Badge in Azure
Badge in Azure - Chapter 1503: Baiting and Killing the Heretic God Part 2

Electric snakes, thunder hawks, lightning ravens, and thunder dragons. Out of those magic beasts, only thunder dragons truly existed. That was to say that in the crystal wall system Saleen was in, thunder dragons were the only lightning type living beings.

Every other lightning type creature was conjured by mages using magic.

Saleen had created an electric snake the size of a finger, which wriggled its way to the youth's nostril. When the electric snake moved, the youth felt as if their insides were about to rupture from fear.

"No need to worry, you won't die from it. I can control it, after all," Saleen said, comforting the youth with a low voice. It was only then that the youth began to stop looking down on Saleen.

The youth had initially thought that Saleen was only a lackey. From the looks of things at the moment, no one would have been able to stop what Saleen was doing. No one even seemed concerned that the youth would end up dead or having something unfortunate happen to them.

"I'll tell you. The Heretic God's wea..." The electric snake wiggled inside before the youth could finish speaking, leaving only the snake's tail dangling out of their nostril.

"I'm sorry, it's time for punishment now. When the punishment is over, you'll have the right to talk again." Saleen took control of the electric snake as it wiggled inside the youth's nose. The snake continued to wriggle, and finally, it completely disappeared inside the youth's body with a pop.

The youth opened their mouth, wanting to shout, but quickly found that Saleen had control of them. They were unable to make any noises because Saleen wouldn't allow them to speak.

Saleen didn't do so just because he wanted to torture the youth. He was actually doing research, looking into the youth's body structure and what parts would have been lethal when attacked. Or at least, which parts could cause the bodies of his enemies to become paralyzed.

The electric snake wriggled its way from the youth's head to their toes. The youth was even incapable of sweating, as water was being forcibly evaporated and then reabsorbed. The seal on the outside didn't even allow the youth to vent their pain. That one electric snake was the manifestation of torture in itself.

The electric snake eventually dissipated without climbing out of the youth's body.

"You shall die a horrible death, mage!" the youth said as viciously as they were able to.

Saleen smirked and continued, saying, "I'll let you in on another secret for free. I'm not afraid of curses. You saw it yourself. I was using lightning skills. Not even curses from the Heretic God would have worked on me. Alright then, let us continue. So, what is your name?"

"Figo," the youth answered. They were no longer in the mood to play games.

Saleen conjured yet another electric snake in his hand, which shot through the air and landed on Figo's mouth.

"This is the punishment for cursing me. Of course, yet another part of my training." Saleen controlled the electric snake and made it wiggle into Figo's mouth. The grandmaster and the others looked on, feeling a disgusted, tingling sensation deep down. It was as if the snake had climbed into their bodies as well.

Saleen turned out to be more trouble than they had imagined him to be.

Figo cursed Saleen repeatedly on the inside, but they no longer dared to voice any curses. The pain caused by the electric snake moving throughout Figo's body was very difficult to put into words. It was as if someone was stimulating the nerves all along their body over and over with a sharp razor.

Saleen had gained even better control of the electric snake by the time it disappeared.

He smiled and spoke to Figo, saying, "Alright, let me ask you again. What are you doing here on Myers Mainland?"

"Lord Heretic God told me to look into the case of the oracle's disappearance!" Figo replied.

"Wrong answer." Two more electric snakes appeared in Saleen's hand. One snake went left while the other went right; both of them wriggling into Figo's ears. Figo continued to convulse, not out of fear, but because the electrical currents caused them to lose control of their body.

Both snakes stayed inside for quite a long time, and by the time the punishment ended, Figo thought that they were dead.

"Alright, Figo. Another question. Why do you keep lying?" Saleen asked.

"If I were to tell the truth, the Heretic God would kill me before you could!" Figo answered.

Four tiny electric snakes appeared on Saleen's hand that time. He didn't have any hopes that those snakes would become thick and strong. He was simply learning how to control them. The hardest thing to learn about lightning magic was control. Power was actually not that important. He had the Lightning Moon at his disposal. If he were to cast electric snakes using the Lightning Moon, those snakes would have appeared in lengths well over 100 meters.

"I'm telling the truth!" Figo no longer had an attitude after seeing that Saleen had conjured four of the snakes. Figo became rather pathetic and tried to reason with Saleen instead.

Saleen smirked and asked, "You're telling the truth?"

"Absolutely!" Figo said.

"But you just told me that if you told the truth, the Heretic God would kill you. Well, you're not dead, so I take it that you're lying." The four snakes shot forward and wriggled their ways into Figo's body again.

The general and the others around him were completely baffled. The way Saleen asked his questions made it so that no answer would have been correct.

Saleen indeed had no interest in getting truthful answers. All he cared about was getting to test his lightning magic out on Figo.

The profession of a mage was indeed an evil one. Once a mage became set in their path, nothing would have changed their will.

The grandmaster, on the other hand, came to have a better opinion of Saleen. Such was the way of the mage, unfettered by the opinions of others around them. Figo had shown a hard, unyielding attitude when they were being hauled around by the goddess, yet it took only several torture attempts to soften Figo considerably.

