The Life of a Wise Cult Leader - Chapter 194

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 194

Celestia gasped in shock and supported me.

“Ascetic, Ascetic! What is this…”

Teacher’s energy that had been lying dormant went berserk and delivered an additional follow-up strike.

The wound on my chest crawled up along my collarbone and climbed all the way to my left cheek. When I touched my cheek, white fragments came off.

‘What exactly is Teacher…’

First, let me deal with this wound. Even if I can’t prevent damage to my divinity, I must prevent physical damage. It takes too much power to reconstruct.

However, the ether wouldn’t be manipulated. Even when I was human, I wouldn’t have controlled it in such a way.

I silently clenched and unclenched my fist, gauging my strength.

Then the cart in front of me exploded with a roar, scattering hay into the air.

I had only meant to push it.

‘Like trying to pour just one cup of water but overflowing it, or turning off a faucet but it still flows…’

My divine authority wouldn’t obey either. It was similar in difficulty to a one-year-old baby trying to sketch with a mechanical pencil.

When I opened my clenched fist, my arm was trembling violently.

‘Just from gaining insight into the Young Lady’s memories, such a blow…’

A trap Teacher had laid.

Alderion rushed toward me in a panic.

“I’m fine, so prepare for an attack—”

Thud, step.

One alien sound could be heard. In this place where all senses seemed to be blocked, only that sound seemed to be allowed.

Celestia and Alderion jumped up and pointed their sword and hand toward where the sound came from.

Thud, step, thud, step.

Through the thick smoke, an Old Gentleman with a cane walked calmly forward.

His eyes behind the monocle looked benevolent, but the energy flowing beneath his white hair neatly slicked back with pomade gave off a subtly unpleasant feeling.

“Even gods inevitably age and are forgotten equally before time and fate.”

Each time he stepped forward with his cane, the ground of Endeb dried up and lost its vitality.

‘A demon.’

Just as Alderion was about to grip his greatsword properly and unleash his fighting spirit—

“Shut up, old man.”

Celestia’s cold voice cut through the air. She had no intention of letting him spout elegant words.

As Celestia’s finger flicked lightly, the residents who were still sleeping were sucked into spatial distortions and launched far away to a safe district.

The sky seemed to be dyed blood red, then a massive meteor pierced through the clouds and poured down above the Old Gentleman’s head.

Rummmmmble—

It wasn’t simple magic. Ignoring gravity and gaining acceleration, the massive rock crushed the Old Gentleman.

Thud-CRASH—

The overwhelming mass was so great that even the explosion sound couldn’t be heard as it swallowed the Old Gentleman’s bowler hat. The shockwave tore through the mist and swept in all directions.

With a roar, the ground screamed and collapsed, and the spot where he had been standing instantly transformed into a burning crater.

It was a perfect preemptive strike, unmixed with any mercy as a Transcendent.

“I have a personality that pays back ten times what I receive.”

Celestia shrugged her shoulders.

It was a cold-hearted demeanor different from me, who had hesitated to attack not knowing where Austin Gerard might be.

“Are you perhaps angry?”

“Did you know where Austin Gerard was when you used magic?”

“No. But since this was a trap targeting both the hostage Austin Gerard and you, Ascetic, I made the choice to prioritize your life over that one person’s life.”

She wasn’t originally like that.

Does one leave behind pieces of humanity to become a Transcendent?

If I had given my heart to Gretchin and never received it back, I might have really become like that.

‘Hmm! Let me treasure my human self very carefully.’

The thick dust cloud burned in the meteor’s heat.

Inside the pit where the giant meteorite was embedded, it should have been boiling like lava, but what came from there wasn’t the sound of rocks breaking but something weathering away.

Rustle, rustle.

An unpleasant noise like ancient books thousands of years old crumbling to powder at one’s fingertips.

“…As expected, he’s not someone who’d end with just that.”

In the center of the crater where the smoke had cleared, the Old Gentleman was still adjusting his bowler hat.

The massive meteorite that should have crushed him was scattering as ‘grains of sand’ above his head.

“What an impatient young lady.”

The Old Gentleman laughed briefly.

“All things eventually become old, crumble, and are forgotten. Even that grand star you launched is no exception.”

The Old Gentleman, speaking as if a grandfather teaching his granddaughter, brushed the dust off his suit and fiddled with his monocle again.

A glinting gaze pierced through me.

“And the god you follow is no exception either.”

“Something about to die sure talks a lot.”

Simultaneously with Celestia’s muttering, magic circles that were usually difficult to handle even three of filled the sky.

Unlike her angry tone, the magic that shot out was extremely rational and coldly precise, drawing elaborate trajectories as it surrounded the demon.

Alderion charged through those deadly spells with his sword in hand. He planned to advance while taking the magic head-on. He’ll die at this rate.

I pushed my ether manipulation to the extreme and wrapped it around Alderion.

The pathetic barrier shattered the moment Celestia’s magic touched it, but Alderion didn’t care and swung his sword.

Just from using that little bit of ether, the cracks on my face spread further and split to my eyes. One side of my vision flickered as if going dark, and pain like seeing the world through a broken mirror stabbed my brain.

