Mystery: Big Alarm Clock Ghroth Path

Chapter 372 Bandit's Combat Wisdom
Under this slash, Arexos, now shattered, was filled with disbelief.

He could clearly sense that Roger's "shadow of depravity" was not an attack launched against him from the outside, but rather that it had been a part of his own "shadow" from the very beginning!
At this moment, Roger's "Shadow of Corruption," which had been lurking in the shadow of Arexus, finally bared its fangs and dismantled the seemingly indestructible armor that could freely deform with the movement of the shadow from the inside!
In fact, this was one of the things Roger had planned in advance: to use his "secret insight" into the mystical nature of a portion of Arexos's blood as a foundation to give "Shadow of the Fall" a fate consistent with Arexos.

Roger's plan was to bury the "Shadow of Corruption," who possessed the "Demon Slayer" and whose fate had been altered, within Arexos's own shadow.

However, this has a drawback: almost all demigods who follow the "Hanged Man" path are demigods who control the shadow, so Arexos will immediately notice that his shadow has been tampered with.

Therefore, Roger was originally worried about how to send his "shadow of corruption" into Arexos's own shadow without being noticed by the other party. Fortunately, after carefully reviewing his understanding of Ouroboros's abilities, he guessed that the two of them probably had a conditionally triggered "reboot" effect. Later, Roger's observation with "Secret Insight" after arriving in Plantagenet further confirmed this to him.

In terms of the principle of "rebooting", it is not about reversing time, but rather about reading a pre-set "fate save file". That is, it uses a pre-saved segment of Arexos and Venera's fate to overwrite their current fate, thereby helping them escape some inevitable endings.

For those outside the realm of destiny, a certain degree of self-awareness dissonance will inevitably occur after each "reboot." This is essentially because the "archived" node of the reboot is different from the self's experience in the node before the reboot. This will lead to a certain degree of cognitive bias, so that people who have experienced the "reboot" need a period of time to recall and immerse themselves in their current situation.

This is similar to what is written in those online novels. When a person is reborn to a certain point in the past, their first reaction is usually to determine "what time it is" by looking at the surrounding environment and recalling what happened at that time, so as to balance the differences in self-cognition that occurred between before and after the rebirth.

On the other hand, Urelius, the "Angel of Fate," lost many psychological states at various points in time due to the excessive number of restarts he underwent. This resulted in his mental state being close to that of a child. Apart from his unwavering loyalty to the "True Creator," his thoughts were the most abnormal among the former eight archangels.

It is precisely because of this mechanism, and because of the slight incongruity of fate, that Arexos will have an adaptation process after "rebooting" by shifting his attention to the outside world, and will not immediately notice the subtle changes that have occurred in his shadow.

As for how to trigger this "reboot", Roger can almost be certain from the previous battles that the "Box of the Old Days" is one of the triggers for this restart of fate. In other words, the banishment effect of the "Box of the Old Days" on Arexus and Venera will be negated.

Roger also knew that Amon, the "Angel of Time," and Ulrich, the "Angel of Fate," were probably playing a game of power over the people he supported behind his back. Therefore, the "reboot" power that Ulrich bestowed upon Arexos and Venera was likely tampered with by Amon.

As expected, when Roger used the "Box of the Ancients" on Arexos and Venera, their fates were about to be restarted. However, with Amon's counter-strategy, the "restart" was delayed for a period of time. This allowed Roger to successfully bring the two demigods to the lifeless and uninhabited "Blackwing Reef" according to the original battle plan, and launch a concentrated attack on them there.

Shocked, Arexos' first reaction after being shattered was to reassemble his flesh and blood to revive, but he was surprised to find that he seemed unable to do so.

"what happened???"

At this moment, Arexos finally realized that something had changed in his soul. In the past, he could reassemble his flesh and blood and regenerate quickly with just his willpower, but now this mechanism had become extremely difficult.

Even the connection between the flesh and blood cells he had previously distributed for resurrection and himself was severed at this moment. Moreover, the souls enslaved by Arexus also began to stir restlessly, with many malicious forces pointing directly at Arexus's spiritual essence.

"curse?"

In his anxious, rapid thinking, Arexos considered this possibility.

"There's something wrong with that sword!"

When the physical body is destroyed, the spirit is exposed, and the "Shadow of Corruption" seized this opportunity to harm Arexos's soul with a sword that had been pre-cursed by the "White Saintess" Katarina Pelle!

Because Arexos had only recently taken the potion, his digestion was still in its early stages, so this sudden disturbance caused him to show signs of losing control.

