My field of view was completely filled with nothing but dust and lightning arks of my power flowing around in the cloud before me. Relaxing my stance and lowering my sword to the right of myself, I waited for them to attack. I don't need my eyes to sense their strong souls after all, and I didn't have to wait long.
Two yells rang out from the smoke as both Athena and Ares burst forth at different angles of attack. Athena was coming from directly in front of me with a spear glowing red in a thrust attack. While her right hand was holding the spear in a strong grip, interestingly enough her owl was perched on top of her shield glowing gold, that was in her left hand.
With a bit of interest I thought, 'The owl's back huh. Where did it fuck off too I wonder, and why now…'
While I was thinking about the odd glowing owl, Ares was coming out of the debris cloud from above me. Like Athena, he too was yelling at the top of his lungs while bringing down another large two-handed sword at me. I made the mental note that everything about him was now glowing red, indicating he was heavily using his Authority to augment himself and his attacks now.
Both of them had some horrible burns across their bodies that were visibly healing, even now. But while it was visible, it was still a great deal slower than how fast they would normally heal. Another interesting thing was both of their blood was golden and glowing.
I made no effort to defend myself, as while their attacks were indeed incredibly strong, they still fell short of being able to break my Aura. As Ares's sword landed directly in the middle of my head, and Athena's spear struck over my heart, I flared up my Aura in my defence. I was soon covered by my immense bloodlust powered Aura as it pushed back their weapons with ease as it rippled a deep crimson red.
Their eyes widened as they both yelled in confusion, "What?!"
Before they could react to my movement, I firmly grabbed Athena's spear with my left hand and lifted it. While she couldn't react to my speed, she still had an excellent grip on her weapon, so she was lifted along with the spear. Which I used as a makeshift flyswatter to bat Ares out of the sky and both of them into the ground behind me.
As I was raising my sword to stab into the two to make a deity shish kabob, they suddenly both glowed a sky purple. As my sword was coming down, they suddenly blurred out of the mini crater and appeared next to a perfectly fine Chroni.
Ares rolled his shoulder as he said, "Well, that was a surprise. Thank you, Chroni."
Athena was already back in her ready stance in front of Chroni as she said, "Yes, thank you Chroni. But we need a plan, to have such bloodlust that she can actively use it in combat is frankly ludicrous. Is there any more you can do, Chroni?"
With an annoyed sigh Chroni said, "No. I can not affect her with my time Authority at all. Even her attacks are immune. Worse yet, when I leave this time stream I can not find one where she is in the past. And I can not go to the future past eight minutes to ask ourselves how we dealt with her."
Athena's eyes narrowed as she observed me as she said, "Explain please. Though, I fear that I know why."
Chroni pointed up at my "meteor" as she said, "Because of that fucking massive rock falling at us. As it stands, whatever Zeus is going to do about it fails. We have no future beyond eight minutes."
I was calmly waiting for them to talk for a few reasons. One being I was in no hurry to destroy them, and second because I was interested how time interacted with me. While Tearwyn's necklace does what she intended to prevent time magic, or in this case the Authority, from affecting me it shouldn't prevent me from appearing in the past to a time traveller. Which means I am currently a singular existence and can only be found where I currently was in a timestream.
I was honestly getting a bit of a headache thinking about it, 'Time is such a painful thing to deal with. But regardless, I need to give Tearwyn extra snuggles for the necklace. While I didn't doubt it would work, I am surprised it's strong enough to prevent someone's Authority over time from working. Granted, they are merely deities, and not actual gods, so it makes sense I guess.'
Their small conversation was soon interrupted however by a massive thunder crack and an absolutely titanic sized rainbow coloured lightning bolt heading up to the sky. As the absurd lightning struck my meteor, it started to tunnel into it. Even from here I could tell that the lightning bolt had several extra Authorities in it, enhancing it. Several seconds later the hole it had dug started to release a blinding light and rainbow cracks started to appear all over the "meteor."
Moments later, the "meteor" had exploded as it separated into various sized chunks and left a massive dust cloud. Those chunks started to rain randomly down onto their Heaven out of the dust cloud immediately after.
Ares let out a smug laugh as he turned to me and said, "What now, woman? Soon you'll be flooded by the… why are you smiling."
I just started to laugh soon after as Chroni said, "Zeus failed."
As I continued to laugh Athena turned to Chroni and asked, "What do you mean? Clearly the threat is gone now? It's nothing but chunks that are much easier to deal with!"
Chroni just sighed as she pointed back up at the sky, and as the two deities looked back up, their faces soon paled. I could only laugh even harder as they finally realised how FUCKED they all where.
Because not long after another "meteor" had pushed through the dust cloud left behind from the first one Zeus destroyed. But the worst part? This one was even bigger.
Ares's arms fell to his side as he stuttered, "B-but how?!"
Chroni looked crestfallen as she said, "The first one was already so massive that we couldn't see nor sense anything behind it…"
As my laughing died down a bit I said, "You all STILL do not notice it, do you?"
As they all turned to me in confusion I once again laughed hard in their faces.
As I calmed down a cruel smile was on my face when I said, "It took EVERYTHING Zeus had, along with several gods help if that rainbow colour was any indication, to destroy that first meteor. And yet, I am here fighting the three of you just fine."
