Chapter 2330: Collapse and Demon

Chapter 2330: Chapter 2330: Collapse and Demon

"Since you say this is your obsession... very well. Shelly, I too have contracted a strange illness due to the demon’s curse, and now I require two fiery hearts of knights to cure my disease. Shelly, kill the two people behind you and offer me their hearts."

The coughing Queen spoke, and so the kneeling Lady Knight stood up, swiftly swinging her sword to kill the other kneeling person, then carrying the blood-stained sword and looking towards Shard.

"Meow~"

The cat on the shoulder immediately let out a threatening call towards her, evidently worried she might harm Shard. As the cat’s call sounded, not only did the cat bristle, but even the small flame on its tail grew larger.

"Miss Nate, do you still recognize me?"

Shard comforted Mia, then furrowed his brows and asked the Lady Knight holding the treasure sword, who gently nodded with her gray-white hair;

"Yes, you are Mr. Shard Hamilton, a knight who helped me greatly in the Gravel Golden Desert."

"So your choice is..."

Shard looked at her sword, and Miss Nate gently nodded:

"This is my obsession, the last thing I can do in my life. I’ve walked such a long road, sacrificed so many people, and experienced so much. Even if the ending is tragic, even if I ultimately fall into hell, even at this moment, I will never regret any decision I have made. I’ve spent my life moving forward, and I will absolutely not look back."

She lifted her sword, bowed to Shard one last time, and closed her eyes as she stabbed the sword into her own chest.

Just like that, she extracted her own heart alive, along with the heart of the other person, placed them on a tray containing green crystal, and offered them together to the coughing Queen on the bed.

The Queen did not reach out to receive them, so the tray fell onto the bed, and Miss Nate closed her eyes and fainted.

Crack~ Crack~

The sound of glass shattering spread from where the Lady Knight fell, and then the surroundings vanished like shattered glass, revealing the scene located in the Temple Mausoleum in the Gravel Golden Desert.

Shard ignored the dissipating black mist around him, ignored Miss Mister still sitting on the bench, ignored Miss Nate fainted from phantom pain while clutching a stone heart at the edge of the coffin, but instead lifted the Moonlight Greatsword in his right hand and leaped up:

"Moonlight Slash!"

From within the coffin, a thin man with skin and bones had already sat up. Although it outwardly appeared human, under Shard’s Arcane Technique [Demon Vision], this entity was radiating black light all over; it was undoubtedly an Ancient Evil Spirit Demon.

The illusion dispersed, and the sword attached with brilliant silver moonlight sliced towards the man looking like he hadn’t come to his senses. But at the moment the sword was about to sever its head, it suddenly extended a hand wrapped in burnt yellow bandages and firmly grasped Shard’s Moonlight Greatsword.

Crack!

The blade developed cracks at its fingertips; then the entire sword shattered into light points. Simultaneously, three identical swords pierced out from the void towards its face, but were all swept away and scattered into pure moonlight.

The demon, newly free from its sealing, did not allow Shard another chance to attack; it waved its right hand, and tremendous force directly hurled Shard along with the unconscious Miss Nate off the high platform where the coffin was situated.

Whether by coincidence or not, Shard rolled a few times on the ground, then bumped his head against the stone leg of a long seat. At that moment, he saw smooth light-brown legs, and looking up, he met the probing gaze of Miss Mister.

"Lady..."

The Saint smiled and asked:

"Don’t you understand yet? The mausoleum’s appearance in this desert is an integral part of the seal’s procedure itself."

"It also fears the sunlight here!"

Destroying the church’s body from within would completely break the ’Power of the Earth: Blessing All Things,’ whose effects have endured for countless millennia. This church has remained unscathed in such harsh conditions due to the sacrificial power of Divine Arts. Its disappearance signifies the church’s lifespan is at its endpoint.

But Shard couldn’t care about this too much, as he jumped up and saw the coffin lid had been completely lifted off. That man, thin and only wrapped at the waist with burlap and arms with bandages, was slowly floating out of the coffin.

"Take care of Miss Nate and my cat!"

He placed the cat, which had similarly fallen from the platform but was unharmed as he had cushioned its fall, onto a chair next to Miss Mister, then crossed his arms over his chest:

"Moonlight Slash!"

Instead of forward, it went upward, as Shard, donned in golden armor, transformed into a Moonlight Cross and shot straight towards the church roof. As the cross-shaped sunlight shone into the dark church’s interior, the church’s sudden collapse commenced without warning.

