Godslayer's Legend

Time was a fundamentally relative Concept.

The rate at which it passed was not constant, and it changed depending on various factors. One of those factors was the kind of universe one existed within.

For Primary Universes, the general speed at which time passed was slower relative to Secondary Universes.

Then, when it came to the interstitial space of the multiverse, where the immense gravities of the ginormous celestial bodies known as universes warped the fabric of space-time, the speed of time became even more unstable.

This was why, to avoid losing track of their perception, the average rate of time within a universe was usually what people within that universe used to calculate how much "time" they had spent outside it.

In a war spanning dozens of universes and thousands of battlefronts, where armies constantly travelled between different universes and fought across vast stretches of inter-universal territory, this distinction became increasingly important.

Campaigns that appeared to last months from the perspective of one battlefield could span years from the perspective of another.

Soldiers departed from their homes and returned to discover that more time had passed than they had expected.

Commanders fought wars whose durations varied depending on where those wars took place.

Entire generations of mortal civilisations rose and vanished while higher existences continued fighting battles that, from their own perspectives, had only occupied a fraction of that duration.

Even so, a standard was necessary.

And by the standard used throughout most of the major universes involved in the conflict, approximately 30 years had passed since Diablo’s declaration of war.

30 years.

30 years of bloodshed, conquest and retaliation.

30 years during which entire universe-level civilisations had dedicated themselves to war.

And despite everything that had happened throughout those decades, there was still no end in sight.

If anything, the war had only become more chaotic.

The frontlines that existed during the opening years of the conflict had long since disappeared.

Territories changed hands repeatedly.

Entire campaigns that consumed years of preparation ended with little to show for them after opposing forces launched counteroffensives from unexpected directions.

New battlefronts appeared across multiple universes as alliances expanded, old rivalries resurfaced, and ancient conflicts and grudges that had existed long before the declaration of war became absorbed into the larger struggle.

What began as a war centred around Olympus and Hell gradually evolved into a conflict spread throughout a large region of the multiverse.

Some battlefields stretched across small universe clusters, while others were fought entirely within the space-time of individual universes that had become secondary fronts in the larger conflict.

The casualties were staggering.

The losses suffered during the opening years of the war, which had once shocked all sides involved, eventually became little more than statistics recorded within military reports.

Entire regions of inter-universal space became graveyards.

The remains of destroyed warships drifted endlessly through those regions, their shattered hulls floating alongside broken weapons, severed limbs, pools of frozen blood, and the decomposing remains of soldiers whose armies no longer had the resources or opportunity to recover their bodies.

Some battlefields became so saturated with death that scavengers, opportunists, and independent factions began establishing themselves there, harvesting whatever resources could still be found among the wreckage.

The war had become a self-sustaining machine of destruction.

And despite how chaotic the conflict appeared from the outside, it was still fundamentally a war between two major factions.

On one side was the ’Divine Alliance’ headed by Olympus, Asgard, Romersk, Oblivion, Erin, and Egito, consisting primarily of god-ruled universes and their allies, including many angel, elf, and celestial-ruled universes.

On the opposing side was what those within the Divine Alliance had termed the ’Infernal Coalition’, led by Hell, Muspelheim, and Jotunheim.

It consisted of Devil Universes, Demon Universes, Giant Universes, and their many allies, including dark elves, fallen angels, fallen celestials, and numerous other races that had long existed in opposition to the Divine Alliance’s constituent universes.

To an outsider, the Divine Alliance appeared to be stronger.

After all, the number of major god-ruled universes involved in the conflict surpassed the number of leading universes within the Infernal Coalition.

However, appearances were often deceiving.

The Infernal Coalition possessed an overwhelming numerical advantage in both manpower and supporting universes.

The Devil Universes alone numbered in the dozens. When combined with their demon, giant, dark elf, fallen angel, and fallen celestial allies, their total military strength was more than enough to match the Divine Alliance across every active front.

This balance of power was one of the primary reasons the war had continued for so long.

Neither side possessed enough strength to decisively overwhelm the other, neither side was willing to accept defeat, and both sides had already sacrificed far too much to simply walk away.

Among all the major universes involved in the conflict, the universe that had suffered the greatest damage over those 30 years was undisputedly Olympus.

Not because it faced stronger enemies, or because it occupied more battlefronts, but because of the wounds Olympus had suffered from within.

It hadn’t just been 30 years since the beginning of the war, but also 30 years since Hades sealed the Underworld, causing Olympus’ reincarnation cycle to stop functioning properly and resulting in souls beginning to accumulate throughout the universe without resolution.

And the consequences of Hades’ decision had only continued to grow.

