บท 346: Angel-Devil War
"Is that so?" said Morris before summoning a disturbing creature that was the combination of many different mid-level devils. It had three bodies stuck together, while the lower part appeared to be an enormous octopus.
Dante used his Body Magic to turn into a small muscular giant 5 meters tall. At the same time, numerous bones sprout out from Zenon's back as he uses his Bone Magic. Furthermore, the two could still use the magic attribute from when they were a devil host.
Gravity Magic: Presence of the Demon King
Dante used Beelzebub's Gravity Magic to increase the gravity in the surroundings.
Spatial Magic: Spatial Mana Domination.
Zenon created a cub that surrounded the group, and inside that cube, he had absolute control over mana. So, he can cancel spells if he wishes to. Meanwhile, Morris' abomination of a creature opened its mouth to shoot different attribute attacks.
The first head shot a jet of purple poison, the second head had a fire element and the third wind.
Edward calmly watched these people perform. He created an Anti-Gravity Shield around to block Dante's attack. As for Zenon's spell, it was useless to him since his control of mana was even better than those loved by mana, which this spell is ineffective against.
As for Morris' creation, he only looked at it and said: "Silence." With Zagred's Word Soul Magic, this creature could no longer open its mouth, causing their attacks to explode their heads. Regrettably, as devils, they could regenerate.
Meanwhile, Dante took this opportunity to rush toward his opponent. His Body Magic granted unimaginable physical and healing capabilities, making him perfectly suited for close combat.
And he knew that most wizards were weak to close combat. And even if they were not, they could not compete with his overwhelming strength. Unfortunately, he miscalculated this time.
Once he arrived in front of Edward, the latter punched straight in his face, sending him crashing on the floor while leaving a fist mark on his deform face.
Furthermore, Dante sensed an unknown and strange energy nullifying or delaying his regeneration. So, he quickly used his magic to its full extent.
"Bind," said Edward, and chains appeared to capture Dante, rending him useless. Zenon went on the offensive as his bone spike rushed toward Edward. However, his attack was a distraction as he separated a few dozen bone spikes to free his body.
Meanwhile, a Time bubble came out of Edward's body and, before Zenon could react, encapsulated him, rendering him immobile since time had stopped inside.
In this short time, Lucius managed to remove the Anti-Magic Arrows from his back. And for his next step, he opened the 7th layer of the Underworld and summoned all the devils under his control.
There were hundreds of thousands of them, and they all had the same Angel-Devil Form that Lucius and the Dark Triad had.
Edward ignored Lucius as he looked at the calm Morris; he then sneered before using the Origin Grimoire to summon the Shikigamis from the Spirit World. He asked for their help to subdue all these devils.
Then, he suddenly appeared between Lucius and Morris. Before they could react, a black sphered enveloped them, rendering their magic useless.
Spatial Magic: Anti-Magic Domain.
Edward created a cube-like space similar to Zenon before filling that space with Anti-Magic to create a pseudo Domain where magic is nullified. He then watched as Lucius punched the cube's edge with all his strength.
Although he had the enhanced physical abilities of Lucifero, without his magic, he was not strong enough to break this spell. Meanwhile, Morris slowly disintegrated while his pet lay in the cube, also useless.
Under Edward's control, the captured Dante and frozen Zenon flew into the cube before it became smaller until he could hold it in his palm. After selling these three, he looked at the confrontation between the Shikimamis and the devil. And after noticing his side had the advantage, he opened a portal to another place: the Underworld's 8th Layer.
"I guess I cannot escape my fate," said Morris calmly.
However, Edward ignored him but looked at a throne where a skeleton dressed in dark gold armor sat.
'Satan's dead body? It seems he really is dead. Nevertheless, he would make a great Undead,' thought Edward, looking at Morris, who seemed to be establishing some sort of ceremony.
"I always suspected that God had a pawn on the mortal plane. I did not expect it to be you."
"Father offered me something I could not resist."
"Let me guess: knowledge."
Morris was slightly surprised before smiling: "I had a feeling that you and I were candid spirits."
"Maybe. But I would never sell my soul for things I could get myself. Now, are you going to resist?"
Morris just smiled, but Edward suddenly appeared before him before placing his finger on his forehead, sealing and controlling his soul. Then, he sensed the power of the Universe Will, trying to eliminate Morris's soul, but he was ready this time.
He used his Origin Grimoire to cancel God's Universe Will before searching Morris' soul for information. And he did find something.
In his early years, Morris became infatuated with researching magic at all costs to unravel its mystery. So, when a mysterious being contacted him in his dream and offered him the knowledge he could never dream of in exchange for working for it, he quickly accepted.
His first task was to help the devil open the Gate of the Underworld while keeping tabs on them. Then, recently, his task was to acquire Satan's remains. Unfortunately, accessing the 8th layer was not easy, and even Lucius did not know how to and might not even know of its existence.
After getting that information, Edward was not satisfied since he had only learned very little about God. So, he placed his focus on someone else who might know more: Astaroth.
This devil survived since the ancient war and should know a lot more information. Lucius's Soul Magic allowed him to suppress Astaroth's soul and take control of him and his magic. Of course, Edward believed that the injury he gave the latter few years prior also contributed to his success.
