Chapter 444: Welcoming Death
Olivia’s face showed a struggle. The color of her pupils flickered between blood‑red and green as her footsteps gradually came to a halt. The surging magic power tightly coiled around her body, blocking the falling raindrops.
Olivia moved forward in a somewhat dazed manner. Her entire being seemed as if it had lost something important, leaving only the shifting colors in her eyes and a face full of struggle.
However, her struggle did not last long. From the distance came a lion’s roar filled with fury. That furious roar then turned into a wail before abruptly falling silent.
Only the sound of rain remained in her ears.
After a brief stillness, a massive lion’s head was smashed and flung over.
Within Olivia’s pupils, the green color froze, then suddenly receded, once again soaked in blood‑red. The magic power entwined around her body instantly changed from green to crimson.
Olivia let out a roar, and veins seemed to bulge across her face.
Her right hand gripped the sword, her left hand clenched into a fist, and then her left fist smashed forward, striking the flying lion’s head.
Crackling sounds rang out. In an instant, the head of that already‑dead Golden Lion was smashed to pieces.
Blood and mane exploded outward, veering away from Olivia, while Olivia simply stood there quietly, panting. Her eyes were locked tightly on the direction from which the lion’s head had been thrown, meeting the gaze of Aen, who hovered in midair there.
It was still the golden vertical pupils facing blood‑soaked crimson eyes.
In that sudden moment, Olivia’s magic power erupted, and Aen’s will erupted as well.
The terrifying force even bored through the thick clouds above their heads, revealing two enormous holes. The rain stopped for a moment, and only waves of dragon roars echoed from within the clouds.
「Roar！」Both sides released beast‑like roars and then transformed into streams of light, colliding with each other.
With a deafening boom, space collapsed and then violently blossomed outward. Tremendous power spread continuously, tearing apart the earth and space itself.
This time, however, Olivia was not blown back. Instead, she held fast against Aen. The sword in her hand had even hacked halfway in, embedded deep into Aen’s bones.
Aen’s golden vertical pupils narrowed slightly. He could feel that Olivia was now an existence of the same level as himself—namely, a pseudo seventh‑tier demi‑god.
He suddenly opened his mouth and released a dragon roar. The force capable of twisting space slammed directly into Olivia’s face, nearly snapping her neck.
Under this sudden strike, the stalemate between Olivia and Aen weakened. In an instant, she was smashed and sent flying away by Aen.
Narrowing his vertical pupils, Aen watched the backward‑flying Olivia. He spread the flesh wings behind his back and flew toward the heavens.
Olivia lay sprawled in the rain, her eyes wide open, no longer using magic power to block the falling raindrops.
A trace of sorrow suddenly appeared in her eyes.
Unlike before, the wounds blasted onto her face by the frontal dragon roar did not visibly heal at rapid speed.
The lingering pain from these wounds told Olivia that she seemed to have lost a cherished bond, offered up as a sacrifice to her frenzied will.
Her pupils trembled. The liquid flowing down her cheeks seemed like rainwater, yet also like Olivia’s tears.
But Olivia did not cry out. Instead, she forced a strange, ferocious smile onto her face and lifted her head to look at Aen, who had begun performing the Dragon’s Dance in the sky.
Thunder rolled within the clouds. Along with Aen’s Dragon’s Dance, lightning in the sky struck down at him from time to time. Terrifying power was gradually being nurtured within this dance.
Just as the Lake Fairy had told Olivia, the power of the Dragon’s Dance nurtured by those two sixth‑tier dragons in the sky back then had been enough to heavily injure Olivia.
But now, the power transmitted by Aen’s Dragon’s Dance made Olivia absolutely certain of one thing.
She would die.
Even if her mother had given everything to her, allowing her to complete a transformation and approach that realm closest to divinity—the seventh‑tier demi‑god.
「Hahahahahahahaha————」
Olivia suddenly burst into laughter.
She struggled as she stood up, blood streaming down her face.
Even though she clearly sensed the aura of death, Olivia possessed the will inherited from Pegira. She would not abandon struggle or battle simply because she foresaw her own death.
The sword in her hand suddenly condensed an incomparably vast amount of magic power. Fresh crimson flooded and bloomed with light, as if forming a black‑red sun about to rise from the ground.
High in the sky, Aen seemed to have completed his Dragon’s Dance faster than those two dragons. His body had already turned into brilliant silver, with lightning entwined around him. This enormous power caused even the fully dragonized Aen to feel tearing pain throughout his body.
Yet this pain instead stimulated the ferocity within Aen’s dragon soul.
「Roar！」A dragon’s roar rang out. Aen, wreathed in lightning, became like a silver‑white beam of light, instantly piercing through the black‑red sun on the ground.
Only the black‑red sun rolled across the earth, then contracted, and finally erupted upward into a pillar of black‑red light that pierced through the clouds. The colossal power blasted away the thick cloud layer for dozens of kilometers, revealing two dragons coiling and flying within the clouds.
One of their bodies seemed entwined with frost, while the other appeared to condense flames.
Violence and unease filled their eyes.
The Dragon’s Dance had been interrupted, but they turned their gazes toward the earth.
Aen had already disappeared. Only Olivia lay on the ground, her ribs torn open along with the concept armament, forming a massive wound through which even her beating heart could be seen.
A rasping sound kept emerging from Olivia’s throat. Even after suffering such grievous injuries, she still had not died.
Even the concept armament was slowly repairing the wound, as Aen’s will was somewhat difficult to heal but was ultimately being dispelled little by little.
As long as Olivia had time.
One hour—no, just five minutes would be enough.
With only five minutes, Olivia would be able to naturally repair this wound.
However, the two dragons in the sky would not let Olivia off so easily.
They let out roars, abandoning further accumulation of the Dragon’s Dance. One transformed into a massive pillar of ice, the other into a pillar of fire, intertwining and diving downward together.
Fire and ice—things that restrained each other—under the control of these two dragons instead achieved an eerie harmony. In the end, flames wrapped around the ice pillar, and the whole became scorching, like magma.
Amid roaring, the twin dragons smashed down viciously.
The light in Olivia’s pupils gradually faded, as if she had already sensed death.
Was she to calmly welcome death with a mind gone blank?
No. Olivia felt sorrow.
Since her birth, the mother who had accompanied her in her eyes was now dead.
And it was such an unwilling death.
Was it because of her own willfulness?
But that was precisely the mission she had been born with.
The godfather had completed the most difficult part, so it was only natural that she die in battle, welcoming her end.
Because Olivia had known for a very, very long time that Pegira’s will, which had crossed countless spans of time, should not proceed into the future.
That was not a god, yet it was far more terrifying than a god.
Thus, Olivia could face death calmly.
Perhaps the reason the godfather had not reached out to hold her hand at such a moment was also because this was her destiny.
Olivia understood. The godfather’s gaze always looked toward the future, while she herself, from the moment of her birth, had already had no future.
Aside from her mother, Olivia herself had no remaining regrets.
Olivia suddenly recalled that not long ago, Corleon had suddenly told her about the birth of the life called Olivia.
This had been something Olivia had always been confused about, and at that time, the godfather had answered all those doubts for her.
Perhaps the godfather had already seen her current self.
After all, the Lord was the present, the past, and the future.
Olivia smiled.
She thought of her mother’s identity. In the future seen by the godfather, an existence like her mother should not have existed either.
This was fine.
This was enough.
To welcome death together with her mother—
Then, Olivia suddenly saw a streak of golden light flash past, instantly shattering the descending pillar of molten flame.