Chapter 172 - There Was A Fourth...

**SWISH! SWISH! CLANG!!!

Knowing fully well that his comrade's ability made it so that the arrows could not harm him, the spear-wielding celestial confidently engaged Arthur, intending to keep him in place.

Arthur put the box back in his inter-spatial ring and pulled out the sacrificial artifacts he stole from the dead lightning mage.

**CCRACK!!!!! CRRACCCKKK!!!!

Although the damage dealt by each individual arrow was negligible, the sheer amount was enough to cause two sacrificial artifacts to shatter almost instantly.

Despite this, Arthur had a wide grin on his face that sent chills down the spines of the two celestials.

He was visibly injured as spiderweb-like cracks had begun spreading over his face, even so, he let out a loud laugh under the rain of countless arrows while allowing the various sacrificial artifacts to take the hits for him.

'I never expected to evolve mid-fight!'

**CRACKKKK!!!!

The reason why Arthur was withholding the condensed divinity instead of releasing it was because he was doing something else, something Lute and everyone else who knew of the true nature Arthur's energies would consider crazy.

He was trying to combine his negative divinity opposing energy with his divinity, hence the reason for the cracks on his face.

The action of combining the two opposing energies within his body was already causing it to break down and even the sacrificial artifacts on him could not negate the damage caused by this.

He was trying to develop a new variation of Extreme nothingness that ran on his divinity instead of magic power when he had the idea to mix the divinity with his divinity opposing negative energy.

**CCRACKKKK!!!!

Another sacrificial artifact shattered as Arthur closed his wings and dropped downwards. He then stabbed his sword into the ground before calling out in a loud voice.

"Extreme Nothingness: Seismic Surge!"

The moment Arthur spoke, he released the condensed energies that were infused with the powers of time and destruction.

The ground quaked and then enormous waves of purple energy surged from the ground in all directions.

Seeing this, the two celestials felt their hairs stand on end as Arthur's negative energy gave them goosebumps just by sensing it. They tried to take distance from Arthur but it was a bit too late for that.

The two opposing energies that were forcefully condensed together exploded in the next moment, creating a giant purple mushroom cloud and releasing shockwaves that traveled for thousands of kilometers, destroying the already fragile earth in its wake.

***BOOM! BOOOOOM!! BOOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!!!!

***BZZZZZZZZZZTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!

The lightning using celestial hugged his comrade before infusing lightning into his body and blitzing out of the range of Arthur's seismic surge.

The sudden increase in energy concentration in the area caused the celestial's 'bow of heaven' to be canceled but he could not care less at this point.

Arthur fell flat on the ground, exhausted after using such a large amount of energy. He still had quite a bit of his 6x multiplied aura left but he was not even sure he could use it.

The majority of his energy circuits were fried due to the risky move he just used and they were not gonna recover anytime soon.

He opened his inter-spatial ring and downed as many healing and magic potions as he could.

Meanwhile, the celestials on the floor, just barely out of the range of the seismic surge, were being healed by the fourth member of their group.

The fourth member was supposed to stand by and only take action if it seemed like the mission to retrieve the box had less than a 10% chance of success.

He was armed with a sniper rifle, loaded with bullets containing a deadly poison that not only infected the physical body, but the soul!

"Black Magic : Corrupted Recovery."

Pitch black three-ringed magic circles spread out underneath his two comrades' bodies. He poured his energy into the two celestial's bodies as their wounds healed visibly, he then gave them energy potions which they downed quickly.

The spear-wielding celestial then whispered something into the ear of their last comrade before summoning his spear and dashing towards Arthur at full speed.

As for the lightning user, he infused lightning into his body and blitzed towards Arthur who was stunned due to the fact that the two celestials were already recovered barely 5 minutes after he released the seismic surge.

The effects of magic and healing potions were not immediate and Arthur had not recovered the amount of magic he wished to.

He felt the same should be for the celestials as he rose his sword and pointed it in their direction before calling out with a tinge of anger in his voice.

"Sword of Victory."

Waves of silver-colored aura surged towards the lightning celestial who was in front but he kicked off the ground and jumped high up into the air before spreading out his arms.

Dark clouds gathered above Arthur's head as lightning rained down on him. He gritted his teeth and jumped out of the way, before pulling out the box from his inter-spatial ring and a mirage artifact alongside it.

He then threw the two into the air after activating the mirage artifact, causing there to be six boxes instead of one. Carefully wrapping his barely recovered magic power around them, he moved the mirages alongside the real box towards the celestial who hurriedly dodged so as to not get hit by whichever was the real box.

'That thing is durable enough to hold the aura of extinction back for who knows how long, no way I'm gonna let that hit me!'

With those thoughts, he landed on the ground and moved around quickly to dodge the boxes that were blitzing towards him.

He occasionally fired lightning at them to check for the real one but he only hit the mirages. When there were only three boxes left, the spear-wielding celestial arrived and threw his spear towards Arthur.

Arthur hurriedly dodged the spear but he temporarily lost control of the boxes, causing them to fall to the ground.

