Soul Venerable (Re-written)

Boom! Boom! Boom! Countless explosions resounded as two figures fought against each other.

On one side, there’s a giant three headed demonic dragon whose body is over 150 meter long, while on the other, was a giant 20 meter-class humanoid robot known as a MEKA.  

The demonic dragon’s scales are alternating between dark red and black, they form an eldritch pattern tinged with the power of chaos. If rank 5 Epics were to glance upon its form without defensive measures, they would be subjected into madness and insanity. 

The demonic dragon’s majestic four wings are large enough to darken the skies, yet all of them have been wounded significantly with strange curses. In the short term, the wounds on the wings could not be healed; they cannot be used to achieve flight.

As for the MEKA, it has the appearance of a purple-red high-tech knight’s armor, with hexagonal patterns scattered on its surface. It has purple-red energy wings and other countless auxiliary armaments on its back. Its hand held a giant gunlance and giant shield. Behind it were spell circles that incessantly produce lighting artillery projectiles.

Swoosh! Each of the three demonic dragon’s heads produce different breaths in retaliation. The center one exhales a stream of pure white frost, the left one releases a demonic flame of dark red mixed with black lightning while the right one is an ethereal pink-purple soulfire that would incinerate the mind and soul.  

The giant mecha possessed auxiliary armaments; they flew by themselves from its back for a counterattack.  “[Seven-Layered Defense Matrix]!” Seven colorful lights flared to life to defend against the three demonic dragon breaths, while the auxiliary armament which was 18 funnel-shaped artifacts counterattacked with purple lightning projectiles in addition to the lightning artileries.

Boom! Another continuous wave of explosion enveloped the three-headed demonic dragon, but the giant mecha did not stand still while both traded blows. It dematerialized the gunlance and shields away to take out a heavy weapon and spray its load at the discombobulated dragon. Boom! Boom! Boom! The gun was as big as a spaceship’s spinal mounted turret; it was actually a proton collider modified for repeated firings. 

After the plasma winds subsided, the demonic dragon’s chest was revealed. There was a large hole, its remaining four hearts are visible but they are recovering at an observable rate. The demonic dragon is truly a powerful creature that defies logic.

“Paimon, give up. My master has decimated your army, you should accept your fate.” The mecha spoke as it switched its weapon once more. This time, it is a waist mounted weapon, a gatling laser. Pi!Pi!Pi!Pi! The concentrated light rays fired from the weapon burns the very air, the explosion it makes when hitting the demonic dragon’s scales constantly melts it.

Bang! The gatling laser exploded as it cannot handle the abuse, the barrel has melted despite being designed to handle the heat. It couldn’t be helped, the mecha was under various amplifications. 

Before the plasma winds subsided, the giant mecha simply took out another weapon, this time, it was a shoulder-mounted cannon.

SWOOSH! It shot a dark red laser beam with black at the core. It was like a pillar of light, the weapon completely ignores the demonic dragon’s defenses as it lascecrated its scales and almost decapitates the right head.

Just like the gatling laser, the shoulder-mounted cannon’s barrel was melting due to overuse. From this, it was clear that the weapons are being abused higher than their maximum settings. 

The mecha simply dematerialised its weapon and took out another weapon. The previous scenes occurred once more. 

After repeating it 9 times, the mecha stopped using ranged weapons. It materializes a 40-meter long black stake as it impaled the demonic dragon’s body into the ground. The black stake wasn’t a normal stake, it is an artifact specifically designed to weaken the demonic dragon. The burning stench of demonic dragon flesh being scorched by the spear spreads around the area as the stakes produce a unique frequency that stabilizes space and disrupts elemental particle movement in the area, not allowing spells to activate. 

Then, the mecha materializes another stake and repeats its action. The mecha stopped its action after the demonic dragon was pierced by 109 stakes in various locations, unable to move nor retaliate.

