Soul of Searing Steel

In the skies, the Demon King was forced to give up on retrieving more than half of Helm’s remains, while almost one thirds of the Insectoid Demon General’s body was left.

Though there were unexpected circumstances, the outcome was not so bad.

‘Ding-Ring…’

A little luminous orb detached itself from the colossal luminous human figure, flying away from the celestial being and perched itself over Joshua’s shoulder. Light jingled with a tinge of worry, but the worry merely shook his head. “It’s fine. If an Abyssal Liege sets its mind on blindsiding in the Abyss, nobody would be able to hold it back. It’s not your fault.”

Indeed, Joshua expected that Goliath, the Demon King of Gluttony would act right after its two Demon Generals were defeat. After all, there were just those few Generals in the entire Sixth Abyss, making them a precious resource that must not be lost for the Demon King—it must have been shocked that Helm was slayed so directly, which was why it certainly would not let Saluka die in his hands.

There was nothing more normal for Light being unable to stop it. In the preexistence, the Abyssal Liege had stood against the gods with its own power—if not for the Legends of Mycroft noticing that its core in Tear Valley Fortress was extraordinarily weak, even dispatching an unprecedented strike team of Legends to ambush, the end of the war might have turned our very differently. Furthermore, Goliath appeared to have survive even after its core was destroyed—it appeared to be simply heavily injured, and was still manipulating the Abyss’s war efforts from behind the scenes.

In other words, it was acceptable to force such an incomparable Demon King to retreat, wounded and empty-handed.

“It’s meaningless even if it snatched off the cocoon that Saluka turned itself into. My Steel Strength had seeped inside its body, and unless it wastes huge amount of resources of dispel it, the Insectoid Demon General would have to recuperate quietly for years. It’s very much crippled.”

Joshua spoke as he stood in the skies, a hint of disdain in his voice as he looked towards the bits of cocoon belonging to Saluka that was still floating in the air.

“And what we have is time to study its body.”

And in a few years, who would be concerned about an Insectoid Demon General that had no advancement in ability, as well as being studied thoroughly in every attribute it held?

Joshua waved his hand and retrieved all of the cocoon shards left by Saluka, ready to analyze it with Nostradamus, Barnil and the others in days to come. He then turned towards Helm’s spiritual fragments that had yet to completely disperse, frowned, before waving his again as well to recover every last piece. The shards of light thus started to flow as if a reversed waterfall, gathered into a box in Joshua’s hand.

The Abyssal Liege Goliath had braved the seal from the Multiverse Sacrificial Grounds and the Light’s attacks to retrieve Helm’s remained and Saluka’s cocoon. It was understandable for the latter since it would be a Demon General in full form after it had recovered, but it was unusual for the former. Helm’s soul was beaten in pieces, and Joshua would not believe that a being that burnt its own soul so that its Soul Particles could be used as ammunition would have any chance for survival—it was already a miracle for it to leave spiritual fragments.

And therein lies the question: Why would Goliath not allow Helm’s spiritual remains to simply vanish within the winds? Apart from revival, there was that one possibility—its memories held information their enemies must not know!

Though it was a mere guess, Joshua understood that the most important thing about battle was to not allow the enemy to get what they want—and that applies to both before and after battle. If Goliath would take such great lengths to reclaim Helm’s remains, he would take it as well even if he wanted to destroy it all initially. But since the Demon King would come and take it, he was not so willing to do that so simply now, and try to see what was inside instead.

Having done all that, Joshua breathed a long exhale, an irrepressible sign of tiredness on his face.

He did not feel so tired when he brawled hand-to-hand against the Void Mother and its aberration spawn, the first reason being that it could convert the corpses of enemies into fuel back then. Most importantly, for the warrior, it was not even sport to Joshua to cull those weak aberrations—only the final bout against the Void Mother counted as the melee.

On the other hand, he had fought decisively against the Black Dragon King first just now, and it had been two Legends battling most determinedly, manically and without mercy until the very last moment. They simply did not put up any defense, simply resorting to tearing each other apart to see who would be the one to last longer kill the other. Though Joshua attained final victory, the battle had been so toiling that it was comparable to a single duel against the Void Mother… Moreover, although the battle appeared to have lasted just a dozen minutes, it had burnt the Black Dragon King’s ideals, resolve, and the very days it lived.