Nevertheless, it was not a complete success since Lucius appeared to not know about God or even the 8th layer of the Underworld: these were secrets that Astaroth should know and should have learned from him.
Edward removed Astaroth's Soul from the cube and slowly searched through his memories. Although much of it was blurry through time or some outside force, he did learn a lot.
God and Satan were the first creatures in this universe, and they each served the purpose of maintaining the balance of the world: they were responsible for guarding the afterlife.
After a creature died, it would be judged in the underworld. If they lived a good and morally upright life, they could go to Elysium and turn into angels. If they were horrible in their lifetime, they would be punished for eternity in the underworld. And if they live a neutral life, then they can reincarnate and try again.
Everything was normal until Satan got greedy. He discovered that the sinful souls he punished in the underworld could increase his power if he swallowed them. So, he began to tempt the races in the mortal plane to commit more sins so they would go to the underworld after death.
And, of course, God was not happy with this, so he wanted to stop his counterpart and former friend. Unfortunately, the war expanded and got out of control until the Wizard Sage appeared and sealed these two.
Edward frowned after learning this. He previously thought Satan and God fought for a chance to transcend this universe, but it appears he was wrong.
"Something is wrong with this information," he muttered. From the information he got about God so far, he appeared to be a cold and calculated individual, not someone who would do something for the greater good of all the races in the mortal plane.
After reviewing the information again, he found a few anomalies. The first one was Satan's death. He sacrificed much of his life force to increase his strength and severely injured God. Then, he used the Afterlife to reinforce the seal on God.
As such, since the war, the soul of 80% of the dead people of this world will turn as energy to reinforce the seal; this is the reason it has lasted for hundreds of thousands of years since the war.
After that, Satan did not resist when the Wizard Sage sealed the underworld, prevented all devils from entering the mortal plane, and died soon afterward.
"His actions were not like someone consumed by his lust for power, but out revenge and anger," commented Edward on Satan's action.
Another anomaly he discovered was a battle Astaroth experienced between Satan and God. Although they appeared evenly matched, based on God's facial expression and eye movement, he could tell the latter was not really trying.
Oftentimes, he would look at one of Satan's openings, but instead of taking the opportunity to attack, the latter ignored it. Furthermore, when Satan suddenly boosts his power to use a surprise attack to defeat his opponent, the latter would easily respond while making it look like he had suffered.
'With this evidence, there is a high chance that God started the entire war because of his goal of transcendence.'
After coming to this conclusion, Edward raised the threat level of God for their confrontation. Nevertheless, the Elysium Invasion was less than a month away, and Nacht had already infiltrated these. So, he will know all the answers soon.
He then gazed at Satan's remains.
'The Soul is already scattered. However, I could use Astaroth, Beelzebub, Lucifero, Lucius, and the Dark Triad's souls to create a truly powerful undead as my aid.'
He proceeded to take Satan's remains away before taking out the Diamond Origin Grimoire, which was the final piece.
บท 347: 7 Scale
Edward did not waste time to start placing enchantments in the Throne Room of the Underworld. Then, he left for the sixth layer, where the Shikigamis had already captured all the angelic devils. Then, he used Lucius's Soul Magic to control them before placing more enchantments in all six layers.
Finally, Edward left the Underworld. The first thing he did was try to enter Elysium again. With the Diamond Origin Grimoire, his grimoire was completed, and he now had more control of the Universe Will.
Unfortunately, he felt an even more powerful resistance preventing his entrance.
'Something is wrong. Why does it feel like God's control of the Universe Will is greater than mine?'
A lot of thoughts flashed across his mind.
'Could it be…' An idea suddenly popped into his mind based on his previous study of the Universe Will.
'If what I'm thinking is true, the final battle against him will not be so simple–especially without my Floating City.'
After making some preliminary plans, he opened a portal to his laboratory in the Clover Kingdom. He first instructed young Sally to create a new body for Julius's soul before meeting Clone Number 8, which was in charge of fixing the World Gate.
"How are things going?"
"Good, but slow," replied Number 8.
"How long before things are fixed?"
"3 to 5 years."
"That means the Gate won't be helpful in this upcoming battle."
"Do you even need it?"
"I have some new information which suggests that this God might be much of a greater threat than anticipated."
Number 8 frowned, "I could quickly fix some of the Tier 7 Canons."
"Do so. What about the other tasks I gave you?"
"Come with me."
Number 9 led him to a room with a few people cryogenically frozen in large glass tubes. Edward walked to the first one, wiped out the frozen fog, seeing a very familiar yet strange face: it was Asta, except with a scar over his right eye.
Edward walked to the other tubes, and they all contained Astas.
"What's their stories?" he asked.
"Asta 1 is after the result of a failed Spade Kingdom Rescue Arc. All the people who participated died at the hands of the devil. Ultimately, his madness allowed him to gather more power to kill all the Dark Triad."
In the original timeline, the Dark Triad captured Yami and Vengeance to open the Gate to the Underworld. Then, a team composed of magic knights from the Clover and Heart Kingdom went to rescue them.