I couldn’t be a burden to the two fighting. I covered one side of my face with my palm.

‘Damn it. Is this skill sealing…’

My vision turned red, and fragments of my crumbled cheek fell as white powder onto my robe. Due to the wound that had climbed up my collarbone, even speaking now brought pain as if my lungs were being torn.

The demon laughed.

“Don’t you know that even your great power becomes old and dull before time? The most fearful thing in this world is my own body weakening in the flow of time.”

Just before Celestia’s multi-attribute spells reached the demon.

Like the meteor that had turned to sand, various spells weakly faded away in mid-air.

But Alderion’s sword, not missing that gap, cut off the demon’s hem, just a small part.

‘I see.’

Even if magic is extinguished like that, physical mass or force cannot be erased.

I forcibly suppressed my gasping breath and opened my mouth.

“Celestia, magic attacks don’t work. Support Alderion.”

“Support? It’s not my specialty, but…”

However, the Archmage who had become a Transcendent skillfully handled even fields that weren’t her specialty.

The Archmage’s tremendous buff skills rushed toward Alderion.

Green light flickered at Alderion’s feet, then he charged at the demon at a noticeably faster speed than before.

When Celestia gestured, the terrain twisted. She aimed for just before weathering to block vision and break posture.

So that Alderion’s sword could cleave the demon.

The roar from the collision of forces that could be called superhuman tore through the mist and created earthquakes.

“If we hold out a little longer, Family, Commander, and Harmony will come. Hold on.”

“How long do we have to hold out!”

I don’t know…

My condition isn’t good enough to check that far.

I tried not to worry them. However, pain like touching a nerve during dental treatment made my whole body tingle sharply, forcing me to collapse and sit on the ground.

“Ascetic! Damn it, damn it, damn it!”

I could feel Celestia attacking with all her might.

It wasn’t simply the level of pouring out magic.

So much magic poured out that it seemed to burn even the surrounding oxygen, and with each breath, burning air stabbed my lungs.

Each time she waved her hand, dozens of magic circles floating in the air screamed and rotated. Contrary to her distorted expression, the magic from the circles was refined and beautiful.

To counter aging, corrosion, and weathering, she was attacking with materials that didn’t corrode well, didn’t weather, and remained unchanged. Diamond.

It seemed to be an effective tactic as the demon’s speed of corroding magic slowed significantly. However, no useful damage was getting through yet.

My body shook from the trembling ground and powder fell from my flesh. I could taste blood in my mouth. Even though this body has no blood.

Kagagagagak-

Rumble…

Bang!

Every time Alderion’s blade cut through the air, thunder crashed down.

‘Pieta’, inherited from the God of War, spewed red ether as it charged toward the demon’s monocle. But the demon merely tapped the ground lightly with the tip of his staff.

With that light gesture, Alderion’s speed became abnormally slow.

No, it wasn’t that Alderion had slowed down, but rather ‘time’ itself that he stood upon had lost its vigor and stretched out like an old man.

“Ah, how pitiful. You foolish ones bound by the chains of time. Yet still, isn’t life brilliant and beautiful?”

The Old Gentleman, having easily dodged Alderion’s sword, aimed the tip of his staff at Alderion’s chest. He twisted his body in his sluggish state to avoid that strike.

“Why not abandon that decrepit god and enjoy an eternal prime with me?”

He didn’t answer and roughly swung his sword. The blade’s tip grazed the Old Gentleman’s high nose bridge.

“Ah, what a pity. If only you were a little younger, it would have connected.”

The Old Gentleman very elegantly countered all attacks from Alderion armed with Celestia’s buffs and the magic filling the sky.

He was toying with our kids.

Celestia the Transcendent and Alderion who had become the God of War’s final Apostle.

Even these two couldn’t handle a single demon?

Then just how strong was Lumensia?

I felt Lumensia’s strength from the Forgotten Gods’ memories in my very skin.

Far from facing a single demon, they were being toyed with. It seemed like we’d need at least two Transcendents to even land an effective hit on a demon…

‘Rather than give up on using the internet with spotty one-bar wifi, I have no choice but to engage in close combat using the reed based on an overwhelmingly divine body.’

The demon raised his hand.

“Let’s put an end to this playing around. Time is precious for both of us, after all.”

Silent ether gathered beneath his hand. Neither Celestia nor Alderion noticed.

I tried to protect them with ether, but as if someone was interfering, it wasn’t easy to control.

Embracing the pain, I gripped the reed horizontally.

Kuuuung!

The moment the demon’s Divine Power clashed with the reed, I lost sensation in my left arm.

Like a porcelain doll struck by a hammer, everything from my left fingertips to my elbow turned to white powder and burst out in all directions.

“Ascetic?!”

Celestia, who belatedly grasped the situation, screamed.

In her eyes, I was already half-destroyed.

The cracks on the left side of my face now extended through the center of my pupil to my hair, and my robe was covered white with the debris of my crumbled flesh.

The left side of my body had been blown away.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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