Chroni was the first one to clue in as she gasped in horror while taking a few steps back, "You…. you're still fine. She's still fine! Her mana is raging around her this very second in an absolutely absurd amount, even after summoning TWO of those things!"
Athena let out an audible gulp as the blood drained even further from her face. Not even Ares was smiling anymore as he kept looking between myself and my "meteor."
Chroni took another step back in fear as she whimpered, "We… we need to flee. That can't be stopped, Heaven is doomed. I need to tell Zeus we need to descend to the mortal world in earnest!"
As she shimmered and disappeared, Ares reached out to her and yelled, "Wait, Chroni! Damn it! Fuck, Athena this is a lost fight. Chroni is right. Even if we manage to defeat her, we die. We nee-"
I interrupted him as I practically teleported next to him with a kick to his chest. He managed to bring up his arms just in time to cushion the blow as much as he could before he left with a loud crack.
As I parried a spear thrust from Athena she said, "You have no intention of letting me go like the other two… do you?"
My cruel smile never left my face as I said, "No, no I do not. I have use for the other deities. But you. You've pissed me off, and I am not in so much of a need to not act on it."
Athena tightened her grip on her spear as I continued, "You deities are more like holy spirits than actual gods. In fact you all may claim you have Authorities, but in reality even your strongest connections are less than a low gods weakest. I'll be using your world as a training ground of sorts I think. And while you deities will not lose much if any power as you descend to the moral plane, you're bound to that planet. Should it be destroyed, you all go with it."
I dismissed my visor so she could look directly into my golden glowing eyes as I finished, "And unlike you all, I can bring back my servants should they fall. So I am not worried about you destroying the planet in some petty attempt at vengeance or vaunted justice."
I looked towards where I had kicked Ares and could only smile slyly as I felt he had retreated beyond the range of my senses. Turning back to Athena, I raised my sword into a ready stance.
My cruel smile returned as I asked, "Ready to die?"
I noticed her owl was circling above us as she shuffled a little bit when saying, "No, and I will resist with everything I have."
With a slight chuckle I said, "Oh, please do. I will enjoy breaking you before I leave you dead at my feet."
With that said I charged at her with a downward swing of my sword as it hummed with the power of NULL. She clearly felt something was off as instead of trying to block with her shield she dodged backwards.
Thrusting my left hand out as a follow up I said, "Winds of Nihilism."
Black tinted winds rushed from my hand towards Athena who was wide eyed from an unknown magic attack. She wasted no time and brought up her shield, while a golden dome of power appeared around her.
The wind howled something horrible as it crashed into her golden bubble and made terrible screeching sounds upon contact. It almost sounded like millions of souls were crying out in rage as the wind bombarded her bubble, slowly pushing her back. Even over the sound of the wind and her shield I was able to hear her screaming in effort to keep it all at bay.
Her shield was starting to slowly flicker every now and then while a few tiny holes opened. Though they were closed nearly instantly after, some of the wind did manage to get through, and impact her actual shield. The areas the wind had touched became warped with black rust-like stains that were resisting the ability of her Divine Weapon to repair itself.
I slowly floated towards her as I started to amp up the mana I poured into the spell. As I got closer, the wind got stronger and more terrible in its force. It wasn't long before her defences were overwhelmed and her golden bubble shattered. I stopped my spell at the same time however and charged.
As she was still behind her shield when I arrived in front of it, I dropped kicked it with all my power. The shield that was struggling to heal itself from the damage caused by the wind shattered as I felt the force of the kick also shatter her arm. With a wonderfully sickening crunch sound Athena had shot off into the distance.
As I was righting my self Hestia's voice sounded out in my head, 'My Goddess. I have fully merged with my true body with no complications. Hephaestus and I encountered no problems or opponents as well. It seems everyone was too busy with your impressive display of magic.'
Raising my eyebrow slightly I asked, '"Was?"'
With a small giggle she answered, 'Indeed. After they destroyed the first meteor, and saw the second one Zeus ordered everyone to descend to the mortal plane. He also ordered the others to bring the true bodies of every god that was still down there as well.'
I hummed with glee as I responded, 'Wonderful. That should create an even bigger and better war down there. I want the two of you to go and reinforce Bell and Lili. I am still toying with Athena, but I'll wrap up soon.'
I could practically feel her bow as she said, 'By your will, My Goddess.'
Shaking my head slightly I mumble to myself, "Still feels weird."
Gripping my sword and with a sigh I said, "Well, time to end this little game then."
As I was preparing to rush to Athena to finish her off, I heard a very unexpected voice in my head, 'Hey Sis! So, Tearwyn actually let me watch your little scuffle there, totally badass by the way, and I actually have an idea of what to do with Athena. If you don't mind?'
I lowered my blade and relaxed my stance as I said in surprise, "Neo? Sure, I don't mind listening at the very least, what's this idea you have?"
With a slightly dark chuckle Neo said, 'Well, you see…'
[author] Here be chapter 56~. Hope you enjoyed it and I'll see you in the next one~! (PS: I am finally started to feel a bit better~!)[/author]