Chapter 412 – Internal Strife Between Allen and the Celestial Court's True Gods
"If you're feeling happy, go clap-clap-clap…"
"If you're feeling joyful, go clap-clap-clap…"
"…"
Allen flailed a flyswatter wildly in his hand.
The swarm of Parademons couldn't even withstand a single blow and were instantly slain on the spot, earning him several hundred experience points.
[Killed Parademon. EXP +420]
[Killed Parademon. EXP +420]
[Killed Parademon. EXP +420]
[…]
[EXP sufficient. Necromancer Lv30]
[New Skill Learned: Necrotic Canopy]
[Necrotic Canopy Lv0: Creates a 10-meter radius domain that grants summoned undead a regeneration effect.]
[Class]: Lv30 Necromancer
[Skills]
– Undead Summoning: Uses corpses as base material to summon undead creatures.
– Bone Refinement Lv0: Enhances undead evolution by feeding them more material.
– Necrotic Canopy Lv0: Creates a 10-meter radius domain granting summoned undead regeneration.
[World]: Blackest Night
[Objective]: Max current class level (Lv120) to return to original timeline.
Allen glanced at his class panel and, without hesitation, tapped a Parademon's corpse.
Squelch!
Just as expected, a skeleton rose from the corpse, gripping a cracked bone axe and instinctively lunging at a nearby Parademon.
Snap!
The lowest-tier skeleton couldn't withstand even one casual strike from the Parademon.
"Absolutely useless."
Allen's face darkened; he realized his basic skill wasn't practical.
Suddenly, a Steppenwolf came slashing toward him.
He reflexively blocked with the flyswatter.
In that instant, divine light shimmered—he summoned the True Gods of the Celestial Court.
In the blink of an eye, the tide turned.
Clang!
The Tyrant Heavenly Venerable smashed a beer bottle across Steppenwolf's face, forcing it back several meters.
Seeing the crowd of Celestial Court gods, Steppenwolf instantly felt caught between a rock and a hard place.
Now that the interplanetary portal between the two planets had been established, escaping back to Apokolips Star would be suicide—Darkseid would probably rip him in half for the disgrace.
"Brothers, don't mind me—go ahead and give him a light beating for two hours."
Allen pointed the flyswatter at Steppenwolf like a gangster boss.
"Crush him!"
Of course, not all the gods obeyed Allen. Only the deranged Heavenly Emperor would reliably follow his commands.
Immediately, the gods split into two factions—one led by the Heavenly Emperor and joined by Venerables and Heavenly Lords, who shamelessly ganged up on the visitor from Apokolips Star.
Meanwhile, the Star Monarchs and their ilk charged to intercept the Parademon horde.
Allen tucked his flyswatter behind his neck collar and rubbed his hands eagerly. "I'm just an AFK cheater—time to level up while lying down."
Ever since he had underlings to fight for him, Allen rarely joined battles himself.
Watching the flood of experience notifications, his EXP bar surged before his eyes.
Undead Summoning.
As soon as the skill was cast, another skeleton rose from a corpse.
But this one held a bone sword resembling a cleaver. Cracks ran all across its bones, looking as if it would shatter at the slightest impact.
In its eye sockets burned two faint, gray flames—presumably its soul fire.
"Doesn't look like an Underworld native."
Allen had visited the Underworld before and seen their undead; they possessed relatively decent intelligence.
As he touched the skeleton, a status window popped up:
[Class]: Tier 1 Skeleton Warrior
[Skills]: Swordsmanship Lv0, Heavy Slash Lv0
"This guy… is it trying to level up?"
Allen glanced at his Bone Refinement skill, then at the littered corpses, suddenly realizing, "So I'm basically a bone-crafting degenerate mage."
"Bone Refinement!"
He shouted, pointing at a nearby corpse.
Time passed… but the corpse remained still. Holding his pose awkwardly, Allen scratched his head. "Okay, what step am I missing?"
"Little skeleton, come over here."
He waved the dazed Skeleton Warrior over and positioned it beside the corpse.
"Bone Refinement."
Immediately, the corpse dissolved rapidly, and a gray glow flowed into the skeleton.
The cracks on its bones lessened noticeably, and its soul fire grew more intense.
Allen proudly muttered, "I'm a genius."
Corpses were everywhere—he didn't need to scavenge for materials at all.
In peaceful times, necromancers were practically worthless.
After all, where would one legally obtain corpses? Grave robbing wasn't a very respectable career.
And Allen, being squeamish and averse to dirt and smell, would rather level up without ever using his necromancer skills.
But now, with so many Parademon corpses available, he could use them guilt-free.
One by one, he refined the corpses.
Suddenly, the skeleton's bones began to crack and shift—it grew from 1.6 meters to about 1.7 meters tall.
Its cracks completely vanished, leaving smooth, pristine white bones.
