Chapter 56: All Old Foxes

Chapter 56: All Old Foxes

Too late? Klein’s heart sank. Then he suddenly felt the Box of the Great Old Ones in his hand begin to tremble violently.

He hurriedly looked down and saw that the Cathedral of Corpses’ door, shrunk into a toy inside the first layer, was glowing with ray after ray of light. Every white skull and every twisted face upon it seemed to have come alive.

Adam’s Cathedral of Corpses is this high in level? A mere door can resist the first layer of 0-61? Without hesitation, Klein once again used the crimson star representing Leonard to lock onto a gas-lamp pole outside 7 Pinster Street.

In an instant, the door inlaid with white bones and protruding twisted faces returned to the real world, while a toy gas lamp appeared inside the first layer of the Box of the Great Old Ones.

Immediately afterward, Klein aimed at Amon inside the Cathedral of Corpses. His right hand slid downward, about to open 0-61’s second layer.

At this point, Pallez Zoroast was no longer on the battlefield. Klein could relocate Amon elsewhere without any scruples.

His specified destination was the astral world. He wanted Amon to receive “care” from the seven gods, though whether a random mutation would occur was beyond his knowledge.

Just then, that door returned to the Cathedral of Corpses. Then the magnificent building overlapping 7 Pinster Street rapidly began to collapse.

The collapse proceeded in an extremely orderly manner. It began with the vault, then the arches and walls, and finally the pitch-black stone pillars.

The falling objects did not strike the ground. They vanished in midair.

Amon, standing before the cross, also disintegrated inch by inch together with the entire Cathedral of Corpses, as though He too had been imagined and could have His existence undone at any time.

Of course, Klein understood very clearly that this was merely Amon exploiting a “loophole.” Through the end of the Cathedral of Corpses’ imagined manifestation, He was allowing Himself to become imagination as well and escape Backlund.

Rumble!

At some unknown point, thick clouds had gathered in midair. A ball of lightning the size of a house trailed silver-white streams as it smashed fiercely into the Cathedral of Corpses and Amon before they had completely collapsed.

Fine cracks instantly appeared across Amon’s monocle of ground crystal, and the pointed soft hat atop His head collapsed.

However, the Angel of Time showed no panic. After His face twitched uncontrollably, He continued smiling. Holding that crystal pillar formed from light and shadow, He completely scattered like a phantom, vanishing into the sea of light that filled the Cathedral of Corpses.

The next second, the towering cathedral of deep black inlaid with white bones completely returned to fantasy.

At that moment, the house at 7 Pinster Street still existed. Only the floor of the living room bore an exaggerated mark.

It was shaped like a person lying there, transformed into charcoal.

This was what remained after an unknown number of Amon’s avatars had been struck dead, but Klein knew that Amon’s main body had successfully escaped and achieved His intended goal.

Once He recovered, this King of Angels would need only a ritual to ascend to the divine throne and become the embodiment of all Error in this world.

“After I swapped away the Cathedral of Corpses’ door, the first to notice, the first to react, and the first to send down power was actually the Lord of Storms… The Goddess truly cannot descend in divine form. She can only use various media to interfere with reality slightly. When Amon’s main body is prepared, it is difficult for Her to affect Him…

“…I was still happy about shaking off Amon, still satisfied because I avoided His traps several times in a row. Yet without making a sound, He accomplished something this huge…

“…When did He shift His focus to Backlund? Mm, it should be after I used the rules of ‘Deceit’ to revive in another place. He sensed the shadow of Pallez Zoroast, and the fact that there was a connection between us. From then on, He began focusing on obtaining the final Sequence 1 Beyonder characteristic and becoming a true god…

“…Leonard’s prayer earlier was not detailed enough. He only mentioned that something had gone wrong with the Jacob family treasure… For Pallez Zoroast—so familiar with Amon and so cautious as a Sequence 1 angel—to fail to notice anything abnormal and directly step into the trap, Amon must have done something else extraordinary…

“Whew. Although I have grown at terrifying speed in this battle of wits with Amon and completed a transformation, compared to this top-tier deceiver, I am still far too lacking, far too immature…

“Once Amon becomes Sequence 0 Error and can still walk upon the earth, things will become truly difficult for me…

“No. I have to figure out the Marauder pathway’s apotheosis ritual and find a way to sabotage it. I cannot allow Amon to ascend to the divine throne so easily…

“But could this be exactly what Amon wants? Is He deliberately holding the ritual, waiting for me to deliver myself to His door?” As thoughts raced through his mind, Klein gave a long sigh.

Then, using The Fool’s posture and tone, he transmitted information to Leonard:

“There is no need to pray anymore.”

…

Inside Saint Samuel Cathedral, Leonard had just emerged from the soil in the garden and was about to rush into the grand prayer hall when he heard Mr. Fool’s words.

