Soul Venerable (Re-written)

 

As a [Great World], Morgen World could sustain a large amount of intellectual lifeforms. In the Land of Autumn Rain, there are four super-factions equal in strength with the Hartina Kingdom,  just the kingdom alone possessed roughly 10 billion population of intellectual races, and that does not include the countless number of smaller dimensions under the control of the Nine Master Clans.

Through the faith of these mortals, the divines could survive and thrive.

However, the relationship between gods isn't all rainbows and sunshine.

Despite their numbers, mortals are limited through various metrics such as lifespan, territory, or others. Since the amount of power gods could receive is dependent on the number of mortals pledging their faith, the contest for believers is an unending competition between the divines. Without believers to provide faith, gods would lost their source of divine grace and without them, gods could not give blessing to their believers.

Since the Morgen world is vast and harbors complex biomes with all sorts of unique environmental traits, there are all sorts of deities who attach themselves to various divine concepts.

For example, there are the God of Freezing Desert, Goddess of Unfettered Skies, the Goddess of Deep Sea Wanderers, and many others. The believers of these deities who bound themselves with environmental concepts are scattered depending on the terrain itself. A god whose divine concepts related to the deep sea almost has no believer in the Land of Sand and Fire, or a goddess whose divine concepts tied to the sun has a severe lack of believers in the underwater cities of the Seas of Eternal Winters. 

This case would be worse for racial gods, so on and so forth.

That being said, the concept of belief is actually a trade. Mortals pledge their faith towards a divine, while the divines grants a certain amount of benefit to the mortals. Needless to say, the mortals are the one who get the shorter end of the stick.   

The most powerful gods in Morgen World are no doubt the Twelve Main Divines who have occupied the central continent and have their own pantheons consisting of several subordinate gods, but that does not mean they are the only gods in this world. 

“Dear Goddess of the Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter in the shallow reefs, the Mistress of the Silversong Mermaid… I implore you to heed this humble one’s prayers…” A 170-centimeter-tall woman with back-length silver-gray hair prayed on her knees in an underground room. Her face excludes a mature charm that would enchant males, her blood red eyes and unhealthy pale skin tone is eye-catching. 

If there’s a special feature on this woman’s body, it would be the three gills-like stripes underneath her ears and the grayish hue that started from her thighs and armpits which become darker towards the edge of her limbs. 

Her gray-silver religious apparel was more like a swimsuit, it wrapped her body tightly like a second skin and highlighted her bountiful chest, slim waist and soft buttocks. She’s also wearing a leather collar on her neck as if she wanted to elaborate that she's a pet of someone. If not for the silver loose robe that wrapped her shoulder like a cape, she would be revered as a pervert.

“Dear Goddess of the Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter in the shallow reefs, the Mistress of the Silversong Mermaid… I implore you to heed this humble one’s prayers…” The woman repeated her prayers once more. Despite doing so for half a day without replies, her fervor does not get extinguished nor strengthened. Her words are constant, her emotion stable.

“Dear goddess of the Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter in the shallow reefs, the Mistress of the Silversong Mermaid… I implore you to heed this humble one’s prayers…” She prayed but she got interrupted by the giant wolf sleeping behind to her.

This wolf has smooth silvery-gray fur. If it stood on its four legs, the wolf would be around 2.5 meter tall, having a body length of over 4 meter. The wolf has hairless shark fins on its back and sides, it also has a shark tail, and fangs. If not for the four muscular wolf legs, this creature could be considered as a land-shark. 

“Yawn…” The wolf rudely yawned, revealing the four rows of shark teeth and interrupting the woman’s prayer. “You’re not putting your effort. No wonder she’s not listening to your prayers.” The wolf spoke.

The woman frowned. “Let me do my work.”

“We’re not getting anywhere. Let’s just use that.” The wolf replied.

The woman shrugs. “Your call.” She took out several precious ratman lord organs and put them on top of an elevated rock. It was a makeshift sacrificial altar that wouldn’t look good in the face of deities, but nobody cares about getting on the deity’s good side. The two only wanted to make contact with the goddess.

