Soul Venerable (Re-written)

 

 

“As expected of our Senior. He is simply the most murderous Magus of all time.” A man with short white hair that turned translucent around the edges muttered. His eyes had a texture of the endless starry skies, they locked onto a figure beyond the horizon. “I can’t believe the End War was halted by a single man… The Supreme Commander wouldn’t like this…”

“That’s why the Imperium dispatched us as vanguards, to support him or correct his wrongs.” a dark silhouette of a man, a lump of black smoke-like pixels, a distorted shadow, replied. 

Although they were conversing ‘casually’, they were actually working to the fullest. Their true bodies might not move a single muscle, but men of their caliber don't need to move their body to act.

“Well, it can’t be helped. This world is governed by a dragon god of time, after all… Subjugating this world is like playing a 5-dimensional chess against a soothsayer that could read minds.” The white-haired man squinted as the scene millions of kilometers away reflected on his eyes.

“Rank 6 time-path killer move, [Chronosphere]!” a golden-purple spherical boundary spread around from a three-headed dragon whose body length reached more than two hundred meters. The speed of which the Chronosphere spread is actually extremely slow. Well, it is actually spread in an instant since it moves in a time-stopped environment.

On the opposite side of the three headed dragon, there was a 20-meter tall humanoid mecha. The mecha was caught in the Chronosphere, but at that very instance, a time-stop countermeasure was activated, pulling the mecha from realspace into a higher dimension. Not bound by three-dimensional physics, the mecha quickly chases the dragon.

‘Tsk, Chronosphere is a brand new time-stop method that was activated for the first time since its inception, but that could not stop him?’ The three headed dragon tried to make some distance by accelerating, reaching at 300 times the speed of light, but the humanoid mecha simply used dimensional phase-shift to catch up. 

‘Fuck fuck fuck fuck!’ The three headed dragon continued to speed up to almost a thousand times faster than the speed of light by accelerating self’s timeflow, leaving a trail of shredded dimensional scar. After reaching the boundary of the Seas of Eternal Winters, the dimensional scars stopped appearing as space seemed to be reinforced. The originally ‘light’ air suddenly turned heavy as if she’s suddenly switched from swimming on river water into diamantine plates.

With this level of Dimensional Anchor, space had solidified too. Her accelerated self timeflow requires injection of timeforce from higher dimensions. Since she cannot get them, she slowed down to her original timeflow, barely reaching the speed of light. Naturally, the mecha couldn’t move in the 4th dimension as well, so he was ejected and forced to move through physical means. Although it is extremely fast, it is not as fast as the speed of light.

“Lord Limitless Heaven, Lord Distorted Shadow…” After reaching a certain location, the three-headed dragon bowed respectfully at the two figures floating above air. “Thank you for your assistance.”

“All fine.” Limitless Heaven, the white-haired man, waved his hands as if it wasn’t a big deal.

“You’re too slow.” Distorted Shadow, however, was on the opposite spectrum in terms of acceptance. “Go and be useful somewhere else for once. Trusting natives was a mistake.” He dissed the three-headed dragon as if she’s a bad dog.

“Now, now. There’s no need to be so hostile, we need to work together to defeat Senior Grimsong Specter.” Limitless Heaven glanced at the three-headed dragon, “Lord Paimon, we shouldn’t dally, every second is priceless so we should think up countermeasures for him.”

“Yes.” Paimon, the three headed dragon, nodded in acknowledgement. “Lord Limitless Heaven, do you know what might work against him?”

“Unfortunately, I do not. He has become a Sovereign before I was even born.” the man turned to Distorted Shadow. “Do you have an idea?”

“Both of you are imbeciles.” Distorted Shadow spat. “To stop him, we need either the Imperium’s Supreme Commander or the Emperor himself.”

Limitless Heaven touched his chin. “True. With my progress of constructing the Hyperlane halted, there’s no way the forces from Holy Terra could arrive in time.” He then shrugged. “Well, considering senior Grimsong Specter’s lethality, we wouldn’t be alive for another day anyway..”

