"Father, with you here we, your vassals, can finally have a moment of peace from those vile creatures who embraced the darkness ignoring the light." Israfel looked incredibly relieved as he uttered these words.
In fact, they were all looking at God with awe, fanaticism, and above all; eyes shining with infinite hope.
This was their God! The God they had always revered and fought for, prayed to, and worshipped!
Medes sighed in his heart as he saw the faces of the people before him. It was at times like these that he always experienced a little headache as it was difficult to explain some matters.
Fortunately for Medes, he was not alone.
The archangel Gabriel stepped forward, and in a soft and gentle voice, remarked, "I'm afraid His Grace would not be able to kill those demons."
"... What?" Matthew Sanchez looked at the angel with three pairs of wings and said as if he could not believe what he had just heard, "The Lord... can't kill those demons...?"
They were all in disbelief and looked at their God expecting him to dismiss the words the angel next to him had just said. Unfortunately for them, Medes could not reject the truth he was bound to; this was his reality, whether he liked it or not.
"It's not that he doesn't have the power or ability to do so." Gabriel smiled kindly and explained with seemingly infinite patience, "The universe is vast and its secrets are immeasurable. Just as there are laws for the activation of magical skills there are also laws for us, beings who have transcended the mortal realm."
Laws? Naomi looked at the six-winged angel before moving her eyes in shock to the God she had worshipped for as long as she could remember, the one she was raised to love and respect.
Wasn't God the creator of everything? If he had created this universe and the life in it, then why would his own laws restrict him?
Gabriel continued: "There are other Gods in the universe, as you probably already suspected in your hearts. To prevent the God of any faction from attacking the worshippers of another God directly, they all formed a treaty in which they are not allowed to intervene physically or directly in the affairs of mortals. This is so to prevent the balance of the universe from being broken, but most of all to protect all of you from hidden dangers."
Gabriel's words were very reasonable, and it had to be said that he had found a good point to lie.
He knew that if he revealed that the God they had worshipped all their lives had once been a low-level mortal like them that practically blind faith and fanaticism they felt would waver, and neither Gabriel nor Medes wanted to see such an occurrence.
While it was true that they would probably no longer have the same kind of faith as before and some things might change in their hearts, Gabriel knew that the Army of Heaven could by no means afford to be left out of Earth. This treasure-filled world needed to be theirs, and for that, they needed to work and slowly build their influence so that when the time came for Earth to complete its evolution to a Higher World they could take it over much more easily.
At the very least, Gabriel was clear that they could not let Earth fall into the hands of another faction. Besides, there was also that extremely abnormal human brat who needed to be taken care of somehow or other; Gabriel had never seen anyone so terrifying in his entire life when it came to Lower Existences, not even Sirius could compare to that human when he was on his level.
Indeed, the expressions of some changed and they looked at the two with complicated eyes.
Naomi and a small handful more secretly clenched their fists and lowered their heads in silence. All the joy they had felt from meeting God was practically gone now that they learned "the truth."
It seemed that they needed to continue fighting the demons after all.
"But..." Israfel looked at his legion and a glint of concern shone in his silver, almost white eyes.
With the current strength of the Legion of Holy Knights it was questionable whether they would survive an upcoming confrontation against the demon race. Although Israfel had successfully killed the First General of Hell, his wounds were not light and he was completely worn out; his subordinates were in a state very similar to his so, asking them to fight under such circumstances was no different than asking them to die for nothing!
There was no way Israfel could do such a thing...
But as if seeing and sensing what his concerns were, Medes smiled slightly and said calmly, "The human race has developed very well in the path of magic, I am amazed and proud of you... However, I know that you have also developed very well technologically and have conducted research to create weapons of mass destruction so powerful that even the strongest soul evolvers need to fear."
A few people's pupils twitched as they understood what their God meant.
"B-But!" Mateo Sanchez took a step forward. His abrupt movement caused his wounds to worsen, but he didn't care and as he grunted in pain he said quickly, "Launching a nuclear missile this close to our shore will alert the sea race and enrage them!"
The Holy Church faction had naturally had their less-than-friendly encounters with the sea race in the past. Although in their eyes the sea race was not particularly strong, especially if they came out of their natural environment, their numbers were frighteningly high; even more massive than the zombies!
Israfel looked at God and then looked at his troops.
In the end, although the First Grand Knight's words were true and not meaningless at all, the Supreme Pontiff knew what he had to do in his heart.
Approximately two minutes later, not only the Legion of Holy Knights but even the bases a few thousand miles away watched the distant horizon; some in fear, some in curiosity, a few in awe, and another handful in shock.
Gabriel's face gleamed under the glare of the nuclear explosion that lit up the sky. The earth trembled and huge waves were created in the sea that approached the shore as if they were monsters sent to destroy everything.