The deaths of the Main Entities were also major issues that the Olympians had been burdened with.

Due to their necessity, replacements were made among the Twelve Olympians, beginning with the restoration of Hestia’s Throne, which she had given up when Dionysus was incorporated into the Twelve.

As for Apollo’s replacement, Poseidon had dragged Zeus into quite literally begging one of the few Titans who wasn’t imprisoned in Tartarus to temporarily take up the position.

He was one of the Main Entities of the Universe during its days as ’Orthys’ under Kronos’ Rule, the Titan of the Sun, Helios.

Ares and Athena, who governed the Aspect of War, were the two whose replacements became the greatest headache for the Olympians.

The Authority of the ’Aspect of War’ had initially been divided between the two of them, with Athena possessing ’Strategic War’ while Ares wielded ’Violent War’.

And those weren’t the only Authorities Athena and Ares possessed.

For Athena, War wasn’t even her main Authority, but simply something she had come to possess due to her position as the strategist of the Twelve Olympians.

Her Authority as the Main Entity governing ’Wisdom’ wasn’t something that just anyone could take on.

To put it bluntly, if your IQ wasn’t high enough, forget comprehending the Law of Knowledge, you wouldn’t even be able to wield the Authority.

To replace her, Hestia was the one who pleaded with the Titan goddess Metis, Athena’s ’mother’, to temporarily take up the mantle. Luckily, Metis, while being someone who had secluded herself from the rest of the universe, wasn’t unaware of the situation and the consequences of major aspects of the universe being left without proper management.

The chaos caused by Hades shutting down the cycle of reincarnation was enough proof for her.

As for Ares, his Authorities were divided between his two strongest sons, Phobos and Deimos, however, the two newcomers couldn’t even match Ares’ management during normal times, much less during wartime.

These replacements barely managed to patch the smaller holes in the system, but that was all they could do—patch holes.

The true cores of these Authorities were still within the trapped souls of the gods sealed in the Underworld, and unless those souls died, Metis, Helios, Phobos and Deimos could only serve as temporary managers.

Metis had voiced a major risk associated with this method of replacement, the fact that Hades, who possessed the souls of the original Main Entities, could place them into bodies to temporarily allow them to regain their power, forcing the Universe to strip the replacements of their Authority and return it to the original owners, only for Hades to kill them once again and destabilise Olympus once more.

Zeus had been enraged by her words and had shouted that Hades wouldn’t dare do such a thing, and he had even tried to rush to the Underworld to fight Hades, but Poseidon and Hera held him back just like they had been doing since the war began.

The gaping void left behind by Hades’ actions was the biggest hole in Olympus’ functioning system, but there were very few options available to try to make him change his mind.

For starters, if Zeus even approached the Underworld, the possibility of Hades doing what Metis had warned about would increase beyond any conceivable limit.

Poseidon and Hera were also impossible choices. Demeter would at least be heard since she was Persephone’s mother, but there was the possibility that if she got too close to the Underworld, Hades could simply drag her inside and lock her away there, stripping Olympus of another one of its Main Entities capable of combat.

That left only one person who possessed a high enough standing to speak with Hades on equal terms and also wouldn’t be rejected without a word—Hestia.

The Underworld was the soul engine of the Olympus Universe, and sealing it stopped the reincarnation cycle, causing soul congestion in the waking world, rogue spirits and vengeful remnants to roam the lands, and as the supply of souls began running dry, stillbirths became more common.

Hades had weaponised Olympus’ afterlife against Olympus itself, but this was a double-edged sword.

The domains of Main Entities weren’t merely symbolic. They were all functional laws within the system of universes, even if the specifics of the domains and aspects they governed differed from one universe to another.

Hades, as ’King of the Underworld’, wasn’t merely a Ruler by choice but by causal designation. He was the balance point of the Underworld Dimension, and sealing the Underworld violated his law-bound duty.

He was willing to endure that backlash, but eventually, the damage inflicted upon Olympus would become so severe that the Cosmic Policeman would come for him to enforce accountability.

The Law of Causality.

Hades refusing to manage the Underworld and shutting down the Reincarnation Path was like gravity refusing to pull, quite literally a metaphysical crime.

This was the only card the Twelve Olympians had available against Hades, but that card only held value when played by the only person whom he would even consider listening to.

This was why, despite numerous rejections, Hestia continued returning to the Underworld to speak with Hades until finally, she was allowed into the Dimension and brought before Hades’ Seat of Authority on the Apex World Khthonia.

Upon stepping into Hades’ palace, Hestia found herself feeling nervous.

She was here to speak with her brother, her immediate younger brother, but the feeling of unease within her heart was difficult to ignore.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!