At the same time, Bandit, clad in black armor, with a physique as robust as a lion, holding the "Spirit and Flesh Blade" in his mouth, and having already dealt with the "puppet," appeared from behind a portal of light.

At the same time, the figure of "White Saintess" Katarina Pelle appeared, and as black flames and petrifying rays spread out, the pitch-black greatsword also slashed down.

Seeing that Arexos, which was already on the verge of spiraling out of control, was about to be destroyed, Roger once again felt unusual ripples spreading through his and Bendit's fate.

A flash of silver light appeared, and Arexos reappeared unharmed in the spot where he had been standing.

The power of "rebooting" has been triggered once again!
As long as his spirit is not completely destroyed, a part of his physical body still exists, and his destiny has not completely dissipated, even if Arexos is on the verge of death, the power of this Sequence 1 archangel can save him.

However, at this moment, his three heads looked very bad. This was not only because it was the last chance for "rebooting" that Urelius had left on him, but also because the "puppet's" soul had not been successfully resurrected during the reboot.

The reason is simple: the soul of this "puppet" has been completely destroyed and vanished into thin air, losing its own destiny and therefore cannot be "rebooted".

For a moment, Arexos considered running away, but before he could use the teleportation ability of one of his enslaved "travelers" to escape, Bandit once again disabled the spatial teleportation on the "Blackwing Reef".

"Not awesome anymore?"

Although Roger realized what had happened, he remained calm and made a sarcastic remark.

Because of the "curse," the flesh fragments that Arexos had previously released to help him resurrect had been completely removed, and now "teleportation" was disabled, so Roger was no longer afraid that Arexos would escape.

"Kneel down and call me 'Master,' and I might consider making your death more dignified."

Roger quickly glanced at Klein, who had accumulated a certain amount of misfortune but was still using Maggie Lopez to withstand most of the misfortune-related spells released by "Saint of Misfortune" Vinera, thus constantly wearing down her opponent and not in a hurry to kill her, and Lindsay Louise, who was still fighting against the incomplete mythical creature form thanks to the infusion of music rules from Roger's mental domain. Then he said to Arexos with a mocking look on his face.

"*&%&^*..."

Upon hearing this, Arexos immediately launched into the most offensive insults, but Roger, instead of getting angry, simply shook his head slightly.

Do you know why I chose this place to fight you?

He suddenly spoke up and asked.

Arexos was taken aback by these words, but the next second, he saw Roger make a strange gesture with his left hand and point at him in the air.

A thunderous explosion suddenly echoed in the sky. Arexos looked up and saw that a meteorite with a diameter of nearly 100 meters had broken through the clouds and was falling toward the stone platform of the "Blackwing Reef"!

The meteorite's outer shell was a fiery white with a reddish tinge. On the other hand, although it was still far away from Arexus, there was a strange wind pressure that locked Arexus in place at a distance of nearly 10,000 meters, rendering him unable to move!

Arexos was shocked. Although he knew Roger had the ability to summon meteors, he had never experienced it firsthand and therefore hadn't taken it seriously.

In his view, although these types of meteorite attacks have a large range and high intensity, they are generally not a big problem as long as you dodge them in time.

However, heaven knows why this meteorite is so strange; right now, Arexos can hardly move.

He immediately thought of using "self-destruction" to break free from the wind pressure lock, but Bandit, standing next to Roger, raised the greatsword in his mouth to the air and then slashed it down at Arexus.

The strike was powerless, yet it caused a noticeable distortion in the space between the tabby cat and Arexos.

The next second, a phantom portal of light appeared behind Alexstrasza, which immediately sucked him in and temporarily "exiled" him.

Roger was slightly taken aback by this action. Just as he was about to ask a question, he suddenly realized Bandit's intentions.

That is, it should have "exiled" Arexos to a space behind a door that was not suitable for self-destruction, and then released Arexos the moment the "Star Punishment" meteorite fell.

This way, it can be ensured that he cannot use any potential means of escape while taking 100% of the damage.

As for Roger and his allies, Bandit could use the "exile" and "transformation" effects under the "magnification" effect to throw them into a safe alternate dimension to avoid this bombardment.

This idea is very similar to a classic team composition in a game Roger played in his previous life, which involves temporarily banishing certain enemy units to another dimension and releasing them at a specific time to ensure that other teammates' non-targeted control or damage skills can hit and deal full damage.

"I didn't expect this guy to have such high combat talent."

Roger suddenly looked at Bandit with newfound respect.

Even if Arexos was a demigod, after eating such a meteorite with its maximum energy and temperature, he would most likely be severely injured, if not killed.

