Chapter 114
What emerged was a flawed, tainted, and dangerous echo.
A remnant of praise now infused with doubt, a holy light within which dark questions pulsed.
This reflected echo was not meant to wound the angels physically, but to pollute the battlefield of meaning itself.
It was spiritual contamination, making it difficult for the enemy to maintain the purity of their own doctrine within an arena now saturated with deviant reverberations.
"We are a people who live by curses.
By insults.
By rejection."
Fhhhhh!!
"Every prayer of theirs that seeks to impose, we answer with denial.
Every pressing light, we answer with the courage to remain standing."
Hoooohh!!
"Drive them from your minds.
Drive them from this land.
This is not their world.
This is not their sky.
And we—we never asked for permission to breathe."
Thus, the clash reached its apex.
For several seconds that felt like centuries, Zhulumat's forces were locked within an unbearable grip.
Spiritual pressure loomed over their shoulders like a colossal mountain, while flashes of divine light gnawed through their defenses layer by layer.
Cracks in the shields widened into small chasms radiating hateful light, the stabilizing obelisks behind them screeched sharply, and the telepathic bands around the captains' wrists felt as if they were burning flesh.
Behind every helmet, hardened faces contorted under suffering that surpassed the physical, a temptation to surrender seeping all the way into the marrow.
The image of throwing down weapons, of falling to one's knees and wailing for impossible forgiveness, flickered at the edge of everyone's consciousness—from the foremost soldiers whose arm bones were close to shattering, to the High Elders in the core circle whose minds were besieged by whispers of despair.
It was a fragile moment in which defeat nearly became a certainty accepted with resignation.
Yet from the heart of that near-perfect destruction, a voice arose.
Not a thunderous shout that split the sky, but a low vibration that originated in Zhulumat Katamtum's chest and spread through the ground like a minor quake.
That vibration carried not words, but images, will, and collective memory.
It portrayed the grip of the One Accursed not as destiny, but as a shackle meant to be broken.
It ignited memories of every humiliation, every oppression enacted in the name of holiness, and every assault upon the right to stand on one's own.
The spirit that had nearly gone out found its fuel again, not in hope of victory, but in a blazing hatred for all forms of domination over will.
That address was a unification of souls, a declaration that resistance itself—regardless of the final outcome—was the first form of victory over a tyranny that claimed absoluteness.
Then, the scream exploded.
A collective curse, harsh and profane, originating not from mouths, but from every pore of the soul of each satanic faithful on that field.
From Shaqar's hoarse roar, from Onigakure's thunderous cry, from Makakushi's hissing defiance, from every frontline soldier biting bloodied lips, and from the depths of the High Elders' hearts, an absolute rejection was proclaimed.
They did not ask for victory.
They commanded departure.
They demanded that the minions of the One Accursed be gone from the ground they stood upon, from the dominion they had fought for with blood and curses.
That shout became the final energy, the closing nail in the coffin of the divine assault already teetering on the brink.
And as the last echo of that curse still lingered in the air, something miraculous occurred.
The heavenly slash of light that moments ago had pressed forward with devastating force suddenly shuddered violently.
No matter how perfect a doctrine may be, it is fragile when confronted by absolute, unwavering rejection.
The light flickered, its density unraveling, then burst in a silent detonation that released every spectrum of color before fading into tiny points of brilliance.
Those points shimmered briefly, like dying stars, before vanishing completely into the void of space, leaving behind no smoke, no fragments, and no residual energy.
Only a sudden, vast silence remained, and a battlefield still trembling with the remnants of the iron will of those who dared to say no.
"The remaining breath of a world that was just forced to shut its mouth."
In the vacuum created after that annihilation, a silence heavier than all celestial praise suddenly settled.
The vanished eruption of divine light produced no echo, but instead drew all surrounding sound into itself, forming a sensory-deadening bubble of quiet.
The soldiers of the Anti-Thunder Formation still stood rigid, hands locked around shield grips that had finally ceased to tremble, yet their arms felt both light and hollow, as if the immense burden they had borne had suddenly evaporated into nothingness.
The low vibration that usually emanated from the telepathic bands also died away, leaving an empty space within their skulls that had once been filled with command whispers and static interference.
In the second line, captains like Shaqar and Onigakure could only stare blankly ahead, ears ringing within an unnatural silence, while their ever-active tactical instincts suddenly found no enemy left to analyze.
This vacuum was not pure absence.
It was an inverted pressure, a traumatic "after" born of an explosion of faith that had been too intense.
The air that had once trembled with divine energy and dark curses now became static, cold, and thin.
Each soldier's breath formed short plumes of white mist before their visors, something previously impossible amid the heat of metaphysical energy exchange.
They felt a paradoxical loss, as if they had long been standing while leaning against the pressure-wall of the enemy, and now that wall had collapsed, nearly causing them to stumble forward.
Heartbeats that had once thundered in rhythm with battle now sounded individually, isolated and strange.
Each pulse echoed like a sound in the cavern of their own chests, reminding them of fragile bodily separation, far removed from the collective unity they had just shared in resistance.
At the center of the formation, the circle of Satanic High Elders slowly opened their eyes.
The Liturgical Reversal Ritual devices in their ears had ceased glowing, becoming warm, inert objects.
Zhulumat Katamtum lifted his heavy gaze toward the sky.
Above, the formation of five thousand five hundred fifty-five Holy Beings still stood, but their light seemed to dim for a brief moment, like lanterns running out of oil.
This moment of stagnation was not victory.
It was a pause, a zero point between two breaths of war.
Yet within that deafening silence and trembling emptiness, a new realization took root.
They had endured.
They had not only withstood the slash, but also faced the temptation to surrender at the threshold—and they had remained standing.
The silence itself became the first proof that something deemed absolute and unquestionable could, if only for a moment, be erased.
"Maintain your steadfastness.
Not merely your bodies standing upright, but your iron will that holds the world from collapsing."
That command did not travel through the air, but slipped directly into the spine and the dark space behind the eyes of every soldier.
A pure impulse, louder than sound, sharper than pain.
'Maintain your steadfastness.'
Those two words ignited the final circuit untouched by fatigue or despair.
"No one retreats.
No one bows.
No one begs for mercy.
Not because we are strong, but because we choose to remain standing."
To be continued…