Cthulhu Gonfalon

On the Negative Plane of the Great Circulation, at the judicial court of the dead in hell.

All the judges and patrols had dropped all their work and assembled at the edge bordering hell and the Abyss. They had organized themselves into troops that looked so neat and orderly that they seemed to be works illustrated with the use of drawing tools. They were silent and motionless as they gazed at the roiling and boiling Abyss.

Numerous devils inside it were roaring. Countless words were collapsing. With that huge amorphous subject consistently climbing up, the entire Abyss was gradually melding into one.

In the midst of this process, countless devils died. Their bodies melted away and became a part of this newborn Abyss. There were also a few lucky survivors who absorbed a huge amount of energy and evolved into more powerful and frightening forms.

They were still a little dazed at the moment, but it would not be long before they regained consciousness. By that time, under the lead of the demons, they would launch crazy attacks in every place they could reach. Then they would attack, damage and destroy everything. f𝔯𝒆𝚎𝚠𝑒𝚋𝓃૦νℯƖ.co𝘮

And hell, which had prevented them from invading the Main Plane for such a long time, would be the thorn in their flesh. It would certainly encounter an extremely ferocious attack.

So all combat forces of hell had assembled to prepare for this great battle.

Every blade was polished till it was bright, shiny and reflected the murderous intention on the faces of the soldiers. Every spear pointed forward with its tip flashing cold, dense light. The powerful spellcasters closed their eyes and wasted no time in preparing to cast their spells. The high and lofty Hell Kings had taken off their usual attires and changed into their military uniforms. Armed with weapons, they stood amongst the army of soldiers as well.

There was no need for mobilization, and also no need for impassioned slogans. For these courageous soldiers who bravely fought in the shadows to ensure that good and evil of this world would have their own rewards, everything that was happening was simply a matter of course.

Guarding and defending Earth, as well as punishing evil, gave meaning to their lives.

Perhaps after this battle, they would all fall, and hell would become history. Perhaps today would mark the end of all the hard work and struggle they put up for such a long time. But right at this very moment, their lives would be completely radiating with resplendent brilliance, like the meteor shower that tore through the night sky, leaving a most magnificent brilliance.

Earl Palin was among the army of hell. Watching the roiling and boiling Abyss, his heart was cold with murderous intent and blazing with the spirit of war.

He knew that he might die in this battle, but he was not afraid.

Everyone would ultimately have to die. Besides, he had already lived through an extra cycle as compared to the rest, what else was there to be afraid of?

Dying on such a battlefield was not that bad an ending after all.

At that moment, from the middle of the boiling Abyss, he saw a ball of blazing, black flames rising up. It was quickly spreading upwards towards the opening of the Abyss.

The aura of that flame was crazy and fiery. It was filled with a fervent sentiment of extreme hostility. And this was none other than the famous demon who was known as the “Belligerent Pigg.”

The Belligerent Pigg was the former God of War. He constantly created clones of himself and madly participated in every war that could be observed. Finally, he fell into a state of madness. Attracted by the Origin of Destruction, he became a demon. 𝑓𝗿𝐞𝘦𝘄ｅ𝘣n𝘰𝘷eƖ.c𝘰𝗺

This demon was considered to be a relatively enthusiastic one among all the demons. Although it had also fallen into a deep sleep like the rest of the demons, it still continued to develop its base of followers and went on advocating war. It even had a clear doctrine—everything in the world would eventually perish, and war was the best way to guide them to this end.

Because it was eager in responding to sacrifices, at least a good half of the demons’ followers on the Main Plane were its followers.

Now that Chaos had awakened, the demons were collectively waking up as well. It was time for them to go on a rampage to wreak havoc, and of course, Chaos would be at the front.

And beyond the Abyss, a huge jellyfish that was shining with a brilliant light was flying towards the Abyss while going against the chaotic, evil aura that was spewing out in a violent manner. From the momentum of its movement, the jellyfish seemed to be intending to use its body to plug the Abyss and keep all the demons locked within the Abyss.

