Chapter 181: 097. Judgement of the Heretic -3 (Part One)
Mikael felt a chill run down his spine after listening to the Seventh Imperial Prince’s observation.
The boy must’ve witnessed the might of the Aztal rune, yet he didn’t display a single hint of shrinking back or getting scared by it. He actually stared back at the cardinal as if the latter happened to be a product on sale.
‘N-no, he’s simply bluffing! Yes, that has to be it!’
Even as such thoughts swirled in his head, Mikael’s mouth had already clamped shut.
The undead army around the boy was screeching out bizarrely.
He had managed to summon an army with over one thousand combatants all by himself. And then, his power allowed him to easily extinguish even the Heavenly Sword…
The Seventh Imperial Prince before his eyes possessed powers that defied all common sense. Without a doubt, him killing Aslan’s king, Rahamma, wasn’t a lie.
But would Mikael be able to kill Rahamma under the same condition?
Cold sweat trickled down the cardinal’s face.
‘No, wait. I must not waver in my conviction.’
The ceremony to activate the Aztal rune was completed and their holy war had been declared already.
However, the rune’s effectiveness would run out soon.
He had been waiting for this moment so that he could fulfil his dream of becoming the next pope. He just couldn’t afford to fall here. Rather than waiting for his death, he chose to bitterly struggle and survive this ordeal.
***
Allen’s eyes shooting a sharp glare at Mikael narrowed down to slits.
‘Fifteen minutes left, huh.’
After that, the backlash from Amon’s relics would start hitting him hard.
The divinity in his body would be exhausted by then, he’d lose his consciousness, and become utterly defenceless.
Charlotte and the Verdant Cross were here to protect him in such a case, and Alice Astoria was tasked with healing him afterwards, but all of them combined was still inadequate to deal with Cardinal Mikael.
That’s why…
‘…I gotta finish that bastard off inside the remaining fifteen minutes.’
“Kasim Derian!”
Allen roared out, and Kasim kicked the ground to leap up. The holy undead knights nearby also followed after him.
The group agilely and rapidly climbed up towards the cathedral’s balcony.
Mikael shifted his gaze and stared at the ones appearing in his vision.
Kasim’s eyes were gleaming murderously. He raised his greatsword, then while activating his ‘Divine Aura of wind’, fired a wind blade.
BOOM-!
The air expanded and the deadly-sharp aura pounced on Mikael.
However, the cardinal simply roared out instead, “How foolish!”
A barrier made out of divinity suddenly materialised all around him, easily deflecting the wind blade. More divinity entered Mikael’s physical body, enhancing all of his senses to the extreme.
He clapped his hands, and that simple action materialised several blades of light.
“Destroy those undead abominations!”
The blades of light flung out and pierced straight through the holy undead knights. Kasim Derian defended against the attack using his greatsword, but then, Mikael personally leaped up towards the hulking golden knight.
“Oh, dear Gaia!”
Mikael tightly clenched his fist.
“Grant thine blessing on this faithful servant. Bestow thine iron mace to this servant, so that he can…”
Divinity rapidly coalesced on his fist and created a gauntlet of light.
“…Defeat our enemies!”
The fist glowing with divinity smashed powerfully into Kasim’s head.
Divine energy exploded and the golden knight’s neck broke, twisting at a weird angle. At the same time, his body was flung away and crashed right next to the Seventh Imperial Prince before bouncing away like a rag doll.
Allen turned his head and glanced at Kasim.
-Fuu-woo…
The hulking golden knight staggered back up to his feet.
As expected of the former successor to the sword king; as befitting his moniker as a berserker, the mad warrior, he possessed quite a high defence.
Allen glanced back at Mikael.
The cardinal roared out, “You think I’ll just take all of your beatings lying down?!”
Some Priests approached Mikael from the sides and changed his bloodied robe for a new one.
In the meantime, the cathedral’s entrance opened up. Paladins and Priests that had escaped inside leapt back out while fully kitted in various equipment.
Allen used [Mind’s Eye] and analysed the flow of their divinity.
The distinctive golden aura oozing out from the cathedral was blanketing all of the clergymen.
His eyes beneath the mountain goat’s skull narrowed once more. “Well, this… might get annoying.”
“Oh, fellow clerics who worship our goddess, our time to rebel has finally come!” Mikael raised his crosier up high before leaping off from the balcony. “We shall punish the evil, and uphold the good!”
Every single one of the Church of Caiolium’s clerics had become blessed soldiers. Their emotions heightened even further.
“I am the chosen proxy of the goddess.” An armour of light materialised and enveloped Mikael’s entire body. “And I am the pope that shall judge and punish all evil!”
He raised his crosier high.
“I shall punish the heretics that defile Gaia’s noble intentions!”
He roared out loudly. Along with his Spirit Speech, the aura of light rapidly spread out from his body.
His raised crosier came down to the ground, hard. Divinity rapidly wrapped around the shaft and transformed into a lengthy spear.
On the tip of it was a semi-transparent flag made out of divinity, waving heroically in the air.
When he roared out at the top of his lungs, Mikael even vaguely resembled a spear-wielding Saint of the legends. “Believe in the word of the goddess! I, Pope Mikael, shall lead from the front!”
He pointed the bladed tip of the light spear at the Seventh Imperial Prince.
“Our target is the corrupt Seventh Imperial Prince! By killing this devil worshipper, we shall prove to the rest of the world that our faith isn’t false! We shall truly confirm that Goddess Gaia is indeed watching over us!”
