754
Amon vanished over the horizon before Klein's eyes.
Klein leaned back defensively, slowed his run, and gradually stopped a dozen meters from the bizarre pit, clutching the Golden Cross that pulsed with light. For some reason, he seemed to feel that "God Almighty" was watching this farce with great interest.
"...Your Highness, Red Angel?"
Standing outside the pit, Klein craned his neck slightly and called out uncertainly.
Then he heard a vigorous reply from inside. It was somewhat muffled, but it was unmistakably Medici's familiar voice.
Finally reassured, Klein let out a long breath and realized that sweat had soaked his back. As his taut nerves suddenly relaxed, he nearly lost his footing and landed on his backside.
On the surface, he had indeed forced Amon to flee, but given a choice, who would actually trade his life for an avatar?
He had kept this move as a hidden reserve. The key to their mutual destruction wasn't Klein himself, but God Almighty.
He had thought that the Amons who swarmed him after discovering Pallez Zoroast's trail and realizing he was easy to bully because he wouldn't hurt innocents should have been unafraid of death. Yet Amon still proved unwilling to die alongside a Sequence 3 Saint.
As a result, Klein had turned the tables and driven him back.
Of course Klein feared God Almighty, too. He feared not only his power, but also his ability to indoctrinate and brainwash everything. Looking around this world, he had realized just how terrifying faith was.
Gods treated humans as possessions, and humans believed themselves to be the gods' property. Just as Amon could righteously declare, "Believers belong to me, and I can punish them for converting," everyone believed they needed to worship a god. Thinking otherwise might not amount to heresy, but