However, just to be on the safe side, and unsure whether Arexos still had any "reboot" chances left, Roger placed a mystical pathogen created by Katarina Pelle around the portal of light released by Bandit. This pathogen could kill flesh cells and had a curse effect. It was one of his backup plans for Arexos, and it would be useful in the current situation to greatly increase the probability of killing Arexos.

At that very moment, the "Saint of Calamity" Vinera also noticed the meteorite above her head.

At this moment, she opened her eyes, revealing her mercury-like pupils.

No, it's more accurate to say it has four eyes than two.

On the sides of Vinera's two pupils, there was another pupil on each side, which looked extremely eerie and grotesque, so much so that Roger and Klein, who had originally thought of her as a beautiful woman, both felt their scalps tingle.

Considering that the eyes of Ouroboros, Will Onsetin, and even Rijold, who also belonged to the "Fate" pathway, were not like this, Roger guessed that Vinera's strange appearance might be a congenital mutation, or it might be due to some special curse or pollution. However, it seems that it is precisely because of this peculiarity that Vinera's combat power is much higher than that of ordinary Sequence 4 demigods.

Vinera's eyes began to dart around rapidly, and the next moment her secondary eyes suddenly turned to face forward, while her primary eyes moved to the side.

Both eyes turned to Roger at the same time, and in that instant, Roger felt his fate undergo a tremendous upheaval!

At the same time, a fairly strong wind suddenly arose over the Sunia Sea, so much so that the trajectory of the meteorite released by Roger was slightly deflected.

This made Roger laugh.

The next second, a phantom figure detached from Roger's body, stepped into the night, and then disappeared.

At this moment, the "misfortune" that accompanied Roger was completely wiped away, and replaced by an extremely powerful stroke of luck!

The wind in the sky completely disappeared, and the landing point of the "Star Punishment" meteorite returned to normal once again, landing precisely at the place where Arexus was currently being exiled.

"how is this possible?"

Vinera's eyes widened in shock. Only now did she have to admit that Roger's abilities had exceeded her expectations.

Previously, when she fought "Trickster" Klein, she noticed that the rate at which the bad luck accumulated on the other party was far below the expected level. Normally, even enemies at the same demigod level would be at a disadvantage due to various combat mistakes or the bad luck that plagues them, under the effect of Vinera's bad luck spells, which had almost completely absorbed the "Bad Luck Mage" potion. Ultimately, she could easily reverse the situation and kill them.

However, it seems that Roger possesses some special fate-related ability that can offset or even reverse the effects of the "Mage of Misfortune" ability.

However, this was not the end of the story. Immediately afterwards, Vinera felt that her fate had taken an abnormal turn again.

Her fate seemed to have been altered by something. If she had to put it into words, she believed that she and Arexos, the "Shadow Saint," shared some kind of mystical commonality at this moment.

Because of this, the wind pressure that had originally locked onto Arexos instead locked onto Vinera, rendering her unable to move as she had intended to use a sealed artifact on her body to quickly escape the scene.

In fact, Roger had always wanted to see how Vignera, the "Mage of Misfortune," would deal with him, because the name of the "Mage of Misfortune" potion sounded like a sequence that was good at giving bad luck.

However, Roger had guessed that this ability might be ineffective against him, and now, after his own experiments, he had proven that this was indeed the case.

The core reason for this is that the "living horoscope" does not have a fixed destiny. Almost all extraordinary abilities that utilize the inertia of destiny will become ineffective when facing the "living horoscope" because the corresponding inertia of destiny can be dispelled.

Moreover, the "Living Star Chart's" abilities of "fate bestowal" and "identity alteration" can act on a group simultaneously, and Roger had already altered the fate of all his comrades before the battle.

Afterwards, with the support of the "Original Core", he directly used "identity alteration" to control Vinera with the wind pressure of "Star Punishment". Although he knew that Vinera might still have the power of "reboot" and this attack might not be able to kill her completely, for Roger, it was good to remove one of the buffs.

Just a second before the "Star Punishment" meteorite struck, a phantom resembling their own shape detached from Klein, Bandit, and Lindsay.

As these "false identities" were detached, they realized that they had been affected by area-of-effect doom spells, which, while not fatal, were still subtly influencing them.

Lindsay thus found an opportunity to retaliate. He transformed into a streak of light once more, unleashing a violent sonic boom. Taking advantage of the moment when the "manipulator" was not paying attention, he plunged the short sword burning with black flames into the dragon's heart!
As Lindsay landed, the portal flashed by, and Bandit released Arexos again, then "exiled" himself and the others to the space behind the portal. A moment before Roger entered the alternate dimension, he saw a meteorite larger than 20 semi-trailer truck cabs crash into the stone platform of "Blackwing Reef."

