Before this, just as Belial was about to gather what little power remained and blast that fleeing bastard to death in one shot, a familiar beam of light hurriedly rushed out from within him.
That in itself was nothing special, because Belial had long expected that some unknown existence would jump out at him from one place or another. What truly shocked him was that after the other side fired a ray of light straight into his mind, he suddenly understood a message without effort. There were no words spoken and no need to interpret anything, he simply knew exactly what the other side was thinking.
And the meaning was perfectly clear.
"Hello… for the sake of how I helped you before, hold back for now and don't kill him yet."
"Fire me over there too. I need to take something from his body."
"…"
Pure White Giant Dragon paused for a moment, and the light itself felt a jolt of tension. What if he refused? That thing was extremely important. She had not expected things to escalate this far, as she had only invested the last of her remaining faith power to awaken that divine aspect he somehow possessed, planning to leave after stirring the scene.
Instead, it produced a form that felt completely excessive. Now she could not be sure what he was thinking. If awakening this state turned him into some kind of indiscriminate executioner like the King of the Great West who refused to listen to anyone, that would be far worse.
After making a cautious inquiry, Belial sent a response back along the information channel. She opened it carefully.
"Holy crap!"
"I can understand you!"
"After all these years I can finally understand what someone is saying! Hurry up, anything is fine, keep talking! Even just chatting is good, I'm going crazy from holding it in…"
"Oh right, who are you anyway? What's your name…"
"Stop, stop, don't dump it all at once, the connection is about to explode!"
The light immediately felt drenched in sweat. That rapid barrage nearly overloaded her completely, and that was without even counting the cost of translation and conversion in between. In her current half-dead state, just maintaining communication was already a massive burden.
Still, seeing that he was mentally just as unstable as she remembered, she finally relaxed. Letting out a breath, she continued.
"That old bastard isn't in a hurry to be killed. He's weak enough that you can deal with him anytime, and it's better to let him go to draw out bigger prey. Besides, he's carrying two very important treasures, important to me and to this world."
"No problem!"
"But I have one condition!"
Hearing that, the light's heart tightened. It seemed impossible to ask someone to work for nothing, but in her current poor state, she truly had nothing to offer. She asked carefully, "What do you need? The condition…"
"Teach me."
"?"
"This way of communicating right now. Teach me how to talk to others like this."
That was the most important thing. Compared to that old thing's worthless life, this long-desired translator meant far more to him. Compared to his clumsy grasp of foreign speech that required careful guessing, direct mind-to-mind communication was simply better.
"…Ah?"
The light thought for a moment, then started sweating even more. Any other request would have been easier, but this one was truly difficult. The difficulty was not for her or for Belial, but for the people he wanted to communicate with.
If communication were like blowing air into a bottle already full of water, the more you spoke and the longer you communicated, the stronger the pushback became. What was worse was that Belial was more like a reservoir than a bottle. Just maintaining a connection without being crushed by his unconscious will was already extremely hard.
It was a simple pressure problem. One side was far too strong, and the leaked pressure alone would shatter the other container. The result would be heads bursting open. Still, since she was the one asking for help, she tried hard to find a solution, ideally with some kind of intermediate carrier.
"Hm?"
Wait. This might actually work.
"I can give you a communication platform later, something like a relay. I can't teach you the direct method, but would that be acceptable?"
"Deal!"
That was how the earlier scene came to be. As she tossed the small sun in her hand, she felt relieved. That last blast might not have guaranteed Elfido's death due to whatever backing he had, but Edward was definitely dead.
If it were her past self, she would have done everything possible to stop the revival of Fate that her old friend had finally managed to press into the grave. But now, she simply smiled.
"In the future, a revived Fate, whether by its own will or by that so-called destiny, will definitely clash with you, and the outcome is easy to guess. Since you want to become Fate, then go ahead. And besides, having only Ham die once is far from enough to completely shatter the Shard of Fate."
"There will never again be such a thing as Fate. Once Fate can be observed and decided, its most important possibility is already gone, you fools."
Belial did not wait long. He looked around at the ruins, and due to the previous battle, every living thing within dozens of miles was dead. He made a vague sound as he thought.
Before he could settle on anything, his eyes lit up. The light had already rushed back, carrying a shining sphere. She said, "This is what you wanted. Once you eat it, you should roughly understand how to use it."
"Because of, well, a bit of personal quality issues, please be careful with how much you speak. The translation may not always be precise."
"Alright, no problem!"
After a brief consideration, Belial swallowed it. The sphere melted instantly upon entry, turning into something he vaguely understood and sending feedback back to his main body. Once he returned and digested it properly, he would be able to understand his current state and what that thing truly was.
"That's good… I'm a bit tired… When I wake up later… I'll try to find you."
The light let out a very human yawn, her weakness impossible to hide. After those few words, she dissipated before his eyes, leaving him slightly regretful.
He had finally found someone he could communicate with smoothly, and now she was gone. Still, he could tell this was not easy for her, so he said nothing more. The connection remained, like a chat avatar grayed out after going offline. It seemed he would have to wait for another chance.
Now he could return to what he had been thinking about earlier. After activating this burst state, his power only grew stronger toward the end, to the point where he felt almost omnipotent. That was clearly an illusion caused by the special state, and his energy would soon be exhausted, causing this Clone to collapse on its own.
So Belial had an idea.
"Since I'm about to blow up anyway and this won't last much longer, I might as well do something good. The scale is pretty rough this time though. Just a few thousand earlier was enough to wear me out."
He finally spread his wings, the light behind him growing ever brighter. With a furious roar, blazing golden holy flames burst into countless rays, spreading outward in waves.
This startled Chloe and Fei'er Li who were watching from above. To be honest, both had already been shocked beyond expectation. Fei'er Li was still mentally blank after seeing that trident ice sword dragon's new form, wondering if she had accidentally launched a saint instead of a strike.
Chloe was just as confused. The original plan had been to use the power of the Holy Sword to give Belial a boost, but who could have expected this kind of form to erupt instead. It was absurdly strong, tearing apart Augustus's domain and Laws with a single glance and causing permanent damage. She had never known the Holy Sword could be this powerful.
If she had possessed this level of strength back then, she would not be dealing with such trouble now. She would have cleared everything long ago. This pure and holy appearance was completely different from the earlier evil dragon, and the vast radiance made her immediately realize that Dawn had personally intervened.
After hearing that, Fei'er Li understood as well. She really had thrown out something like a saint, so everything made sense. The two of them then watched as Belial glanced at Augustus and erased him, while Elfido fled and was chased through space by a single breath attack that likely killed him as well.
But now, with Belial spreading his wings so openly, it felt different.
"So what is this dragon doing now? Do you know?" Fei'er Li asked.
"…I don't really understand. He is beyond my comprehension," Chloe replied, then paused.
She sensed the faint light, dark power, and drifting souls of the entire region being drawn into a vast and majestic domain. The city ruins began to tremble, like a dying patient mustering one final surge.