Chapter 39: Teach Him a Lesson
Compared to the so-called Soulflame Gaze, Joshua was actually more interested in this system that had not appeared for a long time.
After all, the only existence that had come to this world with him was probably this system.
Joshua did not care where he came from, because he knew who he was. Joshua also did not care where he was going, because his goal had always been the same. But regardless, a warrior knows his origins. He would not be sentimental enough to say he had no sense of belonging to this land, nor would he deny that he had always been interested in this miraculous thing called the system, for it was this system that gave Joshua his first foothold in this world.
Not caring about the system's origin was one thing; being interested in its existence itself was another. In the past, he did not seek to get to the bottom of the system because his strength was insufficient and there was no need to care. But now, having achieved the Legendary Realm, to ensure he had no weaknesses, he had to find this mysterious system.
Think, and then act.
At this moment, Joshua had sunk his spirit deep into the depths of his soul. He followed a certain fluctuation in the void, tracking the system's whereabouts based on the information it had given him. The warrior wanted to catch the tail of this system and find its source.
The result was somewhat regrettable; he found nothing.
Joshua's spirit surveyed the depths of his soul. This was the reflection of his subconscious, the manifestation of his will and soul. In a vast, boundless black space, countless mountain ranges stood. At the very center of all these mountains, a towering peak, like a pillar, connected and supported heaven and earth. The warrior's spirit looked down from a high altitude, but he found no trace of the 'system'.
The warrior was not skilled in matters of the soul, but he knew some basic information. For example, if a foreign object had invaded his soul, there would inevitably be an anomaly in the reflection of his subconscious. But now, no matter how Joshua examined his soul, he could not find any difference. This left only two possibilities.
First: his strength was still insufficient. The system's own rank had even surpassed him, a Legendary expert, and was at the level of a 'Deity'. Its form of existence could not be detected by ordinary observation methods, so he found nothing.
Second: the system itself was a part of his soul. Because it had existed from the very beginning, there was no anomaly. It was like who could find a single drop of water in the ocean? Even if one could find it, the energy expended in self-examination would be enough to exhaust a Legendary expert.
Thinking this, and determining that he could not find the truth of this system for now, Joshua withdrew from the depths of his soul. He was not dissatisfied, because he had not held much hope from the start. Moreover, for a long time now, the system had not had much binding power over him. Joshua vaguely remembered that after he entered the Ultimate Realm, the system had become much quieter, no longer issuing quests. Even the situation log had to be searched for manually. In the later stages of the Ultimate Realm, there were even signs of collapse or self-dissipation.
Joshua's search this time was because he felt that if his strength continued to advance, the system might completely disappear, and he would never have the chance to learn the truth behind it. But since things had come to this, he would have to deal with it another time.
Withdrawing his attention, the warrior looked back at the information still floating before his eyes.
A powerful ability, no less than the high-level spells 'Death Gaze' or 'Petrifying Eye'. But Joshua felt little joy in his heart.
"Divinity..." he murmured to himself, then shook his head.
Since the battle in the Bloodmoon Abyss with Mandagar, Joshua had never tried to use his Divinity again. This was also true when facing the Ashen Longsword and the Endless Shadow of the Grandia World. Regarding this, the warrior frankly admitted that it was a power he could not control. He could not be sure he could break free from the erosion of the Divine Power Great Source every time. Moreover, that state of mindlessness was perhaps not an enhancement for a true warrior, but a weakening.
Furthermore, if Joshua had not broken free, there would only be two results: he would become a mindless Divine Monster, filled only with the desire to kill and destroy, or he would be completely dissolved by the endless river of Divine Power in the Multiverse, becoming a part of it. Joshua wanted neither of these results, so he had always tried his best not to use his Divinity-related powers.
But clearly, this thing was different from muscles. Not using it did not mean it would not grow stronger.
—Probably because he had killed too many demons, which aligned with the essence of the three Divinities: 'Battle', 'Kill', and 'Destroy'.
Thinking this, Joshua could not help but frown. Divinity does not lie. Whoever obtains a certain Divinity represents that they are most compatible with it. One who obtains the Divinity of Conspiracy can never be an upright person; one who obtains the Divinity of Justice can never be an evil and cunning being. Every word and deed in the Abyss was Joshua's true heart. He did not feel that killing demons and destroying fortresses was wrong in the slightest. His Divinity thought the same, so its synchronization rate with him increased by another degree.
—In the end, it was not a bad thing.
Although he was not very excited, Joshua would not dwell on such matters. The growth of Divinity was not a bad thing; it was just that he had not yet fully mastered its power. What the warrior needed to do now was not to get tangled up in such trivial matters, but to continue achieving his goals.
"Syndicate, where are we now?"
Standing on the Black Dragon's head, feeling the fierce wind beating against his armor, Joshua asked the Flame Demon, who was running frantically ahead of the Black Dragon, in a low voice.