As it pulverized the newly appeared Arexos, the meteorite also triggered a violent shockwave, creating tsunamis tens of meters high in all directions!
Immediately afterwards, Roger, Klein, and the others went to a barren mountaintop.

Although there is no sunlight around this mountain, the mountain itself emits a faint glow. More importantly, there is not only oxygen all around, but also a cool breeze.

This was an alternate dimension that Bandit had chosen in advance. It had confirmed that there were no hidden pathogens or toxic substances in the environment here, and that its members could stay for a short period of time.

About ten seconds later, Roger and the others disappeared from the hilltop again and reappeared on the "Blackwing Reef".

At this moment, the stone platform of "Blackwing Reef" looks almost completely different.

The originally blackened stone ground has now turned bright red, clearly scorched by high temperatures, and meteorite fragments are scattered all over the ground and island, and even the sea level around it has dropped significantly.

Due to the instantaneous evaporation of a large amount of seawater, fog filled the area around "Blackwing Reef," and a few seconds later, it began to drizzle from the sky.

At this moment, Arexos had been blown into charred clumps of flesh, with only his three heads remaining, which seemed to retain their original shape, rolling on the ground.

Due to the double blow of the Sequence 3 level "Mystical Pathogen" and the "Star Punishment" impact, Arexos was even unable to use his flesh-based abilities and the Shadow Armor that could reduce damage.

As for Vinera, she also disappeared, but Roger judged from the familiar "fate" power fluctuations at the scene that Vinera herself was not dead.

"Let me ask you one more time, are you still as arrogant as ever?"

In the rain, Roger smiled as he crouched down and looked at Arexos's oldest face.

“Just kill me if you want, why all the talk?”

"In any case, I have done my best for my Lord... unlike you, a traitor who deceives the world, falsely claims to be the Son of God, and parades around in the name of a saint!"

"Roger Abraham, I curse you! You will die a horrible death like your mad ancestor!"

Arexos scoffed and cursed.

These words contained an insult to Mr. "The Door" Bethel Abraham. Normally, Roger would have been surprised that Alexstras knew so much and annoyed by his rudeness, but at this moment he did not show any anger.

He simply closed his eyes, recalling the appearances and deeds of his ancestors and forerunners such as Bethel, Amra, and Raziel, before opening his eyes to look at Arexos on the ground.

"Thank you for elevating me to the same level as our ancestors."

After a long pause, Roger suddenly laughed:
“I don’t blame you. You’re just serving the god you believe in… From every perspective, the ‘true creator’ is fundamentally in line with my position.”

"However, judging from what you're saying, you probably don't know what sacrifices our ancestor made for this planet."

"In a sense, Mr. Door was indeed a madman, and it was because of him that the Abraham family had not had a few days of peace for more than a thousand years."

"But how could you possibly understand that the descendants of Abraham's family have been giving their lives for this world, one after another?"

After saying this, Roger shook his head slightly:

"In any case, based on your current understanding and contributions, you are not worthy of insulting the great 'Gate of Ten Thousand Gates'."

After saying this, Roger formed another special hand seal with his left hand, and colorful light flashed on Arexos's three heads at the same time.

"Goodbye, Arexos."

“From now on, the ‘Aurora Festival’ will be in my hands.”

As soon as he finished speaking, Arexos's three heads exploded one after another. In his weakened state, he was powerless to resist the effects of the "Astral Explosion".

After a while, as a silvery light spread out, "Saint of Calamity" Vinera was "rebooted" once again.

This was the last time she could use the "reboot" power, and faced with the fact that her ability had little effect on Roger, Vinera felt utterly desperate.

In an instant, Lindsay, Klein, and Bandit surrounded the "Mage of Misfortune," while Bandit reiterated the prohibition related to "teleportation" to prevent Vinera from escaping.

"If you're expecting the 'Angel of Fate' Urolius to descend, I advise you to stop fantasizing."

Roger knew that with Amon helping to hold Ulrich back, it was unlikely that Ulrich would descend upon Blackwing Reef at this time; otherwise, the consequences of his own death would be unacceptable to Amon and Adam.

"Do you have any last words?"

He paused for a moment, then looked at the beauty opposite him.

To be honest, because of the religious beliefs of "New Fog City," he originally didn't really want to kill Vinera.

