Two hours later, Arad stood in front of a large, dark staircase that led to the depths of the earth. Looking down, he could feel the corrupted divine magic pulsing and convulsing deep inside. The god inside never stopped trying to escape, and the barrier was the only thing keeping his violent powers from ripping the whole kingdom apart.
Doma was behind Arad, looking at the stairs with a passive face. Gabriel, on the other hand, was sweating buckets, and the guards escorting them were on the verge of throwing up from the sheer pressure.
“Arad.” Zariel could barely speak. “Are you sure about this? That thing isn’t something we should even think about fighting.”
“One day he’ll escape, and that would be the end of the mortal world, not just your kingdom.” Arad looked back at her, “He is a threat to my kingdom as well, and I’ll erase him before he harms anyone.”
“I’d once again suggest we call your brother first. Going to face him alone is a bad decision.” Gabriel managed to speak, but Arad only looked back at him with a smile.
“I know. But I don’t want to call him before trying for myself. Who knows, I might just kill him on my own.”
Gabriel remained silent as Doma disappeared into Arad’s back. It was time for him to face the god of war, and it won’t be a simple fight; this might be the turning point for the whole world.
Gabriel had managed to ensure the barrier’s stability to encase the whole fight, and also set up many observation points so everyone could watch the fight.
Arad walked down the stairs with steady steps and disappeared into the darkness. At that moment, all the half-fallen-angels rushed into the observation rooms to watch the fight.
Gabriel was the most worried of them all. If Arad died here, Zephyr would probably level his whole kingdom to the ground, even if that meant releasing Alexander so she could fight it. Forget Zephyr, Kali would probably blow the whole world before that could happen.
Due to all of that, both Gabriel and Doma had made several precautions to pull Arad from the barrier in case he started losing, and those precautions were quite precise.
If Arad gets damaged a bit too much, Doma’s curse would forcibly rewind him back, while at the same time ripping him off the fabric of reality inside the barrier and ejecting him outside. The curse was so complicated that it made Gabriel’s head spin, but it made sense.
Existence itself is a curse; you get to live, but must suffer any side effects thrown at you by life. Gabriel understood that in concept. But he couldn’t imagine seeing someone using it.
The first step of Doma’s plan is time reversal. If Arad sustained a certain level of damage, he would get rewound back to a state where he was mostly fine. In exchange, once he is healed, he’ll start taking the damage back, doubled, over a set duration of time. It’s like exchanging 60 damage for 120 damage over one minute.
That first plan would allow him to be healed instead of just being killed with one big hit.
Now, about rejecting Arad from the reality inside the barrier. It was simple.
The barrier already has a rule that forces Alexander to stay inside it as long as people are sacrificed to fuel the barrier. Doma took that curse and flipped it, making it so Arad won’t be allowed inside if a sacrifice is made. That sacrifice was the life of a goat, and Doma already did it and locked it in a constant curse that’ll only activate if the first plan is initiated and Arad is rewinded.
Arad tried to understand how Doma used curses and learn from her, but he quickly gave up since he realised it would probably take him weeks, if not months, to get decent, let alone master it.
Gabriel didn’t even dare ask Doma questions because he felt that whatever knowledge Doma had, it wasn’t something mortals were supposed to know. And he was right. The knowledge of curses itself was cursed to bring ruin, and knowing it without understanding how it works or how to work around the negatives is a sure way to madness.
Arad finally reached the bottom of the stairs and found himself standing inside a tiny room, his head only an inch away from the ceiling. He looked around, seeing rows of dolls, tiny boats, and ancient scrolls.
In the middle of the room stood a table with a map, on which a one-finger-sized statue of a gaunt man with a long beard, wearing black armor, stood. Taking a closer look, Arad couldn’t even tell the difference between the statue and a real living being.
That was the statue of Alexander, taking the lead on a massive battlefield. Arad was now in a war room, and those dolls were statues of soldiers, angels, and monsters that were supposed to be placed on the map.
Right now, Arad was using his void presence to stay hidden from the god’s eyes. And so, it was time for a sneak attack. He extended his hand and touched the map, immediatly getting sucked into it’s depth and found himself standing at the peak of a snowy mountain, looking at the same battlefield drawn on the map.
Arad took a deep breath and then exhaled, his breath freezing and falling as shards of ice. He lifted his arms and then took a step forward, almost sinking into the snow.
He could already see Alexander standing like a dead statue in the middle of the battlefield, ever waiting for his enemies to show up from over the horizon. It seems that even corruption wasn’t enough to change him from being a warmonger.
But if Arad knows anything about war, it’s important to erase your enemy before they get a chance to fight back. He debated pulling the black hole and just throwing it at the god, but then changed his mind. Such a thing won’t kill him.
If Arad can already guess that Alexander would survive a direct hit from the black hole, he’ll leave it as a trump card. Now he wants to weaken him up before the fight, and for that, he’ll charge a massive [Ho-white Nova], fuel it with hydrogen, and then throw it at Alexander as fast as he can.
A second later, the battlefield disappeared into blinding radiance.
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