Above Your Head

Vol 2. 43: Heroes Fade Like Flowers While Gods Burn Brightly (4)

Vol 2. Chapter 43: Heroes Fade Like Flowers While Gods Burn Brightly (4)

Kaaang!!

A heavy metallic sound resounded. The tip of a blade was held in front of my face, quivering ever so slightly. I had been murmuring to myself in boredom when the assailant tried his luck. It was a dangerous situation, but I didn’t even blink an eye.

“Ugh… Kuughh. You. Ugh, Kuugh.”

The warrior spoke while violently coughing up blood. He had the appearance of a hedgehog with dozens of metal spikes sticking out of him. His thundering sword had been fierce indeed, but his skills, even though he was nearing a completer, had been insufficient to avoid all the soaring metals.

Taak!

Pushakkk!

When I moved my fingers, the iron skewers burst through the bodies, and the penetrated bodies also burst like bubbles.

“You monster! Ugh! My sword…!”

“Dammit! Get rid of all the weapons on the floor! At this pace…!”

Even without the help of Ares, the spirit of metal and lightning, I wielded vast powers over the elements. Just like a mutant with a superpower from a movie, I bestowed all the metals around me with a powerful force and flexibility.

Kwaaakkk! Thud thuck! Splat!

Blood splashed. Flesh cracked and bones broke. The numerous armaments littered around the battlefield became my instruments to slaughter all the ability users of the Zhu Family.

I walked.

Some tried to run while others charged towards me. But they were all stabbed and cut down by their own weapons, as well as random, ownerless equipment. Some enemies tried to crush me with their bodies from above, but a semi-spherical barrier of metal surrounded my body and blocked them like an umbrella.

Blood rained at every step.

Flesh poured down with my every other step.

I hadn’t walked too far yet. I had only reached Gwanghwamun Gate.

Rumble!

A hand made of metal caused a mountain of bodies to collapse with a little push. Without blinking an eye, I jumped over them and exited Gyeongbokgung Palace.

“…The devil.”

“How vicious…”

I could see the warriors of the Zhu Family turn deathly white. The ones who had been rushing toward me were now slowly retreating. Despite having killed so many of them, tens of thousands of ability users were still alive and kicking.

“You, you bastard. You.”

I turned my head. The Fist Emperor was staring at me with a look of disbelief. His right arm was lacerated, his insides were muddy, and his armor was colored with blood.

“What kind of power did you accept? Even though the Ghost Blade wielded the energy of the Heavenly Killing Star, it wasn’t to this degree…”

He looked terrible, but it was quite impressive. Even though he had been subjected to my attack at the beginning of the slaughter, he was still alive. It proved that he was one of the strongest people of Earth.

I looked back at him. With my brother dead, he was the strongest human in this place. But his pathetic wriggling only aroused my hatred.

“Do not speak nonsense, insect. No one can defy the heavens. Even you, who summoned that feeble evil spirit.”

“…..”

I turned my head from him and looked at the insects.

In fact, this was a needless battle. As soon as the Fist Emperor summoned the evil spirit by sacrificing his allies, the Zhu Family’s state of alliance was virtually broken. What kind of madman would fight for an alliance that was sacrificing them? Needless to say, the sacrifice hadn’t been agreed upon previously. It wasn’t as if a few troops were sacrificed as a part of a deal, but rather, he had killed enough people to cripple several organizations.

Even if I had not come forward, the Zhu Family’s forces would have collapsed on their own. An internal strife would arise, and the soldiers would start killing themselves. The only reason they were still fighting together, even though they didn’t trust each other, was the result of a sudden appearance of a powerful enemy.

Thuckk!

As my mind wandered here and there, my vision darkened with sudden pain.

Thud!

My body was collapsing.

Thud thud thuck. Clang!

The arsenal of weapons flying in the sky fell to the ground like rain.

“I, I got him!”

“What? Really?”

“Did you really?”

