The battle on the island was far from over.
As a Sequence 1 angel, the might of the Divine Abomination Suah needed no explanation. But the enemies he faced were no ordinary Sequence 3 demigods.
They were two pirate kingss of deep and formidable pedigree: the King of the Five Seas, Nast Solomon, descendant of the Fourth Epoch's great empire, who had ruled the seas for decades with a wealth of battle experience and collected treasures behind him;
and Queen Mystic, Bernadette Gustav, daughter of Roselle, former princess of Intis, who had collected who knew how many of the sealed artifacts her father had crafted into her own treasury.
Together, the two of them could not truly wound an angel in any real sense, but they could hold out against his assault for a good while yet.
Glug... glug...
The entire black lake had come to a boil.
Countless massive arms, thick and black as tar, plunged into the earth, blurring the boundary between the spirit world and reality, spreading their dreadful corruption outward.
On the thick trunk that was Suah's true body, countless blood-red eyes stared fixedly at the two ships, glinting with a light of curse and madness.
But the two kings were giving no ground either.
Nast sat upon a weathered stone throne on the deck of the Black Emperor, a crown like a spire upon his head, his body swollen to the size of a giant.
The entire ship lay wrapped in his order and will, and whenever the Divine Abomination's attacks came howling in, his power would forcibly warp them, stripping away most of their force.
Bernadette stood at the bow of the Dawn, her long chestnut hair streaming in the wind, surrounded by countless things of fairy-tale wonder and beauty.
Mermaid maidens sang in the empty air, conjuring dazzling, illusory foam that blocked the black arms' massive reach.
Toy soldiers in military uniform stood in neat ranks, their muskets roaring. And Bernadette herself had turned utterly elusive and unreal, so that Suah's curses fell through empty space, landing on nothing at all.
"Your Highness, this reinforcement you spoke of, you mean the Blood Reverend, and the angel who brought him here?"
The King of the Five Seas, Nast, had witnessed from a distance the final outcome of Agalito and the Death Announcer.
His black eyes betrayed no emotion, and he offered no opinion of his own. When at last he spoke, low and deliberate, it was to ask about that man, Alexander Gascoigne.
Nast's father had received his title from Roselle himself, so it was only proper that he addressed Bernadette as "Your Highness."
"That's right."
Queen Mystic Bernadette answered, her deep blue eyes gazing across the distance at that black, three-masted sailing ship, her expression a tangle of feeling: nostalgia, sorrow, joy... as if she were recalling days long past, and all the joys and sorrows that had come with them. "According to my prophecy, he will bring us our turning point..."
"!!"
As if to bear out Queen Mystic Bernadette's very words, suddenly, across the hundred arms of the Divine Abomination, every mouth let out an unspeakable shriek all at once.
That attack, which struck directly at the soul, had a single target: Silas, out over the near waters!
Boom!
Antia surged forward at once, spreading her palm wide to block the terrible blow, the rushing gale whipping her long black hair into the air.
"Are you sure you want to make an enemy of that thing?"
The angel turned to look at Silas, worry plain on her face. "I have to be honest with you. The gap between Sequence 2 and Sequence 1 is far greater than you can imagine..."
She was afraid that having only just gained a captain of her own, she might soon find herself alone again.
"It'll be fine."
Silas answered.
The Divine Abomination Suah across from him was a Sequence 1 angel.
If Silas laid out every card he held, only two could actually deal real damage: first, the illusory sea tide within him; second, the powerful artifact the queen had given him.
The illusory sea tide was difficult to use, requiring either that the enemy's spirit invade his own body, or that he transform himself into a river of blood and let the tide spread through his whole being, so that whatever was swallowed by his sea of blood would suffer an utterly devastating impact.
But the Divine Abomination Suah had already been burned once by that trick and surely wasn't foolish enough to invade his spirit a second time, and his own blood river would have no hope of engulfing the vile, corrupted body of a Sequence 1 being.
Which meant, in truth, he had only one option left.
Unconsciously, he ran his fingers over the mysterious staff head in his hand.
A gift from the queen. It was said to let its user borrow strength from a past version of himself... a precious, single-use item, but he had already worked out roughly how it functioned.
Threads
The ritual could be reenacted, and the most crucial step of that ritual was to pray to the representatives of the "Pupil-less Eyes" and the "Twisted Line," to Mister the Fool himself, and borrow power from him.
The thought struck Silas suddenly, and something clicked into place.
Being able to borrow strength from Mister the Fool would, in itself, prove that his relationship with the man was no ordinary one.
The moment Queen Mystic saw him use this item a second time, she would be certain that he knew Mister the Fool...
Then again, she had already guessed as much. This would, at most, only confirm it from another angle.
So Silas thought to himself, and lowered his eyes once more to the mysterious staff head in his hand. He could feel it: the Red Angel, the malevolent spirit within him, was waiting in silence. Medici, too, hungered for power, longing to feel the glory of days long past.
Heh... when this creature, normally so noisy, went suddenly quiet, it meant it cared very, very much.
"Antia, lend me a hand with your power."
Silas said, and with a slight tightening of his grip, crushed the staff head outright.
Whoosh!
The staff head shattered, and at once a thick, dense mist, gray and steeped in spirituality, came pouring out from within.
Just as he'd thought...
Seeing that gray mist, Silas felt a moment of surprise, and yet it also made sense.
Because the shape and texture of the mist was exactly identical to what he had seen at the meeting place of the Tarot Club.
This truly was power from Mister the Fool himself!
Once the mist spread out, it hovered there in midair, its surface glimmering with those mysterious symbols.
Silas extended his own spirituality toward it and at once formed a connection with the gray mist, understanding immediately how to use it from there.
It was a feeling hard to put into words, so he simply acted, guiding the mist and driving it straight into his own chest, into the very place where the three-in-one malevolent spirit of the Red Angel dwelled!
The next instant.
Boom!
Silas felt the spirituality within him give way like a collapsing dam, pouring out in a thunderous rush, surging along the symbols' connection straight into that malevolent spirit's soul.
To any onlooker, the Blood Reverend Alexander Gascoigne's robes suddenly seemed to change, shifting from their original bright crimson into a deep, rust-red hue.
And that wasn't all. His spiritual density climbed at a frightening rate, a heavy, dreadful pressure spreading outward, a majesty so thick it felt almost tangible!
The Divine Abomination Suah sensed the danger at once. Every mouth across his entire body snapped open in the same instant.
Those mouths opened and closed without pause, their voices overlapping again and again, each in a different rhythm, a different tone, a different pitch, all crying out the very same name: "Mother Tree of Desire!"