The Oracle Paths

On the other side of Celestial City, nearby the battlefield occupied by Mirror Vanguard and Neri, an unseen building was biding its time.

The Lost Divinities Players who were patiently waiting inside the Pantheon of Gods for Ael to shout the signal to attack could not hear or see what was going on outside, but they could follow the video feed of what their leader was experiencing. As they witnessed the sudden mutiny of Mirror Vanguard, including Vexa getting his heart speared by Radur, they were suddenly caught off guard.

"What's going on out there?" Ashun stammered in disbelief.

Dhamde, Deimos and Khag' Dagmai frowned as they saw the broadcast. Felphi, who stood mutely with her arms crossed beside them, snickered in disdain, then explained,

"This is the work of Psykow. Ael had his reasons for hiding you inside the Pantheon of Gods. Here, Psykow's psychic powers cannot reach you. I am not immune to it either. Ael is probably holding on to his sanity as hard as he can right now. He can nullify his surface effects, but the alterations to his psyche deep down are much harder to counter."

The four Lost Divinities Players exchanged worried glances. Dhamde drew his sword a few inches, then sheathed it again with an uncertain look.

" Then should we still attack? At the rate they're killing each other, I wouldn't be surprised if they all perished before Ael gave the order."

"That was probably his plan all along." Deimos sighed in frustration.

Felphi did not respond immediately. Instead, her countenance darkened significantly with each passing second. There were only 40 seconds left before the Purple Hell was completely destroyed, but as the sky began to tear apart at an exponential rate, it was apparent that it would be shut down much sooner.

The same was true for their Pantheon of Gods. The others hadn't noticed, but Psykow had repeatedly scanned their position with his mental sense. This meant that for minute moments the artifact had ceased to perform its functions.

"Ael's plan hasn't changed. He just wanted you to stay lucid a little longer." She finally answered. "When the Pantheon of Gods becomes unstable, I will take the artifact from Ael's hands before he loses control. I'll hold on as long as necessary. In an optimistic scenario, you could have eliminated any survivors in a short time to bring the Ordeal to a hasty end. We won't have that chance. When the Pantheon of Gods is deactivated, equip your Oracle Shields and try to survive. And above all... don't blame yourself if you do something wrong during that time.

"See you later and good luck."

Felphi suddenly vanished and the unstable Pantheon of Gods stabilized again. Outside, the Mana Storm had already begun to spill into the Purple Hell through the many gaps in the sky. As she appeared before the Nullifyer, she found him shaking like a leaf in a 20m diameter sphere of vacuum.

To get the artifact out of his hands, she had to use her disruption powers at full strength.

"Run." Ael mouthed in a haggard voice, his eyes bloodshot. "Psykow has hidden his game very well. If we don't kill him, we'll all lose. I'll deal with him personally."

Without another word, the alien teleported directly in front of Psykow, but found only a mirage of his enemy. The Anti-Life leader was constantly shifting his position on the battlefield, literally untouchable.

As long as he was conscious, Ael had no intention of giving up, and a cat-and-mouse game of high-frequency teleportation took place in Celestial City between him and Psykow.

At the same time, Felphi, who was hoping for a few seconds of respite, suddenly saw the purple sky disappear, leaving an ocean of black clouds and an even more apocalyptic Mana Storm.

BOOOM!

As soon as the false sky faded away with the Purple Hell's deactivation, Felphi immediately understood what had just transpired.

"Shit! Vexa lost control" She exclaimed, cursing him inwardly with every name under the sun.

Out of reflex, she ran her Oracle Scan but was shocked when she read the result. Vexa had not lost control. He was dead!

*****

Earlier on the side of the Myrtharian Nerds.

The insubordination of Jake's conjured Inquisitor illusions had already raised the level of panic and chaos to unprecedented levels and Hephais' unknown condition after being ambushed by them didn't help matters.

Jake might have reacted differently if his psychological state had been normal, but alas, he was also infected with Psykow's mysterious psychic powers. At that moment, thinking he was doing the right thing, he made a mistake: he cancelled the illusions he had created.

This should have solved the problem in a flash, but it didn't. The numerical disadvantage of the remaining Myrtharian Nerds and Pureblood Players became even more overwhelming, but at the time it had another, even more disastrous consequence that Jake had not foreseen.

The clearing of the battlefield. The survivors' sight was momentarily cleared as those thousands of illusions dissipated and they could finally see what was going on around them. Then the unthinkable happened.

Enya, one of the few who still clung to her sanity along with the Eltarians, gave Jake a suspicious look filled with who knows what emotion, but it didn't take much more to trigger a catastrophe. Because this fleeting glance was caught by another person: Lucia.

The Myrmidian princess who was fighting like a tireless demoness against Vhoskaud and his infinite army suddenly turned away from the Undeads facing her, her pretty face turning livid with rage.

Jake watched transfixed as the Myrmidian princess blurred out of focus and crossed the distance between her and the Fire Mage in a flash. A blink earlier, Lucia was standing several dozen meters away from Enya and the next blink the tip of her sword was no more than an inch from her throat.

"What are you do-" The Fire Mage didn't have time to finish her sentence.

With his telekinesis, Jake, whose vision was beginning to cloud, pushed her body out of the path of Lucia's sword, but his intervention only made things worse.

Quivering with fury and as if possessed by hatred itself, Lucia heaved loudly, her firm chest rising and falling frantically because of her inability to calm herself. Her wrathful face froze into a mask of chilling indifference and turning slowly to Jake, streams of bitter tears flowed from her misty eyes and she said,

"So you chose her over me... I CAN'T lose. I won't allow it!"

An aura unlike any before erupted from the blonde princess' body, her golden eyes becoming brighter than suns as her hair began to float ghostly behind her producing enough light to turn night into day.

Despite his difficulty in keeping control of his Purgatory, Jake vaguely recognized the technique. It looked like his Warrior Trance Skill, but its power and abilities were in a whole different league. With such a power-up, Lucia truly had a chance to get her revenge, whatever it was.

Her sword rose above her head and with a lackadaisical swing brought it down like a thunderclap. The friction of her blade as it passed through the air created a hyper-pressurized blade of sharp air that sheared off all the Undeads and androids in its path.

Jake wanted to jump in again to save Enya, but at that moment an splitting headache wracked his skull, blurring his vision and knocking him to his knees. The Purgatory went out for a split second and the hitherto advantageous battle environment dissolved, revealing the strangely shaped buildings of the Purple Hell.

When his vision stabilized, he found no trace of Lucia and Enya, but a deep furrow in the ground stretching as far as the eye could see. His heart clenched with anguish at the sight, but as he searched for the two women with his mental sense, he found Enya safe with Asfrid. Lucia had already forgotten the reason for her previous attack, dedicating herself once again to slaughtering the enemies in front of her.

"I got it. Don't worry." The Nereid reassured him telepathically.

Jake breathed a sigh of relief as he received the message, but as if to belie her a towering pillar of scarlet flames suddenly rose to the sky. The Aetheric signature of half of the Eltarians suddenly disappeared and when he scanned in their direction, he found Asfrid on the verge of death, charred to the third degree by an insane Enya.