Chapter 24: Cheated by the Old Man
After finishing the meeting, I immaterially called all of my five Generals and gave them my orders. The first one was to double the numbers of my army so that each legion would consist of 200,000 soldiers. Meaning altogether 5,2 million.
It wasn't big enough to compare to some more militaristic Houses, but it was a nice number. During the Great War, a number of devils that fought there numbered in billions, or rather casualties were in billions.
Second, I informed them about my plan for small planar conquest and ordered an army to increase the training regime by x10. I also invested a lot of Soul Coins to buy precious potions and pills for soldiers.
The third thing was about increasing the combat process of the Generals. The first thing I thought about was buying some high-grade magical equipment from other Pantheons, so I gave that responsibility to General Borke.
I have also been thinking about the usage of Sacred Gears, but that possibility was not very realistic for several reasons. The first one was that currently, Heaven was at its strongest and controlled all Sacred Gears tightly; all users were pawns and soldiers of Heaven. On top of that, Sacred Gears were tied to God's System in Heaven, and it can know its current holder.
Obtaining Sacred Gears when Big G is still alive is just pure action of courting death. Also, I personally disdained depending on the equipment to increase my power. While it is basically a Soul Weapon, Sacred Gear can still be rendered useless. I also had the theory that Big G could directly control all of them, as he was their creator through God's System.
Rizevim had an ability called Sacred Gear Canceler, which worked on a relatively easy principle. It could nullify Sacred Gears of people who were weaker than the user, on the same level as the user... basically, it depended on the amount of energy used. I
remembered that it couldn't nullify Diabolos Dragon mode of that perverted trash in canon, as it was created with the power of Ophis, who was basically a being of law, far above Rizevim's level. So, if he had such ability, it was respectable that similar abilities, skills, spells, and methods existed in the infinite Astral Boundary.
Still, while I don't plan to use Sacred Gears in the foreseeable future, at least not until I find a way to sever them from God's System completely, I won't be using one. It is too dangerous to leave something that is connected to Heaven to be bounded with your soul.
Even though I can later get some of them for my subordinates as they are pretty useful weapons. After Big G is dead, Heaven won't have enough power to protect even the Church, not Sacred Gears, which were, in comparison, not that important with the source of their religion on Earth. So I can get a few of them.
Getting them was though problematic. God's System decided when the Sacred Gear would be bound to someone. Meaning the host of one Sacred Gear could appear only once for several centuries if unlucky. Searching for such a person was also pretty hard. Heaven had it easy; they could just look into the System and know who the host was.
Everyone else had it hard, as they needed to search for them.
I have even decided on which of them to obtain. The first one was Telos Karma. While I didn't plan on using it, this one was unique, as from what I heard about it, Telos Karma was built with the usage of infusement of Laws of Fate, thus capable of changing the probability of things. I don't want to use it for a simple reason; I would rather study the Laws of Fate itself.
If possible, I also aimed to obtain Sephiroth Graal due to its usefulness in genetic manipulation and its ability to use the Laws of Creation, Life, and Soul. Other useful Sacred Gears were Annihilation Maker and Dimensional Lost.
For me personally, Incinerate Anthem for its ability to use the highest-grade Holy Flame.
After the war, I can start my research upon Sacred Gears... maybe even compare notes with Azazel. I heard that even now, that man was spending most of his time in research. Then I started to wonder if Grigori could be recruited for my plan... probably not after the war... but later, who knows.
Once Underworld is mainly under the Devil's control, Fallen would need to be dealt off. Either by Grigori joining, expelling them, or annihilation.
I sat in my study as I was looking at the room's ceiling, and thinking about various things. There were currently many things to do, soon, the war would start, and I needed to be prepared as much as possible to obtain the biggest gains.
Additionally, I also needed to visit Asgard and Takamagahara to deal with the two Pantheons. Zekram would go to Olympus and Vampires.
When I looked for information about the Asgard situation, there wasn't ideal.
Apparently, Odin got into conflict with his eldest daughter Hela, and their relationship was almost at the point of the war. God-King of Aesir has decided to be a peace-loving fool for a foreseeable period, from what I heard. That wasn't something I wanted to hear. Now I can see why Zekram left it to me; that old man cheated me.
Odin molded Hela to be his weapon of conquest, and now that man has decided to end wars in his sphere of influence, she was practically made redundant for him.
God Queen Frigga, Prince Baldur, and Prince Thor have decided to remain neutral. Prince Loki is leaning towards Hela's camp. So... who should I get.
That only leaves me with one option.
Hela.
She was pretty strong, pinnacle Intermediate Divinity Stage, same Class as old Zekram. She would also soon enough reach an even Greater Divinity Stage. Maybe Odin also feels threatened; if she is like I read about her, it wouldn't be weird for her to challenge him for the throne.