However, as Amon had said before, Roger, as an Outer God avatar with authority over “destiny” capable of disrupting the balance of power, would ultimately have to choose a candidate for the “Key of Light” to support.

In a sense, this may not have been his choice, but rather the "Key of Light" choosing its own candidate in the dark. Roger was just one of the most important driving forces in the whole process.

Therefore, although Roger himself did not want to make a choice so quickly, his conflict with Vinera was now irreconcilable.

Regardless of whether Will or Ouroboros ultimately wins, Vignera must die at this moment; that cannot be changed.

After hearing Roger's words, Vinera remained silent for a long time before opening her eyes again and asking:
"What did you mean when you said that my Lord and you share the same position?"

This is the only thing she cares about. Born with double pupils, she was abandoned by her parents in her childhood due to her deformity and became an orphan wandering the streets.

If she hadn't been adopted by a divine messenger from the "Aurora Society," she wouldn't be where she is today.

Vinera still remembers the words of the divine messenger: "You have two pairs of pupils, so you will surely be able to see further into destiny."

And this was the first compliment Vignella had ever heard in her life.

Since then, Vignella has maintained a fervent faith in and absolute respect for the "true creator," but at this moment, she is also very curious about Roger's words.

In fact, her question was full of overstepping her bounds.

But for Vinera, who died without a burial place, the underlying motivation for asking this question was whether Roger and the forces supporting him would be detrimental to the "true creator".
She needs to figure this out, otherwise she won't even die peacefully.

"Since things have come to this, there's no harm in telling you."

Roger shook his head, glanced at his three teammates, and finally placed his right hand on Vinera's shoulder.

Vinera didn't understand Roger's meaning at first, but before she could speak again, a series of words rang in her ears.

Roger told her everything he could, and the process lasted about two minutes.

When he lowered his hand again, Vinera's lips were already tightly clenched and his brows were furrowed.

After a long while, her expression finally relaxed.

The "Saint of Calamity" nodded to Roger:

"Let's do it."

"it is good."

Roger nodded, then placed the index finger of his left hand on Vinera's forehead.

Vinera closed her eyes in relief, and as three colors of light shone between the brows of this "Saint of Calamity," her body finally fell heavily backward.

Roger watched Vignella fall silently, then sighed.

He did not choose to enslave Venera's soul, but simply waited for the 15 extraordinary qualities of herself and Arexos to be released one by one.

In addition, he also found a sealed object on Vinera that was highly suspected to correspond to the extraordinary characteristics of the "Sailor" pathway Sequence 4 "Disaster Priest," resembling a blue crystal pendant.

Perhaps because the side effects were too strong, Vinera never used this sealing artifact from beginning to end.

Roger thought for a moment, then placed the blue crystal on the ground, laid out his other spoils, and looked up at his three teammates:
"A total of 5 demigod-level acquisitions. Apart from the one I'm returning to the 'School of Life' from Vinera, we'll each take one of the remaining 4."

"You can take whatever you like from those 10 items with the sequence characteristics, but each person can take no more than 3 items."

The five demigod-level items are the extraordinary attributes of "Three-Headed Sanctuary", "Doom Mage", "Disaster Priest", "Manipulator", and "Puppet".

"You choose first, Captain."

Lindsay thought for a moment, then spoke:

“You did the most work; we’re all just here to work.”

"Ok."

Roger didn't stand on ceremony. After a moment's thought, he chose the extraordinary characteristic of the "Three-Headed Sanctuary".

The reason for this choice is that he will definitely need to cultivate a new saint within the "Aurora Society" in the future, and he already has an extra "Black Knight" extraordinary trait. If he connects to the "Three-Headed Sanctuary" next, it will be more advantageous in terms of both combat power improvement and the smoothness of the advancement curve.

On the other hand, judging from the content of Roger and Adam's covenant, the probability of him being promoted to the "Tri-Headed Sanctuary" is very low, in addition, the appearance of the "Tri-Headed Sanctuary" is indeed not very beautiful.

So if possible, he still hopes to see if he can jump his secondary pathway sequence from "Black Knight" to a different pathway sequence 3.

After Roger made his selection, Bandit, who had contributed the second most in this battle and displayed incredible combat wisdom, was nominated by Klein and Lindsay as the second member of the team after some polite refusals from the other two.

"I choose..."

Bandit was in a dilemma for a moment. This was the first time it had obtained a powerful spoils other than the "Virtual Star Hub," and it was having some difficulty in making a choice.

"Bandit, can I give you some advice?"

Just then, Roger smiled and spoke at the opportune moment.

(End of this chapter)