Chapter 1059: The Masked Man's Conviction
Actuass had made a lot of preparations.
He had patiently waited for centuries and meticulously used all the resources he could find in Aigas, and that was all after a lot of research. The masked man was almost convinced that he knew more about this world than 99% of the living things here.
Was his goal and hunger just that much deeper than that of anyone else?
Had the Ashing of Time not only distorted time but in the perception of the denizens of Aigas, but their fervour as well?
No matter.
It didn't matter.
All Actuass cared about was that finally, everything had fallen into place, and he did his best to make sure that it would all go according to plan.
That said, as he did all this, rage burned his heart.
All this work that he was proud of, no, all this work that he began while tasting nothing but bitterness only to grow to be proud of it as the centuries passed, had still gone unnoticed? Or was it indeed perceived but not appreciated by the one he was doing all of it for?
Either way, bitter words nestled in his heart for centuries. He would get to say them all and cast away the mask that had almost become a second face for him soon.
Very soon.
Well... that was what Actuass had thought.
Before embarking on this journey, he had made sure to bring a creature he had captured a long time ago.
The Definer of Causality.
Because even after drowning it in undeath, its powers still worked the same despite its loyalty, Actuass rarely used this creature. He also didn't want to develop a habit of depending on it. That would be very bad for his long-crafted plans and ideal mentality. He hadn't reached this point by simply relying on forecasting. That was just a part of it.
The Definer of Causality was able to define cause and effect. In a way, it was able to give accurate predictions of the future, since it directly linked an action to its eventual result.
However, there were two shortcomings.
The Definer of Causality's very identity was hinged on being impartial. It would advise anyone it met, or was forced to meet.
The creature was also limited in its scope of advice. It wasn't a councillor. It only gave vague warnings and at its own time.
Thankfully, the Definer did offer perks to its master. Once Actuass enslaved it using his necromancy, it was able to empower his actions passively as long as he kept it close to him. This had the benefit of increasing the likelihood of the consequence that the masked man desired.
So far, all the benefits that the creature could offer were working in his favour... for the most part.
...
At the start, Actuass had released all the undead he had stocked up until now in order to mask his presence and what he was going to be doing next.
Jerthrax, the Vision of Misery - a Herald - was not just a creature given the powers of the Deities, but a combatant in his own right. His awareness was likely to be ungodly. His power was also supposed to be equal to Rayn's or even stronger.
Against this, the old Actuass would have died very quickly, even while knowing the future to a degree.
However, after absorbing the divine energy in Rayn's soul, he had increased his chances of not just survival, but also victory.
He had earned the power to resist the ferocity of divine power and to even use it very well.
Thus, he had used it to protect his undead from being erased in an instant by the vicious dragon.
Things were going perfectly.
....Until an anomaly started to unravel his plan.
Actuass wasn't ignorant of this being. In fact, while the Definer of Causality couldn't read his actions clearly, the masked man was very well aware of what this anomaly was.
He had found that there were two of them acting against him on this journey. No, three.
He had taken note of this particular one when he managed to snag his ship thanks to the Definer, but now, he regretted that he hadn't done something final about him.
As his undead were somehow stripped of the Undeath essence keeping them tethered to life, to him, Actuass had been forced to act before things took a worse turn.
The divine energy he wielded emboldened him, his undead cloaking it.
Actuass then proceeded to launch the Paladin Champion he had bested and enthralled from the mask of millions of undead, and at a speed enough to catch Jerthrax off guard.
The Paladin Champion landed squarely on Jerthrax's chest and without delay, used his Divine Blessing, Brunt Divide.
The first ranked Paladin Champion had a monstrous Divine Blessing which allowed him to separate, split and divide two or more entities of any kind from each other!
The applications of the Blessing were as broad as one would think. The only limit was the amount of energy used and the user's understanding of what they were doing.
Once Actuass discovered that the Paladin Champion had this kind of a Blessing, he had decided to learn it himself by temporarily moving his soul into the body of the Champion, allowing the man's body to teach his soul how to use this Blessing through the divine energy he could now use.
And indeed, once the masked man learned Brunt Divide, he used his hefty volumes of energy to split the world in a ration of three parts to one; the latter was where he was, where he
intended to be.
Brunt Divide was also the power used to remove a few of Jerthrax's scales, which was the utmost the Paladin Champion could do after channelling all his reserves of energy, and within
a short amount of time.
Once that was done...
Actuass' greenish black undeath essence burned like malevolent light from his body.
He finally revealed his location from the swath of undead after his scheme had born fruit.
Just that spot of vulnerable flesh from Jerthrax was enough.
Actuass lunged.
He barrelled through the undead, all of which made way for him.
However, on his path, he sensed the rapid approach of four individuals towards his location. Two of them he was slightly wary of.
One was another anomaly, like him, and the other, was a most strange woman, one whom he deduced was heading the group that was after him.
Unfortunately, Actuass was much faster than them in reaching his goal. He travelled at a speed that burned his enchanted dark robes and warped his figure into an elongated dot.
His hand flared with an unbelievable torrent of greenish black undeath energy as he zoomed and then thrust it where Jerthrax's scales had been removed.
Unfortunately, while the dragon was only a split of a split of a second late in reacting, someone else wasn't.
MBIIIIIIIIING!
...!!!
Actuass grimaced as he bounced off something that suddenly got in his way, and sped into the
sky.
The hazel glow of his eye showed hints of displeasure.
The one to block his strike just now... had been the Null Devil King.
The creature held a large sword that was bathed in a staggering amount of Null Life Essence.
It had defended Jerthrax, who growled in fury and swatted the enthralled Paladin Champion on his chest away.
The dragon then drew back so fast that the weather seemed to chance, becoming violently
stormy.
"YOU ALL SEE ME AS A MERE PRIZE TO BE WON, DO YOU?" he said in a furious tone, his blue eyes looking at the masked man who had saddled a flying undead creature high up in the sky.
Actuass let out a sigh.
He failed.
That had been a decent strategy to end this centuries' old strife, but no.
'I suppose my final hurdle has to at least be this difficult, hmm?'
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