At the same time, those intercepting the white colossus suddenly saw the inverted projection of the starry river beneath the Great Hollow in the World Wall ahead, and the Seven Heavens were becoming clearer and clearer.
Even more unbelievable was that the Gates of Heaven, spread open high above, expanded further. One smiling soul after another rose from the misty holy pool filled with milky-white water. As the light mist clung to them, pairs of luminous wings appeared behind their backs.
More and more angels gathered and took shape within the light, rapidly replenishing the Angelic Legion that had previously lost nearly a third of its number.
Humans... angels... spirits serving the light...
So souls stripped of all emotion and memory were the raw materials used to create angels!
Then the angelic legions from before...
All at once, Samael, looking up at the sky, seemed to realize something. A jolt ran through his mind, and blood surged into his pupils.
The Greco-Persian Wars!
Marduk had stirred up a thousand years of human conflict, making different races slaughter each other across the earth. His goal had not only been to invade Greece, but also to absorb spirit particles and gather souls, using them to nourish himself while preparing the materials needed to create the Angelic Legion and break through the World Wall!
In truth, as one of the creators of Greek humanity, Samael could vaguely sense that human souls were something special. They were not truly creations of the gods in the strictest sense, but an overflow of the planet's own spirituality onto its surface.
Humans were the beings closest to gods. Because of that, through reproduction and iteration, they could accelerate the decline of the Age of Gods and become the foremost spirits of all life upon the earth.
That was why their souls and faith were precious resources sought after by the different pantheons.
The Egyptian Solar Boat, the Greek Elysium, the Scandinavian Valhalla, these foundations established by the gods were all unique pathways meant to select outstanding souls and create armies of Heroic Spirits.
But those sides were more inclined toward mutual benefit and coexistence.
Marduk's method was the other extreme. He viewed life on earth as lambs waiting to be slaughtered, draining them of milk and blood without restraint.
That strategy was almost identical to the way Velber, the Star of the Demon Broom, hunted civilizations.
The so-called Last Judgment was the harvesting of every human soul on the surface, breaking them down into spirit particles and gathering them into the Seven Heavens, reducing them to fuel that drove the white colossus. Their memories and emotions would be erased, and from them, combat weapons known as "angels" would be created.
Clearly, during the Thousand-Year War, most of the souls of ordinary human dead had likely been gathered by Marduk into his divine realm, turned into fuel for piercing the World Wall and driving Velber's descent.
And the proof of that was the Underworld of the Mesopotamian World, long since empty!
Even if Ere and the others had relocated to the Areopagus, the number of warriors from the various tribes of the Persian Empire who had died in battle over the Thousand-Year War was beyond counting. Their souls should have filled the Underworld long ago!
From this, it was obvious that Marduk had begun laying his plans far earlier.
In fact, during the few days Samael had stayed in the Vulture's Nest, he had already learned this from the old man. But because he lacked enough information, and because Ere and the others had vanished, he had somehow missed such a crucial clue!
So the war between Heaven and Hell had been taking place in secret all along.
Just as the Bible said, the mortal world was the battlefield of Heaven and Hell!
After hearing Samael strip away the details and reveal part of the truth behind the Persian Empire's expansion and the three Thousand-Year Wars, everyone's expression changed drastically. Marduk's depth of calculation filled them with dread.
At that moment, the Sea of Void was a field of pale white.
As soul after soul was drawn into the Seven Heavens, the Great Hollow tearing through the World Wall expanded further. Heaven and the mortal world seemed to draw closer and closer. With the white colossus as the node, the entire surface of the planet was being covered and reshaped by the Kingdom of Heaven!
They had to stop this monster from seizing the Greater Source and remaking the planet, no matter the cost!
This was a war for the survival of all life on earth, whether noble gods or humble humans!
This was a war fought in the present to decide the fate of the planet. If they lost, the world would have no future!
With their own existence at stake, a powerful sense of crisis drove everyone present, no matter where they came from or what side they had once stood on, to make their divine cores pulse and unleash every ounce of divine power within them. They charged toward that illusory Kingdom of Heaven, toward the white colossus standing between heaven and earth.
"My salvation and my glory rest in God. The rock of my strength and my refuge rest in God! Rise, Lord, and scatter your enemies!"
However, the angels of the Seven Heavens sang hymns of praise and poured down in swarms. Besides the four elemental lords, Michael, Raphael, Gabriel, and Uriel, more appeared.