Earl Palin knew this jellyfish. It was another god that he had believed in, His Majesty, the Void Mask.

His Majesty, the Void Mask, was completely different from the usual gods. He was a powerful god who showed much indifference. He had no desire for belief and status, but he was eager to do good and obtain benefits for the toiling masses—he was not like a god. Instead, he was more like a saint.

From Earl Palin’s point of view, he seemed more like an unrestrained and unfettered embodiment of goodness.

When the gods were battling for supreme hegemony, he scrupulously remained neutral, even though his power clearly gave him a decisive position. He only focused on helping the refugees who had been displaced out of their countries because they had given up on the intention of war. He firmly prevented the damaging effects of war from expanding and prevented the massacring of civilians by armies, a situation that was commonly seen in previous wars.

And then the new overlord emerged, that was, the God of Light stepped up the ladder of ranks to become a greater Divine Power. When the God of Light destroyed the great enchantment of the Main Plane with his immeasurable great power, it was also the Void Mask who stepped forth to protect all the living creatures in the Ancient Forest by blocking the attack of a greater Divine Power, the God of Light.

Now, it was still he who charged up to the forefront when the world’s scariest evil awoke with the plan to attack. And he did it all to shelter the people of this world from all harm.

“The other clone of mine may not be strong, but it has great foresight!”

Earl Palin sighed to himself and could not help smiling.

He felt extremely honored to be able to fight alongside such a prestigious god.

Under the watchful eyes of the Hell Gods, Sui Xiong and the demon, who looked just like a black fireball, collided heavily into each other.

There was no explosion or whatsoever. All Sui Xiong did was to suddenly spread out his body. Then that huge body of his became something like a large cloth used to wrap clothing and enveloped the demon, whose appearance resembled a fireball.

Then, his body suddenly shrank, twisted and was wrung into the shape of a fried dough twist.

Though the void space was equipped with sound insulation, almost all the witnesses felt that they heard the sounds of a demon being crushed and the ferocious roars of a demon at its dying moment.

That roar was comprised of three percent despair, three percent anger, three percent reluctance and the remaining 91 percent was complete confusion.

Perhaps it could even be assigned a line that went, “What is going on? Where am I? Why is this happening...?”

But it did not matter how confused it felt. Because it was about to die very soon, and it was going to be a very thorough death.

The God of War, who had been galloping, suddenly froze in his tracks. His eyes widened in surprise as he cried out loud, “Pigg is dead?!”

His figure appeared in the Pantheon temple, and he shouted, “Pigg is dead! He was killed by Auscar!”

There was an uproar among the gods. The most terrifying thing about demons was their immortality—because they themselves were the embodiment of “destruction,” so there was no way they could be destroyed. Without this unique characteristic, many gods would have been brave enough to challenge the demons.

Since ancient times, no demon had ever been destroyed. At most, they were sealed. Yet surprisingly, a demon was destroyed today. And this demon was the “Belligerent Pigg,” who was considered to be one of the extremely powerful demons amongst the horde.

This fellow stirred up trouble on more than one occasion. And more than once, he had been under the siege of the gods. The direst situation he had gotten himself into, was the time where four great Divine Powers had combined forces and battered him so badly that he was frightened out of his wits. But even so, they were unable to kill him.

At that time, the four great Divine Powers had completely crushed Pigg’s body and burnt him into nothing but dust and ashes. By right, he should be dead for sure. But in less than a period of a few hundred years, that fellow was resurrected in the Abyss, and once again, he was out to stir up trouble.

And it was after that time, the gods finally affirmed the immortality of the demons. They banished all intentions of destroying these demons and changed the course of action to sealing them instead.

However, as the embodiment of “destruction,” the demons were perpetually spreading an aura that led all living creatures to destruction. Regardless of how strong the seals were, there was no way they could sustain for long as they were being subjected to the erosion of this aura. These seals would be slowly damaged after all.

