Without the protection of another pillar of divinity,
even a single hit would reduce you to ashes.
Hela strode forward coldly and spat a bloody mouthful onto the charred corpse.
This foolish ancient dragon had made the same mistake all powerful divine beings often made:
Arrogance.
"Did you really think I was an ordinary demigod?"
Hela sneered at the corpse. "Did you think I spent over a decade bleeding Hain dry for nothing!"?
Hela smiled proudly.
She stretched, looking thoroughly pleased with herself.
An ancient dragon?
That was it?
Beating one was a piece of cake!
But then Hela noticed Rhine in the distance.
Rhine was excitedly waving his arms at her.
Inside the iron armor, Hela's senses were greatly dulled. Confused, she asked her daughter, "What's he saying?"
The doll listened closely. "His Highness seems to be saying..."
Histia Hela: "Get ready..."
Italien Hela: "We're going into phase two..."¹
Hela: "?"
Hela hadn't yet figured out what was going on.
Suddenly, the ground beneath her feet began to quake violently!
Then,
Hela and the dolls stared in shock.
The ground had melted.
Some unknown heat source rapidly liquefied the black rock, turning it into glowing mud...
One dull roar after another erupted from beneath the surface.
It was—
The ancient dragon's howl!
"Demigod, and you, mortal!"
Obadiah's voice echoed through the abyss:
"You're both—dead!!!"
The fully liquefied ground was suddenly burst apart by a giant dragon!
Lava became a rain of fire that set the entire abyss ablaze. The boiling dragonflames danced and leaped, welcoming the ruler of the Blazing Sun Deep Wall—come to reign!²
Obadiah's true form emerged from the lava!
Eight pairs of blood-red eyes glared murderously at Hela from his hideous dragon head.
Having just finished molting, Obadiah's body was an unsettling shade of tender pink.⁷
His new, soft scales offered no protection at all.
But the hard muscles beneath them, along with the scorching dragon breath within him, were more than enough to crush a mere demigod into a bloody pulp—and then burn it to ashes!
"You interrupted my ascension! If it weren't for you, I might have completed my coronation! Now I'll make you repent! I'll make you fear! And then—pay the price!"
Obadiah roared in fury:
"Today, you will all be buried here!!"
The next moment,
the ancient dragon's barrier activated.
A layer of crimson light enveloped the abyss, and intricate magical arrays covered the entire sky.
If ancient dragons were already among the strongest races in the mortal world,
then within their own domains,
they could slaughter every powerful foe in the mortal world!
Obadiah said coldly, "Demigod, kneel!"
The instant the ancient dragon finished speaking,
Hela felt a weight of thousands of tons crash down on her shoulders!
Her knees slammed into the ground, where lava flowed.
Hela fell to her knees.
The iron armor encasing her let out a shrill, agonized wail!
Obadiah looked down at the three pitiful beings.
One demigod,
two divine constructs.¹
With a single glance, Obadiah made the two dolls cry out and kneel just like their mother.
By draining the elemental ley lines of his neighbor, the Leta Empire, Obadiah had made his barrier exceptionally powerful.
And now,
Obadiah brought the full pressure of the barrier crashing down on Hela and the dolls!
This was Obadiah's true strength.
Hela had no chance of defeating him.
If she hadn't arrived while Obadiah was molting,
she probably wouldn't even have gotten near the abyss before he killed her!⁷
And now,
to defeat Hela, Obadiah had been forced to interrupt his ascension ritual and fight in his true form.
His loss, his regret—
the demigod's blood and screams would make up for all of it!
The barrier continued to crush Hela and the dolls with all its might.
The dolls' bodies were already beginning to break down. Their previous injuries worsened under the immense pressure, spreading into fresh cracks...
Hela was in even more agony.
She could clearly hear her beloved armor and her bones slowly shattering...
At last, she despaired...
There was no turning things around.
The moment the ancient dragon's barrier enveloped the abyss, it had severed the entire space from the mortal world.
Teleportation Magic was completely useless now.
Within this small world centered on Obadiah, forget escaping—even gathering magic power to strike back was practically impossible.
Meanwhile,
Rhine had just dodged the rain of fire, and now the barrier's residual force pressed down on him so hard he was nearly crushed into a pulp.
Rhine was just a mortal with theoretically noble blood.
Even though Obadiah was focused on Hela,
the slightest stray force was enough to kill Rhine!
But...
This was exactly the opportunity Rhine had been waiting for!
From the very start of the battle,
he had been waiting for Obadiah to deploy his barrier!
One function of the barrier was to block Teleportation Magic.
Those inside couldn't get out.
But on the other hand,
those outside couldn't interfere with the battle either.
"Now... I don't have to worry about... the Leta demigod..."
Rhine's face was pale, but he was smiling.
Summoning all his strength, he struggled to call out to the dolls.
"Histia... Histia! Can you hear me? Answer me!"
"Your Highness..."
In the distance, Histia Hela caught Rhine's call with her keen senses.
Histia tried to raise her hand toward Rhine.
Rhine continued:
"Histia, how old are you this year... If I remember right, you're seven, aren't you? You're a doll, but ever since you turned two, you've acted of your own free will, right?"
Histia listened carefully to His Highness Rhine, but she didn't understand why he was bringing up the past at a moment when their lives were at stake.
Your Highness, what was he trying to say...
Rhine: "Now, Histia, remember how it felt when you were being controlled, then hand your body over to me—trust me!!"
"Your Highness..."
Histia's body was already at its limit.
Like her mother,
she was powerless against the ancient dragon's full-force pressure.
The gap was simply too great...
She was only a doll with divine blood flowing through her...
At that moment, the fact that His Highness Rhine hadn't yet been killed by Obadiah already seemed like a miracle to Histia Hela.
But she didn't understand...
What was His Highness trying to do?
My body...
Could His Highness turn this hopeless situation around with that thing?
"Your Highness, I trust you..."
Histia Hela closed her eyes.
She handed control of herself over to Rhine in the distance.
She placed her body before Rhine, without holding anything back.
"Your Highness... I now offer myself... to you..."⁷
"Thank you, Histia."
Rhine smiled.
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