A Stadium near The Retreat
A few days later
Bishop Varl Jekrikson calmly walks through the entrance of the enormous stadium – one large enough to seat a hundred thousand people – before navigating his way to a seat. Meanwhile everyone who sees his robes clearly showcasing the holy symbol of the Holy One gives him a wide birth. Something the bishop of the Holy Empire is used to by now.
Before the Reset, the Holy Empire was a major power, with worshipers of all kinds across the entire universe. But after the Reset, everything began to fall apart.
Their worshippers, slaughtered by the masses due to being largely from amongst the weaker echelons of the universe.
Belief in the Holy One’s radiance dwindling due to his mere third place ranking on the Tutorial leaderboards. A ranking that, while excellent by any standards, is not the perfection that the followers were led to expect from the Holy One.
It was always fine that he was not on the main leaderboards, since that was led by Class S beings who were said to be above all others. But for the Holy One to not make it to the top rank in the Tutorial rankings simply broke their beliefs.
The bishop calmly watches the center of the stadium, where a large stage is located surrounded by guards, with several of the people from The Retreat there.
Despite the sight though, very few people in the stadium actually pay them any attention beyond a few glances here and there, clearly checking to see if she’s arrived yet.
Because the only reason the vast majority of the current attendees are even here is the rumor spread around that The Reaper herself will be attending.
And nearly everyone in the Dimensional Blocks wants to meet her.
Precious few of the people here genuinely care about The Retreat itself beyond its connection to The Reaper. And the bishop is sure their leaders know that and are taking advantage of that themselves to form connections and grow into a power that they will care about.
But the bishop himself still doesn’t care about The Retreat.
He just cares about Alexia Knight. The Quantum Reaper.
And the same goes for the Holy One.
The bishop continues watching silently as the countdown high above the stadium ticks down. And the moment the countdown hits one hour remaining until their Dimensional Championships begin, the leader of The Retreat begins to float into the air along with the stage they were standing on.
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“Welcome everyone! To the ceremony and gathering for Dimensional Block #108’s illustrious Dimensional Championships!!!” Alara Blake declares, the woman having both of her arms spread out with a wide smile on her face. “But before we begin, let us welcome our special guest!!”
With those words, everyone in the audience immediately begin to tense up with anticipation.
“The great protector of The Retreat, Reaper of the Universe itself and the only Quantum Being to walk amongst us, welcome our Dimensional Champion to the ceremony!!!” Alara shouts, her voice echoing out through the entire stadium as the air above the stadium begins to glitch. “Welcome Alexia Knight! The Quantum Reaper!!!”
And the moment she finishes speaking, the entire skies begin to glitch out and for a single instant, the bishop swears that he sees a woman appear amongst the glitching skies, her eyes drilling daggers into his soul just from a glance. Then an enormous wave of quantum energy rushes out from the center of the glitching skies across the entire Dimensional Block. Meanwhile a bright beacon of glitchy purple and blue light shoots up high into the sky and straight down to the ground with a small amount of black light mixing in with it.
The bishop feels instinctive fear simply from the sight of the sheer power flooding out from the beacon and filling the stadium and the entire Dimensional Block outside of the stadium. And he’s not the only one as he sees everyone in the stadium frozen in fear with their eyes wide open, looking straight at the beacon with no exceptions.
Varl sees a faint silhouette inside of the beacon of a woman before the silhouette gradually begins to change shape.
And when the Quantum Reaper finally reveals herself, with the beacon vanishing in a glitchy flash of light, the skies that were previously clear begin to grow dark with clouds. Clouds filled with glitchy purple lightning.
But Varl’s eyes are locked onto the woman.
She now has two purple, draconic yet also bat-like wings sticking out of her back, with two horns angled backwards sticking out of her head, and a large war scythe held in one hand. One that is crackling with the same glitchy purple lightning as the clouds above.
The lightning in the skies occasionally strikes down at the ground without hitting anyone before the bishop hears the Quantum Reaper’s words echo throughout the stadium the moment he identifies her.
{Quantum Reaper – Watch your actions, for the Reaper’s scythe is always ready to swing.}
“Know that messing with my sister or The Retreat is the same as messing with me,” she declares while holding onto her scythe to one side with her other hand moving into her pocket and her eyes beginning to narrow. “And those who mess with me will learn to regret it for the rest of their lives.”
The woman then vanishes in an instant just as quickly as she appeared. And it’s not just her, but everything else in the skies vanish as well. The clouds, the lightning, and the glitchyness in the skies.
Everything becomes eerily calm.
Without a single person saying a word.
Even the bishop has to force himself to breathe after having forgotten to do so.
“Now then,” Alara states, sounding as casual as she was before, “let’s begin with the ceremony.”
The bishop slowly turns his gaze towards her, still feeling dumbfounded and terrified by what he just saw.
I need to report this to the Holy One.