“Dear Goddess of the Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter in the shallow reefs, the Mistress of the Silversong Mermaid… I implore you to receive this humble one’s sacrifice…” The woman prayed once more. 

With tangible benefit being offered, the goddess’ attention soon descended upon this small underground chamber. Silver-gray divine light enveloped the room as a divine will of a woman appeared. 

The goddess’ apparition was pale. Her skin was almost transparent, the veins flowing with silvery ichor are almost visible from the naked eye. The goddess wore almost the same outfit as the woman who prays for her, but there's a significant difference in terms of charm and quality. Unlike the woman, the goddess’ apparel was adorned with jewels, corals and shellfish of pastel pink and blue hue. Her face was also enshrouded under a silver veil, but even then, her visible pink lips are enough to elaborate her heavenly beauty.

Her exposed thighs and limbs have silver fish scales on them, proof that the goddess is not a human deity.

“Mortal, speak of your name!” The goddess’ voice contains some types of laws. Mortals who heard her voice would be charmed and reduced to slaves. 

Yet, the woman is no ordinary mortal. She was a former Demon King of Grand Strategy, Paimon! 

“Your grace, this humble one is Lazareva Larissa Agatha… I am thankful for being bathed in the presence of your divine will...” Paimon, or in this case, Larissa Agatha, kowtowed. 

“Larissa Agatha?” The goddess frowned as she repeated her name. “You’re that devil's pet?”

Larissa Agatha raised her head, “Your grace, I think the one you’re looking for would be this guy right here…” She pointed at the sleeping wolf behind her.

“Larissa you dumbfuck.” a small voice could be heard from the wolf as the goddess put her attention on the wolf.

Then, the wolf’s back opened up, ejecting a 1.8 meter tall human with heterochromia eyes. His right eye is purple while the left one is gold. 

“Pale Hunter, do you remember our contact?” Mordred sighed as he struck a conversation with the goddess’ divine will.

“Hahah.” The Goddess of Shallow Waters grinned as she immediately recognized him. “O’ Great Archmage Mordred, you’ve been reduced into this weakling…” As she finished her words, her presence in the room seemed to be more tangible. To Mordred, it was obvious that Pale Hunter’s true body is funnelling her attention into this location. As a result, the divine pressure that her divine will passively emits becomes even stronger. “If any other gods were to know their prey, the Devil King, is here, how would they react?”

If mortals were present, they would involuntarily kowtow no matter what. Otherwise, their body would break.      

“Larissa Agatha, this one’s on you.” Mordred sharply reprimanded with his gaze, there’s no need for a shrink to tell his mood has taken a sharp turn. “Pale Hunter, cease with your jest.”

“Oh…” the goddess smirk started to become smug. “With your current power, you can’t even resist if I took you into my Divine Kingdom. What do you say? Shall we take a trip? There are so many things to see there. Your last visit was ages ago, you’ll be surprised how things have changed throughout the ages.”  

“Surely you’ve forgiven my past self’s transgression upon your beautiful Divine kingdom. I’m sure you have a wonderful forest of coral reefs, I have compensated you with one rank 5 Mordred Replicant completely bound to your beck and call. Please forgive me.” Mordred pleaded. There’s no way Pale Hunter would allow him to return to the material world once he got dragged into her divine kingdom, that’s for sure.

“Your replicant is extremely helpful but there’s one thing that he absolutely cannot do…” Pale Hunter, the Goddess of Shallow Waters rebuked.

“Pale Hunter, cease with your impatience. I have stated previously that I can only do my part of the bargain after I become a Paragon! You absolutely know why yourself, don’t ask for the impossible.” Mordred stood his ground.

“Heh.” Pale Hunter scoffed. “You also know why I’m being like this, don’t you?” Her divine will becomes more tangible than before. Without a shred of doubt, her true body’s attention has been focused on this chamber. If not for [Divine Descent] taking a heavy toll on her, she would’ve already done that. 

“My karma, is it?” Mordred sighed.

