Chapter 189 - Episode 25. Deus Ex Machina (4)
Chapter 189: Episode 25. Deus Ex Machina (4)
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Karavan, Ignis’s Vicegerent, watched the scene from afar with his mouth hanging open. When he turned, Chronos and Pest, who had been confronting each other, were also staring down at Jaehwan in disbelief. After furtively checking their reactions, Karavan spoke to Ignis in his mind.
‘My god. Isn’t that guy cheating?’
[······.]
‘What kind of law-type Setting gets that strong just from singing and taking off some clothes?’
[So I was not mistaken when I saw it back then.]
Ignis had already seen Jaehwan’s 「Naked」 Setting through a 〈Metaverse〉 broadcast.
[Truly remarkable. That bastard cannot possibly still be alive... Has it been inherited, then?]
‘Huh? You know that Setting? This is my first time seeing it.’
[Of course you would not know. That Setting was created more than 210,000 years ago.]
‘210,000 years ago?’
That was when the Three Ancient Gods had been at the height of their activity. Who could have created a Setting like that in that era?
Kwarararang!
The Naked God’s rampage continued.
A Setting that displayed overwhelming power against Gigantes.
Jaehwan tore apart a third, then a fourth Gigantes with his bare hands. Watching him, Ignis spoke cautiously.
[A mad god who hated Deus created that Setting.]
‘A god who hated Deus?’
[Yes.]
Karavan was startled.
Who was Deus?
Deus, the destroyer of Plausibility. One of the legendary Three Ancient Gods whom even hundreds or thousands of supreme-grade gods could not defeat together.
Gods born within the past ten thousand years sometimes did not even know the name, yet whenever anyone named the strongest god in history, Deus of the Three Ancient Gods was always included.
[They did more than hate each other. They even fought 210,000 years ago.]
‘What?’
Ignis, the God of Flames and Third Seat of the Seven Divine Thrones, was one of the few gods who had endured the era of the Three Ancient Gods. Because of that, Ignis often boasted about those days as though recounting heroic tales.
Yet this was the first time even Karavan had heard this story from Ignis.
‘Who was the god that fought Deus?’
[That one was...]
Perhaps Ignis had recalled an unpleasant memory. His voice darkened. Nothing remained of the pride he usually took in having survived that era.
Karavan grew even more curious.
Just who had created the 「Naked」 Setting, for the ill-tempered God of Flames to hesitate like this?
After pondering for a long time, Ignis finally spoke.
[Only the Three Ancient Gods could stand against the Three Ancient Gods. There was a saying like that 210,000 years ago. Now it has all become an old story.]
* * *
Tear them apart. Strip them bare.
At that moment, Jaehwan was the Naked God, existing only to repeat those two acts. A Gigantes’s arm was pulled free like a loose thread, and its glove was torn away as though peeling off a sock. Before Jaehwan, who poured out merciless World Force, the gods were utterly helpless.
Torn apart, stripped bare.
Torn apart again, stripped bare again.
The god trembling inside a Gigantes cockpit was stripped clean in an instant, like hide pulled from a pig. Some Vicegerents foamed at the mouth and fainted despite suffering no physical injuries.
Whether it was from shame or some other cause, no one knew. At least one thing was certain.
Those facing Jaehwan now could never return to how they had been before.
The Vicegerents who had lost their Gigantes stood blankly, as though they had lost something precious.
“Ah, aaaaah!”
“Save me! Someone save me!”
They were not screaming at Jaehwan. They feared something behind him. They could not explain it, but the moment their clothes were torn away, an indescribable terror took root within them.
It felt as though the world they had always known had suddenly become unfamiliar.
“What in the world is that...?”
The gods looked confused. A few knew of the 「Naked」 Setting, but even they were witnessing its true power for the first time.
Only an extremely small number of gods understood what the others were experiencing.
“Could it be...?”
Turis bit down hard on his lip as Jaehwan approached.
He was one of the Seven Stars. In other words, no more than twenty-one gods in the Abyss were stronger than him.
He was even piloting Gigantes, the strongest Part. Even a direct strike from one of the Seven Divine Thrones would not kill him instantly while he was inside it.
Yet Jaehwan was tearing apart that Gigantes as if it were nothing and toying with the Vicegerents inside.
As though the world they had long settled into was this fragile.
Another Gigantes right before his eyes was torn apart, and Turis’s fingertips trembled.
He saw it clearly. At the same time as the Gigantes was ripped apart, something within the Vicegerents was tearing as well.
“Worldview Collapse?”
Worldview Collapse. A condition in which one lost World Force as the Sanctuary they had always believed in became unfamiliar. It was an Abyssal illness some called Gestalt Collapse.
‘No. That cannot be possible.’
Turis could not believe it, even as he watched the Vicegerents collapse before him. The Ancient Gods capable of causing Gestalt Collapse had vanished long ago.
So, instead of trusting his instincts, Turis chose to trust the years he had lived.
Then belated humiliation came over him.
A being that destroyed Gigantes like toys and stripped the Vicegerents naked.
Before him stood someone who insulted the Holy War.
[You! What exactly are you trying to do!]
Strictly speaking, that was what Jaehwan wanted to ask.
‘Tell me before pulling something like this.’
