Chapter 94: Try to live up to the name
Ginnungagap was the Void, the great emptiness that seperated the frozen Niflheim and the burning Muspelheim, two realms of Yggdrasil that were linked by a flow of water that leaked from Niflheim to Ginnungagap and was frozen, and the ice flowed to Muspelheim where it was thawed and turned into water of life.
From that water sprang forth Ymir, and from his body, the races of all of realms of Yggdrasil, it's leaves.
Many races outside Norse had a name of their own for the same realm of emptiness and non-existence, such as Chaos of the Greek, or cosmogonical chaos of christian mythos that seperated Heaven and Earth.
The Devils, however, called that void the 'Interdimensional Gap'.
So, when Momonga pulled out the World Item of YGGDRASIL, [Ginnungagap], and struck it to the ground, [Boosted] by a factor of thirty-two… The Void extended.
There was no sound, no motion, but rather the world lurched as a chunk of it was twisted from the natural order.
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A gigantic shimmering rift opened from Japan, reaching across the Sea of Japan and splitting North and South Korea in more permanent fashion than by mere border.
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The Great Red, the True Dragon of Interdimensional Gap, paused his floating-around as he squished his snout on something like a seapark seal that had swam into the glass wall of a pool.
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The ground in front of Momonga was ground no longer, and instead there was a wide kaleidoscopic void of dancing colours and dark shadows, each twisting around each other like a madman's painting that had been submerged in boiling transparent oil and inwardly lit by shimmering starlight.
'Eh?' Momonga was feeling a bit puzzled as he held the World-class item [Ginnungagap] by the shaft, the shock and lack of Emotion Suppression leaving him a bit surprised and stunned over the unexpected effect of the staff. 'I thought this just deleted modified terrain, counteracting [Creation] or other terrain manipulation things? I figured that this could destabilize the ground and cause the Dark Young to topple over?'
Momonga felt that he was partially right in his assessment, as the ground in front of him was no longer ground, but instead looked more like a portal to the kaleidoscopic realm he had visited briefly when he had first 'arrived' to the Ero-World.
More importantly, however, the Dark Young… Had disappeared.
Momonga sighed in relief until he heard a screech of incredible anger.
He turned his eyes to the side, and saw that Shub-Niggurath was looking directly at him with all seventeen of her remaining building-sized goat-like eyes
'Yes, I believe that this is a good time to escape…' Momonga hurried towards the teleporters and the group of Three Faction defectors who were huddling in their hastily-made formations and staring wide-eyed at Momonga.
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However, when Shub-Niggurath's attention had been drawn away from Cthulhu, the young (at least when compared to Shub-Niggurath's age) Star-God took the opportunity that it was presented.
Timelines snapped to certainty as the distraction allowed Cthulhu to manipulate reality freely, snatching the future from Shub-Niggurath's tentacles… And Cthulhu punched Shub-Niggurath with the altered, augmented reality that turned the simple physical action into something utterly illogical- At least from the point of view of the 'old reality'.
But, from the point of view of the 'new reality', the punch made complete sense.
The full-body twist uppercut connected with Shub-Niggurath's 'main' jaw in slow motion as the living tree-mother was distracted, sending the ancient Mother flying directly upwards, and blowing a hundreds of tons of oxygen out of Earth's atmosphere alongside her, and causing the Outer God to live up to its name as it was sent straight out of Earth's atmosphere in a ball of oxygen-turned-to-plasma, nearly at the speed of light.
And she kept picking up speed all the way through, until she broke the speed of light, and the speed of light around her 'sped up' to match, effectively rewriting the laws of physics and thermodynamics in a bubble of reality around her until nothing conventional made sense.
Thus, the creature flew off at a speed that was utter impossibility in the 'old' reality for multiple reasons, but what Cthulhu had dreamed into being possible in the 'New' reality.
The Ancient, goatish Star-God passed the Karmen line in a picosecond, flew straight out of Earth's magnetosphere, crashed right through the entire planet of Venus, and flew in a stumble towards the Sun like a bullet that had passed a sheet of plywood.
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Amaterasu was feeling groggy as the Sun-god of Shinto, and the leader of Shinto Gods, was waking up from her nap in the sun.
