Chapter 164: Final Chapter – 4

Chapter 164: Final Chapter – 4

Brilliance and darkness intersected.

The sky flickered erratically, and the ground was increasingly pulverized.

But still, neither of them intended to stop.

The distorted world, held in spherical form in the god’s hand, was shot forth.

The girl’s unique Holy Sword extended, blocking that distorted world.

Following that, the girl’s Holy Sword descended upon the god, but the god also repelled it by deploying the distorted world like a barrier.

It was a simple situation, but…… the aftermath was anything but simple.

Shot, and blocked.

Then, falling, and repelled.

It was a duel without any particular skill, technique, magic, or anything.

Of course, the techniques they displayed were not limited to just that… but neither being waited for the other to fully unleash a technique.

If the girl tried to take out a potion, the god would immediately smash it.

Conversely, if the god tried to exert his authority, the girl, sensing it immediately, would summon the will of the world to seal it.

Therefore, the seemingly simple fierce battle actually contained numerous techniques and countermeasures against those techniques.

One clash.

The god’s distorted world was blocked by the girl’s Holy Sword.

Two clashes.

The girl’s Holy Sword was covered by the distorted world deployed by the god.

Three clashes.

Again, the girl’s sword tore through the god’s world, descending towards the god’s form.

Four clashes.

The god’s world extended towards the girl, and the girl hastily pulled her Holy Sword towards her body, blocking it.

So, how much time had passed? Both beings were getting tired of this tedious repetition.

And…… the world, which had to endure dozens of these clashes, was becoming a wreck.

The sky was splitting and breaking, creating huge cracks.

The ground had long since crumbled, leaving both beings floating in the air.

Everything around them was destroyed and pulverized, with only fragments remaining as traces.

In a place that had become a ruin, almost unbelievably the former center of the Holy Kingdom where the Cathedral once stood, the two beings stared at each other.

Both beings accepted the fact that, at this rate, they would either fight forever or perish together.

Even without them, the adversaries dealing with the attacks and souls summoned by the god before he clashed with the girl had also reached a stalemate where neither side was pushed back.

Therefore… they all made a decision.

To allow the opponent’s attack, and to attack themselves.

A battle of who would allow a more fatal blow to the other.

The god transformed the distorted world into the shape of a giant spear.

Where the distorted world brushed, it warped grotesquely, and only the god’s authority was intensely felt.

The girl, after a quick deliberation, also took out a potion. It was a potion that strongly evoked the feeling of the adversaries who had been with her.

A moment of silence, a moment of stillness, a moment of pause.

Even though time was not being manipulated, a fleeting moment passed where a few seconds felt like hours……

*Clang!*

With a familiar clear sound, the god’s distorted world, tearing through the real world, shot towards the girl.

And the girl, too, gripped her Holy Sword and charged towards that distorted world.

Clash.

An ineffable, incomprehensible sound echoed.

The god’s distorted world, which even blocked and twisted the real world, clashed with the girl’s Holy Sword.

Neither side was pushed back.

Normally, it would be absurd for a human to confront a world, no matter how distorted and hastily created.

Even with divinity, it would be even more so if most of it was used to seal the god’s authority.

However… for some reason, a denser divinity settled upon the girl’s Holy Sword, and even more so upon the girl herself.

For a very brief moment, it was denser and deeper than the god himself.

As if, once again, the will existing in this world was with the girl.

The moment the god felt something strange about that logically impossible sight, certain words flowed from the girl’s lips.

“…I will prophesy victory and existence.”

Therefore, divinity was given. And, the adversaries wielding divinity blocked the god’s authority.

“…I will defy the god and reign over the laws and reason of the world.”

Therefore, your divinity was answered. Authority befitting a god was given.

“…No matter what happens, we will not surrender.”

Therefore, all creatures who shared your will could avoid perishing in vain by the god’s authority.

“…I will challenge that incomprehensible being, that absolute being.”

Therefore, you challenged the god, and clashed equally.

“…I will create a miracle that will defeat the god.”

Therefore, we believed in you again, and granted your request.

“I will make a wish. To the world, and to all creatures. Betting all my divinity.”

……Therefore, that wish can be fulfilled. With your pure strength.

Instantly, the divinity granted to the girl was withdrawn.

But…… the girl was still clashing with the distorted world created by the god, and she was not being pushed back.

