The Forest on the Evacuation Route
The pungent smell of gunpowder mixed with dust and the scent of charred roses. The Uchiha elites silently guarded the core area, moving like a well-trained unit of ghosts under Hiroki's command, swiftly weaving through the ruins and the garden landscaping that hadn't been completely destroyed.
Hiroki's mind was almost entirely focused on the word "retreat."
Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced at the girl with the extraordinary aura in Izumi's arms—Kido Saori.
She showed no signs of panic; instead, she was like a statue of an ice goddess, frighteningly calm.
However, Hiroki could keenly capture the extremely subtle energy fluctuations rippling from Saori's body from time to time, containing a certain divine rhythm.
Like tides, or the aftershocks of a heartbeat, they radiated out faintly but clearly, aimed directly at the core of the energy storm in the distance—the battlefield of the Saints.
"Tsk, this must be the legendary Goddess buff..." Hiroki muttered to himself with a bit of helplessness and mockery. "Is this the legendary remote casting of the 'Cosmo of Love'? One of the essential elements for cheaters to grow?" He recalled the basic setting of the Bronze Five.
Once defeated, they would enter flashback mode, and then get the Goddess's buff.
However, his reason quickly suppressed the urge to complain. "Even buffs have to follow the basic laws of physics! The opponent is Saga! A demigod-level existence! Those little Bronzes can't even find the door to the Seventh Sense. Do they really think they can defeat Saga just because a remote healer gives them a few shots of health? Are they dreaming? At most, this buff will just let them lie on the ground a bit longer and spit out a few less mouthfuls of blood..."
The only thing he could hope for was that this "Goddess's Protection" would allow the Bronze Five to become immortal cockroaches, buying enough time for Saori to get away from this meat-grinder of a battlefield.
As long as Saori reached the "safe zone" determined by the system, his job would be considered a success. With ten thousand points in hand, he would never have to look at the world-destroying punch pressure of a Gold Saint again.
"Toward Mount Kido of Senjin, full speed!" Hiroki barked, pointing toward the silhouette of a mountain covered in dense forest in the distance. It was far from the main estate and had complex terrain, making it the first planned safety node.
The team moved quickly through the forest, the shadows cast by the tall trees providing them with brief cover.
Izumi's movements as she held Saori were light and swift, her gaze vigilantly scanning the surroundings.
Uchiha Fugaku, Shisui, and Itachi were split between the flanks and the rear, their Mangekyo Sharingan glinting with an eerie light in the darkness, ready to respond to any sudden situation at any time.
However, just half an hour later, the glimmer of hope was completely extinguished.
Without any warning, and with even the energy alerts lagging for a brief moment—the sky suddenly distorted!
It wasn't a sound, but a silent roar of space being brutally torn apart!
Looking up, the pitch-black night sky in their field of vision seemed to be forced open by several huge gaps. It wasn't falling stars, but several energy meteors burning and flowing with a lava-like aura of destruction, condensed purely from terrifying Cosmo! They traced arcs of death, ignoring the scream of the air, accurately locking onto Hiroki's high-speed moving group!
"Galaxian Explosion!" A low, majestic voice filled with endless dark will exploded in everyone's minds like a divine punishment!
The shadow of death instantly enveloped them!
Without any need for orders, four blinding flashes of spiritual light erupted from the team! The top combat forces of the Uchiha family showed incredible chemistry and instinctive reactions at this moment.
"Susanoo!"
"Susanoo!"
"Susanoo!"
"Susanoo!"
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Four half-bodied skeletal warriors of different colors rose from the ground, roaring ferociously! They were no longer the energy skeletons of a first-time summon, but forms that condensed even greater power and were covered in energy armor!
Deep black, emerald green, crimson, and indigo! The four Susanoo were like four indestructible energy barriers, instantly unfolding and overlapping above, protecting the entire evacuation team below!
In the next second—
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!
The deafening sound of the explosion finally arrived! The air currents, carrying a torrent of heat and destruction, slammed violently into the four Susanoo! Blinding light swallowed everything, and the shockwave instantly turned the trees within a hundred-meter radius into powder, while the ground collapsed and cracked like tofu!
