The Spirit tried to verify any sense of deceit from Haru using her Divine Senses, but there was neither any deception nor any exaggeration. Every word he spoke was nothing but the truth.
She looked at him for a long moment, 'A random habitable planet or the Divine Kingdom of a future God King…'
"If I leave with you." She said finally, her voice calmer now, "Arboriel would face an apocalypse. The Laws of a planet sustain everything. Mana, Divine Laws, the ability to cultivate, the ability to attain Godhood, everything relies on me. Without me, even the creatures that survive won't be able to cultivate, and new supernatural beings won't be born."
(T/N: The word 'Cultivators' is absolutely ruined for me by various trash novels. That's why I plan on using the word 'Supernatural' here.)
"The Burning Legion is coming regardless." Haru said, "Arboriel is already doomed. The surface is already a ruin, what's left is this underground world, a handful of native creatures, and Phoebe. She herself wanted to take them and leave." He paused, "A dead planet with no one on it has no value to anyone."
With silence, the Spirit's resistance stopped all at once. Next, she even began actively helping Haru plant his imprint on her. Haru felt it and said nothing. He just finished the work.
…
The nine-colored light sphere shattered and a girl who looked about sixteen or seventeen years old walked out. She wore a long white dress. This was the Spirit of Arboriel's Laws in human form, her expressions composed, carrying the particular charm of someone who had made a decision.
She bowed, "Your Majesty!"
Haru asked, "What's your name?"
"We Spirits don't have names."
Haru considered this briefly, "From now on, you shall be named Elyndor."
"Praise you, Your Majesty!"
And then a vast surge of divine power poured out of her and into him. This was the feedback of him binding the Spirit of a major planet's laws. The origin of the planet's laws flowed into his Godhead all at once. He felt his strength increase, and he broke through the intermediate stage entirely, becoming a late-stage Supreme God!
In a single moment, without any warning, he stood at the same level as powerhouses like Celestia and Svetlana. He really hadn't expected this.
'Even Malakar and Skarion together aren't enough to hold me back anymore.' He thought, taking stock of himself, 'I can handle the three Evil Supreme Gods alone.'
He looked at Elyndor with considerably more warmth than before. She smiled back, and then he noticed that her power was rapidly draining. The binding had cost her enormously. What remained barely matched a newly ascended Supreme God, weaker than even Micteya, the Goddess of Death.
"I'm less than a thousandth of what I was." Elyndor said, before he could ask, "This is the price of separating the Spirit from its body."
She didn't seem distressed about it, "It would recover when I merge with Your Majesty's Divine Kingdom. The sooner I go, the sooner it begins."
Haru opened a Space-Time channel to 'Heaven', his Divine Kingdom which he had named recently. It was the planet suspended in the Void that would, with Elyndor inside it, take its first real step towards becoming something comparable to Obrys or Drakara.
She stepped through without hesitation, and selectively forgot about Phoebe and the sealed Eye behind her. She had made her choice so she went simply.
…
Celestia and Yvonne were already smiling. Every angel in existence had been waiting for their Lord's Divine Kingdom to evolve into the 'Heaven' they have seen in the Illusory world.
The first step towards that would be for Heaven to become capable of independently producing Divine Crystals. With a Spirit now bound to it, that future had stopped being theoretical.
"You've both worked hard." Haru meant it. Then he turned to Svetlana, "Thank you."
He kept it simple, but he meant that too. Without her arrival, Celestia might have had to destroy her Natal Artifact to hold Elyndor down, which was a loss that couldn't be easily recovered from. Svetlana had saved them from that.
"The Aetherium Empire is the Endless Continent's best hope against the Abyss." Svetlana said, with a graceful smile, "By helping Your Majesty, I help the Endless Continent, which is technically my job."
Haru accepted this without commenting further. He'd find a better way to express his gratitude later, something more concrete than words. She'd helped the Empire more than once, and she was the mentor who had helped his 'adopted sister' Lily find her path.
He did notice, though, that when Svetlana looked at him, her silver eyes had a quality to them, he couldn't quite name. Something a little too open. A little too bright. He filed it away and said nothing.
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