"Whoosh..."
The crimson river surged skyward, roiling and churning as it thundered toward George III's royal quarters.
The blood aura shot into the heavens, mad and terrifying!
Up ahead, a figure blocked its path.
Duchess Georgina had her hair pinned up, wearing loose, flowing sleeves and a huge hoop skirt with a high, stiff collar.
Her clothing style was vastly different from contemporary women's fashion.
Yet such attire didn't restrict her movements in the slightest.
She floated in midair, expression grave, golden light bursting from her eyes as if she had merged with the very rules of the world itself, making it difficult for anyone to muster the will to resist.
"Passage is forbidden here!"
The duchess declared with immense authority.
Behind the duchess, before the blood river, an insurmountable invisible barrier instantly materialized.
"Boom!"
The crimson river crashed into the barrier with a tremendous roar, blood water spraying upward.
Silas was blocked!
But the river only paused for an instant before surging forward again, continuously pounding against the transparent wall as if determined to advance.
Seeing her target intercepted, Duchess Georgina didn't grow overconfident.
The lesson of Prince Grove was still fresh in her mind, and the king was watching from behind. She had to give her all.
"Boom, boom, boom!"
A second wall, a third, a fourth... transparent barriers rose from the ground in succession, combining together to form a fortress that forcibly imprisoned the river, preventing it from flowing freely!
"Deprivation!"
Seeing that the river had nowhere left to evade, she extended her hand and pointed at the red vortex on the ground, pronouncing judgment.
Powerful rules instantly formed, penetrating deep into the river.
The mighty law Georgina invoked could directly strip away one of the target's Beyonder abilities.
And the ability she chose to deprive was naturally "Blood Flesh Magic"!
Honestly, Georgina had never seen such an absurd Sequence 5, actually able to transform himself into a blood river. This guy was definitely extraordinary!
"Whoosh..."
She watched as majestic order rapidly took effect on the river.
It shuddered violently, trembling as it stopped flowing and began to contract.
"Whoosh!..."
But just as Georgina thought she'd succeeded, the river suddenly surged again with tremendous momentum.
Different from before, the river's state became somewhat strange, viscous and profound, and mixed within the water sounds seemed to be illusory ocean tide sounds...
In this peculiar tide sound, order collapsed and instead rebounded back onto Duchess Georgina!
"Ahh..."
Georgina shrieked.
Her pinned-up hair exploded outward, strands flying as drops of blood fell. Looking again, blood was already flowing from her eyes and nose!
All four walls shattered simultaneously. The river set off once more, advancing toward the royal quarters.
"Damn it! Stop, I said stop!"
Duchess Georgina's hair flew loose, her composure lost as she screamed shrilly.
She flew up rapidly, blocking the blood river's path once more and slamming her right fist down into the void with devastating force!
"Boom!"
Blood water splashed up. From within the river's turbulent flow came what seemed like angry water sounds.
At the same time, several forces arrived simultaneously.
Qonas completed his report to the king, crossed through space, and arrived at the battlefield.
"Clang, clang, clang!"
Another squad of palace guards charged forward, but unlike before, they actually wore outdated full suits of armor.
The two leaders even had their faces covered by pitch-black visors, their entire bodies radiating powerful spirituality.
The Beyonder guard squad within the palace.
The two leaders were Sequence 5 "Disciplinary Knights"!
"Whoosh!"
In the sky above, a figure rapidly grew larger.
Prince Grove, who'd been several kilometers away, finally returned to the scene.
His clothes were slightly charred and he'd consumed considerable spirituality, but he remained the strongest person present, a Sequence 3 demigod.
Multiple powerful individuals simultaneously surrounded this crimson river.
They not only needed to stop the river but also completely destroy and kill its main body!
On the river's surface, Silas's figure slowly materialized. With his upper body emerging from the water, he looked around left and right.
"Heh..."
Facing the formidable enemies surrounding him, he showed no panic but instead revealed a contemptuous, cold smile.
The next second, he flipped his palm and somehow produced a crystalline white bone.
The bone was curved, with one end rather sharp. It appeared to be a section of rib.
"Thunk!"
Without hesitation, Silas stabbed the rib into his own side.
"Ahh!"
Everyone present cried out in pain simultaneously. The lower one's sequence, the more unbearable the agony.
The prince only swayed slightly, the duchess and Qonas let out low groans of pain, while the guards directly toppled over in disarray, their screams piercing!
