did not fly to its target like a projectile and sought the spot right above Bhumi. It grew a halo around itself and the undead god's knees buckled as an unrelenting weight pressed down on him.

"[Mondgefängnis,]" Soma intoned as he appeared in a flash of moonlight. Clouds of silver dust descended from the sky and congregated into columns of silver-colored stone. They fell through Ranka's flames and formed a crude encirclement around Bhumi.

The undead god immediately tried to swing his sword but Soma acted first. He split his bow and rushed forward, parrying the large weapon with a freshly conjured pair of short swords. Lunar energy danced around the blades after their creation.

"[Eklipsenmegalith.]"

In the blink of an eye, all light disappeared. Or, to be exact, darkness enveloped the planet for the span of a second; the Earth itself became an eclipse.

Ramsa grimaced as her power momentarily weakened due to it. But, thanks to that, by the time it was over, Soma's twin swords had been stabbed into Bhumi's shoulders down to the hilt.

The undead seemed almost in a daze, the moonstone pillars around glowing faintly alongside the blades stuck into him. Now that his arms had been immobilized, Soma's hand surged with light and tore into Bhumi's right arm. He wrenched the elbow off with clinical violence.

Bhumi's eyes abruptly seemed to lose the intellect they had displayed a moment prior and were finally replaced by the madness of an undead. The reason was simple as Soma retreated with the amputated arm. The sword was still in the ownerless hand; the meager amount of awareness the Fallen God had managed to achieve was nothing more than his swordsmanship itself.

Zikserth and Ramsa simultaneously conjured a magic circle, merging them until it let out slithery crimson and orange flames licking the air. Their mana boiled from inside their body and heat up the atmosphere.

""[Blood Sun.]"" They chanted at the same time and the flames began to spin around the magic circle. They became faster and faster until it practically became a cyclone. It expanded in size at a dangerously fast pace, dwarfing its casters by a thousand-fold.

And finally, it grew enough to spin on itself. It whirled and turned into a sphere. And like that, an orange sun bleeding crimson formed in the sky and slowly descended toward the undead god as the air became unbearably dry.

Bhumi let out an intelligible roar and fought against Tarasque's gravity, the restraining power of the monoliths, and the swords planted inside him. Spiritual Intent flooded his being; if he didn't have a sword, then his body would do.

"My turn..." Astraea whispered and yanked the seed from her staff. Without hesitation, she put it in her mouth and swallowed it. A rare type of spell that involved cultivating energy externally to recover; a terribly difficult ability to master. But to an Egregore Entity, it was a child's play.

The goddess lifted her staff as her aura surged once again. She pointed it at Bhumi and breathed in deeply. Using green magic with her surroundings wouldn't work at this point since the planet had fully died and was currently being endlessly cleansed by the Lunisolar Blaze.

So, she had no choice but to bring out something from within. "[Ô Children of God,]" she chanted softly and her wings grew larger. Blue tendrils of light escaped her staff. "[Hear My Plea. Hear My Choice. Hear My Judgment. Seeking Gold In Iron, You Have Decayed.]"

She manifested her legend. Something more primal than divinity. The story of an immortal who fled humanity's wickedness despite her benevolence.

"[I Will Abscond From Fate. Forgive My Weakness,]" she intoned quietly and a huge apparition of an angel appeared right behind Bhumi who was frozen in place. "[I Shall Rob Your Sins And Hang Them In The Night Sky.]"

The angelic apparition wrapped her arms around the undead god whose struggles had suddenly stopped. His eyes were clouded and empty.

Astraea closed her eyes. "[Lypiméni Prosefchí.]"

The name of her spell also signed its end. And by that time, the Blood Sun swallowed Bhumi who didn't let out as much as a groan in the process. The power of the crimson and orange star never exceeded its boundaries. There was no destruction to be seen; delimited within its confines.

Soma solemnly watched the sun. It was calm. Enough so that one could delude themselves into thinking the battle was over. However, that hope was dashed by a resounding roar that shouldn't be coming out of a human creature.

