"Roar!"
The Dragon of Nightmare suddenly let out an angry roar. Something incomprehensible had happened: this Angel had bypassed the many virtual personas he had set up and pinpointed his true self!
"Impossible!" The strange turn of events made him sense danger. With a dragon's roar, he summoned Herabergen from the City of Miracles.
He knew that the other party wouldn't have come before him if she were merely a Sequence Two Angel of Concealment. There had to be other Angels hidden in the shadows as well.
Perhaps even Misfortune had come!
The legend of the Goddess of Misfortune still endured. Hundreds of years ago, after personally slaying the grievously wounded Demon Wolf, she had become the object of wariness for Angels of every race, Subordinate Gods, and even Ancient Gods.
It could be said that after a Subordinate God like Misfortune appeared, the circumstances for all Subordinate Gods had grown much harsher, and the Ancient Gods had become suspicious of them.
Of course, some Subordinate Gods might indeed harbor ulterior thoughts...
In any case, the Dragon of Nightmare didn't dare face the Goddess of Misfortune alone.
Like the Elf Queen, he had received blessings and gifts from various Ancient Gods. But the Goddess of Misfortune had killed an Ancient God with the same Sequence Status as his Father God!
"Silence," the Angel of Concealment said softly. All sound was immediately concealed, enforcing absolute silence.
The Dragon of Nightmare leaped and flashed through the Sea of Collective Subconsciousness, moving at an inconceivable speed. He needed to escape the area controlled by the hidden Goddess of Misfortune.
For an Author to be forced into a direct confrontation was already an enormous limitation on his abilities.
"Fear Ignition!" The Angel of Concealment spoke again. She raised a hand and lightly pointed. Something in the Dragon of Nightmare's mind was stirred, then exploded.
This was the ability of a Sequence Three Horror Bishop of the Evernight Pathway.
The Dragon of Nightmare's body, hidden in the Sea of Collective Subconsciousness, nearly fell into reality.
His dragon body burst apart. After several attempts to escape the attack's range had failed, he had begun to feel a trace of fear toward the Goddess of Misfortune. The keen-eyed Angel of Concealment had caught it.
"Roar!" The Dragon of Nightmare whipped around and roared at the Angel of Concealment. "You're Misfortune!"
Both of the Angel of Concealment's attacks had been far too powerful!
Her initial attempt at Psychic Domination had failed because the other party's Sequence Status was too high!
He hadn't realized that before because the Angel of Concealment before him seemed to be in such good mental condition. She didn't seem like a Sequence One, nearly synonymous with madness itself.
Realizing his mistake, he used Pacification on himself. His nearly shattered body solidified again, then swelled wildly, growing incomparably powerful!
The Dragon of Nightmare hypnotized himself into forgetting the fear rising within him, then used the Discerner's ability to make himself even stronger!
The Angel of Concealment raised a hand and spread darkness. It rippled outward like waves, plunging the surroundings into sudden shadow, as though they had entered the deepest, most despairing night.
At the same time, a sense of peace and serenity descended as points of starlight appeared.
Amid the silence came what seemed to be the sound of a hymn, calm and still, lulling all to sleep. It seemed to offer everyone salvation for their hearts.
The Dragon of Nightmare was an expert in the mind and naturally sensed this power. He unleashed Frenzy and Psychic Storm to disrupt the Angel of Concealment's mind.
The strategy worked. The power that lulled one to sleep was suppressed, and the Angel of Concealment's body stiffened for an instant.
Psychic Breath!
An invisible, transparent breath was about to pierce the Angel of Concealment's mind.
Whoosh! At the critical moment, the Angel of Concealment's body vanished, as if erased by an eraser.
When the Goddess of Misfortune appeared again, she was already close to the Dragon of Nightmare.
"Plague Storm!"
The Dragon of Nightmare unleashed his most sinister attack against an Angel. It was made up of Mind Deprivation and Mental Plague, and could destabilize an Angel's mental state, awaken the madness within, and drive them directly out of control.
Buzz!
The Goddess of Misfortune couldn't dodge in time. Black light flashed in her eyes as she revealed her Mythical Creature Form.
The Eight-Legged Demon Wolf growled, its voice already tinged with madness.
The Dragon of Nightmare's eyes flashed. Insight and Dream Labyrinth descended at the same time, shaping the thing the Goddess of Misfortune feared most.
It was a Demon Wolf, howling beneath a blood-red moon as it ravaged the world.
"Annihilation Demonic Wolf!" The Dragon of Nightmare's eyes widened. He sensed something was wrong, but it was already too late to stop.
"The Goddess of Misfortune will surely suffer even more at the hands of the Demon Wolf!" The Dragon of Nightmare could only use his Author ability to speak this sentence.
The scene in the Dream Labyrinth shifted. The Demon Wolf, brimming with destructive energy, used Fooling to deprive the Goddess of Misfortune of her reason.
The Dragon of Nightmare finally got a moment to catch his breath. He was about to use the things the Goddess of Misfortune feared to write a complete story and trap her in a dream.
Whoosh!
A streak of dark light flashed past. The Death Scythe dismembered the Annihilation Demonic Wolf, even shattering the Dream Labyrinth!
Could a dead fear still be called fear?
But it was still too fast!
The backlash from his Spirituality sent the Dragon of Nightmare's condition plummeting. He was about to lose control. He stared at the scene in shock and saw those clear eyes.
The Goddess of Misfortune had only pretended to be affected by the Plague Storm. There was nothing wrong with her mind at all!
"Impossible?!" A wave of intense confusion surged through the Dragon of Nightmare.
Angels were accompanied by madness. Why was the Angel still so clearheaded after being hit?
But the Goddess of Misfortune clearly had no intention of explaining. She was about to finish off this Mystical Item.
"You're Misfortune herself!" The Dragon of Nightmare suddenly realized.
When had she switched?
The Dragon of Nightmare suddenly recalled an instance of Concealment.
That was the only time the Angel of Concealment had disappeared from before his eyes. When she reappeared, she had been struck by the Plague Storm and transformed into the Demon Wolf's Mythical Form, causing even the Psychic Dragon, most skilled at observation, to overlook her!
A Sequence Two avatar and the Goddess of Misfortune herself were two entirely different things!
"Father God..." the Dragon of Nightmare roared, but his voice was still concealed.
Outside the battlefield, some humans opened their numb eyes and spoke the Honorific Name of the Dragon of Imagination.
Buzz!
Amid a faint vibration, the entire city-state was concealed.
The Dragon of Nightmare could no longer maintain his state and fell completely out of the Sea of Collective Subconsciousness.
"Everything here has been concealed," the Goddess of Misfortune said calmly and coldly.
The Dragon of Nightmare forcibly used Pacification on his mind, hypnotizing himself into becoming powerful enough once more.
"Do you know that you're your Father God's resurrection contingency?" the Goddess suddenly said. "That is the meaning of your existence."
The words seeped into his mind like the night. They couldn't shake the mind of a Psychic Dragon—but what if he already feared they were true?
The Dragon of Nightmare couldn't help wavering at her words, and his powerful state instantly collapsed.
He could make himself powerful simply by believing he was powerful. But in the face of his Father God, he was always weak, powerless to resist.
The Goddess of Misfortune chuckled softly and twitched her fingers, stirring the fear in the Dragon of Nightmare's heart once more.