59 Chapter 59: Devastation (1/2)
With a screech, Hades reared back, causing Cecilia to back away a few steps instinctively. All three of us watched in horror as the demonic energy raged around Hades, and his perforated body began to regenerate, his countless wounds knitting together and disappearing as he sought to recover from the fatal blow Cecilia dealt him.
”This is…resurrection?” Cecilia gasped, utterly stupefied by the events taking place before her eyes. ”No…it's more of a curse, a reversal of time to back when he was still alive?”
”That monster really is immortal,” I murmured bitterly. This scenario reminded me eerily of a scene I watched in one of my favorite anime. That meant I knew what to do next. ”Cecilia, Alicia, get as far away from here as possible!”
”Huh? Why?” Alicia stared at me in bewilderment.
”Just do it!”
Cecilia was similarly puzzled, but when she turned to look at me, she jumped back in reflex. Alicia too was already scurrying away, diving out of the graveyard and into the woods for cover, and the Stuart Clan's first daughter followed her example.
They had seen me raising Orion, as well as the gargantuan vortex of magical energy that now swirled around me. I was gathering a tremendous amount of magical energy into my right hand and coalescing it into a single arrow.
”That was a marvelous display,” I told a grim Cecilia who was rapidly retreating from the scene. ”But it's not enough.”
She gave me a look that told me that she had watched the same anime as I did, but didn't want to waste her time commenting on that. Instead, she took my advice and disappeared behind a row of tightly stacked gravestones, her figure blending into the shadows like before.
As the arrow finally solidified in my hand, I fitted it to Orion and pulled the bowstring back, taking aim at the slowly regenerating Hades. By now, he was almost fully recovered, roaring defiantly as the countless bloody craters in his body filled out with flesh and muscle, his wounds all but vanishing from sight.
But he wasn't going to remain in that fully healed condition for long.
”Rigel!”
With a shout of vengeance, I released the golden arrow from my hand.
Rigel soared across the cemetery with unerring accuracy and struck Hades, who had just recently resurrected fully, crashing into his chest with apocalyptic fury.
In a blinding flash, the night lit up, becoming day in those few seconds as a tremendous explosion roared through the graveyard, engulfing the entire area in flames. Tombstones were immediately obliterated and the concrete, rock and earth upon which the burial mounds were placed disintegrated instantly, incinerated by the superheated conflagration. A mini-nuke, Rigel essentially razed the entire area into a desolate, barren crater of molten rock and black, charred earth, reducing everything – be it grass, soil, corpses, concrete, tombstones, skeletons – in the vicinity to ash. A mushroom cloud billowed into the air, shrouding the devastated graveyard in its deathly grip, while the inferno ravenously swept across the scorched crater, devouring everything and anything that was within reach.
After a moment of crackling and hissing from the flames, a pall of gloom hung over the razed graveyard, a deathly silence descending upon the scene of utter devastation.
”Impossible…”
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Alicia's voice cracked when she saw the incredible sight.
Right in the middle of the scorched crater, surrounded by destruction, a single black giant stood immobile. He was still in one piece, unaffected by the flames and debris that had rained down on him. He was so still that it was almost difficult to tell him apart from the statues that formerly resided in the now obliterated cemetery.
”He survived an attack that's the equivalent of a Rank A Divine Device…”
Alicia's tone was filled with disbelief and almost wonder. Then she glanced at me, just as amazed by what I had did.
”How did you…?”
Evidently she had never realized that archer-class mages could be this powerful. This was the first time she had seen an arrow unleash destruction of such scale and magnitude. And to be honest, it was also the first time for me.
This was the result of me infusing the power of Vermillion Phoenix into a single Constellation weapon.
Earlier, while Cecilia was fighting against Hades, I was wondering what would happen if I converted the power I used to summon Vermillion Phoenix and fuel its spells into a single, one-use Constellation weapon instead, and if it was possible. Obviously, back then I was quite distracted by the impressive spectacle unfolding in front of my eyes, but since I wasn't engaged in a life-and-death situation and Cecilia had the matter well in hand, I had taken to toying with the idea at the back of my mind and ran through a couple of simulations.
Eventually I concluded that it was not just possible but insanely powerful. I was glad to see my hypothesis proven correct in reality.
Still, it was a close shave. A single mistake and I would have failed. In that case, I would have been at the total mercy of a fully regenerated Hades.
”…”
Right now, it appeared that I was still at the mercy of a fully healed Hades, but he remained stationary, not moving to retaliate after taking such a horrifying blow. I wondered if he had actually been slain like earlier, when Cecilia slew him, but amidst the crackling inferno, he had regenerated and resurrected for a second time, unseen.
”Heh…marvelous. Very impressive.”
Cecilia, Alicia and I whirled around as Selina approached us, clapping jovially. She peered at the inferno in front of her, unperturbed by the fact that her summoned spirit was still being trapped by its raging flames.
”You're not bad at all, brother. I've taken quite an interest in you.”