The mecha’s nape opened as a 2.5 meter tall man in power armor ejected from the cockpit. “Takemikazuchi, make sure she can’t escape.” The man commanded as the mecha activated another layer of Dimensional Anchor. 

As for the man, he went down to the struggling giant demonic dragon’s head and clasped his hand. “Paimon, I know you have two true bodies. Come out!” The power armor grasped at the demonic dragon’s shadow. 

“AAAAAA!!” The cry of a female could be heard as the power armor’s hand extracted a body from the demonic dragon’s shadow. “[Chaos Labyrinthian Dimension Escape]!” Paimon activated a last ditch effort to escape. 

Space literally cracked open for a split second, but Takemikazuchi’s Dimensional Anchor cancels it. Paimon instantly received backlash.

“Mordred, stop! I yield!” Her dark silhouette slowly shed it’s stealth method as her body revealed itself. She has waist-length dark purple hair adorned with a pair of obsidian purple horns, 180 centimeter-tall body with pale skin tone, and a pair of bountiful breasts with two pairs of wings behind her waist which is a miniature version of the demonic dragon’s.

As a rank 6 entity, her naked body's attractiveness has become a type of law itself. It was difficult to elaborate her demonic beauty with mortal language, even an elven goddess pale in comparison to her charm.

With Mordred’s armored palm on her neck, Paimon couldn’t offer effective retaliation.

However, she had one more trump card. “[No Time Like The Present]!”¹ZA WARUDO, TOKI WO TOMARE!!!

Time literally stopped.

Since photons are something that is affected by time, it cannot be relied upon within a chrono-static world. The world lost colors because the sense of sight relies upon the reflection of light. However, those who can stop time would typically have methods to sense things during a stagnant world. 

At this moment, a golden figure similar to Paimon appeared behind her. “Mordred, this will be your end!” She muttered as she activated a method. However, before it was finished, she was shocked to the core.

In this monochrome world, only Paimon’s golden figure has colors but suddenly, Mordred’s shadow also produced a golden figure like Morded himself. “You were saying?” 

“!!!!”

Time returned to its normal flow, but Paimon was shocked as she lost connection with her time-path clone. The only way to retaliate against it is to kill her clone, and since it happened during the period where time is stopped, she has no way to tell what happened  which means Mordred himself has extremely powerful time-stop countermeasures.

“I concede! If you’re willing to let me go, I’ll give you my Devil Aspect True Inheritance. It contains my research on the devil race.” Paimon instantly pleaded.

Crunch! Paimon’s neck was completely broken by his grip, but her spinal cord is not a weakness. Paimon’s brain can still function even with a broken neck despite losing the motoric function of her body from below the neck.

The power armor’s helmet opened up to reveal Mordred’s face. His black sclera and purple iris exclude an aura of extreme evil which was something that could only be accumulated after harboring the despair, resentment, hatred and other negative emotions from billions of souls. “You seem to have made a mistake. I can plunder Devil Aspect True Inheritance from your soul… What I want… is you.”

Paimon screamed as her soul was forcefully extracted from her body, but he failed. However, it almost disconnected the soul link between Paimon’s demon body and her demonic dragon body.

“As expected, the soul defense of your true bodies are excellent. Takemikazuchi, transport her demonic dragon body to Lemegeton, I still need to plunder her Secret Plane.” Mordred held Paimon’s neck like how someone held a cat. At the same time, the giant MEKA took the three-headed demonic dragon’s body away.

 

…

“!!!!!” Paimon, or in this case, Larissa Agatha opened her eyes to see the picturesque landscape of the Land of Autumn Rain. “Oh, we’re on the surface…” She unconsciously muttered, the bright sunlight of the surface world embraced her warmly. The rare pleasant spring breeze actually licked her face, but she had no intention to enjoy it.

