Ultraman neither dodged nor evaded. He charged headlong into the star-shattering Galaxian Explosion, the absolute-zero Aurora Execution, and the earth-cleaving Excalibur.
BOOM!
The torrent of energy from the Galaxian Explosion slammed full force into Ultraman's towering frame.
The terrifying power, enough to shatter stars, erupted outward. Blinding light swallowed his silhouette in an instant, and the violent shockwave tore apart the floor and pillars of the Leo Temple, sending dust and rubble rocketing skyward.
"Did we get him?" Camus narrowed his eyes.
His Aurora Execution followed close behind, striking the epicenter of the explosion with precision, attempting to seal whatever remained within in absolute-zero ice. Shura's Excalibur slashed into the cloud of debris as well.
But in the next moment, all three of their pupils contracted at once.
"Is that all you've got? A little tickle? That's your best?" A savage roar erupted from the heart of the explosion and the freezing mist.
The attack had been formidable, certainly, but it was not enough to harm a Kryptonian body.
Even absolute zero could not wound him. As for the golden sword-energy and the star-destroying force, he had taken more of those than he could count in his time.
Ultraman strode out of the maelstrom of energy and shards of ice completely unscathed. The front of his battle suit had been partially torn away by the Galaxian Explosion, revealing knotted muscles beneath that looked as though they had been forged from steel. There was not a single mark on them.
Camus's absolute-zero frost had merely formed a paper-thin layer of rime on his skin, and the heat radiating from his eyes vaporized it in an instant.
Shura's supposedly indestructible Excalibur had struck the thick column of his neck and produced nothing but a piercing clang of metal on metal, leaving only a faint white scratch. It had not even broken the skin.
"What?!" Saga, Camus, and Shura were shaken to their cores, unable to believe what they were seeing.
He had taken the Galaxian Explosion and Aurora Execution head-on and come away without a scratch? Even Shura's Excalibur could not breach his defenses? The man was a monster.
They had never witnessed physical durability this terrifying. It was absurd. He was not even wearing a Cloth. Or rather, he simply had no need for one.
"My turn now. The moment I start swinging, you'll all be reduced to dust." Ultraman bared his teeth in a vicious grin. His enormous fist tore through the air with a thunderous crack and hammered down toward the nearest target: Shura.
The speed was too great.
It surpassed the neural reaction threshold of a Gold Saint. Shura only had time to cross both arms in front of his chest while burning his Cosmo to its absolute peak.
CRACK!
The nauseating sound of shattering bone filled the temple. Shura was struck as though by a speeding locomotive.
He rocketed backward like a cannonball, smashing clean through the thick wall of the Leo Temple and leaving a man-shaped hole in the stone.
Fragments of the Surplice on his arms flew in every direction. Both arms twisted at unnatural angles. Blood seeped from beneath his faceplate. A single punch, and the Capricorn Gold Saint, only just resurrected by Hades, had been critically wounded.
"Shura!" Camus cried out. For the first time, a flicker of genuine horror appeared in his ice-cold eyes.
This was insanity. The man had shattered Excalibur with his bare body. What was his flesh even made of? Was he a god?
"Damn you!" Fury blazed in Saga's eyes, and his Cosmo surged wildly once more. "The ultimate technique of Gemini: Another Dimension!"
He thrust both hands forward and tore the fabric of space itself apart, ripping open a vast, pitch-black fissure of terrifying depth.
A horrifying suction poured forth from within, seeking to banish this physically indestructible monster into an unknown dimension.
In the instant Shura had been struck down, Saga had realized that brute force would not work against this enemy. The best option was to exile him into the endless void of another dimension.
"Hm?" Ultraman felt an immense, almost irresistible pulling force seize his body. He was being dragged toward the rift against his will.
He struggled with all his might, his feet plowing deep furrows into the stone floor, but the power of spatial law was not the kind of force that raw physical strength could easily resist.
As Ultraman teetered on the verge of being sucked into the dimensional rift, even his allies were impressed.
