Chapter 190 - What Does It Mean To Be Sub-Cosmic?

"So, did you ask me because I was the first one you saw or because what you wanted to test related to me?"

Arthur rose an eyebrow in surprise before shrugging his shoulders and replying.

"Yes on both fronts."

He then took a stance and faced Hades seriously, the next moment, he had kicked off the ground with enough force to leave a small crater in the reinforced concrete floor.

Arriving in front of Hades almost instantly, he threw out a punch with all his physical strength behind it.

Seeing this, Hades unhurriedly raised his hand to block Arthur's punch.

**BOOOOMM!!!!

His fist collided with Hades' outstretched palm, resulting in a loud 'boom', however, Hades had not moved an inch, and meanwhile, Arthur was knocked back a bit.

He regained his balance immediately and shot out once more, this time aiming a whip-like high kick to Hades' head.

Hades instantly spun around and rose a leg to meet Arthur's in the air.

The moment his foot clashed with Arthur's, he stretched out his hands and grabbed Arthur's leg, flinging him lightly across the arena.

However, what Hades would consider a light fling, was definitely not what Arthur experienced.

**BAM!!

Arthur crashed into the wall causing it to crack slightly, however, besides the small concussion from hitting his head, he was fine.

"Is that really what you wanted to see?"

"Nope, just checking out my physical strength first."

Arthur jumped down from the wall and checked the back of his head for any injuries before flicking the finger on his right hand and summoning Celestia.

He pointed it at Hades and spoke with a dry voice.

"Sword of Victory."

A Silver torrent of Aura poured out of the sword and shot towards Hades with the intent of swallowing him up.

However, Hades only rose his hand with his index finger being held by his thumb.

The moment the aura wave reached him, he flicked it, and the air pressure released from that action, parted the wave in two and went on to destroy the wall behind.

Hades looked up and saw Arthur diving down on him with Celestia in tow.

He shook his head and formed a knife-hand with his left hand and rose it to clash with Arthur's blade.

"The body of a god is far stronger than that of those demis you've killed, boy."

Hades said before moving his hand to break Arthur's guard and cause him to lose all momentum from his attack.

His hand then shot towards Arthur's neck, however, the latter hurriedly created a barrier of aura to block the attack and used wind magic to push himself backward.

"What are you aiming for exactly?"

Hades asked as he felt Arthur's sequence of attacks were not serious in any way or form, however, Arthur just showed a bright smile and pointed at Hades' left hand.

"That."

Hades was initially confused, however, he looked down on his hand and saw a few drops of golden blood dripping from it to the floor.

"What?"

He could not help but voice his further confusion out loud.

Raising his hand, he saw that there was a thin line with blood seeping out from it, exactly in the spot where Arthur's blade had met with his hand.

Such a trivial attack was not enough to normally injure him, yet here he was, bleeding.

It was only natural that he was confused. Still, he was able to calm himself and question Arthur.

"Care to explain?"

Arthur nodded and took a deep breath, releasing it; he flared his energy for Hades to see.

"This, that negative energy of yours…"

"Anti-Divinity, that's what it's called."

The silver energy flaring around Arthur's body was the reason he was able to injure Hades, by injecting a small amount of it into Celestia at the time of summoning, he prevented Hades from discovering that he had used it at all.

"The difference in strength between us is so much that normally even your strongest attack should not be able to as much as scratch me but with this, you can actually deal some damage."

Arthur nodded in affirmation with Hades' words as he manipulated his anti-divinity and used it to coat Celestia.

[Master's energy is scary.]

His forehead twitched at Celestia's words but he held himself back from openly retorting and decided to use the other thing that he gained recently. He called out in a small voice that barely counted as a whisper.

[Authority of the Progenitor]

**BOOM!!

The moment he said that, Hades reflexively activated his authority of darkness and summoned his trusted twin blades.

Waves of divinity poured out of his body in all directions as even Cattleya who was watching from the side could not help but back away instinctively while protecting her body.

Arthur however, was fine. The effects of his authority had its range drastically reduced as a result of Hades superior authority and as for his anti-divinity, although it did not react violently like before, it still tried to push itself against Hades' divinity.

Besides, Hades was limiting his strength by a large margin. If Hades really wanted Arthur dead, divinity or anti-divinity, Not even Cattleya would be able to stop him from killing Arthur. But Arthur was his son, so although he was wary, there was no killing intent.

"What did you just do?!"

Hades asked with a loud voice, as he could not understand why he felt his very existence was at risk all of a sudden.

"Just a little something I possess as a child prophesied to end the gods, it was incomplete before but not anymore."

He wrapped anti divinity around his sword and swung it towards Hades who countered it with a divinity-filled slash of his own.

**BAM!

The two energies collided and nullified each other, causing Hades' surprise to increase. The amount of divinity he put in the slash he just sent out was very minuscule compared to the vast reserves he had, however, it was not something that could be easily nullified by a grandmaster.

One has to take note of the fact that Hades' authority of darkness was currently activated.

"Only an attack backed by an authority could easily nullify that..."

As he spoke, he looked at Arthur who only smiled in response. Arthur then deactivated his Authority of the Progenitor and unsummoned Celestia.

"I just wanted to test out my anti divinity, now that's done, we can move on to more pressing issues."

Hades deactivated his authority while raising an eyebrow in question, he was wondering what Arthur was considering to be more pressing than the fact that he had acquired a weapon that would make the gods restless if they found out about it but Arthur's next question blew his mind.

"Hey dad, Can you tell me what it means to be sub-cosmic?"

Hades nearly dropped his swords in shock upon hearing Arthur's question. Barely managing to keep his hold on them, he narrowed his eyes at Arthur and asked.

"How do you even know about being 'Sub-Cosmic'?"

Arthur was about to reply, when he suddenly felt a hand on his shoulder. He simultaneously summoned Celestia and turned around while pouring divinity into the sword.

**BOOOMM!!!

A small explosion rang out as his sword clashed with 'something', he tried to pull it back and take distance, only to find out that he could not.

The person he had reflexively attacked, had grabbed his sword and was not letting go.

"I'd ignore that since it was my bad for showing up unexpectedly. Let's take this conversation elsewhere, shall we?"

Hearing Diablo's voice, Arthur finally realized who it was and relaxed his guard. He tried to unsummon Celestia but realized that he could not!

"Hmm...Oh, this."

The dust cloud generated by the earlier explosion cleared and Arthur finally saw the figure of the unscathed Diablo who was holding Arthur's sword with a nonchalant look on his face.

"How are you not even fazed, I put a lot of divinity into that slash you know? And why can't I unsummon Celestia?!"

Diablo gazed at Arthur apathetically and Arthur felt himself reflexively step back. Diablo then suddenly laughed and used his other hand to point at the part where he was holding Celestia with.

"Look closely, boy."

Arthur rose an eyebrow and looked at Diablo's hand, his eyes then widened in surprise. Diablo's entire arm was covered in a thin layer of multicolored energy, that was what was responsible for preventing him from unsummoning Celestia.

"You can really see it huh? And your eye too."

Diablo facepalmed and sighed as he let go of Celestia.

"We really have a lot to talk about boy, if you want answers, you're gonna have to give us some answers too."

He then looked at Hades and spoke.

"Let me take us somewhere we can have an uninterrupted conversation."

As he spoke, energy poured out from his body and wrapped around everyone in the arena. Hades, Arthur, and even Cattleya.

Then with a flash of light, they were gone.