“Lord Limitless Heaven, wouldn’t you be able to keep him away in a labyrinthian dimension?” Paimon asked.

“We’ve considered that, it is impossible.” Distorted Shadow replied in his stead.

“Ah, yes. We’ve thought of that, but Senior Grimsong Specter has killed the Armored Titan, Colossal Titan, The Shining, Multicast, Seven Spear, Bright Saint, Undying Juggernaut, Tri Arts, Void Seer, God Hand and many others… Well, basically every single sovereign with the exception of those from the Seas of Eternal Winters. We wouldn’t be able to stall him for long.”

“Ah, you’re right…” Paimon fell into despair. She was in an intense combat with him recently, making her forget the most frightening aspect of Mordred. “How can we beat the personification of death, then?”

There was no response from Limitless Heaven, but his figure flickered, his existence alternating between reality and unreality.

“Demiurge, is there something wrong?” Distorted Shadow suddenly shook Limitless Heaven’s shoulder, stabilizing his body in reality.

“What happened? Did you try to use clairvoyance on Grimsong Specter?” Paimon who sensed the instability in their timeflow raised a question, worriedly.

“Cough!” Limitless Heaven puked the content of his stomach, including pieces of his organs. “He got me, I’m done for...”

“Fuck.” Distorted Shadow took a deep look at the general direction where Grimsong Specter should be. Even without using an over-the-top investigative method, everyone here could sense that the world around Grimsong Specter is dying quite in a literal sense. The ice, soil, water, beasts, cities… everything that has been exposed to his radiation turned into black dust. “Demiurge, you knew my father had countermeasures against clairvoyance, why did you still do that?”

“Cough!” Limitless Heaven coughed pieces of his internal organs which are slowly turning into black dust. Even now, the veins within his pale body are starting to become visibly darker with purple hue. “We have a chance. I’ve just cracked the Dragon God of Time’s method of locking us in this timeline, our original plan might work, we just need to delay him. Lord Paimon, your slave should be able to help you proceed to the next step. Our chances now lie solely in your hands.” He extracted a lump of telepathic thoughts and sent it into Paimon.

Paimon’s three dragon heads reveal a complicated expression while accepting the telepathic thoughts. Eventually, her expression changed into grim determination. “Alright. Lord Limitless Heaven and Lord Distorted Shadow, I'll accomplish your task without fail.” She went headfirst towards the frozen ice at light speed.

The two did not need to converse to know each other’s thoughts. They were prepared to sacrifice themselves to begin with.

“Father once said that the heavens had a natural cycle of reincarnation. Do you believe him?” Distorted Shadow suddenly inquired.

Both of them felt the mecha’s movement in the distance stopped. For some reason, Grimsong Specter was taking out corpses of giant-class beasts which can only be found in the Land of Sand and Fire. Lightning quickly enveloped the corpses which were high in metallic content.

“Why are you asking dumb question. Whether or not the cycle of reincarnation exists in this universe, it doesn’t matter because once we are killed under Senior’s hand, we wouldn’t be able to use any of our death-mitigation methods.” Limitless Heaven replied while barely suppressing the corrosion that he suffered. Even now, his left eye has already melted into black blood.

“True.” Distorted Shadow sighed. “My last moment is wasted on you. Do you know what that is?”

After taking the gigantic corpse of a beast, countless prismatic appendages are spreading, from the mecha stabbing the corpses in some areas. Then, black swarms of human head-sized bots were taken out as it started gnawing and modifying the corpse, some were heating the bones, some were pulling, cutting and froze muscle tendons, whereas some of the bots were modifying itself into bones, muscle, or veins.

“Wait, the corpse looks familiar. No, it can’t be….That is the corpse… of Colossal Titan…” Limitless Heaven was shocked.

“No way, is he refining a Gigafortress Frame from Colossal Titan’s corpse? Fuck, even the Supreme Commander is still at the experimental stage of developing one. Demiurge, I’ll try to delay father.” The lump of shadow heaved a sigh of defeat while looking at the gigantic silhouette of a 20-meter tall Mecha slowly wearing the gigantic corpse as a suit the size of mountain ranges. 

