The Mage Who Devours Disasters - Chapter 47

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 47.
A number’s range is a vessel.
Filling it is my discretion, or so I was told.
In other words, it represents my potential and the magnitude of power I can currently accept.
For instance, let’s assume my talent’s maximum is 100.
But if the power I can handle and accept right now is only 10?
The die’s result would fall around 10.
That’s why Heimdall was at ease.
He could look down at me with a benevolent smile.
No matter how miraculous my achievements were.
No matter that I was a monster who had climbed to Floor 55 in such a short span.
I was still merely a lower-tier deity.
There existed a fundamental difference in rank between him and me—a supreme-tier deity.
From his perspective, my vessel, no matter how vast, was at most 50.
He likely believed that even granting that much would cause a lower-tier deity’s body to burst from the strain.
It was only natural that he harbored no great expectations.
But.
The number revealed before my eyes was different.
[10,000]
“….”
My breath caught.
Ten thousand.
I had never seen a number of this magnitude before.
When I rolled Pandora’s Cube, the number that appeared was 1,001.
Even that was called a miracle that transcended the System’s limits.
Yet to start at ten thousand?
But the shock did not end there.
Clatter!
The die that had stopped began to spin once more.
It rotates with manic intensity.
The number expands.
Surpassing the ten-thousand mark, it soared instantly to the System’s upper limit.
Click.
[99,999]
“…!”
The number just before one hundred thousand.
That extreme figure was etched into the void.
That was when it happened.
Ding!
A loud warning alarm struck my ears.
A crimson message flooded my vision.
[Warning! The System’s display limit has been exceeded.]
[No numerical value exists beyond this point.]
[Measurement impossible.]
[Recalibrating results.]
Shwoooosh!
Light erupted.
The number 99,999 floating in the void distorted.
As if the System itself had malfunctioned, the pixels shattered and fragmented before reforming into that bizarre shape I’d witnessed before.
[???]
Question marks.
It meant there were no limits.
It signified an abyss that could not be measured.
My soul’s vessel.
This irregular body housing the Absolute Deity ‘Inevitability’.
It had begun to devour entirely the divine authority that Heimdall had bestowed upon me.
“Ugh…!”
Heimdall’s body, his hand still pressed against my forehead, lurched violently.
A suppressed groan tore from his lips.
I was being drained.
This was far beyond a master offering a disciple a single cup of water.
The dam had shattered.
Heimdall’s essential power—the source of that colossal tempest—cascaded into me like a waterfall.
Uuuuuuung!
The golden rune inscribed on my right hand vibrated with frenzied intensity.
The instinct to devour.
As the legitimate channel of the Apostle Deity Contract opened, the monster within me ravenously consumed Heimdall’s power.
Ding!
[You have perfectly absorbed the divine authority of Heimdall, Master of All Things.]
[The Apostle Deity Contract is established in a transcendent form.]
[You fully comprehend Heimdall’s divine essence.]
[You inherit Heimdall’s supreme authority.]
Messages cascaded across my mind.
And then the final line.
A text that made me doubt my own eyes appeared.
[You have inherited the authority ‘Creeping Chaos’!]
Creeping Chaos?
‘What in the world is this?’
I’d never heard that name before.
Tempest and chaos.
Are you saying these two words are intimately connected?
Or does it mean that chaos is what remains at the end of a tempest that sweeps away everything?
There is no explanation.
I have no sense of how to use it.
When one obtains a normal authority, one instinctively grasps its nature the moment it is acquired.
Based on the name alone, one can at least conjecture what sort of function it might possess.
Hellfire was like that, and the Gale of Annihilation was like that.
But this is different.
Its form, its nature, its manifestation—none of it can be discerned.
It feels like standing before some colossal beast slumbering in the depths of an abyss.
It seemed there were specific conditions required for its use.
I could not simply activate it whenever I wished.
When I attempted to channel mana into it, there was no response—as if a firmly sealed door blocked my way.
It appeared that a specific situation, or perhaps a specific medium, was necessary.
And yet.
‘The supreme authority,’ it was called.
Among the countless powers of Heimdall, who is known as the Master of All Things, this is the foremost.
I turned over the final word from the System window in my mind.
‘Succession.’
Succession.
To inherit.
Or to receive in continuation.
In other words, it has become completely mine.
‘Something feels off.’
I understand that the original Apostle Deity contract is not like this.
It is closer to a concept of ‘sharing.’
A higher Deity opens access to their own authority for the Apostle to use.
It is the same principle as turning a faucet to share water.
But succession?
This is not a faucet—it is as though I have torn away the entire water source itself.
Not sharing, but plunder.
The golden rune dwelling in my soul, the predatory instinct of the Absolute Deity, has devoured and consumed the very essence of Heimdall.
I slowly lifted my head.
I gazed upon Heimdall.
“….”
His expression was remarkable.
Bewilderment was written plainly across his face.
No—it was shock that transcended mere bewilderment.
The supreme-tier Deity, always composed and arrogant.
The Master of All Things, who looked down upon everything from beneath his feet.