The soldiers of the Zhu Family took on elated expressions as they saw me collapse helplessly.

Crack! Thud!

In an instant, the Fist Emperor rushed towards me like lightning. He trampled on my body, then cut off my arms and legs before decapitating me. Everyone was looking at him with blank expressions, but I knew why he had done so. He didn’t believe that I was completely dead, so he was making sure.

But.

I wouldn’t die because of such things.

Schururuk!! Kireekkk!

“Keugh!?”

The Fist Emperor had even burst my heart into pieces with his fist. But now, he was groaning. A silver hand of metal was holding him by the throat. He struggled with overwhelming force, but the metal fist was made up of hundreds and thousands of metals. It did not budge.

Title: Disaster of Mankind’s effect is activated!

Resurrecting!

My severed limbs and head flew back to their original places and my heart was instantly restored. It was as if time was flowing backwards. I stood in place with my two feet planted on the ground, then picked up a small bullet.

“There really was a bullet made from wood.”

I burst out into laughter of disbelief as I looked down at the magic bullet. When I had been hit on the head by a metal bullet earlier, I thought that I could die if it had been made of stone or wood instead. But now, it had come to fruition, and I had died without ever having taken measures to protect myself. However, it was not carelessness, but rather an extreme sense of complacency.

But arrogance that could bestow such complacency was the privilege of the strong.

“This is insane… Resurrection? He resurrected?”

The Fist Emperor was looking at me with an incredulous look. I stared back. I didn’t feel the need to explain nor mock him.

“Insect.”

Crack!

Along with my short evaluation, he fell to the floor with a broken neck.

“…..”

“…..”

Gwanghwamun Square became filled with silence. It was filled with tens of thousands of troops from the Zhu Family as well as the forces of the Lee Family who had followed me through Gwangwahum Gate. All of them were staring at me with their mouths agape.

“I command in the name of Kwan Dae-ha.”

I drew my spiritual power. I no longer had the Divine Spirit. I could not utilize an Almighty Decree of God to gain absolute command over the machines with souls, the mecha tribe, nor could I exercise the omniscient authority to read the world itself.

But even so, I was still me.

“Running away.”

And it wasn’t as if my strong spiritual power had disappeared.

“Is now forbidden.”

The commanding words fell like lightning and destroyed dozens of spells and magics. All means of movement, such as emergency escape, teleport, and reverse transition, were now nullified.

“Keugh! My astral body has been canceled!”

“My stealth!?”

“My spells aren’t working!”

“Lies! There is no way we can’t move to the surface world or into a temporary channel!”

The ability users screamed at the strange phenomenon. All of their emergency escape routes had been compromised. Some started to sprint without looking back. If magical means were blocked, they could just run away on their feet.

Gold giants descended to the ground and blocked the paths of those who were trying to run away.

“What, what is this? Ro, robot?”

“There’s a giant here, too. Damn it! They’re blocking the retreat!”

“What is this? A fighter plane? Why are there fighter planes in the parallel world?”

Ten units of Golden Knights with the power of human-rank gigas, 50 units of the Golden Lion Unit with the power of beast-rank gigas, 100 units belonging to the R7 Flight Squadron. They dispersed throughout the battlefield and prevented anyone from escaping.

Booom!

A bombardment of magic started to pour toward me. Without any remaining stacks of resurrections, it was a dangerous attack, but.

“Ares.”

Boom!

Like magic, a silver giant landed next to me. The magic bombing disappeared without a trace, just like a stone thrown into a pond. The attacks weren’t able to even reach Ares’ shields – his transcendental level of resistance had scattered the mana.

Obviously, everyone became completely shocked at the sudden appearance of Ares. They shook their heads and rubbed their eyes as if they could not believe their eyes.

“What is that!? What in the bloody world is that!? How could there be a soul soldier of that size!?”

“That’s no soul soldier! That’s just a machine! Is Rockefeller intervening in the matter?”