“Hey old man, don’t you know that uncle has been worried sick? You should've at least sent a message regularly…” He roared at Grimsong Specter. “Rank 6 compound killer move, [Grimsong Specter: Yang Pass Tune]!”

With a flash, Distorted Shadow’s figure slowly transfigured from a lump of misty black pixels into soundwaves, but Limitless Heaven knew he wouldn't be returning back, ever. “Master of mankind, the Emperor of Man, grant me strength to endure this predicament…” Limitless Heaven started praying while in the distance, the mecha is being disturbed by a distorted shadow. “Rank 6 compound killer move, [Nine Layered Heaven]!”

After the activation of Limitless Heaven’s signature killer move, the space between him and the mecha suddenly stretched by a factor of ^9. 1 cm of space would be equivalent to a trillion kilometers. Even if Grimsong Specter can move hundreds of times faster than the speed of light, it’ll take a while for him to arrive at Limitless Heaven. In a sense, Limitless Heaven is best at stalling as the distance between them is… limitless.

….

A three headed dragon reached the deepest location of the Deep Sea Abyss. 

Within these waters, the pressure is so extreme that rank 6 beings would have problems resisting it for a long period of time if they did not activate defensive methods, yet, there’s a floating fortress hidden within the deepest part of the ocean. This Floating Fortress was barely able to resist the pressure, but when Paimon’s radiation put on another layer of pressure, there were signs of its shield flickering.

“Lord Paimon, please retract your radiation!” A telepathic message was broadcasted.

“Stukov, have you finished opening up the portal?” Paimon ignored Stukov’s plead.

“Almost…” Stukov reported the truth. “The Dragon God of Time’s blockade still exist, Lord Limitless Heaven’s method is truly miraculous, but insufficient.”

Paimon frowned as the truth was different compared to what Lord Limitless Heaven had said, but that did stop her. “Then, let me break it.” Her dragon claws took out a wisp of black mist from her dimensional storage.

Sensing the dangerous particles that Paimon took out, Stukov raised a question. “My Lord, what’s that? The moment you take it out, the sensors in my Floating Fortress are giving off warnings.”

Paimon raised his eyebrows, this time of amazement. “Twelve grams of rank 6 material known as Grimsong Specter’s truesoul. I’ve barely procured it during my skirmish with him. His truesoul is the most destructive substance across the Boundless Astral Realm.”

Ignoring Stukov’s next words, Paimon used Grimsong Specter’s truesoul as a spell resource to obliterate the time seal.

Crack! A broken glass-like crack appeared in reality. 

Before Paimon was able to widen the passage so that it’ll allow her giant body through, the Deep Sea Abyss waters which had an ambient temperature of negative ten thousand degree celsius suddenly turned boiling after a distant shockwave. 

“That shouldn’t be possible… Lord Limitless Heaven and Lord Distorted Shadow are killed so soon?” Paimon shuddered. “They are the vanguard sent by the Magi of Holy Terra, how is this even possible? Fuck this, I can’t delay anymore.” 

Paimon quickly decapitates his primary head, his dragon body stuffed the decapitated head into the crack in spacetime before the crack self heals as she was truly at wit's end. The moment the crack completely heals, there is a black wave-force artillery projectile that hits Stukov’s floating fortress. 

Stukov’s Floating Fortress is enveloped by a layer of non-newtonian fluid that would dissipate vibration-based attack. Furthermore, its layered shield system is designed to further boost resistance against vibration-attack. Yet, the offensive power of the wave-force artillery was beyond what the dimensional laws of Morgen World could accommodate. The floating fortress was completely reduced into black cosmic dust, whereas dimensional scars lingered after the attack and almost a tenth of the waters of the Seas of Eternal Winters had evaporated from that attack, clearing the deep sea abyss from water and ice. 

From the looks of it, the world would require thousands of years to completely heal itself.

