Chapter 489: The Abduction

The God of Death was a truly singular divine domain.

Among the ranks of the truly powerful gods, the God of Death stood apart from all the rest, for one reason alone: no divine domain had changed hands more often.

This wasn't because the role was weak. Quite the opposite. This was a domain of ancient lineage, one that had existed even before the Goddess of Magic was born, tracing its roots back to the oldest ages of the world.

Even a mere worm that inherited this domain would instantly become one of the most powerful beings in existence.

After all, who could kill the God of Death?

For this reason, transitions in the role typically weren't deaths. They were retirements.

This was a fine tradition established by the very first God of Death: those who grew tired of the job were expected to step down and let someone else take over. The trouble was, most successors tended not to manage it well, leading to one change of hands after another—to the point where the domain of death had, at various times, been carved up and divided into several pieces.

Other gods had never seen anything quite like it.

The current God of Death, Cranvor, was also a mortal who had ascended to divinity.

He was a powerful deity by any measure, holding a domain as unique and consequential as death itself, yet his talent and wisdom seemed to fall short of what the role demanded.

This was because his defining approach to everything could be summed up in a single word: charge in headfirst.

Among all the Gods of Death who had come before, Cranvor was the sort who would dispatch an avatar straight into the Abyss and start slaughtering everything in sight.

When it came to dealing with the dead, there was perhaps one kind thing others could say about him: he was impartial. But wise? Not even close.

Cranvor had held onto far too much of his mortal sentiment, to the point where he had once seriously contemplated tearing down the Wall of the Faithless, the structure that absorbed all those who died without faith, and the single most powerful deterrent driving mortals to seek divine protection.

Without the Wall of the Faithless, a divine realm would seem a far less precious destination.

But Cranvor, thinking from a mortal's perspective, had seen only a mechanism that left mortals with no real choice, and that could hardly be tolerated. He had intended on knocking it down.

If he hadn't been stopped, Cranvor would probably have earned himself a direct slap from Aion.

There were many incidents like this. Cranvor hadn't committed any truly major transgressions, but minor missteps had accumulated over time.

In recent years, however, Cranvor had surprised everyone by going quiet, developing the kind of low profile that had characterized the very first God of Death: rarely seen, rarely heard from, and keeping very much to himself.

He was so quiet, in fact, that even word of him from other planes had faded. Most mortals alive today probably didn't even know the current God of Death's name.

The God of Alchemy himself hadn't known it when he was still mortal. He'd only learned these details after ascending to divinity.

If Cranvor was simply staying home, that would be unremarkable enough.

Most gods were homebodies, and spending hundreds or thousands of years tucked away in their divine realms without moving was entirely normal. Death required no faith to sustain it, either. It was the greatest concept of all and an endless wellspring of power, meaning a God of Death could stay reclusive indefinitely without suffering for it.

But the moment the President of the Elegiac Society made a move, the context of the situation changed.

After all, the President, Mourner, was the first God of Death, Yeger.

It was this elder who had established the tradition of succession. After stepping down, he had served as an advisor to every God of Death that followed. Whenever a sitting God of Death proved unable to fulfill the duties of the role, Yeger would find a way to replace them.

Despite having given up the power that came with the domain, Yeger somehow still managed to keep every successor in the palm of his hand. The other gods didn't know the details, but they'd all seen the results.

Yeger remained Yeger. The Gods of Death kept changing.

While the God of Alchemy had been preparing to elevate Ambrose to the rank of a lesser god, it was Yeger who had come to him and asked him to wait.

Yeger hadn't said what he was waiting for, or how long. He had simply and sincerely asked the God of Alchemy to hold off a little while longer on promoting his student.

The God of Alchemy had agreed immediately. He wouldn't have been able to refuse even if he wanted to.

On the surface, Yeger was no longer a deity. At most, he was like a clerk serving under the current God of Death.

But everyone knew that when this elder finally did speak up, it was never over a small matter.

The God of Alchemy's best guess was that it was precisely because of Yeger's quiet plan that Ambrose, after stirring up so much chaos, had still not received Aion's summons.

Yeger was an elder even Aion showed respect to.

Wauleen had her doubts, though.

"Is Yeger really going to demote Cranvor? I always thought the two of them got along well."

The God of Alchemy was weary. "It's only a guess on my part. They do have a good relationship. Yeger mentored Cranvor when he was still mortal, and ultimately guided him into the position of God of Death. "Cranvor isn't the sharpest, but he's been diligent and hasn't made any serious mistakes. Given Yeger's character, he wouldn't normally move to replace someone without cause. There may be other reasons we don't know about."

Cranvor had been out of sight for a long time, which suggested the elder had already spent a significant amount of time preparing. The God of Alchemy was curious, but wasn't in a position to press Yeger for answers. All he could do was silently pray to Aion that his student had enough luck to land on his feet. Whether or not Ambrose became the God of Death was almost beside the point. What mattered was that the boy not get ground to dust in the gears of something this big.

A student without prospects was fine. A master could always find ways to keep a student fed and comfortable. What worried him was that Ambrose had been noticed, and there'd be no going quietly unobserved after that.

"Ah, well. It seems I won't be able to grant your student my blessing after all. If I get involved in this now, I'll only draw more attention to him and put him in greater danger."

