Chapter 262: The Faith Virus Has Been Deployed
Today, Conqueror’s Canyon flowed with lava and was often shrouded in poisonous smoke.
The War Goddess’s fury, stemming from the loss of three Incarnations, affected the environment of her divine kingdom, causing these abnormal phenomena and terrifying celestial disasters.
Her Holy Spirits and supplicants, however, felt no surprise. They were Undying within her divine kingdom and saw the environment as a trial from their Goddess, continuing their eternal battles and honing their Skills.
The Empress of Eternal Night, piloting the Mirage Demon Pill, infiltrated Conqueror’s Canyon in stealth.
Leveraging analyses of Teyva’s Abilities from behind, the stealth module on the Mirage Demon Pill had its sensory-shielding algorithms specifically optimized. Even a divine-level perception sweeping by would not be able to detect the Mirage Demon Pill’s presence.
This was not the highest-level stealth in the Universe, but it was the most effective, targeted stealth against Teyva and her Believers.
As the saying goes, know yourself and know your enemy, and you will win a hundred battles. The Azurevine Empire had been studying the War Goddess for over a decade.
The trap successfully set in the Eternal Night World, which captured Teyva’s Incarnation, only cost a large sum of Faith Power for a deeply accumulated deity.
Though it pained her greatly and enraged her, causing her to want to charge back into the Eternal Night World due to this completely unforeseen turn of events, she deemed it not a major issue. Mortals’ struggles were meaningless; Deities were the truly eternal, immortal powers of this Universe. She could send tens of thousands of Incarnations.
“Azurevine Empire, I’ve got my eye on you!”
Teyva’s rage had transformed Conqueror’s Canyon, yet at this moment, she also hesitated whether it was worth investing more Faith Power to contend with the Azurevine Empire.
Time was what a deity in the War sequence, like Teyva, lacked the most.
Perhaps, to make the most efficient use of her rare vacation, she should adjust her strategy and undertake other actions to salvage her parishes being undermined by the Azurevine Empire, rather than pouring more power into the Azurevine Empire’s stronghold.
After all, being able to dispatch tens of thousands of Incarnations and being willing to do so were two entirely different matters.
Teyva was hardly so extravagant as to waste more and more Faith Power out of sheer spite.
The Azurevine Empire’s signal jamming had been too decisive, and Teyva’s naturally suspicious nature led her to hesitate about her next moves.
It was precisely during her hesitation that the Empress of Eternal Night made her move.
The Empress of Eternal Night rarely used weapons or Equipment, or even items like staves, usually achieving victory with her own immense Magic Power alone.
However, she had a special fondness for super-large robots. Ever since Roger first proposed the concept of weapons like Gundams and EVAs, she had always believed the Empire should incorporate such weapons into its war efforts.
Instead of relying solely on agricultural machinery like pink bunnies to consume resources and patience while achieving foundational construction breakthroughs.
As the Empire’s national strength soared, her mages were able to pursue their ideas more freely. The accumulation of basic technology reached a certain level, leading to a qualitative leap. Three years ago, she finally saw the mechanical puppet she most desired:
The Mirage Demon Pill.
It was the feverish creation of an obscure researcher, with materials and concepts in every aspect exhibiting an almost extreme madness, pursuing the ultimate performance within the bounds of material science.
This led to extreme operational difficulty, even making the selection of operators capable of test-driving the Mirage Demon Pill a problem.
It wasn’t until the Empress of Eternal Night personally volunteered and piloted the Mirage Demon Pill that she seemed to find her true calling.
Just as immense Magic Power offered her infinite possibilities, allowing her to adapt to any combat situation, she reasoned that her equipment should also possess infinite possibilities and be adaptable, never confined to a single form.
On her maiden voyage, the Mirage Demon Pill penetrated the War Goddess’s divine territory, achieving battle results unimaginable under normal circumstances through its fusion of pilot and machine.
Subsequently, during continuous testing of more sub-systems, although the Mirage Demon Pill encountered some minor issues, it fundamentally met the Empress of Eternal Night’s vision for an ultimate weapon of decisive battle.
Thus, the dream of a like-minded robot enthusiast was realized. In the future, Royal grants would provide him with unimaginable sums, all technologies would be open for his selection, and even Frankenstein himself would offer guidance on improving his alchemy skills, forming the most elite team.
This also meant he became the Empress of Eternal Night’s exclusive golem master, no longer needing to consider cost-effectiveness or the upper limits of his pilots’ abilities, but truly free to create the ultimate golems of his dreams.
