Chapter 450: By the River Styx

Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Pranav

Low Gods, Mid Gods, High Gods, and Main Gods. It was unknown who came up with such a naming system to classify the Gods’ power levels, but this classification system had been used for countless generations already.

Yet, this classification system was far too removed from mortals’ daily lives. Mortals already viewed Gold rank individuals as grandmasters and treated Gold as their life’s goal. Next was “Legend” rank which would already be viewed as, well, a legend. The power levels after Legend were even more mythical to the mortals.

Yet, ancient existences would view Legend rank as only the beginning. The so-called Saint rank only represented having just left the realm of mortals. Myth rank represented true foundational change after having overcome many difficulties, and SemiGod represented endless potential.

The top-ranked Titans could only be classified as SemiGod under this power level system. Yet, SemiGod was a power level with no upper limits. Even Main God level existences wouldn’t dare to face the top-ranked Titans in single combat. Any similar ancient powerful existences that were from the first generation typically ruled over a dimension of their own, preferring to remain as hermits, or even slept in hibernation. This was the foundational reason why there were so many forbidden districts in the mortal plane and other planes. There was even a female Supreme Immemorial Dragon that directly went to the Chaos Abyss and took over a layer to rule as the lord there. The Chaos Abyss didn’t even give her any trouble for it.

It could be said that the price for having a famous reputation was that it was easy to be dragged into the Holy War that would occur once every one or two millenniums. Any powerful ancient existence with high intelligence would prefer to remain as a hermit instead. And, these existences’ power levels would be impossible to assess by the current power level system used in this world.

Dragons were physically powerful and skilled in magic as well. Elves were even more skilled at magic. Beastmen were highly skilled at pure physical fights. The Gods specialized in their Divine Concepts and knew how to cheat the dimensional laws of the world. There were countless strange and wondrous natural talent abilities and inheritances out in the world. Forcefully trying to separate everyone’s power levels into ranks wasn’t actually something meaningful.

To be honest, the current so-called power levels was a system where the lower power levels were for the humans to improve their own potentials. The higher-ranked ones, especially the divine ones, were only there for the weak to look at. All those seemingly powerful ranks were only there to let the weak know where they belonged, that they shouldn’t recklessly challenge the strong.

Of course, the current power level system was suitable enough for the current generation of low magic. But, once this Holy War escalated even further, liches would be everywhere and SemiGods would be as common as dogs. The current power level system would naturally become meaningless, so a more appropriate power level assessment system would be necessary.

But no matter what power level system there was, Main Gods would forever be at the very top of all lifeforms and existences. Roland had been quite curious about this and even asked Ayer about it.

“Main Gods? There’s no direct way to rank them. I suppose you could say that any God capable of easily shredding another God to death as if the other God was a piece of paper could be classified as a Main God. The Main Gods all experienced countless eons to reach their current levels. It’s quite difficult to kill them off even in the Holy War. Each Main God represents the history and accumulation of an entire dimension.”

There were seven Main God level existences in the Order Faction and fourteen Main God level existences in the Chaos Faction. …But now, there were five Main God level existences in the Order Faction, thirteen Main God level existences in the Chaos Faction, and three Main God level existences in the new neutral (Hell) faction. Without counting the unknown number of ancient hermit existences in the world, these twenty-one Gods represented the strongest existences in the world. Not a single existence among them would be easy to deal with.

The Lord of Putrefaction had conquered and destroyed countless dimensions. The Devil King led his tribe in betraying the will of the Chaos Abyss. War God Donatis had never been defeated once in battle throughout endless eons. Every single Main God possessed an uncountable number of legends about them and represented the peak of the world in both wisdom and power.

Even Anslo, who appeared to be a second-rate Main God amongst the Main Gods, had the “grand accomplishment” of having destroyed the Gold Elves that ruled over his own elves. And if one looked at his recent actions, it was easy enough to see that he was actually quite sly and scheming.

Anslo picked the best possible timing to betray the Order Faction. And now, the Silver Elves and his Moon Elves were in a vicious elven internal war. It would seem as if he wasn’t even able to protect his own, an obvious lapse of his guardian duty, but some things couldn’t be judged only from the surface.

Since Anslo had now joined the Chaos Faction, his Moon Elves would likely join the Chaos Faction together with him in order to avoid the wrath of Order, while the Silver Elves and other Elven Gods still remained with the Order Faction. Anslo and his Moon Elves would continue the elves’ internal war regardless. For the short time being, other species would see no reason or need to interfere with the elves’ internal war.

Yep, this was the typical elven style – betting on both sides while instantly betraying to join whoever seemed stronger. No matter who won or lost in the end, this way some elves would still be guaranteed to survive this Holy War. Of course, the prerequisite for this was that the ridiculous ending of Armageddon destroying the entire world wasn’t brought about first.

