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*****
"Even if you capture me and seal the entrance to the Underworld, you will not win this Holy War."
Pandora watched as Rhadamanthys was slain, realizing her hope of escaping back to the Underworld had vanished. However, not a single trace of despondency flickered across her face. She knew that this Holy War had already been won long before the Specter army ever set foot in the mortal realm.
Hades had known from the beginning that Shion and the other two were compromised. He had resurrected them not because he truly believed they could assassinate Athena, but simply to paralyze the Sanctuary and lull Athena into a false sense of security.
Every move—from sending her to lead the army into the human world and garrisoning Hades Castle, to preparing a human vessel ahead of time—was a calculated repetition of the same patterns from previous Holy Wars, designed to serve as a distraction. Had this been a conventional campaign, the forces deployed would have been far greater.
As it stood, Hypnos and Thanatos remained within Elysium, showing no signs of emerging. In a typical war, the Twin Gods would have led the full force of the 108 Specters while the soul of Hades awakened in its chosen host to crush Athena and her Saints in one fell swoop.
Thus, even with her capture and the total annihilation of the Specters at Hades Castle, Hades' ultimate plan remained unaffected. In fact, it might even serve to deceive Athena further; they would believe they held the upper hand by guarding the entrance to the Underworld, unaware they had already walked into a trap.
"We shall emerge victorious in this Holy War!" Shion stepped forward, his voice ringing with conviction. As a survivor of the previous war, he knew exactly how much of an advantage they held under George's leadership.
Hades Castle had fallen, and they held the gateway to the Underworld. Pandora, the commander of the Underworld forces, was a prisoner; one of the Three Judges was dead, and nearly a third of the Specters had been wiped out. Meanwhile, the Sanctuary remained unscathed, bolstered by the allied forces of Asgard and Atlantis. Athena had reclaimed her God Cloth, and given enough time, she would be able to fully manifest the power of her Cosmo. Furthermore, their Pope, George, possessed power that could rival even Thanatos and Hypnos.
This was, without a doubt, the most powerful and advantageous position the Sanctuary had ever held in the history of the Holy Wars.
Pandora closed her eyes, offering no rebuttal. She wore an expression of total resignation, determined not to utter a word regarding Hades' true design.
"You are truly pathetic."
George's voice drifted into her ear.
"Pathetic? I am the sister of Lord Hades, the commander of the Underworld army, the noble Lady Pandora. You are a mere human—what right do you have to judge me?"
"I say you are pathetic because you don't even realize you are being controlled." George shook his head and walked toward her, extending a finger to point at the center of her brow. "All Curses, End."
Pandora's eyes instantly glazed over. A plume of black aura was forcibly expelled from her body, and memories long forgotten began to flood back into her mind.
Thud!
She collapsed to her knees, burying her face in her hands as she broke into hysterical sobs.
"Father... Mother... It's all my fault... It's all my fault..."
Her original name was not Pandora. She had been the daughter of a British noble family, living a blissful, carefree life in a grand castle. But at the age of three, she had accidentally opened the box sealed by Athena that contained the Twin Gods. Upon their release, Hypnos and Thanatos had enslaved her mind, transforming her into the earthly sister of Hades. From that day on, her family's home became Hades Castle, and her parents and every servant in the household were slaughtered.
"It seems you are a victim as well," George said softly. "Now, can you tell us what other schemes Hades has in motion?"
"I will," Pandora whispered, slowly raising her head. "I want them to face retribution for what they've done, and I wish to atone for my own actions."
She began to reveal Hades' ultimate objective.
"For the past ten years, Hades has been using his divine power to influence the seven planets, infusing each of them with his Divine Will. He is on the verge of using that will to force a 'Grand Alignment,' positioning the planets to block the Earth from the sun. This will plunge the world into eternal darkness. Because this alignment is forced by divine will rather than natural orbits, no god—even one more powerful than Hades—can stop it."
All previous actions had been a ruse. Hades' true goal was the Great Eclipse. Once the Earth was deprived of the sun, it would fall into an endless, frozen night, and all life would perish. Hades would win the Holy War without ever having to fight.
"What a localized, vicious plan!"
Upon hearing the details, cold sweat broke out on the faces of everyone present, George excluded. If Rhadamanthys hadn't defied orders and acted on his own, they wouldn't have learned the location of Hades Castle from Shion, nor would they have captured Pandora. Without her, they would have remained oblivious to the endgame. They would have been busy training and preparing for battle, only for the world to end abruptly.
"It seems we cannot simply stay here on guard," Saori Kido said, her expression turning grim. "We must enter the Underworld and slay Hades ourselves."
The nine planets were now saturated with Hades' Divine Will. Even if Saori could fully utilize Athena's Cosmo, she couldn't force them back into their proper orbits. The only way was to find Hades' true body and destroy it. But his body was hidden in Elysium, the entrance to which lay in the deepest reaches of the Underworld, past the Eight Prisons, the Three Valleys, the Ten Trenches, and the Four Circles.
"To enter the Underworld properly, one must awaken the Eighth Sense," Shion frowned. "Otherwise, the laws of the Underworld will suppress our power to a mere tenth of its potential."
If their strength was reduced that drastically, facing the Specters would be a nightmare—to say nothing of the other horrors guarding the path, the Twin Gods, or Hades himself.
"No, we aren't going into the Underworld," George said, waving a hand dismissively. He didn't seem particularly bothered by the Great Eclipse. "I'll handle the planetary alignment."