It was impossible. The difference between one without divinity and one with divinity is as great as the difference between a god and an ordinary creature.

Nevertheless, the girl did not retreat.

Something, something was terribly wrong, the god felt at that moment.

“……It’s impossible, how can a mere creature…?”

“If divinity exists, you can manipulate the laws and reason of the created world as you please, right?”

“Yes, that’s why there’s a difference in class that cannot be dared to be crossed!”

“What if the world itself, which is those laws and reason, refuses it?”

At that moment, the god felt an inexplicable sense of unease.

A feeling as if something fundamental had been lost.

At first, he thought it was faith.

However…… even so, it couldn’t explain the current situation where his own distorted world was gradually disappearing against a being without divinity.

With an ominous sense of unease, the god unleashed his authority to quickly erase the girl.

Because erasing the girl, who seemed to have willingly abandoned her divinity, with authority would be too easy.

“……? Why, why do you not answer!”

“Because the world sealed your divinity.”

“What the……!!!”

Only then could the god understand.

The girl’s divinity was not withdrawn or abandoned.

The girl had made a request to the world with the divinity granted to her, and the world had granted that request at the cost of all the girl’s divinity.

…The sense of unease, as if having lost something fundamental, that he had felt since earlier.

That sense of unease…… stemmed from the vanished divinity.

The world, at the cost of the girl’s divinity, had temporarily sealed the concept of divinity and its existence.

“Ugh…!”

“Now, let’s see you become the class of creature you so looked down upon.”

What remained of the god, stripped of divinity, was only the body he had personally created for his descent.

A body robustly made to contain a god… but just that.

He had no authority, and in the first place, a god couldn’t possibly have learned magic or swordsmanship.

He knew it because he was omniscient, but he had never actually done it, so he couldn’t immediately perform it.

At the same time, because divinity had disappeared, the power to smash the girl’s potions also vanished.

Therefore… while the god adapted to his suddenly truly human body, the girl was able to quickly take out and use several potions.

*Clang!*

With an unusually loud and clear sound, disaster raged.

From the sky, giant meteors, how they were created, continuously fell, and from the ground, massive icebergs rose with a chill that seemed to freeze the entire body.

In the pain of freezing and scorching. In the concept of pain, which was absolutely unfamiliar, the god felt his own mind becoming hazy.

At the same time…… he felt fear.

A god without divinity… was merely a weak human being.

Compared to that, his opponent?

His opponent was a monster who had challenged a god in such a weak human body and was still alive.

They were of the same creature class, and had the same human body, but she was superior in everything, including experience and skill with the human body.

Therefore…… the god trembled in fear, facing something he only knew as a concept: death.

It would surely be brief.

No matter how much the will of the world helped, there had to be a limit to sealing such immense power as divinity.

No matter how much the world itself was law and reason, there had to be a limit to sealing such a vast concept as divinity.

He told himself that… but the god knew instinctively.

That the girl before him would kill him faster than that brief moment would pass.

“The last one… yes, there’s something that suits it perfectly.”

“Di-divinity, authority, I’ll give it all! Just spare me……!”

“Too late. Far too late.”

And the girl simply let go of the potion in her hand.

The potion fell.

In that instant, the god tried to somehow annihilate the potion… but the earnest wish of a god without divinity was thoroughly ignored by the world.

And. The next moment.

*Clang!*

An incredibly clear sound echoed through the world.

“…No.”

The sky turned black. And flashed.

“It cannot end like this.”

And… something shot forth like a flash of light.

“I, I……! I cannot disappear like this…!!!!!”

The god’s scream was erased by the ensuing lightning.

Like the divine punishment an arrogant god would inflict when punishing humans.

Divine punishment struck the god’s body, already battered by previous attacks.

Within it, as the god’s body shrieked, trembling in pain, the girl’s Holy Sword was drawn across him.

A single, incredibly clean stroke.

“……!”

“Yes, this is the end.”

The god’s head, unable to even let out a death rattle, fell.

The shattered and broken world regained its original form.

The distorted world created by the god also vanished.

The cracks in the sky disappeared, and the ground gradually recovered.

And, only then… did the divinity that the god had so desperately cried out for until the very end return.

“…God is dead.”

On the land where the girl’s declaration echoed, only the chilling, cooling corpse of one being remained.