“Correct. Your bad luck was so bad that it affected my mermaid kingdom!” Pale Hunter used a tone as if she was complaining to a mortal. “What are you going to pay to compensate for your bad luck? My cute mermaids are being slaughtered in the shallow waters…” 

“Don’t play cute. I’ll think of something.” Mordred sighed as he felt the phantom migraine. “How about I give you a mobilization code for Galatreon? This code can be used for requisitioning a squad of my Schutzstaffel, that should allow you to last until I become a Paragon.” He produced a telepathic will and passed it to her.

“Really?” Pale Hunter’s veiled eyes seemed to gleam in expectation as she received them. The Schutzstaffel is the Great Archmage’s personal guard, it was revered to as the most powerful military power in Galatreon despite their extremely low number. 

“Don’t ask for too much. A squad consists of an Epic captain and four Paragon subordinates that cover each other’s weakness, so that’s what you get. I can’t stress this enough to everyone involved, their resource expenditure rate is extremely high, so you have to provide what they need and no matter what happens, do.not.let.them.die!” Mordred emphasizes in his last sentence. “They are worth far more than a Dragon Knight of the Sacred Alliance!”

Pale Hunter’s eyes twitched as she heard the price of grooming them are far more expensive than a Dragon Knight. “Dragons took ages to grow and you say a squad of your Shcutzstaffel is worth more than that?” 

“Yes! Each of them is the source of my endless night without sleep!”

The Sacred Alliance’s Dragon Knights have two core components: the dragon, and the knight. Not only they rode on Immemorial Dragon, the Knight too, is a rank 6 Sovereign. 

Yet, those two rank 6s are cheaper than a squad consisting one rank 5 and four rank 4? It was almost unbelievable since rank 6 Sovereigns are the cream of the crop of any world or civilization.

However, Pale Hunter did not rebuke it. “Hearing you say that made me feel at ease. At the very least, the giant-class Ancient Beast in my territory can be chased away.”

“As it should be.” Mordred nodded. Ancient beasts are rank 5, but it wouldn’t be a problem since the Schutzstaffel are allowed to bring out a MEKA. “This would undoubtedly raise suspicions of the Sacred Alliance but you can smear my name with whatever you’d like, I don’t care.”

“Understood.” Pale Hunter nodded. “Then, about your pet Larissa Agatha…”

Mordred glanced at the silver haired woman who’s still kneeling in prayer. “I want you to make her a rank 1 hunter-priestess of your church. Please give her the necessary blessing required to take on your church’s class.”

“Hunter-priestess? Is that enough for your endeavour? The contract stated that I should grant her enough divine grace equivalent to the Divine Envoy if you so like it…”

“NO!” Mordred rejected with a tinge of panic. “Pale Hunter, if the believers in your territory got word of Larissa Agatha’s presence, they would send a hunting party even if we flee to the Land of Sand and Fire!”

The Goddess of Shallow Waters is a mermaid goddess. In her religion, mermaids have more status and prestige than other races. Obviously, they would riot if a non-mermaid become a Divine Envoy. Even if she forcefully give an oracle to the current rulers of the church, she has to consider the feelings of the mermaids. Otherwise, their faith would waver and it would be detrimental to her own foundation.  

“True…” Pale Hunter touched her chin. “Alright, she can freely use any blessings. But you have to periodically give me offerings since she does not provide me with faith.” While she converses with Mordred, Larissa Agatha is bathed in silvery divine light. The process of ‘class transition’ into a hunter-priestess of the Church of Shallow Waters has begun.

“Dear goddess of the Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter in the shallow reefs, the Mistress of the Silversong Mermaid… This one would serve you for all eternity. I shall sing words of your kindness and beauty so that all races adore you…” 

“Don’t listen to her crap, she has a knack for kissing buttholes.” Mordred interrupted Larissa Agatha’s ass-kissing praise, “Pale Hunter, while you bless her with divine grace, I want to ask you two things.”  Mordred’s expression turned serious. “The first, have Lamost plundered my Archmage Tower True Inheritance?”

“So you’re worried about that.” Pale Hunter paused as she pondered. 

It was understandable why Mordred would ask that.