"Tier 2 Skeleton Swordsman! And it gained a new skill—damn, that's awesome!" Allen whooped, gloating. "Feels like a pet-raising game. If only I could summon banshees too."
But it seemed skeletons were his only option.
Ten corpses were enough to evolve the undead once.
Allen scanned the battlefield—Parademons were descending endlessly from the crystalline dome above. No shortage of raw material.
Steppenwolf was miserable—dozens of foes held him in check, and he couldn't even get close to Allen.
Meanwhile, the other True Gods had cleared a safe zone for Allen to focus entirely on developing his skeletons.
"Let's see what your limit is."
The Tier 2 Skeleton Swordsman still looked expressionless but moved more fluidly and followed commands obediently.
One corpse… two… three…
After absorbing thirty corpses, it evolved again.
Tier 3: Skeleton Duelist—and it gained a new skill: Bone Sword Aura.
"Too cool."
Allen gazed at his creation. The Skeleton Duelist now stood 1.8 meters tall, its bones noticeably denser, like a suit of skeletal armor.
"Little White, go kill that one. Earn your first blood as an undead warrior."
He pointed at a Parademon that had broken through the defensive line.
The skeleton struck a dramatic pose and unleashed a pale sword aura.
Squelch!
Snap…
The Skeleton Duelist shattered on the spot.
The Bone Sword Aura hadn't even pierced the Parademon's armor. In the blink of an eye, the enemy had closed in and smashed the skeleton to pieces with its claws.
"Ahhh—my Skeleton Duelist!"
Clap-clap-clap-clap…
Allen avenged his undead by madly slapping the Parademon with his flyswatter.
"Looks like Tier 3 undead are still too weak. Let's try cultivating a Tier 5 one."
He cast Undead Summoning again on a still-warm corpse.
But this time, something new emerged.
"Holy crab—it's a Skeleton Archer!"
The slender Skeleton Archer had the skills Archery and Bone Arrow Replenishment.
It could generate ten bone arrows daily using bone material stored in its quiver.
Tier 2: 10 corpses
Tier 3: 30 corpses
Tier 4: 100 corpses
Tier 5: 300 corpses
In no time, he evolved it into a Tier 5 Bone Archer, now equipped with six racial skills.
Its appearance changed significantly—the bone bow grew into a massive longbow, basic attacks were replaced by necrotic arrows, and the quiver now held explosive bone arrows.
Whoosh…
Boom!
A jade-white bone arrow shot into a Parademon's chest and exploded.
However, the standard necrotic arrows still couldn't inflict damage.
"So Parademons must be just shy of Tier 6, huh?"
Tier 5 undead were already incredibly agile, even showing hints of intelligence—like tilting its head to check if a target was dead.
With each evolution, intelligence grew.
And the Bone Archer's strength was comparable to a mid-tier hero.
But Allen didn't stop there.
As Bone Refinement leveled up, it consumed less material and had a chance to mutate undead.
Tier 6: 800 corpses
Tier 7: 2,100 corpses
Tier 8: 5,000 corpses
Tier 9: 10,000 corpses
Eventually, Bone Refinement maxed out.
[Bone Refinement Lv10: -50% material cost, 25% mutation chance]
[Class]: Tier 9 Silverbone Archer Lord (Mutated)
[Skills]: Archery Lv0, Bone Quiver Lv0, Necrotic Arrow, Multi-Shot Arrow Lv0, Arrow Rain Lv0, Burrowing Arrow, Swift Step, Bow Combat Techniques…
"Still not at the cap?"
Allen looked at the gleaming silver skeleton with satisfaction. Even its soul fire had turned silver, and the wall of archery skills made it practically a walking turret.
"I wonder if it can evolve into a golden legend."
With millions of Parademons available, he had no reason to stop.
Tier 10: Silverbone Archer King
Tier 11: Silver Archer Lord
Tier 12: Silver Archer Emperor
Tier 13: Goldbone Archer Sovereign
Tier 14: Goldbone Archer Saint
Tier 15: Golden Archer God
"Looks like Tier 15 is the cap."
The Golden Archer God radiated no deathly aura. Instead, it looked regal and divine.
Its golden bones shimmered with intricate patterns, fitting together seamlessly like divine armor.
"Glory to the master."
Silver soul flames danced as telepathic thoughts emerged.
"Big Gold, you can talk?"
Allen asked with a grin, "Can I borrow a piece of your bone to sell for money?"
"…"
The soul fire froze for a moment—clearly, it hadn't expected its master to covet its golden skeleton.
"If Master needs gold, I can conquer the world and command slaves to mine it for you day and night."
Naturally, the Golden Archer God didn't want to lose any body parts—its golden bones were irreplaceable.
"Whoa! Conquer the world!?"