The Blood Sun was assailed with an omnidirectional and unsharpened wave of Intent. It carried neither Sword nor Fist. This Spiritual Intent was being released without restraint; it was Flesh.

Burning flesh on the verge of giving out. Like a final cry, it tore apart the Blood Sun.

Everyone covered their eyes as the heat dispersed. The sun's flames spilled across the Earth but were helplessly overpowered by the Lunisolar Blaze.

What was left behind was a smoldering husk. It was a harrowing sight, with flesh stuck to bones and calcined organs. Soma's swords slipped out after losing whatever grip they had. Despite all that, one eye, just one eye that had survived, was still open and filled with vigor.

"It's over," the Moon God declared, looking directly into Bhumi's gaze. "[Resurrection.]"

Those who reached the realm of Heavenly Gods and above all knew this simple word. It was not to be used on others; it was a command directed at oneself. The realization of one's power given form; the Soul Manifestation.

The activation was instantaneous. It began with Soma's complete disappearance. He vanished as if he never was real in the first place. Then, the light in the sky dimmed slightly and all the moons began to shine stronger than ever instead.

But it didn't stop at the ones close to Earth. Far, far away. Every moon in the galaxy responded to the call. Amidst the stars, silver lights began to emerge.

If you combined the number of stars and planets in the world, it still might not reach the number of moons. The latter has and will always be one of the most prominent celestial bodies.

"[Sintflut Im Schwebenden Mondhimmel.]"

Soma's disembodied echoed and a beam of moonlight descended from the depths of space, from distances untold. It was as thin as a needle and went through Bhumi's body, penetrating his back and exiting from his abdomen.

Then, a second one flashed into existence. Followed by a third, fourth, fifth... And with each one, the process only accelerated. Again, and again. By the time three seconds had passed, it could be said that more than ten thousand of them had ensnared Bhumi.

These countless strings were turning the sky into a massive web, and they only kept increasing in number as time passed. As their count surpassed the six figures, aside from above, where the strings could still be somewhat perceived with the naked eye, it became hard to pick them apart from Bhumi, who looked as if he was suspended in pure light.

"Now!" Soma shouted to the demons channeling the formation. They had been ready to unleash it for a while now, but what he had given them was no regular spell. It was specifically created to be used in this situation.

"Well, regardless, I'm done prodding you," Rakna added and landed on the ground. The outline of his pupils shone brightly and the Beast Remnants across his soul began to approach.

Tarnished Death glanced at the animals that had been keeping their distance until now. None of them were threatening on their own, but the intensity of their gaze was immense. 'How should I describe it...' He wondered. 'Like a horde who suffered great pain together... and learned from it.'

Lilith silently unleashed her Agni Ring, hovering above Rakna with unwavering determination.

"Hm, have you made your final strategy?" Tarnished Death said and stood up. "I suppose you can't use those cards often, can you? What else are you going to try?" He inquired with a tilt of his head. "Time is ticking even as we speak. You don't have much left."

"It's plenty," Rakna retorted and his Stellar Aura returned in full, ending the buff it was giving to his soul power. "[Imperial Crown,]" he intoned and the beasts lunged at him. They transformed into light midway and merged with his body, granting him hundreds of attributes and traits.

"In this moment, Tarnished, your countdown has begun."

The Fiend grinned under his helm and whirled his double scythe. His miasmic aura spilled out of his body in an even greater volume and golden waves fluctuated around his body.

"Is that so?" He snorted and looked up at the sky where one of the moons was flickering in and out of view. "This Marble won't last long either, you know? You have two ultimatums. Only one is enough for me to win," he declared, and with an eruption of dark mana, a literal fortress of magic circles spawned around him.

"Shut up," Rakna extended his arm and clenched his fist, crushing the circles and rejecting them from his World. Though, he knew that it merely managed to widen Tarnished Death's grin.

"With that, you took one more step toward defeat."

"And I've heard enough," Lilith's voice echoed and her sabers descended on the Fiend with wings of Agni adorning the blades. She was parried in the blink of an eye, but thunder roared on impact and blew away Tarnished Death, even if it didn't manage to injure him.