‘When our truesouls intertwined during the climax, it seemed like I had lost myself to pleasure, so I failed to get the coordinates where he locked my demonic dragon body once more… Then, that rotten memory resurfaced again…’ She sighed in her heart but did not put too much thought on it. The memory that has the most impact in her heart has been resurfaced no matter how she tried to suppress it. 

Larissa Agatha caresses the magnificent beast that carried her body. Lupusrazor is large enough to serve as a mount. “Mordred, where are we going?” She asked through a telepathic link while repositioning herself to make herself comfortable. 

“Call me Lupusrazor, I will be acting as your steed until we kill Lord Erebus but I won’t engage in combat as I’m still busy.” Mordred replied back through the same channel as he casually cruised the land at a comfortable pace. “That said, we’re heading towards Elestra City where Lord Erebus’ Mage Tower is located.”

“I see.” Larissa Agatha nodded. “Then, do you have some telepathic thoughts to spare? I want you to brief me about the Goddess of Shallow Waters and her church. You seem to be very close with her.”

Paimon knew about Larissa Agatha’s background as Mordred’s identity card more or less elaborated it. 

The ‘real’ Lazareva Larissa Agatha was from the seas of eternal winter, she has a shark beast bloodline related to snow-and-ice. Of course, she was dead a few years before the fall of the Great Archmage, her body has become fish feed but her identity is preserved with the help of Pale Hunter.

In official documents, she was sent to the Land of Autumn Rain’s underground world for a special mission, but there’s no mission at all, it was merely a cover. It was common to lose track of someone in the underground world since it has so many layers, so having a blank travel record for a decade is not uncommon.

However, Paimon felt she couldn’t act her propper identity if she did not know about the church that she was supposed to serve at.

“Church of Shallow Waters is the official church of the mermaid race. You’ve met Pale Hunter, she was a low-goddess that ascended roughly twelve thousand years ago, she is one of the youngest among deities.” Mordred paused. “Let’s see, her divine concepts include [Shallow Waters], [Snow and Ice], [Hunting], and [Mermaid].”

“Shallow Waters define her domain. As long as it is related to the reefs, ocean, lake with shallow depth or the surface of water, she can be an excellent guide for her believers. If you fight within her domain, you’ll receive some level of amplification.” 

“Snow and Ice was her elemental path as her mermaids originated in the Seas of Eternal Winter, it is hard to find a deity without water or snow-and-ice as their secondary divine concept there but in my personal opinion, your snow and ice-path attainment should be higher than her.”

“Hunting is one of her secondary divine concepts, she was a hunter before she ascended into a divine. Her hunting-related blessing would be extremely useful after we kill Lord Erebus and usurp his identity.”

“As for the last one, Mermaid, is obviously because she was a mermaid. As a racial concept, this one vaguely branches to several other divine concepts, such as beauty and song. As for why her primary concept is Shallow Waters, is because her mermaid subjects are physically weak, they could not survive the water pressure of the deep sea where the most powerful lifeforms in the Seas of Eternal Winters are competing for supremacy. ” Mordred briefly explained.

Larissa instantly understood why she has a relatively good relationship with Mordred.  “You’ve enticed her with your sound-path inheritance because her mermaids are excellent singers? How much did you pay for her defection? Morgen world still stands as a Great World because of their strange unity against external threats!”

Lupusrazor’s wolf lips smirked. “Don’t underestimate my sound-path inheritance. In this ‘Great World’ whose advancement is dictated by the paths pioneered by the Twelve Main Divines, the use of sound and vibration is barely developed. To her, my presence is literally a gift from the heavens. If she has one of my song inheritances, the entirety of her mermaid subjects would advance.”

“That does not answer my question. Your sound-path inheritance alone wouldn’t be enough for a deity to betray their own kind.” Larissa inquired once more. “If your relationship with her is known to other deities, she would be branded as a Heretic God, a Holy Crusade aimed to slay her and eradicate her subject would follow, the risk of a Holy War outweighs the benefit that you can offer.”