The real one was revealed as the lightning celestial dashed towards it, however, his instincts warned him not to as he created two spears of lightning and stabbed them into the ground to forcefully stop his movements.

The moment he stopped, a semi-transparent blade came flying towards him which he used the two hurriedly created spears of lightning to parry.

**BZZZTTTTTT

Arthur kicked off the ground and dashed towards the box, picking it up with his left hand and holding his right hand out.

"Return"

Celestia flew back into his hand and he spun around while releasing an aura slash to block the flame spears that were coming from behind.

He then charged towards the spear-wielding celestial who had already retrieved his spear and clashed weapons with him.

**CLANGG!!! CLANGGGG!!!! SWISHHH!!!! CLANGGGG!!!!

"Just die already, you damn cockroaches!"

"Give us the box already you filthy devil!!"

"You son of a bitch."

Arthur and the spear-wielding celestial cursed at each other as weapons clashed, releasing sparks that lit up the dark night.

The occasionally golden lightning bolt attempted to pierce Arthur but he used the box in his left hand as a shield to block it.

Although Arthur had recovered a bit of magic power, the duo did not give him the chance to use it properly.

Gritting his teeth, he tossed the box in the air and switched to aura before swinging his sword indiscriminately with one hand and sending aura slashes in every direction.

He then used the other hand to condense divinity into his palm and fired it as a beam towards the lightning user that attempted to reach for the box. Meanwhile, the spear user placed a hand to his forehead and sent out a thought transmission.

Flapping his wings, Arthur propelled himself upwards and slashed towards the lightning user with an aura-filled blade.

**SWISH!!

The celestial created a lightning shield to block the slash, however, the amount of aura in it was too much for a hastily created shield to block.

**CRACKLE!!!

The lightning user sacrificed his left arm and let it get cut off, for a chance to deal great damage to Arthur.

He coated his right arm with lighting and punched towards Arthur's head. Unfortunately for him, Arthur was on guard for a possible counter-attack and he hurriedly tilted his head out of the way.

Sadly, he was not fast enough and the lightning fist ended up grazing the side of his head, destroying his ear, alongside the earing that changed his hair color.

His hair reverted to its original silver color and he released a burst of aura to force the celestial back to the ground.

He then poured all the magic he barely managed to recover into regenerating his ear as he pulled off the other earing by himself and let his eyes return to their original color.

It was at this time that the box that he flung high up into the air, dropped back down and he rose his hands to catch it.

Closing his wings, he allowed gravity to do its work and bring him back to the ground; he flipped midair and spread his wings once more, using them to propel himself to the ground with his sword pointed forward.

**BAAAMMM!!!!

He slammed on the ground and created a small crater, before standing up and facing the two celestials.

All three of them were visibly exhausted and had expended most of their energy, nevertheless, neither side wanted to back down.

The spear-wielding celestial then sighed and whistled.

Before Arthur could comprehend why he did that, a high-frequency pulse of mana was released into the surroundings.

'Artifact... canceling magic...'

The two gauntlets on Arthur's arms were artifacts, and artifact canceling magic was cast into the area disabled their effects.

The celestial had noticed this and had told their fourth and final companion who had been keeping his distance to come close enough to use the magic with the thought transmission earlier.

As for Arthur, the backlash for using the 6x multiplier feature of the artifacts began to take effect.

Arthur's body lost all strength, his magic power and aura were sapped from his body and he could barely stand on his feet.

It was at this point, he recalled a certain vision he was shown by a certain blue-haired Candidate for time.

She had told him that if he knew what was going to happen fully, then it would have not happened.

Nevertheless, the sight he was seeing was the exact same thing he had seen that day.

'Ah, so that's…what she…meant…'

**PSHOO! PSHOO! PSHOO! PSHOO! PSHOO!

Three beings then warped into the area at the exact same time that the next events occurred.

Followed by the artifact canceling magic, were five gunshots from a silenced sniper rifle, courtesy of the fourth celestial who had casted the magic.

As it was taking Arthur all he had to remain standing, he did not hear the gunshots even with his superior hearing.

The five bullets hit him exactly where they were meant to.

One on each leg.

One to his stomach.

And Two to his left hand that was holding the box containing the law crystal.

Arthur lost consciousness immediately and dropped the box, however, that was not the main problem.

The true problem was the fact that Cattleya who just warped into the planet Nemo alongside Creusery, bore witness to Arthur being shot five times.

The celestial who sent the four inferior stage legendries against Arthur also entered the planet's atmosphere at the time and although he wanted to rush towards the box, he had expended a bit of power on the deities he just killed.

Seeing Creusery and Cattleya who were high-tier deities, he did not want to appear before them and get taken as an enemy.

The underlings he sent against Arthur were as good as dead already so he abandoned them without a second thought.

Even so, when he looked at Arthur and realized that his underlings were cornered to the point where they had to use the soul poison bullets he had given them, he shook his head in disappointment.

All these happened in the span of the few seconds it took for Arthur's body to drop to the ground.

The entire area was silent, as such everyone present could hear the sound.

The sound of the dying Arthur's unconscious body dropping to the cold hard ground.

END OF VOLUME 1