"Torment"!
When encountering a large group of enemies, Silas didn't hesitate to use this Beyonder item with extreme side effects!
"Come on, you scum, keep at it!"
With "Torment" in his abdomen, his body became extremely sensitive in an instant, as if every nerve's subtle sensation had been magnified a thousandfold.
When transmitted back to his brain, it practically made his gray matter boil.
But as compensation, his pain was equally reflected onto all surrounding enemies!
Not only that, with the white bone returning to his body, his condition rose sharply in that instant.
A trace of [Divinity] originally beyond his control immediately fused into his body, causing the Marauder to become incredibly harmonious and obedient.
At this moment, his spiritual state had greatly approached that of a "Black Knight"!
"Whoosh..."
Countless vortexes rose from the blood river's surface.
Everyone endured the pain and watched crimson figures emerge from the vortexes.
The vast majority were just ordinary blood flesh puppets, but several among them flickered with spiritual radiance, clearly Beyonders, including no shortage of Sequence 6 and 5 Beyonders!
Among all the blood flesh puppets, the figure standing at the very front was especially tall.
Crimson covered his surface, preventing everyone from confirming his appearance. They could only vaguely make out a handsome young man with smooth, long hair.
When Grove and the others saw this figure, their hearts suddenly felt intense unease.
Though the opponent's strength was at most around Sequence 4, he seemed to possess an extremely high status, making them sense danger from their spiritual instincts!
"I'm finding that I'm starting to appreciate you a bit."
Medici surveyed the surroundings, and after seeing the enemies clearly, smiled and turned back to tell Silas, "Your actions are crazy enough, thrilling enough."
"Bang, bang, bang!"
Qonas opened fire.
In his right hand, he held a strange revolver.
Overall gray in color, it was several sizes larger than an ordinary revolver, almost like a hammer.
Unlike typical revolvers, this one actually had six thick barrels with metal studs embedded in the cylinder.
This was one of his sealed artifacts: Revere's Desperate Scream.
The six-barreled revolver fired in unison, bullets like rain, pouring toward Medici.
"Kill!"
The gunfire served as a signal, prompting everyone present to act simultaneously.
The guards engaged the ordinary blood flesh puppets and the Sequence 6 Beyonders in the blood river, while Prince Grove, the duchess, and Qonas faced the even more powerful Marauder subjects: Mr. A, the Rose School of Thought's wraith Steve, the Desire Apostle Jason...
And Medici.
He looked at the chaotic battlefield, his face showing an expression of utmost satisfaction.
After a thousand years, the "God of War" had returned to the mortal world, and there should be weapons of war as ceremony to offer Him blessings!
Gunfire was the fanfare welcoming Him, the dying screams were hymns praising Him. The vivid battlefield made Him tremble slightly.
This was His promised land!
"Very good. As a reward, let me light a fire for you."
Medici praised Silas approvingly.
"Whoosh!"
Cyan-tinged-purple flames ignited from His palm, blazing intensely as if carrying the mighty power to destroy everything.
He effortlessly manipulated the flames, shaping them into the form of a spear.
Then, gripping the spear's middle section, He drew His arm back...
"Shepherding is forbidden here!"
Prince Grove sensed danger from His movements and commanded loudly from midair.
This time, he activated his spirituality and issued the prohibition with full force!
His prohibition was extremely clever, directly restricting Silas at the source.
If successful, not only would Silas lose a major ability, but these blood flesh puppets would become nothing but useless shells!
However, Prince Grove's plan fell through.
The blood river churned with illusory tide sounds.
For some unknown reason, it could actually resist his full-force [Prohibition] as a Sequence 3, and that tall crimson puppet was even more arrogant, merely glancing at him.
The movements in his hands showed no pause whatsoever as he pulled his arm to its limit, then hurled it toward the king's royal quarters!
"Whoosh!"
The cyan-white-tinged-purple flame spear, carrying extreme temperature, shot forth!
"Boom!"
Silas felt the spirituality within his body rapidly depleting, like floodgates opening, pouring out like a waterfall, being drained away!
After throwing the spear, Medici looked down at His palm, thoughtfully opening and closing it, then shook His head.
The aura on His body decreased considerably after the throw, and at this moment had become no different from an ordinary Sequence 4.
However, the enemies present had no mind to spare for Him at all.
"Distort!"