For less than ten minutes, Andersen, not Jaehwan, had controlled Jaehwan’s body. Jaehwan was still too inexperienced to maximize the 「Naked」 Setting by himself.
Besides, there was no way Jaehwan would know a childhood-destroying song about a Naked God who stripped friends naked for fun.
“Ah, the song has to be sung all the way through for the Setting to activate properly. And I did not make you sing it, did I?”
‘It is the same thing. The song still came out of my mouth.’
Jaehwan’s fist sent Turis’s Gigantes flying. Naked Vicegerents already lay unconscious all over the battlefield.
‘Did you deliberately leave them alive?’
“I could not kill them.”
‘What?’
“We stripped all their clothes off. If they are naked too, the 「Naked」 Setting cannot be used.”
The law-type Setting 「Naked」 basically worked only against opponents wearing clothes. That was why it was nearly invincible against enemies like Gigantes, which had Parts piled all over them, but lost its effect when the opponent was naked as well.
Come to think of it, the Leader had taken off his clothes too when he faced this Setting in the 〈Metaverse〉.
‘Do we really have to sing that song?’
“It only displays its proper power if we sing it. For reference, the last verse goes like this: ‘At last, every friend was naked. The Naked God happily returned home.’”
Jaehwan muttered with a dumbfounded expression.
‘What kind of...’
Judging by the lyrics, this Setting was invincible until it stripped its opponents naked, but could not touch them afterward. It had not been made to kill anyone in the first place.
Its purpose was so twisted that it almost carried a perverse sense of morality.
Tukwakwakwakwa!
After taking Jaehwan’s fists one after another, Turis of the Seven Stars fell to the ground naked. The gods on the battlefield were now too busy backing away to approach Jaehwan.
That did not mean the Holy War was over.
Both Andersen and Jaehwan knew that well.
“Do not let your guard down. This is only the beginning. Everyone has gone mad because you called out such a ridiculous bid.”
‘You heard that?’
“Of course I heard it! What were you thinking, doing something like that?”
Jaehwan glanced toward one side of the battlefield.
“Maiad?”
Jaehwan did not answer.
“You are impossible to figure out.”
When Andersen first saw Jaehwan, she felt reverence for him.
An Awakened One who slaughtered gods and Lords.
She thought someone like that must possess insight and composure that surpassed even the gods.
Yet the longer she spent with him, the more Andersen’s thoughts changed.
Jaehwan was incomplete.
He possessed a god’s vision, but moved with a human heart.
He had endured thousands of years without forgetting the past, and he lived for the purpose he had held when he was human. He was still angry, and sometimes sad. He did not feed on human tragedies to soothe his loneliness.
Even after living for thousands of years, he was still human.
“That must be why you made it this far.”
‘What are you talking about?’
“Never mind. More importantly, World Force is starting to run low.”
More than ten Gigantes had already been destroyed, but many enemies remained. They had noticed Jaehwan’s World Force gradually diminishing.
They looked ready to rush in the instant he showed even the slightest opening.
After assessing the situation around him, Jaehwan finally made his decision.
“Are you behind me?”
A voice answered from behind him.
“I am.”
Maiad, who was still confronting X behind Jaehwan, answered. Maiad briefly swept their gaze over Jaehwan’s entire body, then muttered.
“A Setting that destroys Settings, followed by a Setting that destroys Parts. What an impressive combination of Settings. Let me ask again, would you consider joining the Rupture...?”
Maiad kept chatting casually despite maintaining a tense standoff with X.
“You said you would finish quickly, yet you are taking a while.”
“As I told you, the opponent is not easy to deal with.”
Jaehwan gave no answer. He only glared briefly at Maiad.
Maiad gave a bitter smile.
“Did you see through me?”
For an instant, Jaehwan’s total World Force had increased, allowing him to glimpse the World Force Maiad had concealed.
It was a vast World Force, brilliant as the sun. Feeling a distant light so blinding it seemed capable of taking his sight, Jaehwan realized Maiad might be far stronger than he had thought.
It felt distinctly different from facing Pest, Ignis, or Chronos. Still, he could clearly understand why they considered Maiad van Declan someone subject to the Seven Seats Agreement.
Maiad van Declan was a powerhouse dangerous enough that the Seven Divine Thrones needed to keep him in check themselves.
“But I was telling the truth. The opponent really is not easy to deal with.”
Jaehwan studied X, who was locked in a tense standoff with Maiad.
Maiad was certainly not wrong about X being difficult to deal with.
X also gave off World Pressure clearly beyond that of a supreme-grade god.
But X was plainly not on the level of the Seven Divine Thrones.
“Let us run now. Staying any longer will only hurt us.”
Andersen’s judgment was wise. Jaehwan himself had also been considering withdrawing.
Still, there was one thing he wanted to know first.
“Maiad.”
“Yes.”
“Why did you bring me to this auction?”
Maiad tilted their head as if they did not understand the question.
“To obtain the Three Divine Artifacts through you, Jaehwan-nim.”
“I will ask differently.”
Jaehwan looked toward Deus Ex Machina, which was being guarded by attendants in the distance.
“Why did you put the Deus Ex Machina you possessed up for auction?”
Footnotes:
Chapter discussion