As mages advance their cultivation, the scope of their research would increase too. Thus, it is inevitable that they construct a Mage Tower so they do not stagnate. After all, there are myriads of phenomena in the universe that couldn’t be observed with the naked eye alone, to incorporate them into spells would require far more than mere pondering. If one wanted to experiment on them, there was a need to construct the necessary facilities, so a mage’s might and wealth could sometimes be represented by whether or not they possessed a Mage Tower. 

Typically, a Legendary mage would construct a Mage Tower as Protogenic Ascension, which was the requirement to ascend into a rank 4 Paragon, requires deep research in certain fields. 

Before the fortress-city Galatreon was constructed on the extreme south, Mordred’s Archmage Tower was erected in the central continent, deep within the heart of the Sacred Alliance’s territory. It contains the most advanced facilities for manufacturing cybernetic puppets (golem) and artifacts. The construction site of the Floating Fortress Alistair and also one of the best astral observatory in Morgen World is also located there. Thus, it was natural that the current Mordred had some worries regarding its capture.

Needless to say, his Archmage Tower was well defended, its interior laced with traps and countless defense mechanisms, but even with the presence of a Sovereign manning the defenses, if it does not receive reinforcement, then the fall of Archmage Tower would be a given. The question is not whether it would fall, but ‘when’.

“You’re just in time!” Pale Hunter began elaborating the situation, “The 4th generation hero, Lamost, captured it a week ago. Last time I heard from other deities, the Sacred Alliance has deciphered rank 3 cybernetic puppets designs and below. Their next target would be rank 4 puppets, but even I wouldn’t believe that you did not have some kind of contingencies, right?”

“Phew.” Mordred exhaled a sigh of relief. “It seems like Karax Richtofen’s successor made it in time. Yes, it is as you said, the countermeasure would be Scorched Earth Protocol. With this, there’s no way they can mass produce rank 4 puppets for invading Galatreon…”

Considering that it took more than two years (counted from the day the ‘Great Archmage’ had been slain) for Lamost to subjugate it, it could be said that the Archmage Tower defenses wasn’t merely paper tiger. The inheritor of Karax Richtofen was also doing a great job in initiating Scorched Earth Protocol before the high-rank golem schematics were leaked. 

“What’s the second thing you want to ask?” Pale Hunter inquired.

Mordred quickly recalled his focus. “Have you heard anything from the Land of Eternal Springs? Specifically, any large movement regarding the Dead World Tree?”

There used to be a World Tree whose height pierced the high heavens. The tree was truly a magnificent lifeform, perhaps the only rank 7 life that could exist in the material world. 

However, three thousand years ago, the Undead Calamity occurred. 

Just as Demon King Maximilian breached the dimensional walls of the southern continent, the Grim Reaper broke in from the northern continent, deep within the territory of the elves. In that era, extreme-AoE forbidden spells have yet to be invented just like today. Even if there’s someone who had the power to freeze or terraform a chunk of a continent like how Mordred did with the Extreme South, it would take them a long time to activate them. 

The Grim Reaper was also highly intelligent, thus it is inevitable that the Land of Eternal Springs lost its most revered lifeform, the World Tree. Due to this, the elves had an obsession to eradicate undeads, but things are not that simple.

There were records about the Dead World Tree almost being used as material to refine an undead by the Grim Reaper, but no concrete evidence has been unearthed even now. The corpse of the Dead World Tree still remains within the elves’ territory which has now become a forbidden ground. With the exception of Superior Elven races, nobody is allowed to get close so gaining intel regarding it is beyond difficult.

“Why are you interested in the Dead World Tree?” Pale Hunter asked back.

“I just want to know the general movement of those elves.” Mordred brushed it aside.   

Pale Hunter wasn’t an idiot, she knew she was being brushed aside, but it’s not like she had the intel Mordred was aiming for in the first place. As stated before, getting intel from that location is beyond difficult. “There’s no way the elven gods would leak their secrets. Even the high-gods of the Twelve Main Divine wouldn’t be able to easily siphon information, what makes you think a low-goddess like me could do it?”

“As expected.” Mordred did not expect anything in the first place, so he wasn’t disappointed. “Then, that’s it, you should lift your divine will, we don’t want any other gods sensing your actions.” Mordred used his hand shooing the goddess’ divine will. 