The battle against Helm and Saluka later was even harder. Neither of the two Demon Generals were weak, and Joshua would not be confident to take them on any other day. However, since the battlefield was the inescapable Bloodmoon Abyss which denied the two Generals any strategic retreat, they could fight to the death, considerably weak now given his considerable advantage, and were hence given such a rout… Otherwise, in the vast reaches of Void, the Insectoid Demon General would retreat after one strike while Helm supported it from across long distances. Even if they could not kill Joshua then, it would not be difficult for them to delay him over a dozen days.

Taking the luminous orb down from his shoulder, Joshua held it in his embrace and patted Light’s ‘head’. He then looked around at the ravaged Bloodmoon Abyss which was largely vaporized, and said helplessly, “Never thought that the battle would end up so intense.”

The entire center of the Bloodmoon Abyss was now a distinct spherical vacuum zone, with neither mass nor air existing within. Now, air from other regions in are cascading towards it, gusting waves of vacuum turbulences and tempest. In the distance, many stone islands had been melted into magma spheres as well.

The battle against the black dragon had shattered countless stone isle, while the battle against the two Demon Generals destroyed even more. Joshua believed that if the fight went on, there would probably be nothing larger than a fingernail left in the Abyss. Hence, the warrior nodded at the luminous orb that was jingling a little unhappily about the fact. “It’s fine. You’ve helped me so many times, it’s time for me to you now.”

“What’s more, I brought along a present I planned to give you anyway.”

‘Ding-ring?’

It was now post-battle, but power originating from the Multiverse Sacrificial Grounds still kept each world sealed, preventing any being from leaving. It was a colosseum Joshua had designed intricately, lasting two days and nights while imprisoning any powerful foes that could threaten the Infinite Horizon.

And now, all enemies were gone. With so much time remaining, Joshua could do something he planned to in the first place.

Such as growing a tree.

***

Joshua drew out out a crystalline sphere that was actually churning lake water, with a jade-green sprout floating inside. The warrior’s body had always been the best vault—he would always carry along everything useful, and it was no exception the sprout of a Lifetree, a gift from the elves.

In the very next instant, Joshua raised his hand. Gravity revolving around it thus distorted and shifted.

The skies of the Bloodmoon Abyss were still shrouded in the energy turbulences ensuing after the battle between Legendary champions, the empty heart of which where the vacuum turbulences raged. Though air was quick to fill the emptiness, it was a violent process: the gales it drew would only calm days later.

But the very lift of Joshua’s hand calmed it all—smoke began to shift, energy turbulences stilled, the raging vacuum and gales freezing as if a small feline that ran into an ancient behemoth. In the very next instant, the warrior once again released frightening gravity that bent light, and the distant magma spheres as well as stone islands began to move towards him.

Or more precisely, not only from the distant, but every mass in this world began to move towards Joshua!

At first, the stony isles of the Bloodmoon Abyss shifted slowly, but soon accelerated. In a dozen seconds, even the furthest stone islands began to move dozens of meters in a second, whizzing towards the man!

It was as if dust, shards, pebbles, fumes, scattered heavy metals, magma yet to cool and millions of stone islands felt the summons from mass itself. As Joshua deliberately expanded his gravity over the entire world, all mass in the Bloodmoon Abyss began to gather.

In a very short time, that world changed.

Boom!

That was the first sound from those stone islands colliding, even as a breathtaking sight took place at the heart of the world: dozens of mountainous stony islands whizzed towards it from the distance, crashing into each other beneath Joshua’s control, and fused into a singular mass by a certain profound power.

Then came the incessant echoing tremors. As if thousands of meteors were plummeting down on land, the sound of stone shattering and fusing reverberated throughout every corner of the Bloodmoon Abyss. Light, having been hovering high above throughout, witnessed it all in astonishment. Shades that outnumbered the pre-existing islands by dozens or hundredfold were slowly darting toward their direction from the edge of the world, the process in which they shifted causing immeasurable vibrations, disintegrations. However, every piece of substance was thus gathered by the power of man, shaping into a small continent right in front of it.

Indeed, a continent.

Soil and stone that wafted in the air rigidly heard the decree of the champion, and the floating mountains thus shrugged away their stony layers, booming the atmosphere and shook it from near to far without stopping. It was the sound of endless isles crashing and combining, and in an hour beneath the illumination of the Blood Moon, a crude continent with a radius of over two hundred kilometers appeared in the center of the Bloodmoon Abyss. Large stone islands now longer cause tremendous tremors when they crashed into it, even as a silver circle of star cloud engulfed it, seeping into the depths of the continent and melding it completely into a single body.