Saleen, however, knew that Figo wasn't actually softened to the point of yielding altogether. He still had some work to do.

The goddess patiently worked on the magic array, which she did by solidifying the elements and working them directly into the ground, making the array very resilient. The large magic array was made up of many small magic arrays, with every single one of the small arrays requiring a heroic spirit to stand on and operate them.

The heroic spirits were being ordered around by the goddess as they took their spots. Only the general and the grandmaster didn't get assigned a location.

It went without saying that both Saleen and Figo weren't required to participate.

When Myers was done laying down the magic array, Figo appeared terrified stiff from all of Saleen's torture. While Figo's mind was resilient, Saleen's skill was one specialized in breaking the nervous system of its targets, causing hallucinations of all sorts to take place.

It was already considered a miracle that Figo had remained sane.

"What did you get out of that fellow, Saleen?" she asked after she was done laying down the magic array.

"Figo was an oracle of the Heretic God when they came here to Myers Mainland but didn't carry out any of the Heretic God's orders, searching for a lost weapon of the Heretic God on this plane instead. This fool was attempting to replace the Heretic God!" Saleen said.

Even the general was laughing by then. Only Figo still remained silent. Figo didn't have a chance to say much during the interrogation process, so they were baffled at how Saleen had come to know their secret.

Saleen didn't say anything, and no one bothered asking any further. He had only found Figo's secret due to the power of the Eternal Control Shard.

Once a person's soul was trapped by an Eternal Control Shard, it was only a matter of time before said person's secrets were all revealed. Saleen hadn't once stopped torturing Figo throughout the hour, giving them no chance to defend any of their secrets.

Even if they had actually attempted to defend their secrets, their level was the same as Saleen's. Figo's power was sealed, and their body had been repeatedly shocked by the electric snakes until it had collapsed altogether. It was only a matter of time before Figo's soul succumbed to the shard's power.

From the perspective of the goddess and the others, Figo was an utter fool for harboring such thoughts, so Saleen's opinion of Figo was rather apt.

Replacing the Heretic God meant that the oracle needed to be at least at the level of the Heretic God before they even had a shot at it. Acquiring the strongest weapon that belonged to the Heretic God would have only resulted in the god taking back its weapon and returning to the peak of its powers.

"Alright. Come here, Figo." The goddess waved at Figo. She used a prophecy spell—the proper type, not the knockoff version. The goddess was of insufficient level, but Figo nonetheless walked towards the goddess without hesitation, and then to a wooden cage at the center of the magic array.

The wooden cage was a very dark red color, making it look as if it had been soaked in blood.

Figo stepped into the cage and shut the door. The goddess then sealed the door altogether.

Saleen looked at the cage and felt impressed. The blood-red cage was far sturdier than his own lightning cage. He was unable to think of anything that would have been able to break out from it.

"O' Heretic God, in the name of Myers, I hereby offer my sacrifice and summon thee."

The goddess chanted the words in an absent-minded fashion. Gashes appeared all over Figo's body, and blood spurted everywhere, staining the magic array beneath the cage.

The blood of a level 14 oracle was supposedly more than enough to summon the Heretic God.

Saleen watched carefully and learned from what he saw. He saw Figo's body being torn apart and then mended automatically. Figo's blood carried a black aura with it, which was a power that belonged to the Heretic God.

Only blood sprayed out while the black aura simply returned to Figo's body.

Saleen's repeated torture had caused the black aura in Figo's body to become severely diminished. Regardless of how quick the healing process was, it was unable to stop the pain.

Holy prose appeared one after another on Figo's body, both the goddess's and the Heretic God's. Both sets of holy prose fought for dominance on Figo's body. Figo suddenly opened their mouth, and their voice changed.

"Are you challenging me, Myers? You, a god who has just resurrected?" the voice of the Heretic God called from Figo's body.

"This isn't a challenge; it's a warning. Send any oracle over again, and I shall illustrate that ugly mug of yours in detail in the codex of the Nature Faith," the goddess replied.

"You said it, Myers. You really think I wouldn't dare to show, then?" The Heretic God's voice was calm, but it was actually very much enraged.

It was deemed unforgivable for a god to insult another god in their codex.

"You dare? You're but a false god who doesn't even dare to put your name forward. You're a disgrace among gods." The goddess provoked the Heretic God with the harshest of words.

"In that case, I shall..."

The injuries on Figo's body suddenly healed as the Heretic God was in the middle of speaking through Figo's mouth. The entire blood-red cage was shrouded by a black mist.

The goddess then shouted, "Now!"

The magic array was activated immediately. Saleen backed away and saw that the blood-red cage flew into the air. Countless beams of magic were fired from the magic array, forming into a new magic array in the air, trapping the cage at the center.

"What are you waiting for, general?" the goddess shouted coldly. However, she was unwilling to attack using the Lightning Moon.

"Grandmaster!" The general refused to act. He wanted the grandmaster to test the Heretic God's level first.

He was a heroic spirit, and the Heretic God was also a being that had perished before and been resurrected. The general wouldn't fight any battles that he wasn't certain he would win.