Chapter 102 - Picking Sides

Within a matter of seconds after Gaia finished his sentence, a blinding flash of light enveloped the entire field. The white rays lingered for a while before converging into varying silhouettes.

The contenders had arrived.

"Meet our contenders!" Gaia shouted, not allowing the light to dissipate as to create a big reveal.

From left to right, the light slowly faded, first revealing a fighter of an enormous stature. The horned helmet that sat on the Giant King, Yama's head hid all his features except the mouth, which showed menacing rows of sharp, jagged teeth as his jaw clenched.

His four muscular arms were firmly folded, causing the heavy armor he donned to give off a scratching sound. Gaia smiled at the strong aura the Giant King was giving off.

Strongly contrasting with the reveal of the Yama, the next contender the light revealed was the Queen of the Prismatic Elves, a sweet looking lady named Ume. Unlike the rest of her kind, instead of having fully white eyes, her eyes radiated all the colors of the rainbow. With a calm smile, the sparkles that continuously hovered around her body, along with a snow white gown, made her look angelic.

This time it was Athena who bore a satisfied reaction.

With only two silhouettes of light remaining, the final reveal was the Dryad Emperor and Nereid Queen, Haise and Akua. Compared to the other fighters, these two monarchs of nature looked rather bland.

Haise donned an intricately designed robe, with veins of glowing green creating complicated patterns along the threads. Leaves floated above the seemingly wooden mage staff he carried with him. His messy hair covered his eyes, making it difficult to determine his current mood.

Akua's style was practically the same, simple but intricate designs but using water as a design element. Her sky blue hair cast an illusion of flowing water cascading down her back. Similar to Yama, she seemed quite enraged.

"Wonderful! Now for the finishing touches!"

Gaia threw his hands to the air, commanding the earth below him, bending it to his will. A powerful quake shook the lands as a fighting arena designed to resemble cupped hands roze from the earth. The joints in the fingers acted as a seating area.

Gaia expressed his satisfaction with this fighting arena. All that needed to be done now was choose the team members.

"Of course I'll be choosing first," Gaia grinned.

Tension began to build as Gaia slowly spun in midair, carefully examining each contestant. He looked over everyone a number of times before he finally stopped.

"You!"

His finger pointed at Misao.

But instead of showing utter shock, Misao responded with a scowl, projecting her hatred onto Gaia.

"Pretty dumb of you to pick me!" She growled, "What makes you think I'll willingly side with you?!"

In response to Misao, Gaia chuckled. This chuckle lasted for a while before he finally regained his composure, he sighed calmly before saying she didn't have much of a choice.

Raising his hand, Gaia caused tendrils of dark energy to wrap around Misao, burrowing into her ears and selected areas of her skin. Black veins stretched across her entire body, even her eyes.

"W-what... ghk! are you doing to me!?" Misao's will didn't seem to be able to resist whatever Gaia was doing as she slowly fell to her knees, clutching her head.

Gaia watched with satisfaction as this scene slowly unfolded, the tendrils contracted at regular intervals, as if injecting something directly into Misao.

"Gaia! There are other ways to get fighters for your team! Just choose someone else!" Athena's plea gave some minor insight into Gaia's intentions.

But Athena was simply ignored as Gaia's hand didn't even budge from it's position. A few more moments passed before the tendrils finally dissolved in the air. Misao laid still on the ground for a few seconds before slowly getting to her feet.

"Now Misao, I believe you said something about siding with me earlier?"

The air grew tense as Misao stared at Gaia with a blank expression, but all that was instantly changed to utter shock when she placed her fist across her chest before kneeling reverently before Gaia.

"I shall fight until my last breath, Lord Gaia" Misao's voice was dull, her eyes were completely lifeless, as if in some sort of trance.

"!!!"

Everyone present except Athena was shocked speechless. The fact that Gaia, so easily was able to twist Misao to do his bidding truly showed the evil capabilities his godly powers had.

While everyone else was frozen solid from shock, Takumi decided that enough was enough. With a guttural cry, he launched himself at Gaia in an attempt to free Misao of her mental bounds.

"The Misao I know wouldn't let someone take control of her this easily!" With a jump, Takumi led his attack with a punch.

Without batting an eye, Gaia stood afloat as the force from Takumi's attack made his clothes flutter. The attack almost landed when out of nowhere, Misao appeared, kicking his hand away.

Quickly using her momentum, Misao planted a downward kick into Takumi's stomach, sending him plummeting into the ground. Coughing from either the massive dust cloud created or potentially broken ribs, Takumi tried to get up.

*shinggggg!~*

Before he could even get to his feet, Misao was already behind him, holding her scythe to his neck. Light bounced off the golden blade that rested dangerously close to his throat, leaving a tiny nick.

"Enough Misao, I believe he has learned his place" As soon as Gaia said the word, Misao de-materialised her blade, not dispelling her aura just in case Takumi tried anything else.

Looking at Gaia's taunting smile, Takumi's body shook with rage, something about him abusing his godlike powers to take control of someone just didn't sit right with him.

Athena, noticing that Takumi was at his breaking point, gently laid her hand on his shoulder.

"Try to hold it in for now, once we win this tournament we'll get her back."

Seeing that even a Diety such as Athena was struggling to find a silver lining in this situation, Takumi felt he needed to do the same. Nodding with determination, he returned to Athena's side, allowing the choosing of sides to go on.

***

In only a few minutes, the strongest in Endolis were divided into two teams, with Gaia taking control of Yama the Giant King, Haise the Dryad Emperor and Misao, he was left with three fighters, one short of Athena's team.

"Ho! It would seem that we are short on competent fighters." Gaia shouted, with more joy rather than dissatisfaction, "No matter, that can be easily fixed"

Everyone expected Gaia to be greatly unreasonable with his choice to fix this deficit, doing something cruel like forcefully taking a fighter from Athena's team, but as he raised his hand, pointing his palm to the ground, this seemed highly unlikely.

"Raise no hōsoku o yaburu... Watashi wa fukkatsu suru..." (Breaking the rules of the afterlife... I resurrect...)

For the first time, Gaia's tone became low and collected, as if whatever he was doing was really having an effect on him.

While everyone else was dumbfounded by this change of atmosphere from the childish Diety, Athena immediately caught on.

With fear in her eyes, her body shivered, "He- he can't be... that chant..."

Before anyone could ask why Athena looked so terrified, the answer soon revealed itself. The ground beneath Gaia's palm began to crack, but not with an earthly fissure in the earth, but rather a dark, ethereal tear, radiated a stifling aura.

"Hassei suru..." (Arise)

With those words completing the chant, the spiritual fissure spat out a miasma of dark energy, and from that fissure, a jade claw came out. As the woman, with a gaping wound in her chest, crawled out of the hole, her empty demon eyes piercing through the black energy engulfing her, Takumi, and everyone present immediately understood what just occurred.

Urusla... had been resurrected...