As a result, the Mirage Demon Pill, while still the Mirage Demon Pill—its main body an 18-meter tall black and red structure—now possessed an entirely different internal skeleton from its original design.
Through countless battles, it was reborn in blood, with extensive sub-systems adapted for all warfare and supported by the Empire’s highest-level technological advancements, achieving unimaginable feats in the hands of the Empress of Eternal Night.
Furthermore, due to the success of the Mirage Demon Pill, which became the new pinnacle for single-soldier combat among mages, this comprehensive combat platform became the latest pursuit for the Empire’s mages and young people.
From a cost-effectiveness perspective, such large golems could not be mass-produced for the entire army, as the combat power increase brought by the extremely high cost was entirely disproportionate.
However, among the generals and elites, exclusive golems became a trend, offering the strongest adaptability and the most extreme enhancement of personal combat power.
And at the forefront of all exclusive golems remained the Mirage Demon Pill.
Even now, its publicly available data was from two years ago, derived from an analysis by golem experts based on combat footage from a specific battle.
Yet, in that battle, the Mirage Demon Pill’s comprehensive combat power still ranked first on the golem strength leaderboard, with a numerical value that the next nine combined could not surpass.
This was a miracle of mutual achievement between a golem and its pilot.
The Mirage Demon Pill currently appearing in Conqueror’s Canyon was not in a frontal combat state but in infiltration and sabotage mode.
In addition to its specialized stealth equipment, it also possessed the largest internal storage space among all its forms.
Since this was Teyva’s divine kingdom, spatial equipment could not be used; any additional fluctuations could arouse her suspicion. Therefore, this storage size was a true, physical measurement.
It was filled to the brim with the Empire’s most advanced achievement in modifying organic life and magic crystal machinery, with a new wave of upgrades just completed on a small item:
The Faith Virus – Teyva Type.
This was not a true viral solution but rather a series of spheres emitting faint psychic waves, which she continuously deployed in various locations within the divine kingdom, subtly influencing Conqueror’s Canyon’s supplicants.
Under normal circumstances, supplicants with devout Faith would not be affected.
However, they were constantly engaged in combat, and combat involved victories and defeats, emotional fluctuations. In these moments of ebb and flow, there were always windows of opportunity, and the Faith Virus would then exploit them.
The supplicants’ minds would be subtly influenced, their original personalities becoming a false facade. Internally, they would be reshaped with Shana as a prototype, driven by the core desire of Tutor Tianming:
“Overthrow the tyranny of the Gods, the World belongs to humanity!”
At this point, the infected supplicants would become new sources of contagion, emitting Faith Virus amplified a thousandfold. Even normally steadfast supplicants had a chance of being infected.
Even Believers on the level of Holy Spirits could have their minds affected.
This was the most terrifying aspect of a virus; it was weak in isolation but, if not discovered and dealt with promptly, would continuously accumulate, becoming an unavoidable means of attack.
Propagation, resonance, amplification. As the number of infected supplicants in her divine kingdom increased, unless Teyva could instantly kill them all, or destroy Conqueror’s Canyon and rebuild it, she would be unable to halt this process.
The principle behind the Faith Virus was proposed concurrently with the Twelve Twilight of the Gods, but after discussion and deliberation, it evolved into two extreme series.
One was Gigantification, the ultimate armament aimed at restricting deities on the battlefield, prioritizing immediate effect and overwhelming restriction.
The other was Miniaturization, for covert propagation, targeting devout believers within the widest possible range to dismantle the very foundation of divine existence.
The outbreak of the Faith Virus required time. If its effect was limited, it might take an extremely long period, or even fail entirely.
During its design, transmissibility and stealth were conflicting attributes that increased or decreased each other.
The Twelve Twilight of the Gods had already proven effective against deities in the trap set in the Eternal Night World. By suppressing and interfering to find weaknesses, even deities could not resist this attack that had mastered the manipulation of Faith Power.
Now, the Faith Virus deployed by the Empress of Eternal Night was another method awaiting validation.
The good news was that the Twelve Twilight of the Gods operation had been successful, revealing the connection between Teyva and her Believers, and providing deeper analysis of the Divine Power Teyva possessed. This offered more insight for the design of the Faith Virus.
By influencing the subconscious of supplicants, it could draw more references from former Believers who had abandoned their faith. Their commonalities could be used to construct a model, and the mental state of Teyva, having already been judged and condemned, could be simulated.
With such targeted adjustments, the Faith Virus deployed by the Empress of Eternal Night could achieve slightly increased stealth, with doubled propagation and transmission rates at the same power output.
