Chapter 66 – Deep Down in the Sea

===================

Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

===================

The appearance of the God Who Makes Stars had brought many changes.

Among them, the greatest change of all was undoubtedly the assaults that had come to a halt.

Before long, the people no longer felt nothing but fear when the Black Sun rose.

The cruel tyrant that had not tolerated the living could no longer pay attention to the shelters.

Thanks to that, the people gained the time to wander through the city, collecting and refurbishing the remnants of old civilization.

The days when they had trembled, wondering when the next assault would come, were already fading into pale memories.

“This child got mud on her trousers again?”

“Oh, you’ve got it easy compared to my kid. Mine still can’t control their toilet habits.”

“Is that supposed to be comforting? At Hans’s age he should be pulling his own weight by now… hah.”

Women scrubbed their laundry against the washboard with a scowl, and.

“These edible mushrooms began growing after the new star rose. This is not a natural phenomenon by any means.”

“Oh?”

“Have you still not noticed? It makes no sense for rain to pour down at exactly the same time every day, only in places where people gather.”

“Is, is there a living god out there?”

“There was exactly one who revealed itself to still be alive. …The God Who Makes Stars.”

The scholar who had discovered edible food supplies let their eyes gleam.

Over at another shelter, a man supporting a patient was calling out urgently.

“Priest, my friend’s leg is broken! Please come quickly!”

“Ugh, uugh, aaah.”

“Wait just a moment. …If my thinking was correct, this flower would serve as a bandage.”

“That flower? What, will it work if you grind it up and apply it…?”

Even under dismissive looks from people who thought she had finally lost her mind, the elderly priest could not hide her excitement.

Etomanic, the old woman who had nothing left but her priest’s robe, shed tears the moment she held the flower carrying starlight in her hands.

The instant she gripped the flower, a golden hue flowed through her veins.

It was the manifestation of divine power that had been thought lost after the meteor shower.

“Pr, Priest. Wasn’t divine power supposed to be gone?”

“I thought so too, but…”

Before she knew it, the golden divine power was covering nearly half of Etomanic’s wrinkled face.

Having been a priest who served gods all her life, she quickly understood where this flower had originated from.

“…It seems there is still someone watching over us.”

The God Who Makes Stars, Star Creation.

At first, there had been those who rejected the god for the ominous circumstances of being born after the great pantheon.

Those who still held the Sun God as supreme were far from pleased, calling even the title of Godfather of Stars sacrilegious.

But even those who had resisted began one by one to have second thoughts, every time a new star rose.

Because while the gods of the great pantheon remained silent, only the god born after the pantheon had changed the world.

Before long, people at each shelter were looking up at the sky whenever they had a spare moment.

Wondering whether a new star might rise, and what changes it would bring this time.

And those who spotted the rising star first were the children perched on a crumbling railing, dangling their feet.

“Oh? A star! A star rose! Look, it’s a star!”

“No way, last time you…”

“Hwis, this time it’s real!”

“…It really is?”

“Wooah! A star!”

The children jumped excitedly from the railing and began to run.

It was a far larger and brighter star than any they had seen before.

The new star ascended beyond the lonely city streets, stepping up upon the mere foundations of crumbled buildings and the withered twisted trees.

Though it could not compare to the sun, it was a light bright enough to briefly paint color onto a world that had turned ash-gray.

Enough to draw the shadows of the ruined rubble in a world submerged in shadow.

Even people focused on their small tasks or lugging planks felt a light poking at their eyelids.

“A star. The God Who Makes Stars did it again.”

“A star is rising!”

“What? A star?”

The shelters that had been content with light everyday grumbles were stirring busily.

People threw down what they were doing and moved their feet toward higher ground.

They supported the wounded by the shoulder, lifted small children onto their backs, and held the hands of those with difficulty moving to lead them.

As if answering this expectation, the star that rose this time was different in size from the very start.

It could not be compared to the sun.

But it could be compared to the moon.

In terms of sheer light output alone, it was even brighter than a full moon shining in all its glory.

The massive star cleared the shadows from the dead forest and drew the shadows of bare branches.

And it swept away the night mist from eerie alleyways, revealing scattered bone fragments that had been lying there.

Even beyond the crushed door of a desolate ruin, the blood stains scattered around a melted candle.

It showed them the scenes they had failed to see in their gatherings around campfires and furnaces, the world they had been deliberately averting their eyes from.

People who had gathered overjoyed simply at the news of a star rising found themselves involuntarily shrinking back.

“Ugh.”

“…..”

With a short groan they turned away, but it was the same everywhere they looked.

Every time the massive star flickered, it felt as though the starlight was looking around at the surroundings.

At that moment, the sky shuddered.

Like a soft blanket being patted by a hand, it distorted and swayed.

Somewhere it swelled out, somewhere else it caved in.

The starlight already dwelling in the night sky began to bend and scatter in every direction.

At the same time, an enormous sound that an ordinary ear could not perceive shook the world.

Thud.

They could not hear it with their ears, but the souls residing within their bodies shook briefly instead.

People lost their balance all at once and fell to the ground, breaking out in cold sweat.

Some even vomited.

“Wh, what? Why. Wait, bleh. Blehhh!”

“The sky, the sky just shook…”

“That’s not the problem!”

Most could not take their eyes off the sky, which showed no sign of settling down.

Though it was slowly calming, the very fact that the sky had shuddered was a shock.

But below the sky, a far more vivid streak than the day of the meteor shower was being drawn.

