NOVEL NEXT Chapter 362: After the Destruction, Still Standing
After the impact from [Heaven's Spear], the entirety of Termina, which means the trial, was destroyed, including the [Hollow Tower].
Even he didn't expect it to be this powerful, but it also means that if he had decided to use it since the beginning, this entire trial would have been over in seconds.
If he did that though, Sora and Lilith would have died, even though he wouldn't have known of the latter anyway.
The [Hollow Tower Square], being the main point of impact, received the highest percentage of destruction, a massive crater appearing in the middle where the participants previously were.
Stark, on the other hand, completely disintegrated because he had simply just tanked the projectile without even defending himself.
Well, even someone that was kilometers away from the square would have still died, but Stark still took the entirety of the impact.
All he could see now was black.
"Here again, huh."
[Do you want to use the "Revive Token"?]
Because he had taken it from Lilith, he could successfully revive himself without using his talent.
Which meant that he still had a revive afterward!
"How long do I have to use it?"
[30 minutes.]
"Then I might as well just rest a bit," Stark sighed, closing his eyes to think about his next plan.
The [Moon] Apostle was probably now out there, in his true form, meaning that he would need to find him, after all.
...
Back in the trial.
As the dust settled, the cameras focused on the bottom of the crater.
The first thing people noticed was that the [Protection Amulet] had actually survived this impact, meaning that, as its description said, it tanked an attack even as powerful as this one.
[Protection Amulet has been broken.]
"SHE'S ALIVE," Mike and Elise Gardenis, Sora's parents, cried tears of joy as they saw their daughter survive this hell.
"Sis!" and even her brother and sister were happy.
"Sora!" tears also welled up in Lana's eyes, because even though she saw her as a love rival, her interactions and the fact they lived together for a bit did make them closer than before.
Though, in contrast to what many believed, as the golden sphere that protected the two girls disappeared, everyone noticed that they were, in fact, unconscious.
Even through this barrier, the shock from the explosion shook them and resulted in them passing out.
And other than these two, there was one more person alive, whose body didn't disintegrate.
"Clever?"
"Probably, he did use [Zero Hand] after all."
But they were wrong.
Because Clever was nowhere to be seen: the one that survived was Follower, and some weird black substance was over his body, seemingly protecting him.
...
Before the impact.
Follower had completely given up, kneeling to the ground and begging the Godless Demon for forgiveness as he failed his mission of killed Stark.
But right as the spear was about to the ground, killing them all, a panel appeared in front of him, and time slowed down.
[Your devotion to the Godless Demon is admirable, even at the face of death, not many are as devoted as you are.]
"Huh?"
[As a gift, the Godless Demon has decided to aid you.]
In less than a fraction of a second, a black figure materialized in front of Follower, you couldn't see its skin since it was made of a weird substance, but it had crimson eyes and horns.
[The Godless Demon will defend you from this attack.]
"What-?" Follower didn't have time to speak as the spear finally hit the ground, exploding everything around it.
[The ultimate protection of the "Godless Demon" has been granted to you.]
[You have been promoted to "Godless Demon Apostle"]
Follower had actually been promoted mid-crisis, meaning that the Godless Demon was watching the trial from somewhere.
The weird black demon that appeared in front of Follower instantly dashed toward the man, entering his body.
Then a weird black substance materialized all around Follower for some reason.
That is how he was alive.
As for Clever, well, he did use [Zero Hand], but let's not kid ourselves, did he really believe he could escape a goddamned level 100 spell capable of eliminating level 900 classifiers and monsters?
I mean, that would just be silly.
As you might predict it, the moment the spear exploded upon contact with the ground, the diamond hand gripping Clever inside and protecting him instantly evaporated.
"WHAT-" and so the confident old man was also killed before he could even say anything else.
Give him a break, though, there was no chance he could have survived this.
...
Present.
"Follower's alive..."
"What the fuck?!"
The black substance on his body slowly seeped back inside of him as the dust disappeared, revealing that he was also unconscious.
"So three people alive, but all unconscious?"
[Clever has been killed by "Chosen"!]
And then nothing else.
60 seconds passed, then 5 minutes, then 10, then 20.
And yet, nothing was happening.
No one could afford to get their eyes off the screens for even a second, not wanting to miss any important details.
But it seemed like the trial was truly in stalemate.
Or at least, that was until people started noticing something strange.
It all started with some asking a simple question: why was there no message that Chosen had died.
And in mere minutes, the entire world was now asking themselves that very same question.
If Chosen had truly died, then there should have been no problem putting a message that he indeed was gone.
Plus, out of the 15 squares that displayed the participants, the ones that weren't crossed out were: Sora, Lilith, Follower and... Chosen.
There was something strange going on.
...
Back in that dark space of his, a message appeared in front of Stark as he rested.
[Warning, only 5 minutes left to pick option.]
[Failure in picking will result in permanent death.]
"Yeah, yeah," Stark knew that it was time to get back to the trial.
If everything went well, then Lilith and Sora should be the only ones still alive, meaning all Stark needed to do was team up with them and eliminate the apostle.
Ding!
[You have used your "Revive Token"!]
[Brace yourself!]
His consciousness faded as he was being brought back to life.
And so, as the tensions in the real world about what happened to Chosen reached their peak, a sudden flash of light was seen in the middle of the crater.
"Huh?"
"What's happening?"
"The fuck?!"
Stark's body was completely disintegrated from the impact, but the [Revive Token] still needed to revive him.
Meaning that instead of bringing back every single one of his cells, which is what his talent would do, instead, he just... respawned, in a flash of blue light.
Ding!
His body flickered a bit before appearing again.
"Damn, like in a video game," Stark smiled, surprised, moving his arms and body to make sure everything was functional.
The atmosphere around the trial was now extremely calm.
"Lilith, Sora?" he turned his gaze, and noticed that they were out cold, "Oh."
And once he looked around... he noticed Follower too.
"What the fuck?" Stark was more surprised than anybody else: if even Clever with his total protection was killed, then what the hell was this still doing.
Oh, and talking about Clever.
Ding!
[You have slain "Clever", gaining 120,000,000 experience points!]
This was absolutely massive.
Killing that old man gave even more experience than Father Hugo (50 million) and the Tormented One (60 million) combined!
It seems like killing other participants was truly the way to success, no wonder Follower did it!