“But it can’t be a mere machine or a robot. Something is different…”

Even without the Status of God that Ares was emitting, his appearance was truly overwhelming. The 6.5-meter tall statue of Admiral Yi Sun-shin, or rather, the magic golem Sun-shin, was like a small child next to Ares, a 30-meter-tall armored giant. Moreover, his armor and movements reflected the incredible technologies of the Kendler Tribe, a peak Type IV Civilization. Even those who were ignorant of science could not help but feel awe at the sight.

Dae-ha.

He called me. Unlike usual, I could feel that mixed emotions were rushing through his mind. I reached out my hand and touched his ankle.

“I’ll leave it to you.”

…..

He looked down at me for a while, then answered.

Alright.

He bowed his head. With a light metallic sound, the head of Ares opened, and I boarded him. As his frontal armor closed around the opening, a mirage wave from his Iron Heart filled the inside of the cockpit.

It was the Avalon system.

Just like an aquarium full of water, the entire cockpit was submerged in Ares’ energy. After filling the entire area, we began the synchronization process. Normally, no physical change took place when I opened the door and fully unlocked my spiritual powers. I didn’t gain strength, endurance, resistance nor resilience.

On the other hand, the change in my spiritual powers was overwhelming. When I opened the door, I climbed beyond the limits of a player, the number 999. 1,054 points of mana, 900 points of magical power, and even 1,025 points of magical resistance.

The enormous power was too overbearing, to the point that my body could be destroyed by attempting to yield it. It was unbalanced to the point where I could not utilize it properly. My body was so weak, that I could not even exercise my magical resistance to the full extent.

‘I can’t even use my magical resistance because of my body’s lacking capacity. Unless it’s a curse or mental magic, it would be better to face it with my body.’

If I were to activate my magical resistance recklessly, my skin could explode. What more could I say? But the moment I boarded a Gigas and started the synchronization process with the Avalon system, the story changed completely.

The Iron Heart’s incredible durability, the phenomenal body of the Gigas, and the god-like abilities sublimated me to a being close to a god.

Wooong!

My hand grasped onto a spear taken out from the God of War’s Treasure Trove. For Ares, who was 30 meters tall, the spear was as big as chopsticks. However, the spear quickly expanded and became so large that the spearhead was dragging on the floor. It was a function that was contained in the spear, not a power of Ares.

“I see. This is why you thought it funny that Bo-ram carried Gungnir.”

I observed the spear in my hand. It was a weapon that I robbed from the old man who blocked my path when I rode into the Rising Storm with Ares. It must have been a terrible tragedy for the Leondhardt Empire to have lost the weapon. The weapon in my hands was a treasure of immense value that even the empire could never afford to pass on.

It was one of the most powerful transcendental weapons in the universe, one of the 1,000 strongest weapons. It would be hard to procure even a single one of these weapons with five or six planets. It was a Numbering.

Unfortunately for the empire, by the time they figured out that it was in my hands, they were no longer in the position to dare and ask for it back.

I just thought it was a real coincidence. She values Gungnir as much as her own life, and you just happened to obtain it.

“Surely.”

I responded before getting into a proper stance with Gungnir in my hands.

Groarrr---!

My energy started boiling up. Abilities of the Day were shifted as I needed, though I didn’t need to shuffle that much.

*Abilities of the Day!

Sparks flew as soon as I equipped the abilities. One Light. When I hit the ground once more, I stood next to the soul soldier Sun-shin.

“What?”

“Huh?”

A loud thunder resounded along with the questioning sounds. As I turned around, I could see the ability users of the Zhu Family looking up at me, collapsed on the ground in fear.

Then,

Shwarrr!!

The pouring blood and flesh were soaking their bodies. They stared at me blankly, having lost all will to fight.

“…God.”

I loosened my arms as they moaned. Sparks were created from Gungnir, which was almost touching the ground.

Then I smashed the earth.