At first light, the world was still silent, two armies lined up, paralleling each other.
"Wait!"
Shu shouted to his army. He wanted to see what would that damned god do.
Coincidentally enough, Antony, the so-called damned god, wanted to be the one to make the first move.
"Magic users, ready!"
Antony called to his troops.
In the sky, lightning flashed. Three times the sky flared. And thunder roared.
As the third thunder growled, the magic users in Antony's army shot their fiercest spells toward the opposing army.
"Summon a shield!"
Shu ordered.
Hannah, Mrs. Hella, Alexander, and the magic users in their makeshift army created a magical barrier to block the incoming attack.
Shu's army amounted to barely a third as many people as Antony's.
For twenty minutes, Shu's army stood in front of Antony's. The sun rose slowly. They could see the last of the magic users in Antony's army shoot their final spells. They exhausted their tanks too much for a continued long-distance attack.
The moment the last of Antony's spell casters shot his final long-distance attack spell, Shu's army dropped the shield and launched a close-combat assault at their enemies.
Michael Wagner and Avraham Pines, two of the twenty legates from Antony's army, looked at the approaching army with excitement.
Michael Wagner placed his gun forward. He charged it with magic. Lightning reached from his veins out of his hand and was absorbed in the pistol. He took a big chug of alcohol into his mouth and started firing at the nearing enemies.
Large areas hit by his magically enhanced bullets exploded with beastmen, humans, and demons flying all over from the blast.
"Hey! Don't kill them all. I won't have any targets!"
Avraham Pines shouted at his comrade.
"I'm not slowing down for weaklings."
Michael Wagner laughed loudly.
Avraham Pines chuckled. This old bastard was mocking him, and he knew just the way to prove him wrong.
He looked at the enemy army until he saw him, a red-haired beastman who looked more like a man than a beast, with a fox tail and fox ears, wearing partial samurai armor and brass knuckles. This was Shual Adom, the enemy army's leader, the fool who challenged a god.
Avraham Pines launched in Shu's direction.
He stabbed his sword forward through the air toward the young beastman, but Shu easily avoided him.
Avraham Pines kept moving forward and reached a perfect spot to be hit in the face by Shu's punch, so the Redfox family's heir knocked out the strongest representative from the weather god's realm in a single strike.
Or so he thought.
Quickly, the young man rose up and aimed his sword at Shu's neck.
"Not yet! I can't give up!"
Avraham Pines declared.
For just a moment, Shu stopped. Something about this guy felt familiar, but quickly things picked up the pace again.
Shu blocked his opponent's sword and was surprised he couldn't break it with his punch. Shu recognized this sword was made of the strongest substance, dark-metal, but he was confident he could break it, so the only explanation for the durability of this sword was magic, and Shu couldn't use his magic trump card this early. It would leave him too weak to keep fighting.
While Shu was thinking of a solution, an answer arrived.
Shí Hóu, propelled by his elongating stave, kicked Avraham Pines in the head with a flying kick and signaled Shu to keep going and that he would handle it.
It wasn't hard to recognize who the legates were, as each legate wore a golden shoulder pad with Antony's symbol on it.
As Shu ran, he could see Armageddon fighting four legates simultaneously and Thomas, along with Mary's three companions from this timeline, fighting another two legates.
Emilia and Dam fought two other legates, and Hannah fought two by herself.
Alexander and Muriel were fighting four legates and a bunch of weaker foot soldiers, and from the looks of it, Muriel could probably fight these enemies on her own.
Not all legates were equally strong, and some, compared to Shu's companions, were rather weak.
Two of the four remaining legates Shu traced on the field were fighting Mary.
And the final two were fighting Lǜ Zūn and Shuāng Wěi, who weren't cutting them any slack.
Shu also noticed Huli Jing and Akainari Redfox fighting giants from the fake weather god's army.
The war was going well in their favor, even though they had a major disadvantage in numbers.
"So, little fox, are you ready to fight me?"
Antony asked Shu as the latter reached him.
The god's words thundered in Shu's ears. He didn't feel this worried in any of the past timelines, but this time was different. Maybe it was because it seemed as if this was their final chance at winning. Regardless, Shu wasn't chickening out of this fight.
He took in a sharp breath and launched at his divine foe.
Shu moved as fast as he could. He punched, kicked, and dodged, but nothing seemed strong enough against his enemy.
In previous timelines, Antony seemed like an easier opponent. Luckily for Shu, the two of them were equal, and it wasn't a one-sided defeat.
"Sophia! Do it!"
Antony shouted, and only then Shu noticed her.
A weak servant of Antony who hid in the bushes a few meters from them.
She nodded earnestly and ran off somewhere.
"What are you planning!"
Shu shouted.
He couldn't let them fail again. He broke his promise to Mary so many times already.
Soon after she ran off, another opponent entered the battlefield.
A blond, closed-eyed demon with two goat horns.
This opponent dashed in Shu's direction.
He summoned a glowing stave made of pure magic and was ready to hit him, but the moment his punch was mere millimeters from touching Shu's head. Alexander blocked him with a sword.
"What can you mortals do now?"
Both Antony and this new assailant said simultaneously.
At that moment, Shu and Alexander understood the identity of the blond demon.
This was another incarnation of Antony.
After this realization hit them, shouts were being heard from the battlefield. Three other incarnations of Antony entered the battle and changed the tide of war.
This was more than they bargained for.