It was the first time they had encountered someone capable of physically bracing against a spatial technique through sheer brute power.
He truly was a monster through and through.
"Hmph." Grail, hovering behind Axis, let out a cold snort. Her crimson Omega Eyes locked onto Saga once more.
Two scarlet, warping beams of energy lanced through the air with surgical precision, striking the hands Saga was using to hold open the spatial rift.
The power of annihilation and dissolution contained within the beams acted instantly upon the edges of the dimensional tear.
A crackling hiss filled the air, like a red-hot brand pressed against ice. The edges of the pitch-black rift destabilized, twisting and crumbling apart. The force Saga was using to maintain the dimensional corridor was forcibly disrupted and neutralized by Grail's unreasonable law of erasure.
Saga let out a strangled grunt. His Cosmo lurched into disarray, and the dimensional rift he had been sustaining collapsed and vanished in an instant. He stared at Grail with a mixture of shock and rage. The woman's bizarre power filled him with deep unease and dread.
With Saga pinned down by Grail, Ultraman broke free of the spatial pull. He turned toward Saga with a savage glare.
Saga's expression had turned grim. How were they supposed to fight a monster like this? Why had such a creature suddenly appeared in the Sanctuary?
"I underestimated you. You actually have spatial abilities. Let me tear you apart." Ultraman cracked his knuckles.
"Leave this one to me. I'll play with him for a while." Just as Ultraman was about to attack Saga, Grail stepped forward.
She had been affected somewhat by the earlier exchange, but nowhere near as much as Axis, who was a pure god.
Grail was a demigod, after all. A little creature who could manipulate space was a precious find.
She wanted to see if she could capture him alive and take him as a trophy.
Ultraman sneered and lunged toward Camus instead. "Tch, fine then. Hey, popsicle! You're next!"
Camus's gaze hardened with resolve. He gathered every last drop of his Cosmo into his hands. "Diamond Dust!" Countless ice crystals, sparkling like diamonds, shot toward Ultraman carrying absolute cold and piercing force.
At the same time, a domain of absolute-zero frost rose around Camus's body, attempting to slow Ultraman's movements.
But the freezing aura, powerful enough to encase a Gold Cloth in ice, had virtually no effect on Ultraman.
He barreled through the storm of ice crystals like a bull charging through a snowdrift and drove his enormous fist toward Camus with the momentum of an avalanche.
Camus had nowhere to run. All he could do was condense his freezing aura into a gleaming shield of absolute-zero ice before him.
The shield shattered like paper. Ultraman's fist connected squarely with Camus's chest. The Surplice caved inward and splintered apart.
Camus spat out a torrent of blood. His body sailed through the air like a kite with its string cut, crashing through one corner of the Leo Temple before being buried beneath the rubble. His fate was uncertain.
In the span of just a few breaths, three powerful Specters (former Gold Saints) had been undone by the combination of Ultraman's terrifying physical might and Grail's uncanny law-bending abilities. Two were critically wounded. One was pinned down.
Aiolia and the four Bronze Saints stood watching with their mouths agape.
They had not expected three deceased Gold Saints to be among those present, and they certainly had not anticipated that the man before them would be this overwhelmingly powerful.
This hulking stranger and his companion displayed strength that was entirely beyond their comprehension.
That pure, unreasonable physical defense and raw power, combined with the red-eyed woman's eerie beams that erased everything they touched. Were these people enemies, or allies?
Axis was not the least bit surprised by the outcome. Had this been the live-action version of Superman, the Gold Saints might have given him some trouble. But they were facing the comic-book version.
These Kryptonians did not play by anyone's rules. The laws of physics simply did not apply to them.
"You still haven't finished over there?" Ultraman dusted off his hands and glanced impatiently toward Grail. In the rubble, Camus and Shura's life signs were faint. They had clearly lost all ability to fight.
The Hades-variant Gold Cloths they wore had shattered completely. Though they resembled Gold Cloths in appearance, these Surplices were of ordinary quality at best.
