Even so, Meruem's finger still throbbed faintly with pain. The Sea Emperor's Trident was a divine weapon, after all. He was only "bullying" Poseidon now because the god hadn't fully awakened and wasn't wearing his God Scale yet. Against a fully awakened god, only an idiot would try something this stupid.
To take, with bare flesh, the full power of a god wielding their own artifact—that was the sort of thing only a fool would do. If Meruem truly could pull that off, he would have already steamrolled his way through the gods, no scheming, no Four Fiend Cloths.
He'd have flattened the Heavens and gone straight to hunt down Yama.
But that was precisely the point: Meruem knew all this. No one else did. All they saw was him stopping a divine weapon with a single finger.
"Back you go." Meruem tapped the Trident again, this time precisely striking a critical joint along its shaft. He put real force into it.
Poseidon stumbled; for a moment the Trident nearly slipped from his grasp. Even so, he staggered back several steps and dropped unceremoniously back onto his throne.
Seeing him lose ground and fearing he might be hurt, Sorrento and Chrysaor rushed to stand between Meruem and Poseidon. "Your Majesty!"
"You see? Isn't this better? Don't go pointing weapons at people for no reason. It's terribly rude, Your Majesty the Sea Emperor." Because Poseidon was seated and Meruem was standing, he naturally loomed a head taller, looking down at him as he spoke.
He bit down especially hard on the word "respect."
Then, with another blink, Meruem vanished from before Poseidon and reappeared in an instant at Saori's side.
Ghostlike, unfathomable, coming and going without a trace.
Meruem's spatial mastery had long since reached perfection. Even a god of space might not gain the upper hand against him.
He had honed his spatial arts across multiple worlds, constantly refining and integrating spatial abilities from everywhere he went.
In terms of sheer style points, this was a perfect ten.
"Hahahaha…" Before Saori could speak, Julian, now fully possessed by the Sea Emperor, burst out laughing, eyes wild.
"Your Majesty!" "What's wrong, Your Majesty?" Sorrento and Chrysaor cried out.
"It's nothing." Julian raised a hand to silence them. When he lifted his head, his eyes were like flowing blue glass, something strange moving within.
"I have never felt so good as I do now." He rose from the throne once more. "In fact, I should thank you. If not for you, I might not have awakened this early."
A flash of brass‑colored light flared, and a plain yet practical Scale appeared before Julian.
Then another burst of radiant light engulfed the hall. When it faded, Julian was clad in his own—or rather Poseidon's—God Scale.
An immense Cosmo surged upward, smothering everyone in its pressure. The entire Undersea Temple shook as though struck by a magnitude‑ten earthquake.
Under that colossal Cosmo, none of the Saints present could raise the slightest will to fight. The air itself seemed to press down on them.
Poseidon had used Julian's body to fully resurrect. Or rather, Julian's soul had been completely wiped out by Poseidon.
To be blunt, these gods were rather ridiculous. They liked to possess human bodies, yet despised human souls for "tainting" their divine essence. Too proud to seize outright and end it quickly, they preferred the most drawn‑out method possible—slowly, bit by bit, devouring the soul.
Otherwise, a god of Poseidon's stature—second only to Zeus among the Twelve Olympians—needed only a single thought to turn a human soul to ash.
(Hades does not count among the Twelve Olympians, as he rules the Underworld and has no time for heavenly affairs. Strictly speaking, his territory is larger than the sea, earth, and sky combined, though far more barren. As a side note, he is one of Olympus's three strongest main gods.)
Because of this absurd approach, these main gods had been "outwitted" by the humans whose bodies they occupied in more than one Holy War—at least, that's how the gods liked to explain it.
"Athena… You have awakened as well, but without a God Cloth, how could you possibly be my match?" Poseidon raised the Trident and regarded Saori with an elegant smile, as if he'd already forgotten how Meruem had just suppressed him before his awakening. His first words went straight to her.
"To think you would dare bring these humans into my Undersea Temple. What were you thinking? Tell me—if I kill you here, won't the earth fall straight into my hands?"
He did not spare so much as a glance for the Saints around them, including the three Gold Saints.
True, three Golds together could unleash the forbidden Trinity technique, Athena Exclamation. That level of attack might trouble a not‑yet‑awakened Poseidon. And there were the so‑called Five God‑Cloth Guardians and god‑slayer Pegasus among them.
But Poseidon barely cared. If they hadn't been careless, how could the Twelve Main Gods have ever been hurt by a mere Pegasus?
The only real threat was Athena herself, a main god on his own level. Her divine power was no weaker than his. A fully awakened War Goddess Athena, clad in her God Cloth, was someone even he preferred not to face head‑on.
And the Athena before him, if he was not mistaken, had awakened exactly that warlike godhead.
That battle maniac of Olympus—the raging dragoness, as it were. How many years had it been since he'd seen her? Poseidon mused inwardly.
Back in one Holy War, she had beaten Ares—also one of the Twelve and a god who worshiped strength—to the point he'd lost helm and armor both.
Oh yes. Humans liked to call that war the Trojan War.
"Poseidon, it sounds like you're not taking me seriously at all. Forgotten what just happened?" Before Saori could answer, Meruem spoke up at her side.
Poseidon's earlier assessment of her was not wrong. Without her God Cloth, even fully awakened, she would still be at a disadvantage against him—
Especially here, in his home ground, the Undersea Temple.
"Human… I wasn't even looking for you, yet you dare step forward yourself? That's suicide. I'll deal with you first." Poseidon turned his gaze on Meruem, eyes glittering with menace.
______
(≧◡≦) ♡ Support me and read 20 chapters ahead – patreon.com/Mutter
For every 50 Power Stones, one extra chapter will be released on Saturday.