And when a threshold was reached, when the continent was large enough, Joshua took a deep breath.

In the very next moment, the hovering isles accelerated, while the silver radiance that engulfed the continent brightened by a few times. All energies across the entire world hence began to gather towards the continent, and be it those from Joshua, the Black Dragon King, Saluka, even the Abyssal Liege’s and that of the Abyssal dragons from a long time ago, all energies started to appear in the air, turning into a thousand veins of rainbows light before sinking into the center of the continent. Those magical energies would form a base cycle over the entire continent, the mana mineral veins they would eventually form further hardening the integrity of the land.

Faint silver radiance flashed in the center of the world as the Blood Moon shone upon it all, its light akin to the first rays of dawn—neither blinding nor faint. And under that background of dawn, the barren land expanded without stopping as pieces of stony island fused into it, the craggy surface made level beneath the influence Steel Strength.

Finally, Joshua ended his gravity manipulation, nodding in satisfaction as he landed upon the land that he had completely reshaped.

There was no need for him to do the rest. Stone isles further away would naturally continue to hit the continent, and in the next few foreseeable years, every stone island would gather by its edges to form a complete continent. It was a grand sight that none could repress awestruck sighs when they behold it, for it was virtually the same as recreating a world.

Afterward, Joshua simply pointed with a finger, and a circular crater around a kilometer wide caved into the heart of the continent.

“Hurry with the water?” He requested, looking up at the Blood Moon.

Though the luminous human figure did not know what the word ‘water’ meant in the Mycroft common tongue, Joshua’s spirit elucidated everything. With a low hum, the Blood Moon detached ‘a small piece’ of itself that darted towards the center of the continent and into the crater Joshua made, filling it precisely as rippling sanguine lake.

Not bad. Joshua could not help nodding at the sight, and threw the crystalline sphere in his hand into the sanguine lake. The sphere shattered in the air, the lake water and sprout within splashing down and landing directly at the center of the lake.

With a pleased expression, Joshua looked on as the sprout floated along with the lake, rapidly stretching its roots to absorb nutrients. Soon, the Mother Tree that was maintaining its sprout form due to its living environment swiftly grew with the rich energies and energies as if ballooning. In minutes, it was already half a meter tall and displaying the outline of a tree stem: jade-green sheets of leaves with a slight tint of red hence starting to sway against the wind, just as little undetectable seeds spreading across all directions.

In minutes, another awe-inspiring sight became visible: by the shores of the sanguine lake were sparse greenery! Living things known as ‘plants’ were now sprouting upon the barren land! Those were seeds scattered by the Mother Tree, carrying out its duty to create an ecosphere suitable for the living!

That process would be difficult: The Mother Lifetree is fated to not extend its ecosphere in the Abyss which lacked energy, and it was also not Lifetree created by Father Nature that could grow and alter otherworld in spite of the absence of life. Be that as it may, there could well be an oasis around the blood-hued lake, something which was very rare in the Abyss.

Joshua nodded in satisfaction, the seemingly astonishing action was not actually too difficult for him. “Light, you have helped me on so many occasions that I could not idly by,” he said, looking up at the Blood Moon. “Look. There’s even the sprout of a Lifetree on the continent.”

“It’s my gift to you.”

Light did not respond to Joshua at once, although the entire Bloodmoon was slightly reverberating. It was in shock and delight, and though the luminous human figure was not sure what it all meant, it instinctively knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that it was the greatest of gifts.

But just as that profound presence was beside itself with joy, the luminous human figure at the heart of the Bloodmoon Abyss turned and looked towards beyond the world. Joshua did so at the same time as well, his brow furrowed towards the edge of the horizon.

There, the energy of the Multiverse Sacrificial Grounds was flashing. That was a barrier that sealed the world, separating it from the Void as well as preventing anything from entering or leaving it. In turn, the Abyss was an inescapable trap, and yet, it was precisely beneath the obscuring of the shielding that something caught Joshua and the luminous human figure’s attention.

They looked towards the direction of the world of Mycroft, the two majestic beings frowning.

For there came a voice that transcended worlds.