The collapsing structure in the boundless desert stirred up only an insignificant dust cloud. When the blazing sunlight illuminated the demon suspended above the ruins, a phantom flame enveloped it, causing large patches of decay to appear on its coarse skin.

The man remained expressionless but quickly flew out from the ruins, seeking another place to evade the sunlight. Suddenly, Shard appeared behind it, grabbing its shoulder, and subsequently, dark Great Sin Chains bound its neck from behind. With Shard pulling forcefully, they both fell back into the church ruins.

After an unseemly roll, the slender man attempted to ascend again but remained stuck two meters above the ground due to the dark chains around its neck.

Even the formidable "Misfortune Demon - Fanarius" couldn’t break free from the Great Sin Chain with seven runes, so this unknown demon sealed for countless ages evidently couldn’t either. It was thus fully exposed under the desert sun, its face, once calm, now melted away, revealing the rotting, vile red flesh beneath.

Meanwhile, the chains imbued with the power of "Great Sin," underneath the sunlight only made the seven Great Sin Rune’s gleaming more profound. With his back turned to the demon, feeling the chain pass over his shoulder and connect to Shard above, it was clear that this time he had won.

But things weren’t as simple as they seemed. The demon suddenly reached a hand toward the ruins, realizing he couldn’t make Miss Nate fly over, it instead reached for the statue standing at the ruin’s edge.

A beam of black light flew straight toward the statue, and once hit, the statue, no longer under the effect of "Power of the Earth: Blessing All Things," would certainly be destroyed. The ancient knight had died when his flesh turned to stone, but his petrified spirit remained.

Shard’s mouth twitched, yet he withdrew the chains, and in the next instant, appeared in front of the black light. Levitating slightly, he spun the Moonlight Greatsword in his hand into a circle toward the black light:

"Principle of Return!"

A faint starlight flashed briefly behind him, then redirected the black light on its original path, but it brushed past the demon and flew even higher. This time it didn’t choose to leave but aimed a punch at Shard, and with a thunderous sound, the golden armor disassembled in midair tumbling toward the desert below, yet Shard was nowhere to be seen within the armor.

Having daringly utilized Lagre’s Leap twice successively, Shard reappeared behind the dwindling figure, clad in a shirt, as a dragon roar resounded. The blazing sunlight formed the Sunlight Greatsword once more in his hands.

Yet now the demon, having been tricked once before, used the power of spatial movement to dodge the swing of the sword from behind. Now with eighty percent of its skin decayed, the demon stared with pitch-black eyes at the sword in Shard’s hands. Then it transformed into black smoke, rushing toward him on the ground.

The exploding dust rose into the clear desert sky without clouds. Having been knocked into the desert beneath, Shard still hadn’t climbed out, while the demon, marked by three unhealable wounds inflicted by the Sunlight Greatsword, stumbled over church ruins and gravel, attempting to walk further using its legs.

It hadn’t even enough strength to fly again.

It only managed a few steps before looking up and seeing a woman with light brown skin, with a cat standing on her shoulder blocking its path.

The demon’s black eyes assessed this strange woman again; the smiling Saint was about to extend her hand, but the cat with a fiery tail on her shoulder fiercely meowed:

"Meow~"

The cat leapt from God’s shoulder to the ground, its fur bristling as it growled again, its amber eyes displaying a ferocity Shard had never seen.

The demon didn’t glance at the small cat; its bloodied and obscured face expressed surprise, turning to look behind it. Its black eyes unmistakably saw the golden armor pieces scattered on the desert sand begin to move, resonating with the cat’s cries.

The armor pieces, responding to the cat’s summoning, in sequence, beamed a blazing sunlight atop the golden sands.

Miss Mister subtly retreated two steps; the demon suddenly fixed its gaze on the glowing orange cat, still relentless in its cries upon the sand, and its pitch-black eyes reflected a figure standing on the sand...

"Moonlight Wheel!"

The rotating light wheel flew from behind, surprisingly cutting off the demon’s head. As its head hit the ground, the demon’s body and head quickly ignited in the sunlight, burning ferociously.

The foul smoke from the burning prompted clean-loving Mia to promptly step back, but soon it cheerfully ran to Shard, who had just extended a hand from beneath the sand, now struggling to pull himself out from underground.