Then, a broken mecha appeared from the path of dimensional scars. The mecha’s cockpit which was located on its head has already been breached. On the pilot’s seat, there was a humanoid mechanical figure whose chest had been pierced by a glass shard which was refusing to disintegrate despite being constantly exposed to Grimsong Specter’s radiation. Naturally, there are countless glass shards that decorated the broken mecha, with some broken organic matter from gigantic lifeforms constantly producing smoke-like black pixels. 

“Takemikazuchi Nanashiki, the MEKA that shouldn’t exist in this timeline.” Paimon’s remaining two heads cursed. “The Dragon God of Time has truly schemed well…”

“Limitless Heaven’s [Dimenström] or Distorted Shadow’s [Shift+Delete] couldn’t stop me. You’re finished.” Grimsong Specter did not immediately kill her because she lacked the lethality to kill him, even if he’s currently wounded.

Nevertheless, Paimon would like to delay to the best of her abilities. “[Chronosphere]!”

Grimsong Specter shook his head. At the same time, he activated his own killer move. “[Instant Sword]!”

There was a gap in spacetime. In the eyes of mortals, the two-headed dragon is suddenly shredded into cosmic dust, but the event is not so simple to those with extradimensional perception of time.

That instance of time is stretched into a longer period where Grimsong Specter was able to slice Paimon’s large body with a sword of AT-Field. Naturally, Paimon’s body is extremely dense as she was able to move at the speed of light without breaking, but Grimsong Specter’s offensive power couldn’t be resisted by the natural laws of Morgen World. How can Paimon who’s not even a rank 7 existence resist it?

Now that the obstruction is gone, Grimsong Specter simply used his mecha’s broken hand to stab at the location where a River of Time’s was forcefully opened by Paimon. Leaving the mecha to open up the passage, Grimsong Specter dived headfirst towards the river of time with his mortal shell.

Flying above the golden river water, Grimsong Specter was surprised there wasn’t any trap within the River of Time. Instead, there was a huge dragon head which was submerged, slowly dissolved into golden particles, being assimilated with the river water of the River of Time. “You are… too late.” A four-winged succubus sat on top of the dragon’s head with a pleasant smile on her face. She too, has begun dissolving into golden river water.

“Paimon, how are you able to break Lemegeton’s contract?” Grimsong Specter muttered, simply watching the dragon’s figure slowly being dissolved away by the time water. It is impossible to stop Paimon since touching the time water would let it corrode Grimsong Specter’s mortal shell. With Limitless Heaven’s method ‘locking’ Grimsong Specter in this mortal shell with the ‘glass shard’, having his current body dissolved in river water is no different than suicide, similiar to what Paimon is doing right now.

Using time-path methods in the River of Time would be very wise, but Mordred would be weaker compared to Paimon in terms of attainment. It might bring him more harm than good, especially since the effect of time-path methods is amplified greatly.

“Mordred, you were too smart for your own good. All the other 71 Demons in Lemegeton are already my slaves, even that condescending Baal and Asmodeus.” She shook her head when memories regarding the two Demon Kings resurfaced. “With additional rank 5 epic slaves that I procured from Morgen World, I used [108 Sacrificial Slaves] to break your contract.” Paimon felt there’s no more things she needed to explain to Mordred. 

“Heheh, to think the Morgen World’s 5th Generation Braves only consist of 1 Hero without any assisting Braves. I’m interested in how the Human Imperium will fare against Grimsong Specter the Hero… I heard the Myriad Overlord is the Supreme Commander of the Human Imperium which was also your big brother. It’s too bad that I can’t see how he, a commander-type Sovereign, will win against you, an assassin-type Sovereign, with my own eyes… In any case, this timeline is already broken.” was her last words before her true body, which was the succubus, completely melted into the river of time. Flashes of light, though, were visibly swimming upstream of the golden river of time.

“Hmmph.” Grimsong Specter scoffed, he knew he had failed his objective. He threw the responsibility at the Dragon God of Time’s countermeasure to hunt Paimon’s telepathic will in the river of time.