That perfect mask lay shattered into countless fragments.
His eyes wandered aimlessly, devoid of direction.
His lips remained frozen in a half-open state.
The hand that had touched my forehead trembled faintly in the empty air.
He had encountered an unforeseen variable.
The core essence that dwelled in the deepest recesses of his soul.
He must have felt the terrible loss of absolute power being torn away entirely.
I had thought I would merely scoop water from a puddle, yet I had evaporated the entire ocean.
‘How fitting.’
I exulted inwardly.
But outwardly, I erased all expression from my face.
I donned a mask.
The visage of the most loyal and most devout apostle.
Slowly.
I bowed my head deeply once more.
Bending my waist until it nearly touched the ground, I opened my mouth with a loud, clear voice.
“I am overwhelmed with emotion.”
My resonant voice echoed throughout the 55th Floor Golden Temple.
“That you would bestow such undeserved grace upon me.”
I made a vow to Heimdall.
“Great Sovereign of All Things. I, Rag, as your apostle, solemnly swear to do my utmost henceforth.”
“….”
“Your glory is my glory. I dedicate this body entirely to elevating your name throughout Asgard!”
A flawless oath of loyalty.
It was a vow so moving that anyone who heard it would be moved to tears.
Silence descended.
Heimdall was at a loss for words.
The light in his eyes as he gazed down at me grew turbulent and complex.
Rage.
Bewilderment.
Absurdity.
And utter emptiness.
He must have wanted to seize me by the collar that very instant.
He must have wanted to scream—what have you done, spit out my power immediately.
The impulse to tear me apart with a tempest of murderous intent must have risen to the very tip of his chin.
But.
He could not bring himself to say anything else.
Why?
‘Because this all arose from the apostle contract that he himself initiated.’
He had been the one to propose it first.
He had personally bestowed upon me the divine rank.
Had he not even said this to me?
“A number will manifest according to the capacity of your vessel.”
“Whether you fill that vessel to its maximum or not depends entirely upon your discretion.”
“Do not despair even if the number is low.”
It was accomplished entirely under his permission.
I had not forcibly seized it.
I had merely entered through the door he opened and filled my vessel “legitimately” to the extent of its capacity.
Yet now he grows angry?
He coerces me to regurgitate what I took, claiming I took too much?
That is an act of trampling the dignity of a supreme deity into the dust.
It becomes an admission that his own vessel is shallower than the potential of a mere lower-ranked deity.
If Skadi and the other deities learned of this fact, he would become a laughingstock for a thousand years, ten thousand years.
“….”
Heimdall’s jaw muscles twitched.
He clenched his teeth firmly.
Pride.
That accursed god’s arrogance was sealing his lips shut.
I lowered my head, twisting my lips into a silent laugh.
‘Yes, endure it.’
Even if your insides rot and crumble, you must endure.
You chose me as your apostle deity.
You permitted this vessel.
I have obtained the most perfect shield, and he has harbored the most lethal poison.
A silence both brief and eternal.
At last, Heimdall forced the corners of his mouth upward.
“…Your vessel is far larger than I had imagined.”
His voice was wrung out, strained.
That usual magnanimity had vanished without a trace.
“I look forward to your future endeavors.”
A compliment.
Yet it was a blessing so parched it made one’s bones ache.
Heimdall hastily turned his body.
Whiiiiing!
Wind stirred.
But it differed from that overwhelming tempest upon his arrival.
Awkward, as though fleeing.
He escaped from Floor 55’s space like a man in retreat.
The divine rank hovering in the void completely dissipated.
Only then did I straighten the knees I had bent.
I lifted my head.
“Sigh.”
A small breath escaped my lips, yet a deep smile spread across my face.
* * *
The Dimensional Gap.
The path back to the Garden of Gods.
Heimdall’s footsteps felt impossibly heavy.
“….”
His face had hardened into something terrifying.
Something impossible had occurred.
It was merely an Apostolic Deity contract.
A ritual where a higher deity lends a portion of their power to a lower deity.
That was all it should have been.
No matter how unprecedented in the Tower’s history.
How could a mere lesser deity possess that authority in its entirety?
‘Succession? Succession, you say?’
And what was this talk of ‘succession’?
Succession should only occur with the complete consent of the original owner, should it not?
It is a law that requires the clear will of the one who wishes to pass it down.
But the sensation just now felt different.
It was forced.
As if.
‘…as if it were forcibly torn away and devoured.’
It felt as though swallowed by some enormous maw.
That horrible sensation of the very depths of one’s soul being ripped asunder.
I could not bring myself to speak of it before him, for the sake of dignity.
I could not take back the words I had already spoken.
Yet it was undeniably not a normal occurrence.
Moreover, the nature of the authority that was stolen.
‘Creeping Chaos.’
It was undoubtedly the supreme authority.
But its texture was entirely different.
A power that diverged from the typhoon, the apex of the Natural Faction.
‘How could he possibly?’
It was something inherited from the Mother of all Chaos herself.
That power.
That authority….
…was one that even Heimdall himself had not yet fully unleashed, keeping it dormant in the abyss.

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