"Asta 2 is one that had to watch Sister Lily and all the people in Hage's people killed.
"Asta 3 forged enmity with Yuno, and they had a legendary battle where he was forced to kill his best friend and rival. The trauma destroyed his life.
"Asta 4 is an interesting one. Sister Lily actually accepted his offer of marrying him. Unfortunately, she later died in his arm as he could not protect her.
"Asta 5 is my favorite. He accepted Noelle's confessions, and they became a couple. However, Mimosa was corrupted by a devil and lured her to kill Noelle in front of Asta."
Number 8 introduced the lives of all the Asta, and the overall thing they had in common was how miserable the latter was.
"Excellent," commented Edward. "These Asta's variants should have high Willpower. So, let's begin the experiment."
Morris' Modification Magic allows him to alter the structure of physical and magical objects. When boosted by the devil's power, he can affect intangible concepts like Dreams and knowledge. So, Edward planned to use it to absorb the Willpower of these Astas from parallel dimensions.
Nevertheless, he needed to test whether taking such a shortcut would have lasting effects. So, he created clones of himself to experiment on them. After using the Modification Magic to transfer Asta's Willpower to the clone, Edward searched the clone's souls, bloodline, mana, spirit, mind, memories, consciousness, and many other things to see if there was nothing wrong.
Afterward, he developed the magic to be permanent so something like Anti-Magic would not reverse what he did. Finally, he applied the magic to himself.
"Is this the limit of my soul? A Willpower of seven."
Edward shook his head as he was so close to the eighth scale he needed to use Conceptual Magic in his universe. Then, a small flame appeared in Edward's hand.
"My control of mana has reached such a subtle level unimaginable. Moreover, I feel like how I see the world is different."
Edward looked in the distance and could see the dimension where the Underworld and Elysium were located. He could see with his eyes the mana in the surrounding; they looked like blue birds.
He could see everything inside his body, including his magic core, soul, bloodline, organs, and even the nanobots. Usually, he would require a spell or machines to detect these things, but he could now see them easily.
Edward even discovered he could see the atoms that make up his body.
"It seems that my Cosmic Awareness Talent has evolved."
He concentrated before returning his vision to normal.
"I have discovered something expected," said Number 8.
"Did something goes wrong?"
"Not necessarily. Based on the recent data, it seems that your soul is not the only reason you cannot improve your Willpower."
"What did you find?"
"It seems that the modification no longer works for Asta. So, in the future, you would have to find other people with high Willpower to absorb."
"No problem. There are many people with high Willpower, like Steve Rogers or Thanos. Anyway, what happened to the Astas?"
"Their souls are injured, and they have lost the ability to control Anti-Magic. For the rest of their lives, they can only be normal people," replied Number 8.
"Is this the side-effect of the permanent extractions?"
"It appears so."
Edward sighed. He initially did want to use this method. His first plan was to copy Asta and modify the clone's soul to be the same as the original. Then, he would place the clone under a powerful illusion, making him experience many things to increase his Willpower before the extraction.
Regrettably, this plan failed before even starting. The clone did not have Asta's naturally high Willpower–even after the soul modification. And even after placing the latter through many cruel experiences in the illusion, his Willpower's growth was abysmal.
So, Number 8 had to proceed to plan B of taking Astas from parallel Universes.
"Heal their soul injuries. Additionally, fix the problems in their timeline, revive the people they care about, and ensure they can live happy and normal life.
"Furthermore, we need a better way to train Willpower.
Edward knew some of his wives–Hermione, Luna, Olivier, and maybe Fleur–would not accept doing such a thing to increase their Willpower. However, they are okay with human experiments–only one that involves clones.
When it comes to doing stuff like this that harms an innocent person for their benefit–even one from other parallel dimensions–they will draw the line.
Afterward, Edward went to check on the other clones and their project. He looked at some data from Number 7, who was responsible for [Project World Stealing].
"Your plan is a little too risky. We'll discuss safety measures after the invasion. Number 2, what about you?"
"My research on Forbidden Spell is complete. I have created a way to sacrifice lifespans to cast a spell at least one Tier above our level."
"Excellent."
"The trouble I am having is with studying the Karma Empowerment."
"What's the issue?"
"I've managed to discover the power of Karma," said Number before casting a spell. Then, above all the clones appeared two numbers: one in black and one in gold. The golden number was much higher than the black number, but the black one was still large.
"As you can see, we all have the same positive and negative karma since we are one. That's not important. The point is, despite discovering the power of Karma, I have no way to harness that power yet."
"What did you find from the devils?"
"They have a unique soul that allows them to use Negative Karma Empowerment. So, this power cannot be used unless we modify our soul to be similar to that of a devil."
Edward shook his head. He has no qualms about modifying his body, but he rarely touches his Soul.
"Well, take your time. I've brought Lucius' body, and he seems capable of using both positive and negative Karma."
"A perfect combination of angel and devil?" asked Number 2.
"Yes."
"In that case, he should be helpful."
Edward handed him the body before tasking Number 6–in charge of the training and teaching of Sally–to turn Satan's remains into an undead. Finally, he went to see the magic knights and captains: the Elysium Invasion was only a few days away.
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