There was no answer from him, even after a long pause. Larissa could only sigh as she slowly understood why he chose to be silent. Some information would contain karma so heavy that mere knowing it would affect the grand scheme of things. Her experience in subjugating worlds as a Demon King does not allow her to push for an answer.

Since both of their luck is already shit, it wouldn’t be hard to predict what would happen.

“Fine, I won’t ask further.” Larissa gave up. “What about this collar, then? Why should I wear this embarrassing article?” She complained while tracing her finger on her collar.

“That’s because Pale Hunter is a mermaid. Most of her non-mermaid hunter-priestesses are pets of mermaids, like expendable hunting dogs that can be used to bait their target’s attention while the true hunters attack.” Mordred explained.  

“Pity…” Larissa commented. Racial discrimination exist everywhere, she also often used the issue of race to gain clout during her Demon King days, so she completely understood why Pale Hunter did so. “Still, it’s embarrassing. Did you selectively forget to mention that when you told me to choose my identity?”

“Free will is only an illusion. Every single option would have some trap one way or another, there’s nothing new there, why are you surprised?” Mordred stated in a matter-of-fact tone. “As I was saying, non-mermaid hunter-priestesses are pets used as cannon fodders. The collar would be branded with identification of their owners. Yours are branded with my name, aren’t you happy being my property?”

There was a warm throb in her heart as if it was the most pleasant feeling in the world, serotonin flooded her brain but Larissa panicked. ‘What’s this… I am… happy being his toy? No way!’ She clicked her tongue while she shifted the way she sat. Just being acknowledged by him made her nether region involuntarily tingles in expectations. If Mordred had telepathic thought to spare, he would tease her but he has his mind occupied with something. 

‘He must have done something with my soul… I must be vigilant and periodically investigate my truesoul in case of corruption…’  Larissa thought with a tinge of fear. It was truly dangerous to stay by Mordred’s side for a prolonged amount of time, but unless Lemegeton is completely destroyed, she could never be free. 

The two stopped conversing as both are occupied with their own thoughts. 

Larissa’s thoughts no longer linger about Mordred. She is now preparing herself for her next role which was to act as a priestess. 

The class transition also carries a large amount of information that she needs to sort. 

A church would typically offer various occupations, or in other word, a faith-path class is not only priests or priestesses. In the aspect of offense, there would be Blessed Warrior or Holy Assassin. In terms of tank or defense, there are Paladins or defense-oriented Holy Knights. For rearguard, there’s also priest or battlepriestess, Holy Archers, or others depending on the god’s divine concepts.

Since the mermaid race is physically fragile compared to other races, the Church of Shallow Waters doesn’t have a retinue of Paladins nor battlepriestess. In exchange, they possessed hunter-priestesses who are excellent trackers, tamers or hunters and several other supportive occupations such as song-priestess or others. 

Each of these occupations are given access to certain blessings, allowing their classes to be unique and useful in certain situations.

However, due to being granted unrestricted access, Larissa Agatha could take on the roles of any occupations in the church of shallow waters. The countless blessings in her armament is extremely vast, she could literally represent the Church of Shallow Waters as its Divine Envoy if she’s willing and only if Mordred allowed her. 

"Larissa Agatha, I almost forgot to tell you." Mordred suddenly initiated a conversation. He sent forth a lump of telepathic will as he elaborated, "Lord Erbus is not a weak vampire lord, he is a bit special. Since you're the only one with blood among us, you should prepare countermeasures for his methods. I've sent you intel regarding the things that I know, I'll be able to dig deeper if I can find some catalyst that would resonate with my memories."

Larissa Agatha was surprised as the intel was quite throughout. "I need to be careful of his… [Gorod Krovi], you say?" She pondered as her mind is now occupied with battle simulations against Lord Erebus.

After a while, her face turned serious. "It seems like he is very troublesome… Mordred, you have to provide me with snow and ice-path resources."