Ch. 81 - End of Sacrifices

The altar sped through the air at a blinding speed.

The blood-red chains that pierced through the priests' bodies were continuously absorbing their life essence, fuelling the altar's flight capabilities. The priestess didn't care that the priests might die from this -- she merely stared at the crystal skeleton that shone a bright red.

"Great Priestess, there is still a great distance away from the King's City, but our priests are unable to feed enough life essence to the altar. Could we, perhaps, stop to rest?" the Golden Silk Priestess requested shakily.

Before this, the Great Priestess was but a humble slave, who didn't even know where the Royal City was. She blindly followed wherever the crystal skeleton was guiding her. Upon hearing the Golden Silk Priestess' request, she could see cold sweat dripping from her forehead. The priestess slashed open her finger and pressed the bleeding finger on the altar; the altar immediately shone bright red, and the priests pierced by the chains were slightly rejuvenated.

"No. We must reach the King's City by tonight..." However, before the priestess could finish her sentence, she saw the horrified looks from the other priests, and found that the crystal skeleton had dimmed.

"God damn it, Brown!" she roared. She stretched out her hand and gripped at the chains, causing the chains to immediately absorb all of the priests' life essence.

"Great Priestess..."

Boom.

The Golden Silk Priestess exploded in gore and blood immediately, and the cold, chilling voice of the priestess rang in every priest's ear, "Full speed ahead. When our God steps foot into this world, you will be honoured for your deeds..."

...

Ophelia didn't expect Adam to be able to find her sword, despite it being damaged. She immediately took the sword back and kept quiet. William had finally managed to recover from the intense fire magic and floated towards Adam.

"Adam, if you had such a powerful trinket on you, why didn't we just infiltrate the Supreme God Cult's headquarters in the first place?"

"I didn't know how powerful the ring was," Adam admitted.

Everyone immediately nodded. After all, no one knew how powerful magic really was.

"Secondly," he continued. "The mission stated that we are to destroy the cult, as well as bring back whatever medium they are using to summon their god, and I think that the Academy holds a higher priority for the medium."

William frowned upon hearing this, and pointed out, "Then, why didn't we split up? It's clear that the Supreme God Cult is weaker than apprentices, wouldn't that speed up the process?"

"I never restricted any of you," Adam said bluntly. "As long as we complete the mission, it doesn't matter how we do it."

"But... we could have saved more people..."

William immediately lowered his voice, realising that Adam's line of thinking was quite literally in tune with a Mage's line of thinking, and William's recent socialisation with Adam made him forget that. Adam doesn't care about how many people die, nor did he care about his companions -- as long as it could help him complete the mission, they were dispensable to him.

Besides, Adam was right. They could have easily split off from each other ever since they came to the island.

The devil popped out of Adam and taunted sarcastically, "Young man, I sense fear in your heart -- were you perhaps... afraid? Was that why you stuck along with Adam, instinctively relying on the strong?"

William's face turned pale, and Ophelia and Crystal looked away as well. They would never in their lives admit that the devil was right.

Adam had no interest in dealing with their emotions. After scanning around the ruined city for the remaining traces of the cult, he shot upwards into the sky and flew westward alone.

"Well," the devil continued. "If you want to follow him, then follow him. If you don't want to, then do your own thing. You know he is a man of few words."

Crystal and Ophelia glanced at each other and nodded, chasing after Adam. William stopped for a second, but decided to chase after Adam as well.

Two hours later, Adam could see an altar floating in the sky, and the priestess saw Adam as well.

Without any words exchanged, a fight began immediately.

Adam raised his finger and pointed to the sky, and immediately, lightning shot out from the heavens, speeding towards the priestess.

The priestess raised her hand, letting the priests penetrated by the chains to tank the hit for her.

Adam continually blasted the altar, and eventually, the priests could no longer withstand Adam's magic and disintegrated into white ash.

"Blasphemers who offend the power of our Supreme God seek their own death!"

The priestess dispelled the chains and called upon the gods to smite Adam down.

Adam immediately summoned the devil while bombarding the priestess with all sorts of magic. Adam could tell she was dangerous, feeling an alien energy radiating from her. Although it wasn't as strong as Peter Aum's aura, it was enough for Adam's systems to blare its alarms.

The devil shivered under the power of the gods, not daring to attack them at all. The devil merely surrounded Adam, shielding him from any incoming attacks.

The priestess continued to pray, and the volume of her foreign prayers started to increase, piercing through Adam's ears. With her prayers, the skulls on the altar shot out countless energy rays towards Adam.

Adam could feel that the beams weren't actually that strong -- they were roughly equivalent to a regular fireball. Adam stood motionless in the air, letting his psychic barrier tank every single beam.

"White energy?"

Adam was surprised, seeing that the divine powers of the Supreme God were white, compared to the bloody red magic of the priestess.

The priestess took out a dagger and dismembered her left hand, pressing her wound on the altar. The beams immediately stopped and gathered together, shooting towards Adam at a high speed.

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