“There is no need to pray anymore…” Leonard’s steps gradually slowed. He repeated the sentence in a daze.

He moved slower and slower, until he finally stopped beside a stone pillar. Lowering his head, he raised both hands and covered his face.

Just then, a slightly aged voice suddenly echoed inside his mind:

“What are you grieving for? I’m not completely dead yet!”

“Ah?” Leonard lowered his hands, both confused and pleasantly surprised. “Old man, you’re not dead?”

His eyes had already turned slightly red.

“Listen to yourself! What kind of thing is that to say?” Pallez Zoroast’s voice was clearly weak. “Ahem. Simply put, this old man here died once, but not completely.”

Leonard finally breathed out in relief. He glanced left and right, saw that no one was paying attention, and lowered his voice.

“You successfully deceived Amon?”

“It cannot truly be called deception.” Pallez Zoroast sighed. “All these years, the thing I thought about the most was what to do if I were truly found by Amon’s main body. After repeated experiments, I also ‘created’ a method: after the main body dies, I can revive at an avatar. But I will lose my Sequence 1 Beyonder characteristic and passively drop down one level. Heh, I suppose I have not fallen that far behind the times.”

“In other words, Amon killed you once and obtained your Sequence 1 characteristic, while you revived at the level of Sequence 2?” Leonard roughly understood what had happened and asked back to confirm.

Pallez Zoroast sighed.

“More or less. Actually, it is not as if Amon failed to notice. When I pushed you out of the Cathedral of Corpses, He did not stop me, precisely to leave me with a sliver of hope, making me lose the determination to fight to the death in the battle that followed. Ah. If not for that, I would not have been dealt with so quickly. After I absorbed the Beyonder characteristic inside the treasure, I had basically recovered…”

Leonard blurted out in slight astonishment, “Old man, you pushed me out of the Cathedral of Corpses because there was your avatar inside my body?”

Pallez immediately sneered.

“What did you think? Did you really think I treated you like my grandson?”

“…Don’t you still have other avatars?” Leonard muttered.

Pallez gave a snort, then sighed.

“Amon even deceived His own avatars. This time, I lost without complaint.”

If he had not learned from the Amon avatar he had absorbed that this Angel of Time did not understand the concrete circumstances of the Jacob family treasure, He would certainly have been more cautious in this matter and would have made more ample preparations against Amon’s appearance.

This was the most crucial reason. Other factors—whether the matter of the Jacob family’s ancestor, or the situation where Klein Moretti was dealing with Amon’s main body in the Forsaken Land of the Gods—had not been decisive elements in pushing Him to make that decision.

Leonard thought for a moment and comforted him.

“Old man, this was the deadliest trap in that treasure. No matter what, you would have stepped into it. Surviving is already good enough.”

“That is not true,” Pallez immediately refuted. “If I had sensed danger, I would have directly chosen to believe in a true god, becoming His or Her angel upon the earth, and headed for the Jacob family treasure under divine protection. Ah. After absorbing the characteristic and recovering Sequence 1 strength, I was already considering that question: should I directly join the Church of Evernight, cooperate with that Fool of yours, or remove the parasitism and hide as I did in the past, avoiding Amon?”

As He spoke of these things, His emotions became rather complicated again.

…The old man really did have plans… Why are you so practiced at surrendering to a patron… Leonard silently sighed a few times, then shifted his attention back to the most important matter.

“Old man, after Amon obtained your Sequence 1 Beyonder characteristic, does that mean He is going to prepare His apotheosis ritual?”

“Mm.” Pallez’s voice was low as He answered, “That means for a very long period of time, your former colleague and we will at most suffer harassment from Amon’s lower-level avatars. Perhaps even none at all.”

“What are the requirements for His apotheosis ritual?” Leonard pressed.

Pallez fell silent for one second.

“To replace another during their apotheosis ritual.”

At that point, Pallez laughed self-mockingly.

“Amon’s focus next will certainly be His apotheosis ritual. This will be our last stretch of quiet time.

“Once He becomes a god, He will definitely come find you and use you to deal with that Fool.

“Although I can throw you away and run ahead of time, I still need to worry that He will want to reclaim all the characteristics at the angel level.

“Master those rare spirits as soon as possible, digest your potion, become a demigod, take charge of a holy artifact, and obtain Evernight’s blessing.”

Leonard’s expression immediately turned grave. He slowly nodded.

He then found a quiet place and informed Mr. Fool of the necessary intelligence through prayer.

…

“Someone else’s apotheosis ritual? Recently, the only one with hope of becoming a god seems to be Adam… It would be best if those two brothers fought each other… Our last peaceful period… I hope the avatars Amon leaves behind to interfere with me are not too strong. I hope I can find traces of the Dark Demonic Wolf soon. I hope Dorian agrees to that transaction…” Klein sighed, returned to the real world, and continued walking forward through the darkness with the lantern in hand.