Quite literally in the sun, as the aforementioned 'sun' god had unironically ungodly amounts of resistance to fire that allowed her to basically sunbathe in a literal sense, since she could 'live' in the vacuum of space and was immune to being sunburned. Again, in a literal sense.
She had felt odd tremors which had woken her up, and she focused her attention towards the 'Earth' where her cute little pets were mewling and playing with each other the last time she checked up on them.
Amaterasu's eyes widened to the size of saucers as she saw a ancient goatish tree of terrifying power stumble-fly straight towards her, bleating all the way through, at speed which was impossibility for multiple reasons-
But before Amaterasu could do much other than realize that Shub-Niggurath of all things was careening straight at her, the Outer Being hit the Sun God with the force of two stars colliding and pushed both into the heart of the sun.
And, much like what could happen in a catastrophic collision of two massive stellar objects, they merged.
And then, as their power was utterly anathematic to the other, they collapsed into each other.
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Momonga looked up, as did quite literally the entire group of devils, angels and fallen that made the defectors to the 'True God's side.
Indeed, Shub-Niggurath had been punched into the sun by Cthulhu.
And the sun had collapsed.
In its stead was a black hole which was starting to create an accretion disk around it's event horizon, causing Earth to be lit by a thin, cold light of friction-burning stellar gas instead of the burning fusion of the Sun.
"Ahem, yes, I believe that things have gotten thoroughly out of hand right now." Momonga snapped his fingers to get the attention of people present.
Momonga felt a bit shaky so he reached to pat Yasaka's tail, as the woman was too busy staring at the no-longer-sun to object, considering how she was utterly shocked and open-mouthed and her eyes were wide as saucers.
Petting a cute thing calmed Momonga down, so he stopped petting Yasaka's tail and coughed, took down [Dimension Lock], and looked at Dominion Authority who didn't seem at all surprised by the sight, and neither were his other summons. "Activate the teleporter, please."
Cthulhu seemed to realize that Momonga and the group of mis-mash 'people' existed as the teleporter activated, and the Outer Being turned it's milky eyes towards Momonga once more… And the creature's molluscoid temple scrunched a bit, almost as if the creature was confused that Momonga still existed.
The gaze swept over the rest of the mish-mash of 'people', causing them to shudder and freeze.
The teleporter activated, taking the group away from the battlefield.
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The Great Red looked up after it had 'bonk'ed his snout against something tough, and saw that he had been surrounded by hundreds, if not thousands of Dark Young in the Interdimensional Gap.
The dragon managed to let a small 'eep'-sound before the slapping and goatish screaming started.
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Odin was… calm. Unnaturally calm, as if his emotional state had flipped over and had gone from rage, fear, anger and dread to calmness by the way of each of the negative emotions cancelling each other.
Which is to say, the god was perched on top of one of the last few relatively stable buildings in Kuoh, and was sitting on the dust while rocking back and forth while he had hugged his knees against his chest.
"Father…" Thor sat beside his father, although unlike Odin he wasn't sitting by choice.
Nor was he 'sitting' in a regular sense, as the Thunder God's lower half was nowhere to be seen, and his torso was leaning against the broken concrete wall of the building.
"I know. This is the end… Of everything. I couldn't prevent it… I should have known better than to try. Or perhaps it was part of the prophecy of Ragnarok, of Armageddon, that the End would come when we tried to prevent it?" Odin felt calm as he spoke to his brave son, or at least Thor was his son in a psychological sense, as despite Odin being 'All-father', he wasn't the biological father of neither Loki or Thor. Not that godlings like them had biological parents of regular, as each had come into being from the power of mythos and ancient lore.
Nonetheless, Odin loved his 'sons' as if they were his real sons. Even Loki, which was the only reason why he hadn't squashed the up-start annoyance.
Odin held his son's hand as Thor coughed blood. "That was foolish of you. You didn't even make a dent in the ranks of those horrors."
"...Better that… -Khah… than sit idly when our people fought and died." Thor's words caused Odin to feel not a small amount of shame.
The Thunder God had charged the horrific, malformed draconic creature that 'Momon', or as Odin better knew him as, Hastur had unleashed upon the Norse ranks and which had caused horrifying damage to Odin's people.
The Thunder God had fought honourably despite the horror's bloodthirsty rage, and would have won if not for the charge of the Dark Young which had split the fighters apart, and both had received a fair share of damage.