At this moment, the Flame Demon had completely changed its appearance. Originally, because it lived in the Abyss, the black-red flames covering its body had an extremely blasphemous and filthy aura. Aside from other toxicity issues, just the smell was pungent and nauseating. But now, Syndicate was completely different.
The Flame Demon's entire body was burning with golden-red flames. This was pure light, without a trace of evil power. Except for the radiation poison brought by its own body, the Flame Demon now looked like a large torch-lighthouse, giving people a feeling of 'sunlight'.
For Syndicate, this was only natural. Having been forcibly transformed by a Legendary expert into a greatsword, scimitar, longspear, and even a dragon-hunting bow, and then filtered over and over again by pure Steel Force, even an Abyss Slime would be purified into a Celestial Slime. That it, a Flame Demon, still retained some toxicity was entirely because it was its innate constitution. Purifying it completely would be equivalent to burning it clean, so it was lucky to survive.
"I don't know, Your Majesty. I've never been to this place." Honestly answering Joshua's question, the Flame Demon, before the warrior could ask further, immediately added, "But the Sixth Abyss is not large. At our speed, we'll soon reach its central area. Once I see the River Styx, I'll be familiar with it."
Hearing this, Joshua nodded. He believed Syndicate did not dare to lie to him, and what it said was correct. Although Greater Demons could travel back and forth between different Abysses, they could not possibly have visited every corner of the Abyss. For a Greater Demon of the Flame Demon's strength, if they did not want to be forcibly conscripted by an Abyss Lord and stay in their own layer, they could only wander around the River Styx.
"Grrr." Hearing the conversation between the warrior and Syndicate, the Black Dragon suddenly raised its head. While running, it wanted to say something to its master—but it forgot that Joshua was standing on its head. Its voice grew lower, and its anger grew heavier. Finally, this demon suddenly raised its head, sneered in a rough voice, and cruelly crushed the head of a Scale Man in its hand. Pale blue blood splattered onto its body. "Plunder war? Someone has set their sights on our Sixth Abyss? Want us to fight on three fronts?"
This demon was only about two meters tall. Its body was covered in smooth, gray-black carapace. On its head, besides two long horns, there were no other organs, only densely packed, constantly rotating, deep yellow eyes. It had no mouth; its voice came from within its body. In the center of its chest was a diamond-shaped, deep red gem that shimmered with a sinister light.
Seemingly angered by this news, the demon's body slowly floated into the air. This battlefield was in front of a huge Scale Man city. Seeing a demon rise into the air, countless Scale Man sorcerers' spells and a rain of arrows immediately flew towards it at high speed. But this strangely shaped demon showed no panic. Its hundreds of thousands of eyes coldly stared ahead. Then, it raised its right hand, extending its blade-like long fingers.
A dazzling light, accompanied by a shrill buzzing sound, flared up. A deep red beam of light whistled through the atmosphere and instantly struck the distant group of Scale Man spellcasters. Immediately, accompanied by a violent explosion, a bowl-shaped energy shield rapidly rose, expanded, and engulfed everything around it. Moments later, the energy shield shattered into countless specks of light. Within it, whether Scale Men or demons, steel or earth, everything was completely burned into nothingness by the highly concentrated energy.
Not stopping after seeing the results, the demon made no unnecessary movements. In mid-air, the carapace all over its body began to writhe and then transform into protrusions resembling bone tubes. In an instant, hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of energy beams, identical to the previous red beam, even more concentrated, shot out from them, leaving complex afterimages in the air as they bombarded the forward positions and the distant city.
"Run!"
"Can't stop it!"
"The Lord is enraged!"
Instantly, on the battlefield, both demons and Scale Men let out identical terrified wails and desperate screams. One after another, blinding light spots and energy shields enveloped the entire battlefield and city in an instant. Amidst the violent explosions, the Scale Men's sturdy city, built of rock, was destroyed by the terrifying impact and high temperature in just a few seconds. Part of the rock and metal even vaporized instantly. Dried-up artificial rivers and lakes turned into violent water vapor rising, while the sturdy temple, even with magical protection, could not hold out for long. After being hit by hundreds of beams, it slowly melted under the erosion of tens of thousands of degrees of heat. Then, a golden river of magma could be seen flowing through the city's streets, devouring all survivors.
Soon, the city was gone, leaving only a ruin in a lake of lava.
The scorching hot wind turned into a violent shockwave, sweeping across the devastated battlefield. Tornadoes of flame danced across the ground. The bone tubes all over its body slowly retracted. This not-so-tall demon descended to the ground. It closed its eyes, no longer paying attention to the world before it, which was now completely shrouded in smoke, fire, storms, terrified demons, and a hell of molten lava. The demon's spirit connected to the distant battlefield, located in another Abyss.
"Goliath."
It said this in spiritual communication. "Your Abyss, my territory, has been invaded. Suspected Lord-level strength. So I'm temporarily suspending this invasion to go back and check the situation."
After a long while, from the battlefield on the other side of the Abyss, came the Demon King's low response.
"Go."
"Give those who dare to provoke us the most severe lesson."