From a certain standpoint, Anslo was helpless in making such a decision. This current Holy War was different from the previous one where the elves were the ruling species. Humans were the current ruling species of this generation. No “overthinking” was necessary as both humans and elves had the tradition of sending their “trusted allies” to protect “critically important defensive locations” (highly contested locations that would be okay to sacrifice) and to fight as the vanguards (cannon fodder). Plus, the Order Faction was at an obvious disadvantage in this Holy War, so sacrificial cannon fodder on the Order side would become even more common.

And, the elves’ internal war was no act at all. No acting would possibly fool any God. The Silver and Moon Elves truly viewed each other as mortal enemies. No matter which elf species won the internal war, the victor would definitely be seriously injured as a whole.

Anslo chose to sacrifice more than half of all elves in order to ensure the elves’ survival in this Holy War. It could be seen that the Elf Main God was quite vicious and decisive, but this indicated even more that he had quite a negative view for the elves and Order Faction’s potential in this Holy War.

Apart from a certain Death God, there were basically no Main Gods that were completely isolated. And, the Death God who appeared to be isolated had now revealed his own faction to the entire world.

“Ayer is special.”

Yep, this was referring to Ayer. He was the most unique Main God of them all. Not only did he not have a clear Divine Concept that he had to adhere to, he didn’t even have any followers or a species that he needed to guard. Alright, we all know that was only an illusion to fool the world, but the mortals always believed Ayer to be a lone individual who roamed the world. In the legends about him, Ayer was always black-robed and brought death everywhere he went. Of course, this meant that the stories about him almost never placed him on the side of good.

And, the most special thing about him was that Ayer didn’t need to participate in the Holy War.

That’s right, Ayer didn’t need to participate in the Holy War despite nominally belonging to the Order Faction. All other Order Main Gods would absolutely have to get involved, yet Ayer was always able to coldly watch from the sidelines as newly-ascended Gods killed each other. This meant that Ayer was always victorious in every Holy War, which newly-ascended Gods couldn’t comprehend. Yet, it was actually understandable if one analyzed what his true job was.

“Ayer is the Guardian of the Cycle of Reincarnation. He is eternally neutral.”

Since some people would occasionally be reckless enough to challenge Ayer at the River Styx (such as Roland), Ayer had occasionally used his powers to defend the River Styx. He was never one to intentionally conceal his power level, and all the most powerful Gods knew what his true job was. However, very few knew this next piece of information about him.

“Ayer is undefeatable.”

This was no vague description like “most powerful” or “amazing”. Ayer could only be described as an existence that no other existence could face directly at all. This was a fact known by all the strongest Gods. Ayer would be undefeatable while at the River Styx.

The reason? As an example, in the previous Holy War, two newly-ascended Main Gods of Order (Guardian Gods of Wood Elves and Silver Elves) believed that if they destroyed the River Styx, that would stop the unending flow of new demons and devils. The senior Gods that understood Ayer’s true job tried to convince these two Gods to not go, but they ignored their seniors and brought numerous powerful Elf Gods to challenge the Death God. The end result was complete annihilation under the Death God’s sickle.

From a certain standpoint, this unexpected large-scale death of Order Gods was a major reason why the previous Holy War had been so difficult for the Order Faction. The entire elf species and elf Divine Arts rapidly declined as well due to this reason.

By the way, this was also why the elf kingdoms and Elf Gods hated undead so much. Yep, they were simply blaming the undead because of Ayer. That was because even now, no elf or Elf God would dare to directly blame Ayer.

And that day on the River Styx, Ayer had only used a single black rose to destroy the pack of Elf Gods.

He simply gazed quietly at the black rose which bloomed in his hand. When the black petals finished falling, the River Styx’s shores were now filled with divine corpses.

Although Ayer obtained countless accolades of “undefeatable” from this battle which wasn’t a battle, his overly easy victory also caused many gazes of suspicion to be cast upon him. That was because the power level he displayed had been overwhelmingly ridiculous. If he wanted to enter the Holy War, no matter which side he chose to help, that side would likely win instantly.

But, it was quite easy to infer why he was so powerful and undefeatable. All one had to do was analyze his true job and his combat records of only fighting on the River Styx. It could be easily assumed that his ridiculous power was limited only to when he was defending the River Styx.

And now, his own tribe and allies had all escaped to Hell. Ayer was standing by the River Styx when he met with familiar figures.

The existence at the forefront was of course, a familiar being of pure light. His figure was created out of the light itself and appeared to have an endless amount of divine authority. This was yet another incarnation belonging to the God of Holy Light.

It would seem that the Main God who was viewed as the strongest Main God of all, the God of Holy Light, was being commanded by the Source of Order to come face off against the Main God who was viewed as undefeatable.

And, the God of Holy Light hadn’t come alone. The divine might emanating from those around him indicated that even if the other Gods that came with him weren’t Main Gods, they were at minimum all High Gods.

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