Most Sovereigns wouldn't dare do so, but Mordred has a special relationship with the Goddess of Shallow Waters, she wasn’t offended in the slightest.

“I was thinking the same thing… but didn’t you just refine something new again?” Pale Hunter’s attention now focused on Lupusrazor.

“I’ll send some schematics as an offering later, shoo!” Mordred rudely shooed her away. His concern was real as the descent of divine will would leave out traces.

“Don’t be hasty, keep in mind that my divine concepts also include hunting. I’ll use some miracle to wipe the karmic traces away. I’m interested in your artifact because recently, 'Machine God' Oppenheimer received an offering from one of his tech-priests…”

“Oh, that was my fault…” Mordred recalled his little antics with some kid whose name is Klauss a while ago. He helped Klauss design a magic machinery weapon which boosted its development in Kaiserreich due to its efficient design. “You wanted weapon schematics?”

“No.” Pale Hunter immediately denies. “Even if you give me your most precious MEKA blueprints, there is no mermaid talented enough in this world to refine them for me. I want you to personally do it!”

“No way, I’m busy. The Schutzstaffel squad will include every clansman in Galatreon, there must be one Richtofen clansman among them; they can refine artifacts for your mermaids and erect fortresses for defense.” Mordred also instantly rejected her proposal. 

The goddess’ divine will acted as if she does not hear his denial as she produced images of various artifacts used in the war with Demon King Maximillian. 

Seeing her being adamant, Mordred sighed. This is why he doesn’t want to connect with his deity allies this soon. Almost every single one of them views him as a factory who can keep on pumping artifacts. “Fine, I’ll refine 1 arifact per month of my choosing as payment for Larissa Agatha’s blessings. You can request what type I will refine, but since the materials will come from me, I’ll have the final say. If you don’t accept this term, you won’t get any.” 

“Okay, I want that one!” Pale Hunter immediately pointed at Lupusrazor.

“No, it’s not finished yet and I’m using it for my mission.” 

“Come on… please? I appraised it just then, did you take some inspiration from Fenris Wolf Brood? That armor is an amphibious assault armor designed not only to swim in most types of waters, but also low to medium density earth and ice! With slight alterations to accommodate mermaids, my champion would dominate the shallow waters…” Pale Hunter paused, “Wait, you’re not finished yet? Are you intending to make a Soul Armament out of that?”

“Nosy. Shoo, go away!” Mordred rudely chased her away, but there’s no way he can do that. Even if she’s considered weak compared to other deities, she’s still a goddess. Unless she consented, Pale Hunter can stay no matter what.

“Fine, I’ll give your little pet Larissa Agatha a bit more benefit. In exchange… I’ll wait for the Soul Armament that you’re going to offer!” Pale Hunter’s divine presence becomes lighter. Soon, her divine will crumbles into motes of light as her true body recalls them into her Divine Kingdom. The ratman lord organs also disappeared as it was taken as an offering. 

“Now I have to refine a Soul Armament for her church, Troublesome.” Mordred complained, then set his gaze at Larissa Agatha whose body now emits a sliver of Pale Hunter’s divine charm. She became even more beautiful after transitioning into a Church of Shallow Waters’ hunter-priestess. 

Despite being the Goddess of Shallow Waters, Pale Hunter's divine concepts are related to not only the shallow waters, but also snow-and-ice, hunting, and the mermaid race. Since there’s no mermaid with ugly appearance, then it is inevitable that she would also be praised as a goddess of beauty. But then again, the true goddess of beauty was an elven deity, so Pale Hunter did not want to expand her divine concept into that direction in fear of offending the said elven goddess.  

“Did you realized how you fucked up just now? By revealing my presence to Pale Hunter, our karma becomes even more intertwined! I have to dispatch a squad of Schutzstaffel which would reduce the security of Galatreon, exposing them into danger!” He scolded.

Larissa Agatha blinked her crimson eyes innocently. “Does that mean… you’re going to punish me?” 

Something is rising within Mordred, and it’s not anger.