They were barely D-class in terms of durability, roughly equivalent to Bronze Cloths. Against Ultraman, they might as well have been made of tissue paper.
"He's a bit tougher than the two you dealt with." Grail hovered in the air, her crimson Omega Eyes locked on Saga.
Her voice was cold and devoid of emotion, as though she were stating a simple fact. Scarlet energy coiled around her fingertips like serpents choosing their prey.
Saga stood his ground, the chest of his Surplice rising and falling subtly. When Grail had forcibly collapsed his Another Dimension, the backlash had disrupted his Cosmo.
His inner alarm was far greater than what showed on the surface.
The hulking man's physical power bordered on the divine, and the woman's abilities were stranger still. Those red beams seemed capable of erasing existence itself.
When had enemies this terrifying breached the Sanctuary? What were they after? Would they interfere with the plan?
"Tougher, huh? Then let yours truly just..." Ultraman grinned wickedly and started forward.
"That won't be necessary." Grail cut him off, her gaze never leaving Saga. "Spatial ability users are interesting. I will collect him personally."
There was a possessive edge to her tone that sent a chill down the spine. Darkseid's daughter, through and through.
"You! How are you alive, Saga? Have you betrayed Athena again and sided with Hades's forces?" Aiolia, the Leo Gold Saint, shouted in accusation.
"Master, you... why would you..."
"Shura, a warrior like you being deceived once is understandable. But why would you let it happen a second time?" Shiryu and Hyoga stared in disbelief at the Gold Saints they had once defeated.
Saga's eyes flashed. "Collect? Arrogant woman. Do you have any idea who you are dealing with?"
As the former Pope and the Gemini Gold Saint, his pride would not be trampled upon. Even clad in a Surplice, even burdened with a heavy mission, he remained a man who stood at the pinnacle of all Saints.
"The Cosmo of Gemini: Demon Emperor Fist!" Saga's hands formed a rapid seal, and a sinister purple light erupted from his eyes.
An invisible, formless yet soul-warping psychic force condensed into an unseen shockwave.
Like an invisible arrow, it crossed the distance in an instant and drove straight toward the center of Grail's brow.
This was the Gemini Gold Saint's proudest technique. Anyone struck by it would fall under his control.
The woman's physical defenses might well rival that man's, so it was worth trying a different approach. If he could dominate one of the enemies, everything that followed would become far easier.
This technique had once driven the Leo Saint Aiolia into a berserk frenzy. It had been the shadowed instrument of the Pope's rule. Its power struck at the very core of the soul, nearly impossible to guard against.
The woman before him showed no intention of dodging whatsoever, which only heightened Saga's confidence. She had no idea what was coming.
For the first time, something resembling a ripple passed across Grail's expressionless face. Her Omega Eyes flickered briefly, as though registering some anomalous signal.
The invisible psychic assault crashed into Grail's mental domain.
But the anticipated collapse of will, the puppet-like subjugation, never materialized.
Grail's body swayed slightly in midair. Deep within her crimson eyes, countless tiny, twisted scarlet runes flickered and spun wildly for a moment before settling back to normal.
"A psychic attack?" A note of faint surprise entered Grail's voice, which immediately hardened into icy contempt.
"You attempt to shake a vessel that carries the will of endless death and finality? Foolish. Do you have any idea who I am?"
Saga's pupils contracted sharply. His Demon Emperor Fist had been completely nullified.
The power that could warp a Gold Saint's will had plunged into her psyche and vanished like a stone sinking into the ocean, raising only the faintest of ripples.
What was this woman's mind made of? Did she not possess a mortal soul at all?
"As you can see," Axis said with a smile from where he stood nearby, "Grail is no mortal. She is a goddess. Her father is the leader of a race called the New Gods, a being known as Darkseid. In terms of power, you can compare him to the God-King Zeus."
"What? Did you just say Zeus? Her father can rival Zeus?" Saga's face twisted in disbelief. The others were equally stunned. Did this man have any idea what he was saying?