At Mikael’s loud roar, the Paladins began marching forward. Meanwhile, the Priests were raising their staves, getting ready to fire their magic.
“We shall heed the command of his holiness, the pope, and kill the devil worshipper, the Seventh Imperial Prince!”
“Believe! Roar out our battle cry! Defeat our fears! We shall emerge victorious, and we shall continue carrying out the goddess’s will!”
“Waaaaaaaah-!”
All of the Paladins and the Priests roared in unison.
Their fighting spirit was now overflowing. As if to match that, divinity flooded out from their bodies in droves.
The god’s rune, ‘Aztal rune’, had been activated, and now, the only thing waiting for them at the end would be their resounding ‘victory’.
That’s what they truly believed.
“Let’s go-!”
Mikael kicked the ground and dashed forward. The Paladins and Priests followed him from behind.
The Seventh Imperial Prince watched them and could only sigh in lamentation.
As expected of the top cardinal of the Theocratic Empire. His actions truly befitted a man whose ambition was to become the next pope. If only such a man had sworn his loyalty to the Imperial Family, he’d surely have contributed greatly towards stopping the Vampire menace.
‘Yeah, it’s a waste to throw such a guy away.’
But what could he do?
That cardinal was fated to die today.
Allen snapped his fingers.
His zombies screeched out and pounced on Mikael.
The skeletons built a wall out of shields and pointed their spears at the cardinal. The Dullahans aimed their swords at him, and even the Bone Golems, the giant stone statues, and banshees, had set up a cordon.
Double, triple, quadruple layers…
The undead army quickly established multiple layers of defence.
Towards the fifteen hundred undead creatures, a living army made of one thousand rabble with barely any combat experience in warfare rushed in.
When looking at this scene from that point alone, then a fairly obvious result should happen, but…
“Uwoooooh! Gaia’s glory be with us!”
Mikael’s frenzied roar was accompanied by him throwing his spear of light.
The spear shot straight through the air and pierced into the ranks of the zombies. The Paladins leapt into their midst in the next moment.
“Waaaaaaah-!”
They roared out and swung their weapons.
Their swords cut off the heads of the zombies, while their maces crushed the skulls of the undead.
Zombies were skewered by spears and lifted up into the air.
The Paladins raised their shields and created a protective cordon, then prevented the zombies from surrounding them from the left and right sides before shoving the undead back.
“Protect the Paladins!”
The Priests shouted out loudly.
They offered their prayers and casted their magic spells. Arrows of light materialised in the air and penetrated straight through the zombies.
-Ku-ooooooh!
However, a zombie managed to grab a Paladin. The undead shoved the knight’s head aside, dragged his shoulder in, and began ripping into the tender neck flesh.
The Paladin’s throat tore open and blood sprayed out like a fountain.
“Uwaaaahk!”
The Paladin’s eyes shook powerfully. But his shock lasted only for a brief moment; the deeply gouged-out neck was instantly restored to its previous state.
Muscles grew out like feelers around the torn part of the neck, and new skin rapidly covered him. Everything healed perfectly and didn’t even leave behind a single scar.
The moment his pain disappeared, the Paladin kicked the zombie away, swung his sword urgently, and split the head of the zombie apart.
“Oh-hoh…!”
Allen watched this spectacle with great interest.
Such a wound would’ve been impossible to heal with normal healing magic cast by a regular Priest. What you needed was a spell cast by someone on the level of an archbishop.
Yet such level of magic was being showered on every single living ‘soldier’ currently on the battlefield.
They were receiving the blessing of the sanctuary through the Aztal rune. Even if their throats were sliced halfway open, even if their hearts were impaled, even if their limbs were ripped off… All of them recovered quickly on the spot.
Meaning, unless their heads were completely lobbed off or their bodies were completely ripped apart, they would continuously regenerate to full health no matter what.
Without a doubt, this was the miracle of the gods.
‘An immortal army, is it?’
Not like the walking dead, but instead, living, breathing immortals.
Allen grinned under the mountain goat’s skull.
‘Even after excluding that declaration of sanctuary thing, it still has some pretty substantial abilities, doesn’t it.’
He shifted his gaze over to Mikael.
By using Mind’s Eye to see through the armour of divinity covering the cardinal, the boy prince got to check out the Aztal rune’s properties.
[Aztal rune.
Ability: Will allow its user to resonate with other people and share a portion of the user’s ability. The user will be bestowed with a miracle. If the user declares a holy war, the location will turn into a sanctuary and can bring about various miracles, including the ‘miracle of recovery’, ‘miracle of divinity amplification’, etc.]
“Punish the undead abominations!”
Mikael wielded his spear of light. The horde of zombies in front of him were ripped apart into pieces.
He raised his head to look; after going through the zombies, the next thing to greet him was the skeleton legion.
Mikael chucked the spear at them. The air blew apart as the spear flew viciously, landing on the ground and exploding spectacularly.
The cardinal broke through the skeletons’ ranks and advanced forward. Dozens, nay, hundreds of weapons flew in from all directions, but the goddess’s blessing protected him.
Not a single weapon could touch him and they simply got deflected away.
He kicked the ground and leapt up in the air. He could see the Seventh Imperial Prince riding on a skeleton horse right before his eyes.
“Oh, you foolish imperial prince, time to pay the price for defiling Gaia’s teachings!”
Spears of light materialised rapidly all around Mikael. His aim was the Seventh Imperial Prince’s life.
(TL: Merry Christmas!)