While it was true they could use Athena's blood to traverse the Underworld without the Eighth Sense, George saw no need for it. Why fight on the enemy's turf when you could stay on your own? As for the planets... if the planets didn't exist, they couldn't exactly align.
"George, what do you plan to do?" Saori asked, looking at him in surprise.
George smiled and led the group outside the castle.
"Super... Kamehameha!"
He instantly entered the white-haired state of Ultra Instinct, burning his Cosmo to its absolute limit. Aiming at the celestial bodies beyond Earth's atmosphere, he unleashed a full-power energy blast.
A terrifying pillar of energy erupted from the Earth. It struck Mars first; after a second of resistance, the Red Planet was pulverized into dust. Among all the energies George possessed, Ki was the most destructive, especially when channeled through the Kamehameha. Normally, a power level of around ten thousand was enough to destroy a planet.
Of course, these planets were reinforced by Hades' divine power. A mere ten thousand wouldn't have scratched them. As Pandora said, even an average god wouldn't be able to break them by force, given that Hades had spent a decade reinforcing them.
However, there are no absolute rules. Pandora's claim only applied to gods on the same tier as Hades. If a power exceeding the Master Gods—like Zeus—were to strike, the result would be different. George's full-power Kamehameha, in terms of pure destructive output, was no longer inferior to that of a God King.
Naturally, he could break them.
After Mars came Jupiter, then Saturn, then Uranus, and finally Neptune. After shattering Neptune, George swept his hand, and the energy beam curved through space in a massive arc, looping back to the other side of Earth to obliterate Mercury and Venus.
"And... done."
George dropped his stance, calming the surging ripples of his Cosmo. Meanwhile, Saori and the others stood with their jaws on the floor. They never imagined George's solution would be the literal, violent demolition of every planet in the solar system except for the Earth and the Sun.
It was, admittedly, the most direct method. It was also a feat that even if the rest of them combined their strongest attacks, they could never have achieved.
"What?!"
Deep within Elysium, inside the Temple of Hades, the Lord of the Dead suddenly bolted upright from his throne, interrupting the pure souls who were performing music for him.
"Who is it? Athena? Impossible! Even with her power, she shouldn't be able to do this!"
Even if Athena were at full strength, she shouldn't have been able to destroy the seven planets he had spent ten years modifying.
"Hypnos! Thanatos! The seven planets have been destroyed! Contact Pandora and find out what has happened at the Sanctuary!"
Outside the temple, the Twin Gods were equally shocked. They closed their eyes, reaching out through the necklace they had given Pandora. The artifact allowed her to move freely through the Underworld, but it also served as a tool for them to monitor her and issue commands.
Back in the main hall of Hades Castle, Pandora removed the necklace and handed it to George. "This was given to me by the Twin Gods. It allows for travel through the Underworld without being suppressed by its laws."
She began to recount everything she knew about the Underworld's defenses, but halfway through, the necklace floated into the air. The cold, ruthless voice of Thanatos echoed from it.
"Pandora, you dare betray the Underworld? I grant you death!"
A surge of divine energy representing death materialized out of thin air, lunging toward Pandora's throat.
"Thanatos, you're far too arrogant!"
Before George could move, Saori, clad in her God Cloth, expanded her Cosmo and blocked the divine strike head-on. While she was still inexperienced in direct combat, using her vast Cosmo for defense and support was well within her capabilities.
"So it really is you, Athena. Since you refuse to die quietly, then wait for us to end you personally," a different, more composed voice came from the necklace—Hypnos.
Unlike his twin, who was impulsive and arrogant, Hypnos was far more calculating. Since Hades Castle had fallen and Pandora was with them, it was obvious she had leaked the plan, leading to the destruction of the planets. With Athena protecting her, they couldn't kill Pandora remotely. The priority now was to report to Hades and decide how to proceed with the war.
As the connection was about to be cut, a strange voice suddenly echoed through the channel and into the skies of Elysium.
"Cough, cough... Can you hear me? Testing, one, two."
In the hall, George gripped the necklace, using it as a medium to hijack the channel the gods had just used.
"This is George, the Pope of the Sanctuary. Hades, you coward! You're just hiding in Elysium. If you've got the guts, come out and fight me one-on-one! But I bet you won't. You've lost so many Holy Wars—aren't you embarrassed? And that planetary alignment plan? You thought you were so clever, yet I broke it in minutes. Are you mad? Does it hurt? Come out and hit me if you can! I bet you're too scared..."
George laced his voice with the "Provocation" authority of a Red Priest. He wanted to incite as much rage in Hades and the Twin Gods as possible, hoping to make them lose their composure and draw them out of Elysium into the mortal realm. If they came to him, the war would be settled much faster.
Sssss!
The Saints in the room gasped at George's blasphemous tirade. Though they were warriors who fought against gods, they still held an innate reverence for the divine. They would never dream of being so flagrantly offensive. George, however, had zero reverence; the insults flowed from him like water.
Once he was finished, he crushed the necklace into powder, not even giving the gods a chance to talk back.
"Get ready," George said. "Let's see if they take the bait."
"If Hades actually manifests his true body this time," Saori said seriously, understanding George's intent, "then this truly might be the final Holy War."
"That actually works?" the others muttered, stunned by George's "unorthodox" tactics.
The group moved back toward the entrance of the Underworld beneath the castle, waiting in silence for the inevitable onslaught of Hades and his remaining army.
(End of Chapter)