Void Evolution System

What were they expecting?

It certainly wasn't this.

Of all things they could return to, the corpses of their warriors and the sight of their Saintess with her heart in the hands of a man they'd never seen before was not what they expected in the slightest.

And how were they to react?

For most of them, the only answer was shock.

Those other than Damien and Thalia were shocked into a stupor. The instant they appeared in the world, their bodies froze and their minds did as well.

There was nothing that could be done to snap them out of this state. Until they could accept the scene before them, they would remain frozen.

There was no sound.

The atmosphere was eerily silent as the Count processed the situation and the geniuses tried to regain their wits.

That only made it worse.

Because everyone was forced to listen to the Saintess' blood as it poured out of her chest and made impact with the ground.'

Still, not everyone was frozen so thoroughly.

Thalia was definitely petrified at the start.

She couldn't easily comprehend the scene.

After all, she had no knowledge of the happenings of the outside world. She didn't even know there was danger approaching until she exited Gehenna to this carnage.

It was natural that she couldn't accept it.

But more than anything, what she couldn't believe was the sight of the Saintess before her eyes.

She knew how it usually went.

No two Saintesses could live in the same generation. Once one was crowned, the last would lose their power and slowly pass away.

This wasn't slow at all.

This was murder.

The murder of the main parental figure she'd had in her life since the day her parents died.

Thalia felt the exact emotions one would expect of her. It was a huge bundle of negativity and grief that clouded her mind and made her want to recklessly charge at the enemy ahead.

However, the crown she wore pulsed, calming her emotions.

She had to accept it.

The Saintess was dead, and the tribe was facing a calamity.

She was the new Saintess, effective immediately, and before she could grieve, she had to find a way to save her people.

Thalia's eyes dulled.

She shut off all emotion and extraneous thought.

She could only look at the bigger picture. She was not allowed to grieve or panic. Just like her predecessor before her, she had to suffer for the sake of the tribe.

But Damien didn't.

Damien's first thought was…

'...I was too late.'

He knew the Count was coming.

He thought that as long as he moved as fast as possible, he'd be able to save them.

He did move fast. He didn't play around at all or spend any time exploring the parts of Gehenna he didn't need to.

Even his long interaction with the mist led to him comprehending a concept of Existence, so it was absolutely necessary.

He did everything he could.

Yet, he'd arrived too late.

With an injury like that, Damien could not heal her.

Unlike him, the Saintess was close to a regular human, especially in offensive and defensive capabilities. The second her heart was removed, her fate was set.

Was there any way to save her?

'There isn't.'

If there was, she wouldn't have done so much to make sure he didn't find out about the danger until after he was already in Gehenna.

Then, what was he supposed to feel now?

Damien couldn't tell.

He'd gotten close to the Gehenna Tribe, but due to the Saintess' machinations, he couldn't feel the same emotions for them as he felt towards his own people.

That was supposed to make him unwillingly indifferent to a scene like this, right?

Wrong.

It made him even angrier.

Because he understood how much care went into the Saintess' actions.

She didn't need to do that.

Damien was just a guest. He had fate with Gehenna, sure, but the Gehenna Tribe had no reason to welcome him.

He was just an outsider, after all. In the end, his presence was not a benefit to their society.

Yet, what had the Gehenna Tribe been but welcoming since his arrival?

Even when they doubted him, when did they ever treat him poorly?

They were an unreasonably kind people, a kind of people that simply didn't exist in the world today.

Damien knew that kindness was a sin.

However, he couldn't help but respect those who'd managed to somehow preserve it.

When even those people were swallowed by the greed and vice of the world…

The immutable rage in his chest wasn't a laughing matter at all.

The Emperor's Crown that he possessed didn't have many effects in the short term.

It was currently in an unsummoned state, but it was eternally existing atop Damien's head in a dimension nobody could sense or measure.

And as long as it was there, Damien would never experience setbacks or rejection from laws, regardless of where he was.

The instant he returned to the Sacred Abyss Universe, its laws stopped resisting him.

And the instant its laws stopped resisting him, he comprehended them.

Instantly.

He didn't need time to sit and comprehend them when he'd personally experienced them for over a year. All he needed was permission from the cosmos itself for those comprehensions to enter his soul.

He had it now.

That influx of power combined with the emotion burning in his heart…

Needless to say, it was nothing good.

Damien stepped forward.

He looked back at Thalia, who was still shaking, but whose eyes were slowly becoming more grounded.

And he turned back to the Count.

Count Verex grinned.

"Are these the returnees?"

He glanced at the Saintess' dying self mockingly.

"It seems my goal has come to me before I had to go chasing it. Isn't that wonderful?"

The Saintess glared at him with every ounce of emotion she could muster.

She knew she was dying.

She knew she wouldn't last long.

This was the moment her prophecies ended at.

She couldn't see further than this, not because there was nothing else, but because she was destined to die here.

She'd prepared for it.

She'd been ready for it.

However, as she turned her head and saw the pitiful appearances of her young geniuses, she felt a pang in her heart.

She really didn't want to go.

She didn't want to leave the tribe alone at this critical moment.

But she had no choice but to entrust everything to Thalia.

As she felt her final breaths approaching, the Saintess turned to Damien, a weak smile on her face.

One word.

She had one word.

"...run."

With that one word, she tried to warn him.

And that only made him angrier.

Damien took a deep breath.

'I've held it in for a long time.'

Rage, anguish, negative emotion in general…

He'd been containing too much of it within him.

But he couldn't keep it in any longer.

When he looked at the Count, the only thing he saw was someone who needed to die by his hands.

There was no need for conversation with someone like that.

There was no need for negotiation.

Damien's instincts kicked in, and he instantly disappeared.

In the next moment, the sacred jungle was torn to shreds.

A battle of untold proportions had begun.