“A star is falling!”

Someone screamed it, and only then did all eyes turn to the trajectory the star had drawn.

Sparkling golden fragments were slicing the dark sky in half.

As if they were the remnants left behind by a sun that had once brilliantly lit the world.

Golden light was a nostalgic trace, a symbol of the time before the world was swallowed by darkness.

So people struggled to their feet even through the dizziness. Driven by the sole thought of wanting to see it a little closer.

The people who had managed to raise themselves watched the sunlight-like star fragments in silence.

Until an enormous gale swept in carrying small stones and sand with it.

Whoooooooooosh!

What filled the eardrums was the sound of something being torn apart.

And the moment that sound rang out, the dead forests on the outskirts of the shelter began to shake violently.

Crack, thud, crash.

The rotted trees snapped and fell in unison.

The branches that had barely clung on were shattered to pieces in an instant and scattered away like powder.

The rags that had just been fluttering in the wind were ripped apart into threads and cloth scraps and flew through the sky.

“Oops!”

“Grab onto anything!”

The lighter ones stumbled and fell to the ground, and.

“O God! Forgive our sins!”

“Good grief, just lie flat so you don’t roll away!”

“Oh oh oh oh!”

Those with some bulk pressed themselves to the earth and endured the gale.

Only a few who had once been clergy stood up unperturbed with outstretched arms.

The old priest, wearing what had become nothing more than a rag of a clerical robe, swayed in the wind and even scolded those around them.

“Can you not understand even seeing this?! That star, that was none other than a living god!”

“What are you…”

“It was in order to show those who did not believe! O how foolish I had been…! God Who Makes Stars, I knelt before you at last!”

“They had finally gone mad.”

He was undaunted even by words laced with contempt and mockery.

In the way he had devoted his whole life to, following the creed he had memorized, he paid the highest respect he was capable of.

“In place of the silent great pantheon, its humble servants implore your voice, your light! Grant us this!”

“Had you really lost your mind? The priest was actually a decent person until now…”

“Living that life I’d have lost it too.”

“Show us! God Who Makes Stars, Star Creation! Godfather of all stars yet to come!”

At that moment, an explosion occurred.

A literal explosion.

A flash far more vivid than a lightning strike pierced through every obstacle on the ground and blazed.

It was an overwhelming amount of light that did not permit a single shadow to obstruct it, yet strangely, the eyes of those watching remained unharmed.

Even though the star had fallen somewhere far, far beyond where anyone could see.

Purely through light alone, the boundary between body and surroundings was completely dissolved.

It did not last long, of course.

But it was enough, even in that fleeting instant, to feel the sensation of the paradise promised by the gods, the Elysium, that even a moment could convey.

When the light faded and reality returned, the people were all without exception shedding tears.

“Th… that just now.”

“Ah, Mom. Mom was there.”

“Dear, did you see? Our third child!”

“I, I did. What did I just see?”

“Priest! Priest, what was that light?!”

Everyone was craving an answer.

Not only the old priest who had been shouting praise, but also those who had mocked the priest and those who had been trembling with dizziness.

And the answered question was received by the old priest alone.

The old priest stood firm against the tidal wave of questions and could not stop their hands from trembling.

In their palm was a small Starflower.

A Starflower radiating starlight brighter than any they had seen before.

The old priest’s tears would not stop.

“You have shown us, Star Creation…”

The trembling old priest told the people the truth.

“That the people our god gathered are not abandoned.”

“…”

“And that those who have been taken are not dead.”

All movement fell silent.

People who had been wracked with guilt and grief toward those missing, and people who had treated the missing as though they had never existed, alike stood motionless.

“It means those people are still alive.”

The old priest’s voice finally cracked.

Even so, it still carried to everyone’s ears.

“Star Creation had gone to bring them back.”

***

I thought it would only be damp and wet at the deepest bottom of the sea.

Apparently, the situation had changed due to my somewhat unusual method of arrival.

[Wh, wh… what is this.]

The ground was parched and dry.

No, the moment I reached out my hand and swept it across, it went beyond dry and began to melt, hollowing out into a depression.

As soon as a hard stone was placed upon my hand, it transformed into bright red molten rock and flowed down through my fingers.

It wasn’t just stones that were flowing.

Thududududuk-.

Small scraps of flesh were pouring down like a shower.

Even those, once they drew near me, burned away into ash and scattered.

I raised my head and surveyed the surroundings.

A massive wall reaching hundreds, if not thousands of meters, was encircling all sides.

A towering wall made of dark blue water.

But it wasn’t merely clean.

Crammed within that massive wall were things swimming.

The problem was that every single one boasted a familiar and grotesque appearance.

Leeches, lugworms, mermen, sea serpents, and Leviathans.

Fortunately, the majority of them were dying.

[Ah, aaah. Th, this. This… this. How, how!]

The sea was boiling.

Surging steam became bubbles and boiled up furiously in the waters around this area.

The sea was rushing to fill the crater I had plunged into, but even the ground was squishy and melting.

One day the sea would fill it again, but not yet.

Whoooooooosh, whoooooooosh-.

Only a single cry could be heard through the boiling steam.

I lowered my head again and looked at what was before my eyes.

At the dark reddish mud, half of whose body had already burned away the moment I fell.

[Sun God! Sun God, help me! Sun God!]

“The Sun God cannot help you.”

The answer was simple.

If it boasted absolute supremacy in the sea.

“It is time for judgment, demon!”

I shall remove the sea.