But where Hastur's horror had escaped in face of the onslaught once a dark creature had whacked it over the head, Thor had stood firm and fought the Dark Young in a desperate attempt to keep them away from the retreat of the remaining Norse forces- Even though there were scarce few places to escape to, since their longboats had been destroyed during Cthulhu's advance.
Nonetheless, Thor had fought valiantly… And lost inevitably.
The massive rift Hastur had opened in the veil of reality had torn into Thor as well, bisecting the weakened and battle-worn Norse God of Thunder, and Odin had swept down to grab him before he could be devoured entirely by the rift in reality.
Odin saw as Hastur, now unveiled and in his new, terrifying shape of a armored tyrant disappeared into a show-offish teleportation circle alongside a band of fools who chose eternal despair and torment in the lost kingdom of Carcossa over resisting their fate, or over a quick and painless death in their own hands.
Thor coughed and Odin's gnarled hand tightened it's grip on his son's hand… And the coughs died down.
Alongside the God of Thunder.
Odin slammed his fist on the building below them, causing long cracks to form in the concrete and bury his son's body in the masonry while he took flight.
The Allfather of Norse conjured his runic powers to craft the broken building into a massive tomb- His last gift to his lost son, before inevitable death would claim Odin as well.
Indeed, Odin saw as Cthulhu turned his body in the sea… and the Outer God fell to one knee.
Odin's breath caught in his throat as the world seemed to come to a halt, and hope rose in his heart- Cthulhu was wavering, the dreadful battle against the Outer Being's grand-mother having taken much of the ancient and only recently-awoken Being's strength.
Odin knew it was a massive gamble, but he knew that he had no alternatives.
He hoped that if he failed, Sirzechs or other Maous would be strong enough to finish Cthulhu off. It was a fool's hope, but it was the best Odin had.
Odin conjured a massive spear made of runecraft and bark of Yggdrasil, which shed and transported itself to the realm of Earth through the runes, under Odin's command.
The ancient tree of life withered, and it's leaves grew cold and grey as Odin pulled from the ancient energies that surrounded the Norse Realms. But Yggdrasil was self-aware, and gave from itself freely as the sentient tree knew the threat Cthulhu posed to both the realm of Earth, and to all realities connected to it.
Cthulhu seemed to realize the threat it faced, but it's form was beginning to flicker and fade alongside its strength. Thus it's milky, unseeing eyes widened, but it was unable to defend itself.
Odin lifted his hand, and the skies cleared even though the dark sky was lifeless without the sun.
He knew he wouldn't survive the after-effects of making a weapon like the one he had made, but he was willing to sacrifice himself- He was already dead in all but the last vestiges of his body and power, and his people were dead as well.
Thus, his last attack would be his last gift to the Earth he never truly loved.
The Tree of Yggdrasil shed, and from it's core formed a singular Spear, which Odin lifted to a throw.
The sacrifice of Odin's people, of his realms, of his sons… It all crystallized to one scream of anger, vengeance and agony while tears of loss and hope he wished to grant to others streaked down the old god's gnarled, ancient and crease-streaked face.
The god's hand was pulled back, the Spear of Yggdrasil aimed at Cthulhu's heart, and-
A spear of light came through Odin's chest after it had hit him square in the back.
The Spear of Yggdrasil fell from Odin's fingers.
Odin fell from the sky.
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Arch-Angel Michael of Heavens withdrew his extended hand, and placed his hands back to his sleeves.
In the distance the old, withered body of Odin fell from the sky and hit a massive tomb below him, and both the old god's body and the tomb itself shattered into dust.
The Arch-Angel withdrew his twelve pairs of wings as he landed on a half-ruined skyscraper while he looked at the Outer Being that was kneeling in the sea in the distance, but which had started to regain its shape and solidity.
'Father… Odin is no more.' Michael nodded to himself and prepared a teleportation circle.
He had seen the teleporter that had taken Father and his creations and followers away from the battlefield, no doubt to regain their strength and formulate a new plan of attack, and decided to follow them.
After all, Michael had completed his mission from Father, and could return.
'...I know Father knows the best. There is no doubt in my heart.' Michael spared a fleeting thought for the quickly-recovering Outer Being, but he knew that Father would have the situation under control and knew what he was doing.
And so, the heart of Arch-Angel Michael of Heavens felt light as he teleported after the group who had teleported off with Father.
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