Hiroki could even clearly hear the tooth-aching "crack" of the Susanoo skeletons being squeezed and the energy armor being torn! Looking closely, he saw that on the front of the four giants' protective forms, which were bearing the impact of the Star Explosion, the hard energy armor was instantly covered in a spider-web-like pattern of dense cracks! Energy fragments fell like glass, and then were painfully and slowly repaired under the infusion of their masters' Spiritual Pressure.
They had tanked Saga's Galaxian Explosion! Just this long-distance "greeting" had caused the four Uchiha, who possessed top-tier Captain-level combat power, to feel unprecedented pressure!
The light of the four Susanoo dimmed a bit, and the expressions of Fugaku, Shisui, and the others instantly became solemn to the extreme.
"F*ck!" Hiroki felt a chill run from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, and the curses in his heart were almost screamed out. "He can even catch up to this??? Athena! Where are your cockroaches???"
"He didn't even say a word of greeting, just went straight to his ultimate?! Saga, oh Saga, your style of giving a meeting gift... which dimension's lunatic did you learn it from? You don't even know how to follow the standard procedure!"
As the smoke and dust slightly cleared, a golden figure descended like a deity, slowly landing on the open ground dozens of meters in front of everyone, blocking the path between the evacuation team and Mount Kido of Senjin.
With wild grey hair and a handsome yet malevolent face, the gemini gold cloth shimmered with an eerie light under the moonlight—it was indeed the blackened Saga!
His eyes, deep as black holes, were locked onto Kido Saori in Izumi's arms. The curve of his lips was full of mockery and cold killing intent.
"Heh, Athena... you truly impress me." Saga's voice carried a pressure that controlled everything, as if he were passing judgment. "Abandoning the warriors who fought bloodily for you and choosing to flee in panic? You... cowardly god!"
Saori remained silent. Her gaze bypassed Saga and seemed to be cast toward some distant void. Her clear eyes did not reflect Saga's image, only a deep nothingness.
The grin on Saga's face grew wider as he took a step forward. His terrifying Cosmo pressed down like a physical substance, as if he were about to strike in the next second and completely annihilate the Goddess along with these "ants."
However, a sudden change occurred!
"Ugh... st... stop!" Saga's body suddenly jerked, and the arrogance on his face was instantly replaced by some kind of agonizing struggle. He clutched his head, and his grey-black Cosmo, which was originally flowing with the aura of the abyss, fluctuated violently. Within it, a trace of... clear blue actually appeared?
Under the astonished gazes of everyone, his wild long hair actually began to rapidly turn into a soft blue from the roots, as if the color were fading! That other personality representing gentleness and protection—the will of the Good Saga—had forcibly broken free from the shackles of darkness at the critical moment of life and death!
"No! You cowardly fool! Stop it right now!" Saga's voice became chaotic and manic, sometimes low and dark, sometimes pained and struggling. "Don't interfere with me! Only... only I can lead the Sanctuary to victory! Only I can win the Holy War! Stop being fooled by those high and mighty gods!! They are hypocritical! Heartless! They only bring destruction!"
He roared madly, as if denouncing an invisible enemy, and as if affirming his own inner conviction. The blue and grey alternated rapidly through his hair, like two souls engaged in a life-and-death struggle within the same vessel.
This extreme mental internal conflict caused the terrifying Cosmo, which had been poised to strike, to become chaotic and unstable. The absolute pressure that had made it difficult for everyone to breathe also temporarily experienced stagnation and decay.
This turn of events made Hiroki's heart relax, as if he had caught a life-saving straw! "Quick! The personality split has started! This is our chance!"
He immediately issued an order to the system: "Abort the mission! Force teleportation immediately! Now! Before Saga wakes up!"
What did ten thousand points matter? Even for a million points, he would have to weigh whether he'd be alive to spend them! Having witnessed the power of the Galaxian Explosion, he absolutely did not want to face a monster of this level head-on! After the scene where four Mangekyo users barely held on and almost had their armor shattered, if they really fought Saga, his side would definitely not have a good time.
"..." The system showed a rare, brief "hesitation" (perhaps it was an illusion).
"Confirm execution of mission abort command? There is no penalty after aborting."
"Yes! Confirm! Hurry!" Hiroki was impatient.
"Processing mission abort command..."
Hiroki's heart had just been suspended and hadn't fully settled yet—Whoosh! Whoosh!
