[Book 11: Cause Convergent]

“He…the Human God…died? Just like that?” Aziz asked, his breathing ragged as he gripped the artefact tightly. Turning to the others, he yelled, “He just died like that? After everything he did?”

“Aziz…”

“Screw that!” Lava bubbled in the pits of his stomach as he drew a knife. Infusing rage and qi into the metal blade, Aziz slashed out into the air, and a huge crescent of energy flew at the Great Divide, which was somewhat visible from afar. “Screw this! That bastard gets to escape after everything he did?”

The wind continued to howl as he slashed out at mid-air. Aziz could feel his qi reserves drop to a dangerously low level, but he didn’t care about that.

A hand fell on his shoulder. “Colonel. Calm down. There is little we can do regarding this.”

“That bastard started the Second Extermination,” Aziz replied. “Do you know how many were killed by that? And he gets to play it off with an excuse of madness? He gets to die peacefully? Screw that!”

“I don’t think it was an excuse.”

Aziz quivered. “So you’re saying that we should forgive and forget because he had a legitimate defence? A defence of insanity? One that justifies his wholesale slaughter of the beastfolk? Marshal, have you forgotten that you are one of them?!”

“Aziz!”

Aziz froze, and then hung his head. “I apologise. That was…”

“I understand. We have all lost people to the Human God, more than we would care to remember.” Marie gripped both of his shoulders. “But we are not in a place to do anything. At least two great gods and two Demigods were mobilised in this battle. If anyone knew about the Human God’s condition earlier, it would be them.”

Thinking back to the…monstrous, grotesque aberration that the teenage kid had fought, Aziz clenched his fist. Whoever that teenager was, he didn’t envy that fellow; getting up close to that mass of creepy flesh had to have its own dangers.

The others were still staring at Aziz, clearly scared by his sudden outburst of rage. Sighing, the colonel stowed his knife. Before everyone could resume their flight, however, a quake — one that seemed to strike at the soul itself — ran through everyone.

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He could feel the qi he was driving to maintain his Dynamo’s Flight ability weaken, and a heartbeat later, he began to descend. At the same time, another quake — one that he physically felt — came from the direction of the Great Divide. A black ring was faintly visible within the Great Divide itself, in the false space that existed. The Great Divide was a black wall in its own right, but for somehow, he could see an even darker ring pressing down on it.

“Is that…”

“We must hurry!” Qi erupted out of Marie as she said those words, but the only thing it accomplished was to slow her descent. “Forget it. Prioritise a safe descent first!”

Dropping into a roll as he landed, Aziz got up and stared at the black ring that was cutting into the Great Divide. “What’s going on?”

“It’s probably the Human God’s passing. Something has changed within all of us,” Marie replied. “Can you feel it? Our qi’s grown thicker. Stronger. And harder to channel.”

Aziz nodded. “It seems that the Human God was suppressing the quality of our qi. At least he had the sense to undo it with his death. But…why isn’t there a vision of his passing?”

He could remember the events that followed when the Lifespring died, where everyone was sucked into a black space, but for some reason, there was no such thing for the Human God.

“Who knows? That’s not our concern now. Our concern is that.” Marie motioned at the Great Divide. “Everyone, make adjustments to the improvements in your qi. Get used to it, and we’ll prepare to move once more. It isn’t too hard.”

After a few minutes of playing around with the thickened energy within him, Aziz got a rough sensing of the changes that had occurred to him, which was just a matter of efficiency. Simply put, every bit of energy he had would do around twenty percent more work, which was an amazing improvement.

By the time he was finished with some loops, the others had also gotten used to their improvements.

“Let’s go, then.” Marie’s eyes were fixed on the Great Divide. “We might need to even assume that the Great Divide might fall before January next year.”

“At least the first line is already manned with tens of thousands of soldiers,” Aziz replied. “It’s only the bigshots who haven’t arrived here yet.”

There was a rather good reason for that; common soldiers worked together and trained together. They needed to get used to more mundane things like drills, conditions on the ground and working with soldiers of the other nations. The Hall of Guardians initiative was designed to entice more Knights and semi-divinities over earlier, so that they could be integrated into the soldiers here…and they wouldn’t have any leeway to complain once here, either.

From what Aziz had gleaned from the arrangements made by the Five Lands War Council, the plan was to situate a Knight in company-sized units that were expected to take the field. No such luxury would be accorded to those who were on the walls and taking pot shots at the enemy.

Their arrangements were perfect.

He couldn’t quite say the same for the great gods, however. The Demon God was said to be capable of fighting off the great gods of the Five Lands in the First Extermination, but in a situation where the World’s Blight had millennia to recover while the others had to expend energy to maintain the Great Divide…

It didn’t bode well for his side. Even if they won the battle between the mortals, what truly mattered was the defeat of the Demon God.

However, with the Human God’s death, did the Five Lands really have the ability to withstand the demon invasion?

He wasn’t quite sure.