"This level of destructive power is really something else." The great archangel of Seventh Order muttered in a voice that only he and Medes could hear, "Lord, if we can get the method to create this kind of weapon..."
Medes nodded silently as he looked off into the distance thoughtfully.
Being able to use magic and mana as well as technology of a much higher level than Earth, there was one small point that all the Higher Existences neglected; study and scientific advancement based on knowledge of universal matter.
It was hard to believe that a nuclear split or the breaking of a few atoms could cause this level of destruction and damage...
"Looks like the leaders of the enemies came out of their cave." Gabriel smiled slightly.
Israfel had a tremendously serious expression as he looked cautiously into the distance.
They could all see the great blackish-purple dome glowing in the sky, covering what appeared to be the entirety of the island closest to the coast of Pisa, Italy.
"No." Medes shook his head and sighed, "Looks like we can just leave it like this for now."
In the center of the island, an altar made up of five stones carved into geometric shapes was placed around what appeared to be a round mirror the size of a normal table.
The five geometrically shaped stones released blue beams of lightning directly into the round mirror. The round mirror absorbed those blue beams and discharged them into the sky, but the color of the beam as thick as a tree trunk was not blue but deep purple slightly bordering on black.
Upon reaching a certain height, the thick deep purple beam seemed to encounter a kind of invisible wall as it immediately opened up and extended along that invisible wall in all directions.
Inside the large magic dome, a group of 5 Fourth Order demons along with over a hundred Third Order demons stared coldly at the nuclear explosion.
"They want to break through our defenses? Dream on." One of the Fourth Order demons who was over 3 meters tall and whose skin was completely black spat coldly.
"However. The power of that thing is truly amazing." Commented another Fourth Order demon that was less than 1.5 meters tall but was as thick as a palm tree.
Seeing the small but still clear ripples on the magic barrier they all nodded in their hearts. None of them were confident they could take that attack head-on and survive; at the very least, they knew they would lose half their lives there.
A Fourth Order demon who stood just under 2 meters tall with furry dragon wings on his back contemplated for a long time before ordering in a deep voice: "Until His Majesty fully recovers no one is allowed to attack those fucking humans. We can't afford to waste Vengeance Bastion's energy like this no matter what."
The other demons nodded in agreement.
Although they were dissatisfied they knew that reality had to be accepted, and if they did not adapt to the reality in which they lived they would be erased.
They had just woken up after sleeping for no one knew how long. They needed time to reorganize and recover completely. They would have time to deal with humans and other races later.
* * *
Bai Zemin naturally had no idea what was going on in Europe.
After 20 minutes had passed without a second nuclear blast, Wu Yijun judged that the enemies of the European faction had probably been successfully decimated. At the very least, one of the two sides should have been wiped out or suffered colossal damage from which they could not recover for years to come.
Even then, Bai Zemin ordered a group of people to remain vigilant day and night for the few days to come.
A nuclear weapon was no small thing. A single one of these bombs exploding on their territory could wipe out millions of lives and cause immeasurable losses.
For example, if the nuclear missile fell on a minor base, what Bai Zemin would lose would be human lives and a lot of resources. Painful? Definitely painful. However, it was a pain that he and the others could tolerate to a certain extent.
Now... if the nuclear missile fell on one of the bases where experiments and developments of utmost importance were being carried out or where there were many top level soul evolvers it would be catastrophic for the entire faction.
Therefore, he needed more nuclear shields as soon as possible.
After finishing the meeting since he had already announced what he had to announce, Bai Zemin stopped Shangguan Bing Xue who seemed to be intending to have a chat about something with Wu Yijun.
"I'm sorry but I need to talk to Yijun." He said with an apologetic look on his face.
Shangguan Bing Xue looked at him and blinked curiously but finally nodded. She did not ask to stay but after telling Wu Yijun to visit her house in the night if she had time Shangguan Bing Xue left, but not before nodding towards Bai Zemin with a small smile.
Wu Yijun looked at her best friend's back and her feminine sixth sense helped her to realize that the current Shangguan Bing Xue was different from the Shangguan Bing Xue who had left for America two weeks ago. Besides, from the way she was looking at Bai Zemin just before she left...
Wu Yijun sighed in her heart as she muttered something to herself.
She was a smart woman, so her innocent baby face didn't mean she didn't understand some things or couldn't see through people in certain ways. This was particularly true considering that the eyes with which Shangguan Bing Xue looked at Bai Zemin just before retreating formed a look that was not very different from the look she often looked at him with.
Wu Yijun's feelings were very complicated at the moment as her heart was slightly in disorder.
Bai Zemin had to call out to her several times and gently shake her shoulder to bring her back to reality and pay attention to him.
* * * * * * *
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