Wauleen was genuinely regretful. After all this time, despite finally finding the most fitting chosen she had ever laid her eyes on, all she could do was watch from the sidelines. She had no shortage of enemies, and her own power was too limited to stay exposed. Whatever blessing she could offer Ambrose right now would amount to next to nothing. It wouldn't provide meaningful protection, and might actually draw her own troubles down onto him instead.

"Don't worry about it. He's a lich, after all. A few years makes little difference to him. Knowing his nature, commerce will flourish enormously in the years ahead, which means your own power will grow quickly alongside it."

Wauleen rallied herself, resolute. "You're right. I'll find ways to give him what help I can. For the next few years, his business dealings will go more smoothly than most. That much, I can promise."

"Well then, it's about time. I'll head to the elemental plane of water now."

The God of Alchemy packed an assortment of strangely shaped devices into his mechanical backpack. The small space seemed able to swallow an entire castle's worth of contents. He'd pulled out everything he had for Ambrose's sake this time around.

As a spatial gate opened, the God of Alchemy stepped through into that vast blue world.

At the same moment, word reached the three Archdukes of Hell. The infernal armies had assembled by then, and they were simply waiting for the God of Alchemy to draw the kouto goddess out. The moment she emerged, all three Archdukes would move without hesitation to capture her alive.

An event of this magnitude had already been sensed by more than a few deities, even before the first blow was struck.

Hell's tremors reverberated across every plane. There was simply no concealing the lords of Hell's first and third layers both mobilizing at the same time...

...to say nothing of Thanos and his carrying voice.

The Lord of Storms, never one to pass up a spectacle, had grasped immediately what was happening the moment he sensed Hell stirring. From the Tower of Ruin in his own divine realm, he reached out and struck the bell of apocalyptic disaster. Its sound rang out across every plane.

The peals carried everything: his glee, his swagger, and the full story of what was being set in motion.

Nearly every deity who heard understood at once that three Archdukes of Hell were riding out, all to help Thanos steal himself a bride.

The Lord of Storms was truly terrifying in reach. To think three Archdukes of Hell were lining up to snatch a wife on his behalf!

The Lord of Storms roared with laughter. Storms raged incessantly across his divine realm.

But the God of Alchemy and the three Archdukes were furious enough to grind their teeth to dust.

Thanos was ruining their plan! Abducting a goddess was no glorious matter. Left to speculate, other deities would've wondered endlessly about Hell's motives, wary enough of being caught in the crossfire to stay their hands.

Thanos revealing the truth meant that the mystery of the entire affair was gone. In its place came the question of whether every deity with a grudge against Hell would now decide to get involved.

What if the Lord of Dawn and the God of Justice, paragons of law and order, decided this was something they needed to intervene in?

Hell might very well end up picking a fight with every good-aligned deity at once.

The three Archdukes tracked down the God of Alchemy at once. With the arrow already strung, they needed to decide right now whether to pull back temporarily, or press forward.

The God of Alchemy found himself unsure. He wasn't a planner by nature. He'd simply been carrying out Ambrose's predetermined strategy. Who could have anticipated Thanos pulling a move like this?

Sariel and Tiamat, both uneasy, argued for a temporary retreat. After all, they'd already been paid. Not having to do the work meant they would profit without needing to do a thing.

Mammon, on the other hand, didn't hesitate for a single moment. He insisted they press forward, and even more quickly at that.

"Now that every deity knows our target, if we don't move before they can intervene, we'll have lost our advantage entirely by the next attempt. And if some powerful god decides to capitalize on this and takes the kouto goddess under their own protection first, everything we've done up to this point will go to waste!

"Don't think I don't know what you two are planning. You just want to pocket the payment and do nothing. But now that every god knows what's happening, if we pull back now, the story will get out. Will anyone do business with us after this? Do you two have even a shred of contractual integrity? This is exactly how you ruin a devil's reputation."

Mammon himself would have loved to take the payment and do nothing. Theoretically, he still could. But he saw further ahead than did Sariel and Tiamat.

In the end, everything came down to reputation. When only a few parties knew the truth, he could afford to negotiate the details piece by piece, arguing over every word and clause, and pulling out every trick in the arsenal.

But the fallout from this affair was growing larger by the second. No god was going to sit and listen to a devil pick through contracts.

As Hell's most committed miser, Mammon cared more about the reputation of devils than anyone. Devils could be devious, malicious, and cruel, but they could never be seen as contract-breakers. Not even as rumor, not even as hearsay. Their reputation couldn't afford to be stained.

They were already evil-aligned. If people started saying devils couldn't be trusted to honor agreements on top of that, how would the devils of Hell do business ever again?

If the Lord of the Nine Hells heard about this, being flayed alive would be a light punishment.

There had been no turning back from this from the very start. Mammon, a purebred devil, understood what it meant to honor a contract far better than any outsider could.

The God of Alchemy agreed with Mammon's reasoning and came down decisively on his side.

The deity reached into his backpack and began pulling out a heap of components, assembling them at remarkable speed.

In the blink of an eye, a device resembling a sonar horn stood fully assembled before him, the enhanced bone whistle fitted snugly inside. The God of Alchemy pressed the switch.

A low, unearthly tone rang out across the blue expanse of the elemental plane of water, spreading at a speed that outpaced light itself, reaching every last corner of that infinite ocean.

From the deep, the kouto goddess's roar came screaming back almost immediately: "Kill them! Kill every last one of those brain-eating bastards!"

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.