Pitiably, Teyva was still hesitating at this moment, contemplating whether to continue targeting the Azurevine Empire after losing her Incarnations, completely unaware that her three fallen Incarnations had become the means for the Empire to launch a targeted attack against her.
Under information asymmetry, even with a vast disparity in strength, the outcome of the war was already determined.
Arrogance is a sin.
The Deities’ greed, blindness, overconfidence, and reliance on past experience led them to underestimate the impact Mortals could have, seeing them as insignificant opponents.
Indeed, in terms of strictly controlled matter and energy, the accumulation of a single deity like the War Goddess was more than enough to level the Azurevine Empire a hundred times over.
This was why the Azurevine Empire had never abandoned its plan for wandering planes; the power gap between them and the Deities always existed, spanning tens of thousands of years of accumulation.
Even if the Empire could unleash the full productive capacity of its people, with each individual exhibiting more efficient productivity than deities, the technology of Believers mastered by the Seven Gods remained a formidable factor.
However, from the perspective of the Seven Gods, they were facing the entirety of the Multiverse, where Mortals were mere ants that could be crushed at will.
Now, one of these ants had become particularly bothersome, buzzing around their ears and causing Teyva minor irritation.
Would she abandon her work for this minor annoyance, withdraw her savings, and purchase a nuclear bomb to vaporize this ant?
Clearly not. When the cost and return were disproportionate, Deities would not engage in such losing propositions.
Never before had ants managed to kill deities.
They could take their time. Deities possessed long lives and had experienced countless ages, believing they were the ones who would ultimately triumph.
But the Azurevine Empire’s quiet development had actually surpassed all of the Deities’ past experiences.
This ant now carried a deadly venom. If a deity carelessly exposed their skin, they would be bitten, and the venom would be released.
Of course, the ant itself did not know if its method would be effective. From its limited perspective, it could not even glimpse the enemy’s full picture, let alone grasp their exact location.
It could only work with the existing clues, targeting the deity with whom it had the deepest entanglement, and then slowly trace her location, finding a way to make her expose her skin…
In other words, ants were still ants. Currently, they lacked even the qualification to initiate an attack on a deity.
Even though the ant possessed deadly venom, the enemy was encased in a spacesuit, wrapped tightly and impregnably, even remotely controlling drones from the safest possible location…
This posture, both arrogant and cautious, was a helpless necessity for the Azurevine Empire.
They had to wait for the deity to make the first move before they could seize an opening and deliver a fatal blow.
Looking back at the trap the Empire had laid for Teyva, it was a dance on the edge of a knife.
It had to attract Teyva’s attention, prompting her to make more moves, thus creating an opportunity to expose her weakness.
However, they could not truly enrage Teyva to the point of desperation, causing her to discover that this ant was a problem and make an overly drastic decision.
Therefore, it was a psychological gamble, a process of probing each other’s limits. The Empire steadily increased the strength of its fleets, disrupting Teyva’s sources of Faith Power.
Simultaneously, they created trouble on the front lines through the Systems’ Children, indirectly controlling the progress speed of the Seven Gods.
Coupled with the ongoing battles between the Eternal Night World and the Dark Elves, they continuously repeated the provocations previously made against Teyva.
Through multiple avenues, meticulous planning, and a bit of luck, combined with an accurate assessment of Teyva’s petty nature, they had arrived at the current situation.
There was no fierce bombardment, but that drop of fatal venom had finally reached Teyva, affecting her divine kingdom.
Meanwhile, Teyva finally made up her mind to put aside her accumulated petty grievances and first stabilize the foundation of her Faith Power.
Otherwise, if her current cash flow were cut off, even her profound accumulation could face significant problems.
One Nariel had fallen, but tens of thousands of vampires were still lurking menacingly. Teyva was acutely aware of how miserable a deity could be when controlled by others.
The God of Hope, forced to work frantically to repay a debt, was a tragic example before her eyes.
She prepared to mobilize her forces to her parishes but suddenly detected a slight stiffness in the circulation of her Divine Power. She then sensed an unfamiliar presence within her divine kingdom: “It seems a small mosquito has slipped in? My Angels…”
Her command was left unfinished as Teyva witnessed an unbelievable sight:
The host of Angels serving her, their pure white wings turned black, their golden spears emanating a destructive radiance.
The spearheads were pointed at her, their gazes utterly cold and resentful, fixed upon her.
It was as if countless voices, in unison, echoed throughout her divine kingdom, with tens of millions of supplicants and Holy Spirits speaking as one:
“The hour of judgment has come. Target acquired.”
Teyva’s golden dragon and war chariot also began to transform.