Qonas's soul nearly fled his body. He gripped tightly the iron pocket watch in his hand.
On its face, one half had various symbolic marks neatly arranged, the other half was utterly chaotic.
Both sides connected into one at the mechanism behind the dial, with structures so complex deep within as to make one dizzy.
This was his second sealed artifact: "Concerto of Light and Shadow"!
Qonas pressed a button on the pocket watch with a "snap," his eyes fixed tightly on the flame spear, trying to distort its direction.
However, he only heard the watch emit a grinding "creak," and the spear's speed seemed to slow slightly.
Prince Grove directly pursued the flame spear, facing it head-on as he swung his fist!
Before him, the rules and order of space became extremely chaotic.
The scorchingly hot flame spear seemed to be immersed in extremely viscous glue, its speed slowing further!
"Huh?"
The smile on Medici's face froze, then He let out an extremely displeased grunt, as if His mood had been disrupted.
"Ha ha ha! Worthy of the 'Red Angel,' actually being blocked by a little Sequence 3 brat!"
"You've always been this incompetent..."
The wounds on both sides of His cheeks split open wider as two voices mocked in unison.
"Shut up, you two wastes."
Medici said coldly. He observed the situation in the high air, then quickly made a judgment.
Then, He raised His right hand and made a grasping motion toward the distant flame spear.
"Boom!"
Grove had been happily watching the flame spear slowly decelerate before him, but the next instant, that mass of cyan-white with a slight purple tinge exploded without warning, engulfing him!
"Ahh!"
Grove was caught up in the flames midair.
That was an angel's fire. Even though its rank had fallen, it still maintained a certain status and was equally effective against high-sequence individuals!
After the cyan-white flames exploded, everything wasn't over yet.
A spear reduced by more than half bypassed Grove, drilling out from the aftermath of the flames and continuing to shoot toward the royal quarters.
Such frighteningly precise manipulation could probably only be accomplished by a high-sequence Hunter.
"Stop!"
Grove screamed in the fire, breaking free from the flames with tremendous willpower and pursuing the spear.
His appearance at this moment was somewhat miserable, with more than half his hair burned away and his clothes scorched black.
But even so, he still caught up to the flame spear and struck its tail with all his might!
The spear was knocked off trajectory, falling prematurely and landing on the open ground before the royal quarters hall.
"Boom..."
Flames rose up. The intense temperature reached inside the hall, making everyone feel a burst of heat on their faces.
The explosion's shockwave also made the royal quarters shake and sway, like a slap landing on George III's face.
He sat upright on the high throne, feeling the complex gazes of everyone in the great hall, his heart growing increasingly furious, even showing signs of spirituality overflowing.
He truly wanted to walk out of the royal quarters himself and crush this happily jumping little ant directly to death!
"Your Majesty, please restrain yourself."
A calm voice sounded in his heart.
"The people from the three major churches are watching.
If you display strength above Sequence 5, it will immediately be discovered."
"I know!"
George III answered in his heart. "What about those two? Why haven't they arrived yet!"
He was asking about the angels within the Augustus royal family: the Sequence 2 "Balancer," Duke Neville, Derink Augustus, and the Sequence 1 "Hand of Order," "Founder of the Nation," William I.
If these two took action, the chaos within the palace would easily end.
"His Excellency the 'Founder' is still in the ruins. His Excellency Derink is on his way.
Please wait a little longer."
That voice soothed him.
"Hmph, dignified angels, how could they possibly be this slow?"
George III snorted coldly in his heart. He knew that these two family angels' attitudes were actually relatively ambiguous.
If his plan succeeded, naturally that would be good. Even if he failed, They wouldn't feel too much regret.
*
At the same time, outside the royal quarters:
"Damn it..."
Prince Grove suffered setback after setback, his expression becoming extremely angry.
He turned around, originally planning to return to the battlefield, only to discover that the crimson river had somehow already closed the distance.
Georgina, Qonas, and the guard squad were all entangled within, fighting numerous blood flesh puppets but unable to stop the main body's advance.
It was still persistently advancing toward the royal quarters!
"Just how long are you going to keep causing trouble!"
This persistent and mad momentum was simply unbearable for Grove. He roared and rushed to the ground.
"Boom!"
The impact from his flight directly knocked over several blood flesh puppets on the blood river.
"Boom!"
Crimson flames blocked his path. Medici smiled and intercepted him.