"The Face of God" Metatron, "The Mercy of God" Remiel, "The Angel of the Moon" Sariel, "The Angel of Harmony" Anar, "The Friend of God" Raguel, "The Angel of the Mysteries and the Most High Mystery" Raziel, and more than one hundred fifty named high-ranking angels from the Book of Enoch flew out of Heaven and joined the battle.
For a time, under layer after layer of obstruction, everyone who had fought battle after battle and was nearly spent simply lacked the strength to break through. They could only fall into a bitter struggle beneath the siege of hundreds of thousands of angels.
They watched helplessly as the sky over Greece was torn apart inch by inch, while life on earth opened its arms amid the ethereal hymns, walking with foolish smiles into the projected pillars of light, where they turned to ash and burned away.
And the humans who remained clear-headed and hidden found nowhere left to hide as the white fissures continued to spread and the Giant God awakened further. In despair, they waited for the shadow of death to engulf them completely.
"Ants of the earth, do not even think of struggling. Drown here in this bitter sea. This King shall grant you the purest despair!"
At the same time, the blazing white figure within the right eye opened its indifferent eyes. A cold smile touched the corner of its mouth as it whispered, then raised both arms with icy calm.
"Awaken!"
In an instant, starlight twisted and gathered. Tens of thousands of light wheels, large and small, formed and overlapped before the white colossus, rotating and focusing. Blazing white spirit particles were compressed and gathered madly, while the space around the white colossus collapsed further, until it became a stretch of nothingness.
"Reverse Canal, Genesis Light-Year! This is the end of humanity. This is the twilight of the gods. Burn to nothing like weeds! Hehahahahaha!"
Hiss! Hiss! Hiss! Hiss!
In an instant, amid that savage laughter, hundreds of millions of bands of terrifyingly hot light sliced across the sky, streaking through the heavens like a rain of meteors and bombarding the surfaces of the great Ages of Gods.
Wherever they passed, rivers were severed, mountain ranges were pierced through, cities were erased, divine realms collapsed, the earth sank, and the sky caved in!
The entire Earth trembled violently. Scattered dust was hurled high into the air, covering the light of the sun and moon. The dark, gray-yellow sky was like the twilight of the end.
At the same time, nearly half of the Angelic Legion and the Greek coalition fighting over the chaotic sea were vaporized. The gods and Heroic Spirits who barely resisted were sent flying backward while coughing up blood, scattering as they fell toward the chaotic sea.
Countless fragile souls of the dead, guided by the ethereal hymns, broke down into spirit particles and flowed back toward the eternal realm within the fissure in the sky.
It had arrived. This former sea, this ocean where it had once been defeated...
The white colossus halted, standing upon the Sea of Oceanus. From within the blazing white light in its right eye, it raised an enormous golden cup covered in interwoven patterns from the star ring and chanted in a low voice.
"Fill it. Fill it. Fill it. Fill it. Fill it. Repeat the cycle, and next comes the fifth. Yet when it is filled, that is also the time of abandonment!"
The contents of the cup were now full. The world would be soaked and reborn from here!
The next moment, as the golden Holy Grail tipped over, red-black liquid spirit particles poured down like flowing magma, covering the sky and earth. The sea boiled violently.
Deep beneath the sea, the three bronze gates and three dark veils shielding the Underworld collapsed in the blink of an eye beneath the red-black liquid spirit particles, and the thick crust was gradually melted through.
Hum!
Before long, the planet's veins were cut open, and a deep blue pillar of light overflowing with vital life force erupted from the fissure in the earth.
It was over... Greece was finished!
Trapped in the encirclement, the gods looked at the Angelic Legion swarming toward them and at the giant white hand reaching for the deep blue pillar of light. Their eyes turned ashen with despair.
Samael pressed his lips tightly together. The light in his eyes shifted, carrying both urgent prayer and the resolve to gamble everything on survival from the brink of death.
"Aaaa!"
Just as the gods were driven into despair, and the hope in their hearts was about to be completely swallowed by that absolute white terror, a soaring echo like a song, like a hymn, came from within the deep blue pillar of light.
At the same time, the earth's crust shook violently. The deep blue bands of light erupting upward condensed and circled in midair like a star wheel.
Within the warm, surging current of Ether, a vast cyan-blue shadow rose from the sea. It reflected mountains, rivers, plants, and trees, embraced insects, fish, birds, beasts, all things in the world, and even the radiance of the universe's stars. Then a fist shot out like thunder and sent the white colossus flying.