Chapter 215: Kill the Godslayer.
"Master..." Arla lowered her gaze to his hand holding Ikaris's and stared. "Are you doing this because you want us to fight with you at your side, or are you doing it to prepare us for..." She stopped and looked up at him again. "Is this a failsafe in the case of-"
"Arla, do not ask a question you do not want answered." Ikaris shook her head at the elf and spread her arms before Sol. "Dear, I trust your judgement, whatever you ask of me, I will do it without any doubt in my heart, but please, make sure it is for the right reasons." She smiled at Sol, and a moment later her eyes began glowing while Sol's mana began racing towards her body. "I am ready."
"It might be slightly uncomfortable." Sol closed his eyes and Ikaris's mana began racing towards him as well mixing gold and gold, creating a steady white glow between the two of them while the branch was slowly forced through her flesh, melding with her mana and making waves around her body as he used his mana to seize control of her soul.
Ikaris's true form emerged violently, sending waves of power in every direction and knocking everyone off their feet, her mana spread far across their district covering the entirety of the 10.B area and rattling the ground as its potency and purity grew, the land began quaking and her mana began reaching into the clouds and spreading across the skies sending a massive beacon straight off into the cosmos, all while Sol's Godslayer mana quickly followed hers undoing all the damage as he forced a section of her soul to solidify like his own and then planted the tree within it.
"Hnn~" Ikaris scrunched her nose and squeezed Sol's hand as soon as he took hers.
"Are you okay?" Sol asked, watching her closely as her mana raced back towards her and prepared for damage control in case of anything happening during her integration, but she smiled with her pained expression and bore the sensation of her soul suddenly expanding over a dozen times its original strength.
"I'm here, tell me if anything happens that you can't handle." He stared intently at her expression. "You'll need a little time to fully digest such a large change."
"It is as you said, love; a minor inconvenience, Ikaris opened her eyes and looked around. "It feels as though there is a horse resting on my chest, but this much I can easily handle... however just now-"
"Yes, they most definitely caught on to that brilliant phenomenon just now." Arla stood watching the cracks being mended by Sol's mana while Ikaris's finally finished making trips across the globe and subsided back into her as though nothing had just happened.
"What now, that was even greater than the first two times." Sara righted herself and sat forward worriedly. "I fear a larger force will arrive too especially after you destroyed the last breach, sir." She gestured to the window pointing out at the afternoon skies.
"I'm well aware, that's also why I waited until Dina's test was completed; I need you all to go take a back seat for now and let me protect you thoroughly." Sol stood with his hair blazing white and a half crest on his chest and back.
"I'm going to face a lot this time and I don't plan on being as patient or as merciful as I was the last time either, I've been trying hard to hold on to the peace we have built here but it's time to admit that I failed in attaining that peace for you all; Outer Collective, Grand Emporium, I don't care what they are, what they stand for or what they want, they took away my leisure so I'm gonna end them with my own two hands!" He slowly disappeared from their sight leaving the room humming with his residual mana.
"What's happening, is everything okay!?" Dina crash-landed through the door holding on to it when it tore off the hinges and came to a sliding halt right behind Usami who had also come running after she had seen and felt Ikaris's mana go crazy for a few seconds. "Ikaris?"
"Alpha." Ikaris smiled and called their system seeing the girl gently appearing at her side.
"Yes, Milady?"
"Could you take us in again, Master seems to be in a bad mood today after letting go of his leisure." Ikaris lowered her gaze thinking how Sol just didn't get a break.
"At once." Alpha snapped her fingers and all of them disappeared with low popping sounds reappearing in a large spacious yard with a small cabin surrounded by grasslands as far as one could see from any direction.
"Something happened again?" Uriyu looked at his surroundings, frightened after he was supposed to be driving but was suddenly whisked away from behind the wheel leaving his car stranded in the middle of an empty highway. "Where are we?"
"The same sealed space where the invaders are unable to detect you, I made a few assessments after the incident with her holiness the last time," Alpha answered gesturing to the cabin. "In the case of something happening, I will not hesitate to bring you to Master like I did before."
Outside of Alpha's sealed dimension Eve and Mark were instantaneously teleported back to their homes again receiving the same message from the system which they had yet to be directly told was actually Sol's doing, they now knew he had something to do with it but they had no idea alpha was his personal AI.
[Another invasion is coming, as you are acquaintances of the strongest there ever was the system has granted your abodes with immunity to all forms of attack, in case of a global catastrophe of any kind your honesty will swiftly adapt and save the lives of anyone inside of it, do not leave until you are told otherwise] the system sent the messages to them and before eve could even finish reading her phone rang.
"Mark... you too?" She asked.
"Y-yeah, it's just like last time, right?" He replied. "Another invasion?"
"I don't know, but something's happened." She answered honestly, looking out her window and down to the streets where everything seemed to be normal. "It feels unfair that we're getting special privileges because we know someone like Mr Vestic, but I don't want to die so I'm hunkering down, what about you?" She turned on the video feature of her phone and put it on a stand.
"Same." Mark rested his phone on the table next to his bed and sat cross-legged staring at her. "I'd rather be there with you though, I live by myself, so if anything happened I'd be stranded, this house isn't ideal for single people, after all." He admitted and Eve slightly blushed and scratched her chin with a thoughtful expression.
"I can move in next time then, if you don't want to stay alone another time something like this happens, I've always wondered why you stayed there by yourself."
"A small house on the outskirts of the city is a great choice, if I was popular I'd be holding parties every weekend here." He chuckled while his cheeks reddened as well. "But yeah, it'd be nice if I had you here to keep me company."
"Well, let's just wait then, if everything works out I'll move in as soon as I can." She chuckled and relaxed on her bed taking off her jacket and flopping to her side. "So... what's been going on with your exams, you have the same classes as Dina, right?" Eve asked and Mark groaned.
"Let me tell you..."
***
Far into the deep Sol was a bright beacon staring out into the void as he watched one massive breach open up, even larger than the last one as six ships emerged one after the other.
"We have made contact with-" A male pilot to the first intruding ship was logging when a bolt of White mana crashed through the face of his ship killing him and hundreds more in a flash explosion that left a clean hole through it.
"What the hell just happened?" The captain of the second ship stood from her seat staring as the ship was bombarded with more projectile beams that turned it into a nest of holes and bodies.
"Shield up!" She snapped at her crewmen who had gone speechless, and luckily too since a moment afterwards another great white pillar seemingly from nowhere crashed into the barrier and was sent ricocheting out into the void, and then another, and several more, explosion after explosion shook the five remaining ships while everyone inside of them waited with bated breath.
"This is power rivalling the ships themselves, why is a Godslayer this powerful still hiding in a lesser domain?" The same female captain asked, just like 79 she had violet hair with black eyes, and she was wearing the same battlesuit he wore, but her number in comparison was 55, and at her side was a man with the number 5 on his cheek, her vice-captain.
"Ma'am, should we retreat and form a better plan, it feels like this bombardment can outlast our shields." The man stared through the screen.
"He was able to destroy a perfectly functional ship and kill everyone in a matter of seconds, the captain and vice-captain included, Huey," She answered.
"If we expose any more weaknesses he will undoubtedly take advantage of them, he knows what we want thanks to 79 and that brat running their mouths off, he took us by surprise, sure, but the real fight comes now." She looked to the dashboard at her crew who listened to her words like gospels.
"Send word to the other four captains; this Godslayer has easily surpassed the Eighth Order and is likely somewhere on the sixth or even fifth, I recommend using deadly force."
"We kill the Godslayer."