Chapter 522: The Second Oracle

The ash exploded from all over the city. One moment there were thousands of demons, filled with the malevolence of the damned, and the next, nothing but ash.

From where I was floating, it looked like dirty snow. Eradicating fifteen thousand demons in this manner had caused a grey haze to settle over a part of the city, and the wind coming off the mountain blew the ash out across the rooftops in long streaks.

It was strange how the cries of pain and fear from the city were quickly silenced as the ash blew across the people. I am sorry for those who would choke on it; I promise that the ash was not poisonous.

Nobody down there saw me. At that height I was a speck in a grey sky, if I was anything at all, and whatever story those people told afterwards about the day the demons turned to ash was going to be a story about the ash.

That suited me... The mechanism of the loop meant that I did not expect anyone else to remember me. I am sure that their attention would be fixed on the gigantic arms and tentacles tearing their mountain to pieces.

[ Abyssal Executioner — Stored Essence: 0 → 11 / 10,000,000 ]

Eleven... I nearly smiled. At least I was able to get something from demons of this tier; I was still surprised that I was able to get even this much at my level of power. I guess that killing this number of demons was still worth something. Still, for me, the safety of these people below was a far greater reward.

I closed my eyes, and the map of the continent was displayed before me, and I reached towards the hundreds of thousands below and gently moved them four hundred miles away. This was a careful combination of Unbroken Edict, Space Resonance, Cartography, and Lightning Form.

I could not send them away much further because they were too delicate, and placing too much juice into this spell would be a bad thing. If I did push them away, say two thousand miles away from here, what would arrive would be roasted flesh that had been fused into one unholy mass of flesh and bones. If they were wise, then they would keep moving as far away from this place as possible.

I dismissed the screen and turned to the thing I had come for.

∞

I was surprised that the mountain was still standing, but not for long; in addition to the impossible weight of the arms of the Pale Matron, the white fire that was pouring out of the Caelith was treating stone like plastic, although the majority of the flames were focused on the Pale Matron and were pouring directly onto her two arms and five tentacles.

Looking closely, I could see that her bulk had reduced, her arms no longer stretching for miles, and the tentacles had become much thinner. She was losing a lot of her mass to the flames, but I knew she had enough endurance to push past the Caelith’s defenses in time.

’The structure is at full output,’ Hollow said. ’Calculating from the moment she must have arrived, then we have barely four minutes before there is no more Celestial Essence inside the Caelith to hold the pieces of the Pale Matron it has imprisoned.’

"I can see that," I muttered, and I wanted to reach for the Death Stone, but I paused; perhaps there was something else I could do here.

In the distance, I could sense the Caelith I was connected to, and it was being drawn to my position, and a plan was forming in the back of my head that was a bit crazy, but if it worked, I could consume the entirety of the Pale Matron.

My World Quest so many loops ago said I should stop the Pale Matron from rising; now I was no longer satisfied with this. I wanted to kill her... I wanted to consume every bit of her.

"Are you not going to caution me, Hollow?"

’You are the Abyssal Executioner. This Title is meant to humble worlds. Follow your instincts, and kill all demons. You are beyond the mandate of this world’

∞

There had been three Caeliths that had been shattered into thirty-one pieces by an unknown power. I called this power The Void, this was what I could sense from the traces that they left behind.

Three Caeliths holding the Pale Matron were here on this continent, but at this time I was the warden for only one part.

[ Authority: Caelith Fragment (243^235)]

I pushed my perception towards the burning Caelith, and I felt a new connection with it, as it felt as if something enormous had slowly turned its attention towards me.

Unlike my Caelith that had been poisoned to death, I immediately knew that this one was different, because the attention that fell on me had a new weight that was so familiar... the Jade Oracle.

Two massive green eyes opened inside my soul, and they were filled with fury, and then they paused, "... what are you?"

I remained quiet, solidifying my connection with the Caelith in front of me, and then I stepped forward, conjuring Lightning Form, and my figure vanished with a clap of thunder and reappeared directly inside the core of the Caelith.

The inside of this Caelith was the same as mine, even though I had been expecting... some variation, as I looked for some sign that this was a separate structure with its own architecture.

But as I emerged into the chamber, I saw the same black stone, smooth corridors, and vast space that stretched into darkness. The air was cold and still, lacking any warmth, ah, but there was one difference: it was the light.

In the first Caelith, there was a pervasive redness that came from the blood of countless generations of family being poured inside of it, but here, the light I could see was green.

My eyes went to the seven disks set into the floor in a wide ring, and all seven were glowing. The green light came from them, and even as I watched, they became a bit dim.

The Sovereign of the Stars had spent centuries poisoning this light in the last Caelith, but the Pale Matron was doing all of that damage in less than an hour. There was no wonder that this world had no hope the moment any part of her escaped.

And in the center of that ring was a gigantic woman of jade and dark metal, kneeling with her hands open in her lap, her wings arcing above her like the legs of a spider. Feathers the length of a man were scattered across the mirror floor around her, jade and dark metal.

Her head was still gone, that part had not changed. Whoever had sliced off her head had done too good of a job, even when she was separated across ten Caeliths.

I felt her attention turn toward me like a hand on a shoulder. The green light in the disks brightened, then dimmed, as if she were testing me.

"...what are you?"

The voice was surprisingly sharper, reminding me that the first Jade Oracle I had seen was dying; this one would soon be dead, but she was not there yet, and if I had a say in what was going to be happening next, then she would not be dying.

I stood in the center of her chamber, wrapped in the blue-white glow of my new body, and I felt the connection between us snap into place... the same connection I had with my own Caelith, but different. This connection was thin, tentative, like a hand extended across a great distance.

"I am the Abyssal Executioner. I am here to help you..." I smiled, "...Kill your burden."