"Aah... we are back to this, I see," the gladiator commented and adjusted his momentum with a wag of his wings. He conjured another spell and unsurprisingly, it was negated as soon as it tried to manifest into reality. But the landscape seemed to tremble for a moment.

Lilith hounded after him, swinging her twin weapons with flares of Agni. Each attack carried the power to raze small mountains and Tarnished Death deflected them with a scoff. He glided away and effortlessly halted a punch from one of the Agni Arms with his palm.

"[Veritable Sky,]" he voiced and his fingers dug into it with sparks of gold. "[Impel Goliath,]" he lashed out as if he was slapping away a fly and the Agni imploded.

Lilith coughed blood and widened her eyes, feeling as if her body had slammed into a wall at full speed. Her vision inverted and she found herself carving a new crater.

"Ugh--!" She punched the ground to push herself up right in time to dodge a large object; a scythe blade made of bones. It tore through the soil and killed all flowers on contact. She spun in the air, lime green energy swirling around her, and swung her sabers. She shot three distinct slashes of Agni: lightning, plasma, and fire.

They traveled the distance to their target with a rumble and merged. Tarnished Death raised his hand to stop it, but it exploded before he could even try. "...!" He trembled in surprise as the Agni opened a fissure in space. He quickly realized it wasn't an actual spatial breach. It was far closer to a summoning spell.

From the fissure, dark green fog gushed out, and with it came a haunting red mask with a crown of fire. Its eyes flashed blue and its mouth opened with the noise of crackling wood.

"[Dīpebhyaḥ Prārthayatu,]" a reverberant voice, sounding like it originated right down from the underworld, superimposed with Lilith's. Hundreds of hazy, ghost lamps formed around.

"[Pāritrāṇa Anuṣṭhānam.]"

Before Tarnished Death could react, the mask burst into a tide of unrelenting Agni, concentrating its three properties at once. Then, the lamps burned one after another in a chain reaction. In less than a second, a part of the Soul Sea and kilometers of land were shrouded in flames, haloed by plasma, and impaled with lightning.

But Lilith was not finished. She shuffled her arms in a symmetrical pattern and made the tips of her thumbs and middle fingers touch. "[Dhūmrita Prithvī.]"

The mayhem of Agni thundered once again, but instead of aggravating, it collapsed on itself and suddenly released all the power it contained outward in a literal tsunami of flames. It swept over the sea, over herself, Fray's island, and even more to the horizon.

Naturally, the Agni dispersed faster after spreading and Tarnished Death reemerged unscathed, as expected. But, somehow, he seemed apprehensive.

"...what are you doing?" He questioned.

Her spell was formidable, and although it couldn't harm him, he had been ready to praise the attempt. However, her decision to 'dilute' the attack, so to speak, was suspicious. She could have easily raised its power by doing the opposite instead.

Lilith only smiled in response, and on cue, the lights went out. Literally so.

Even Tarnished Death couldn't help but feel some dismay when the Soul Marble turned darker than night. It was too sudden, unexpected, and disorienting. Most importantly, one of the three pieces of his soul, 'Prasminta', was screaming out.

He hastily looked at the sky and stiffened.

The ten moons. They hadn't changed... but they were also all that he could see. The three stars that had been brightening this small world and, ominously, but peacefully radiating their power, were gone. Just like that.

There was no transition to speak of.

Faster than he could think about it; the light had disappeared as fast as itself. And the pitch-black expanse of darkness beyond the moons was akin to heresy. Forget the Mystic Stars; there were no distant stars at all.

The scintillating lighthouses that have guided life for eons were non-existent.

This was not a Sky.

Then, a new source of light was born and the Fiend snapped toward it. Rakna stood surrounded by tendrils of light. Like algae in water, they wriggled around him.

'No, that is not 'light',' Tarnished Death thought. 'It's pushing away the darkness... not illuminating it. It does not have color, substance, or potency. This is a pure... banisher of darkness.'

Rakna opened his eyes from deep concentration and his pupils swayed with the 'light'.

"[Nān...] (I Am...)."

"[Nambikaiyin Nakshatram] (The Star of Hope)."