With everyone racking their brains, the only solution they could come up with was to engage the help of a greater Divine Power. But the greater Divine Power they approached, refused to help. So the gods were greatly frustrated over what they should do with the demons. They were at their wits’ end.

But today, there was a twist of events.

The Void Mask, Auscar, had actually destroyed a demon!

For a moment, all gods’ attention was captured. Compared to the battle of greater Divine Powers, which no one could really understand, it was much more practical to study how the Void Mask destroyed a demon.

So with the exception of a few gods who were still reluctant to give up on the greater Divine Powers, thus leaving their clones near the Wheel of Order to watch the battle, the rest of the gods were all investing almost all their energy into studying the battle on how Sui Xiong fought against the demons.

They missed that particular scene where Sui Xiong destroyed Pigg. But they definitely should not miss any of the following scenes.

Sure enough, things happened just as how the gods had speculated. It was not long after where another demon died in Sui Xiong’s hands.

That was a demon that was silver-gray all over, looking just like rusting metal. Its name was “Aging Tajik.” It was originally from the Mechanical Realm and was a powerful demigod. It had fought against another powerful demigod, “Sharp Roar,” in the Mechanical Realm, where they vied for the position of king of the Mechanical Realm. It lost the battle and was seriously injured. At that time, it did not fall into depravity just because it had suffered defeat. Later on, when “Sharp Roar” expressed its disinterest in becoming a god of the Mechanical Realm but refused to give up that position, and even drove out Aging Tajik after leaving it heavily injured, Tajik gave in to depravity and became a demon.

After Tajik became a demon, he once went back to the Mechanical Realm to stir up trouble. He fought a vicious battle against the two evil gods, “Sharp Roar” and the “Ancient Steel-Melting Dragon,” while he was there. That great battle caused the entire Mechanical Realm to meet with a major natural disaster. Up till the present day, the Mechanical Realm had never been able to restore its former state of prosperity. And Tajik was also heavily wounded in that battle. Together with the God of Wind (who had since fallen) who had subsequently rushed over, they kept the two evil gods secured under a seal and threw them into the Abyss.

Sui Xiong, being a person full of curiosity, had also gathered intelligence about the 24 demons. Thus, he had quite a good understanding of “Aging Tajik.” The most bizarre power of this demon was that just by establishing contact with the “time” it stole from its enemies, it could make them become so unbearably old that they might even simply die of old age.

The great power of time was indisputable. Even an undying god would be reduced into a weakened state if a large amount of time was stolen from it. The God of Wind, who had been close to becoming a great Divine Power was hit by a heavy blow in that battle. To avoid an utter annihilation, he chose to put himself through the self-splitting process, thus becoming the few different Gods of Wind of the present day.

Sui Xiong was recollecting the information about Tajik in his mind, but his leg never stopped moving. He headed straight at Tajik.

Spreading out his tentacles, he paid no heed to the many areas on his body that were cut by those sharp pricks and trenchant edges on Tajik’s body. He also did not care about the areas that were beginning to wither and grow old because they had come into contact with Tajik. He simply focused on entangling himself firmly to Tajik.

Then his body became a huge millstone that dragged Tajik in. Then the grinding sound of metal was heard. It sounded so piercing, like how acidic vinegar was to the teeth. And Tajik was ground into shattered pieces of metal.

Of course, all these shattered pieces were swallowed up by Sui Xiong. Not a speck of dust was left.

When the final fragments also disappeared in Sui Xiong’s mouth, the four Gods of Wind from the North, South, East and West, appeared at the same time. They all wore delighted expressions on their faces. Then involuntarily, they went close to each other. And then, with the presence of a green light, they merged and became a beauty with long, emerald hair and long legs, and who was filled with vitality.

Once the third-highest official of the Natural God System, the God of Wind, who was close to becoming a great Divine Power, was resurrected.