He was talking about the God-King Zeus. The one who truly stood above all other gods, the man who reigned at the very summit of Olympus.
"Excuse me, but Zeus is adequate at best. Compared to my father, well, you know the gap." Grail frowned as she spoke.
She had been born with the singular purpose of killing her father. No one understood Darkseid's power better than she did. Zeus was merely one of the Old Gods. His strength fell short of her father's.
"I wasn't referring to the Zeus of your world," Axis said with a light chuckle. "I meant the God-King Zeus of this world. In fact, Darkseid may not even be a match for this world's Zeus."
The Zeus of the DC universe could indeed not defeat Darkseid. But the Zeus of the Saint Seiya universe absolutely could.
"What are you people even talking about? What is your purpose here?" Aiolia demanded.
From the sound of it, they were implying there were two different versions of Zeus. What was going on?
"You are not from this world, are you? You come from another universe." Saga, ever the former Pope, seemed to grasp the situation. He narrowed his eyes as he spoke.
Unlike those Gold Saints who knew only how to fight with brute force, the Pope was far more learned. During his years impersonating the Pope, he had read extensively from the archives within the Star Tower.
He was well aware of the concept of parallel universes.
"Allow me to explain, then." Axis stepped forward, "The resurrected Gold Saints attacking the Twelve Temples were granted a false, twenty-four-hour life by Hades. Once the time is up, they will become corpses once more."
"Lies! Hades granted me an immortal, undying body!"
"You can fool others with that line, but are you really fooling yourself too? Let me put it plainly. There is a secret known only to successive generations of Popes, a secret concerning Athena's Divine Cloth." Axis shifted into full spoiler mode.
What was the point of keeping secrets? Better to just lay everything out in the open.
"Shut up! You bastard, shut your mouth!" Saga's face drained of color, fury and panic warring across his features.
If the Specters carried this information back to Hades, the entire Holy War would be in jeopardy. They needed Athena to awaken the Divine Cloth. It was their only chance.
"Athena's Divine Cloth? What do you mean by that? Are you saying the Goddess has a Cloth of her own?" Seiya, one of the Bronze Saints, asked.
"Of course she does. What did you expect? The Mariners have their Scale armor, the Specters have their Surplices, and Athena has her Cloth. As a principal deity, she naturally forged one for herself." Axis snorted.
He mused briefly that if he wanted to develop his own universe in the future, acquiring a true Hades to bring back would not be a bad idea. Though the Hades of the Saint Seiya world was notoriously proud and difficult to control.
He also wondered about Golden pineapple's situation. The old man should have arrived in this world as well.
Seeing that Axis intended to continue talking, Saga immediately launched a Galaxian Explosion, trying to stop him from revealing any more of their secrets.
But a figure clad in a red cape and blue bodysuit stepped in front of Saga and blocked the attack effortlessly.
"Keep it down. Don't interrupt."
"Explain yourself! What is this Divine Cloth of the Goddess?" Aiolia pressed.
"You see that enormous statue of Athena? That statue is actually Athena's Divine Cloth. It simply requires Athena's blood to break the seal. This secret has been passed down exclusively through the line of Popes. But why go through all that trouble? Just send someone up there and have Athena give a little blood. Problem solved." Axis waved his hand dismissively.
Besides, he needed Athena's power to help him awaken his own divine Cosmo.
"You... you have no idea what you're talking about! That is a secret weapon!"
"Secret weapon, my foot. The moment you take it out, everyone's going to see it anyway.
"Enough talk. I am a god as well, and I have business with Athena. A transaction, perhaps? I can help you win this Holy War, so just take me to the Goddess's palace beyond the Twelve Temples."
Axis was done wasting time.
The four Bronze Saints and Aiolia exchanged uncertain glances, unsure of what to do.
At that moment, Saga's body suddenly went limp, all vitality draining from him in an instant. The false life Hades had bestowed upon him had run out.
"Hades knows."
....