The moment Haru entered the battlefield, the balance shifted. His natal artifacts were his only real weakness as High God Tier Artifacts. But equipment wasn't everything, and his Divine Power, which was far more overbearing than most late-stage Supreme Gods, hit the battlefield like a tsunami and the spirit felt it immediately. Of course, she kept fighting, but the math had changed, and she knew that her defeat was inevitable.
"Your power will grow beyond your peak." Svetlana said again, gentler now, almost quiet, "I've seen it."
"I shall choose my own fate—"
Haru added, "Then choose to stay with us."
An hour later, the Spirit's Divine Power collapsed. Her defenses fell completely, the four Supreme Gods suppressed her in one unified motion, sealing her before she could draw another breath.
The fourth layer went quiet and the Eye of the Abyss stared at the place where the Spirit had been, then at Haru, then back.
'An intermediate stage Supreme God, with such monstrous strength. He even absorbed my origin law in under half an hour. His potential is comparable to the Demon Emperor, maybe it's even higher.'
'And as a human, he can absorb the source of the Abyss Law that should be impossible for any outsider to touch without being converted. Looking across the entire universe and thousands of planets, there shouldn't have ever been anything like this.'
It didn't say any of this out loud as there was no one to say it to. It just sat in its cage, sealed and powerless, and quietly revised everything it thought it knew about the upper limits of what a Human God could be.
…
"Let me go!"
Even suppressed, sealed, held down by the combined power of four main gods, the Spirit kept trying to fight. Her voice rang clear and bright through the fourth layer, and then, slowly, went quiet. Not because she had given up, but because she had run the numbers.
"Follow me…" Haru said, looking at the figure suspended in the light sphere, "…and I'll make you the spirit of my Divine Kingdom. In time, you'll have power comparable to a God Monarch."
"I can reach that level myself."
She wasn't wrong. The laws of a planet, given enough time, became something beyond the reach of any conventional God or Goddess. The Endless Continent's Laws had been born in the Era of the Throneveil Shrine, millions of years ago.
Even the Gods of the Ancient Era—Elunara, Varkath, the Dragon Lord—all bowed to the Spirit of Endless Continent's Laws without exception. Not out of reverence, but out of necessity. A mature Spirit of Laws was equivalent to a God Monarch, and there was nothing any of them could do about it.
Arboriel's spirit was young, barely dozens of millennia old, and her peak strength reached only pseudo God Monarch Tier, but given time, she could have gotten there. Then again, she also had rules she had to live by. All Laws of planets did.
First, they couldn't leave their planet.
Second, they couldn't directly suppress native creatures.
Third, they couldn't interfere in battles between planets, which was precisely why the Burning Legion dared to invade major planets at all.
The demons' strategy was always the same: slaughter the native creatures first, starve the planet's law of its power source, then bring in something like the Eye of the Abyss to devour what remained.
Arboriel had nearly fallen victim to this strategy. Without Haru, it would have.
He was aware she should probably be thanking him for this 'life-saving' favor, but he didn't say this out loud.
…
"Just let me go, and I promise to leave for a far away galaxy and never bother you."
"Wrong choice." He said instead, and pushed his Divine Power into her.
"What are you doing?!"
She felt it immediately. A Divine Imprint was taking shape inside her, a signature that would bind her life and death to Haru's will. She screamed. She struggled and even against a late-stage Supreme God with three others holding her down, it made no difference.
"Follow me…" Haru said again, still working, "…and I won't treat you badly. I went from a Tier Zero mortal to an intermediate stage Supreme God in just over a month. My strength already exceeds a late-stage Supreme God. I rule the Aetherium Empire, and the God Class Angel Race answers to me. I will become a God King and rule thousands of planets."
He let that sink in before continuing, "Being the spirit of my Divine Kingdom is not a bad future."
In their Space-Time cage, Christina and the Eye went still.
'A month?!' They both thought, 'He really said a month!'
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