Allen scoffed, "Tch… as if I care about protecting a miserable world."
"…"
The master had… quite a personality.
The golden skull somehow managed to look stunned.
"I'm going to build an army of golden skeletons!"
Just like that, Allen forgot all about harvesting bones for money and started summoning more undead.
Squelch!
Skeleton Swordsman.
Squelch!
Another Skeleton Swordsman.
Squelch!
Still a Skeleton Swordsman.
Squelch!
Yet another one.
"Seriously? Are there rare skeletons in the summon pool?" Allen muttered curiously.
He kept summoning.
Finally, on the tenth attempt, a different kind of undead emerged.
[Class]: Skeleton Mage
[Skills]: Meditation Lv0, Necrofire Spell Lv0
"Oh snap, I got a spellcaster!"
A 10% chance for variant undead—Allen grinned.
So, Allen simply kept the Curtain of Undeath activated, launching a large-scale summoning.
Dozens upon dozens of corpses were covered beneath the dark canopy. With the sound of flesh tearing apart, a skeletal army emerged—gleaming white bones and deathly silence.
"Skeleton cavalry, skeleton warriors, skeleton scouts, skeleton spearmen… Am I building a skeletal war legion or something?"
Allen pondered with exaggerated seriousness, "Who could I conquer? Is there anyone worth conquering?"
The answer: No one.
"Conquering the world and all that? I hate that trope the most."
"I just want to quietly live as a lunatic."
"Why are you all forcing me?"
The skeleton army, whose bones had been rattling moments ago, now uniformly stared silently at Allen.
Who's forcing you?
Who told you to conquer the world?
We're just brittle little skeletons, boss!
Yeah, okay—Allen was clearly spiraling into another delusional episode.
He'd gotten way too deep into his own protagonist fantasy, convinced he was destined for grand conquest and empire-building.
"It's the idiot author forcing me."
"It's the 100,000 paying readers forcing me."
"You're all forcing me."
"But I won't let any of you get your way."
"…"
Clutching his head, Allen howled like he was engaged in some great internal struggle.
"What the hell is this idiot doing?"
"Who knows. Probably having another episode."
"100 out of 100. He nailed the tortured male lead role."
"Pfft, moron."
"…"
Even the gods of the Heavenly Court, locked in brutal combat, couldn't help but glance his way in dismay—why'd they have to end up with a host like this?
Suddenly, Allen jerked his head up, an eerie smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
"If I can't escape it, then I'll fully embrace the darkness."
"I am the catastrophe itself."
Crash!
A glass bottle smashed beside him, and Allen dove to the side in fright, looking pitifully at the Tyrant Celestial Venerable.
"Are you done yet? Can we focus on the damn fight?"
The Tyrant Celestial Venerable brandished a beer bottle, threatening to smash it over Allen's head. "One more howl out of you and I swear I'll bash your skull in."
"I was just expressing my feelings, that's all…"
Allen looked up with teary puppy-dog eyes, speaking in a soft, trembling voice: "You're so mean, not letting me say my widdle words…"
"Holy shit I'm gonna kill him—I'm gonna kill him! Don't hold me back! Don't hold me back!"
This nauseatingly fake display of pitifulness was more than the Tyrant Celestial Venerable could stomach. He completely ignored the enemies on the battlefield and stormed toward Allen in a fury, intent on dishing out some divine discipline.
"Calm down, my Lord!"
"Tyrant Boss, please, don't stoop to a madman's level."
"He's not right in the head to begin with. If you hit him again, he might not even be able to take care of himself anymore."
A group of star gods quickly rushed over to intervene, doing their best to soothe the wrathful lord.
But Allen wasn't done tempting fate. He didn't even spare his own divine subordinates, putting his hands on his hips and shouting:
"Let him through! One-on-one duel! Anyone calls for backup is a sissy! Watch as this handsome bastard unleashes the Plague of the Thunder Serpent and hits you with the Lightning Five-Whip Combo!"
"Shut your damn mouth!"
Blinded by rage, the Tyrant Celestial Venerable hurled the bottle without thinking.
CRACK!
It shattered square on the forehead of the Geometry Celestial Venerable, who had been watching from the sidelines.
"You son of a bitch! You hit me!? Just because you outrank me as a Celestial Venerable doesn't mean I won't bust out my sacred Geometry Formulas on your ass!"
The Geometry Celestial Venerable, now holding a protractor in one hand and a triangle ruler in the o
ther, surged forward with murderous intent.
"Let's all calm down! Don't fight, please."
Allen suddenly switched to peacemaker mode, feigning innocence. "We're all brothers here. No need to ruin the vibe."
"Screw you, dumbass! Say one more word and I'll jab your damn eyeballs out!"
Blazing with fury, the Geometry Celestial Venerable showed no intention of giving Allen even a shred of respect.