Two golden figures carrying strong Cosmo descended from the sky like comets, crashing down on either side of the struggling Saga! A powerful and cold aura spread out without concealment.
On the left, radiating Sekishiki of death and decay, with countless wailing souls seemingly swirling around the gold cloth—Cancer Deathmask! On the right, bringing a lethal rose fragrance and thick poisonous gas, with a handsome face but sinister eyes—Pisces Aphrodite!
"Boss! We're here!" Deathmask's voice carried its usual fawning and credit-seeking tone. "That Seiya kid still wanted to struggle, but he was completely flattened by one of your Star Explosions, and even the Sagittarius Cloth was half-shattered! Aiolia and Mu have also been taken care of!" Aphrodite said nothing, but his dangerous gaze swept over the surrounded Uchihas, the rose in his hand emitting a lethal light.
F*ck!!!! The curses in Hiroki's heart were like a stormy sea, and he felt his vision go dark. "Mu! Aiolia! You two useless pieces of trash! You actually got taken care of by two seafood guys?!"
In fact, what Hiroki didn't know was that after Saga dealt with Seiya, seeing that the battlefield was taking too long to conclude, he had conveniently taken care of Mu and Aiolia.
Then he had brought Little D and Aphro to pursue them. It was just that Saga's speed was faster, and Little D and Aphro couldn't keep up, so they had only just arrived.
Saga jerked slightly at the shouts of the two. His chaotic mind seemed to be stimulated, and the black will rose again. The blue in his eyes was quickly suppressed, and the grey pupils regained dominance, though there was a trace of fatigue deep within from the split. However, that icy killing intent became even more concentrated!
Hiroki's heart went completely cold.
They couldn't even withstand one Saga, and now there were two more Gold Saints? There were three on the other side! This was no longer a matter of risking one's life; it was seeking death! He instantly made up his mind: "Go home! This mission can't be done! System, teleport!"
Just as he was prepared to disregard everything and confirm the abortion again, the consistently silent Kido Saori slowly turned her head for the first time. Those violet eyes, which seemed able to pierce through a person's soul, fell calmly on Hiroki's face.
Her voice was still indifferent, without a trace of emotion, yet it was like a great bronze bell, ringing clearly in Hiroki's ears, and also seemed to knock directly on his connection line with the system:
"One million points."
The air instantly froze.
It was like a flare exploding in Hiroki's brain! His pupils suddenly contracted!
"She... she said 'points' directly?! How can she understand points?! Asta only did it through the system..." A terrifying thought flashed by—could this be the authority of a god?!
Before he could fully digest this shock, "Beep!"
The system's cold voice rang out simultaneously, as if responding to Saori's increase: "Detected exercise of authority by the client (Kido Saori): Emergency additional mission requirement!"
"Revised Mission Objective: Protect Kido Saori and assist in repelling Saga."
"Revised Mission Reward: Base 10,000 points + 1,000,000 points added by the client, total: 1,010,000 points. Additional: Random Summoning Scroll x1. Please confirm whether to accept."
Hiss—Hiroki sucked in a breath of cold air. One... one million?! This overwhelming wealth!
But he looked up at the Saga across from him, who, despite having experienced a mental split, was guarded by two Gold henchmen and had his momentum reconsolidated, as well as the predatory Deathmask and Aphrodite... That was a million points! He had to be alive to spend it! No matter how strong the Uchihas were, the other side had three battle-hardened Gold Saints with surging Cosmo! Saga was a monster among monsters!
"Two million." Before Hiroki could answer, Saori's voice rang out again, like the most precise scale weighing the value of life and death. Her gaze was still indifferent, as if she had just spoken two meaningless numbers. Deathmask was already impatiently preparing to raise his finger of death.
"Beep! Client's additional request confirmed: Total mission reward points increased to: 2,000,000 points. Additional: Random Summoning Scroll x1. Please confirm whether to accept."
Hiroki's heart was drumming wildly! Two million! A huge sum sufficient to completely change the current situation! He could almost see the Hōgyoku waving at him! However, the shadow of death and the aura of destruction radiating from Saga were so real.
"Still hesitating?" Saori's brow furrowed imperceptibly, as if feeling a bit of impatience at the greed and cowardice of an ant.
She finally withdrew her gaze completely from Saga's side and gave Hiroki a deep look, as if seeing through the deepest desire in his soul (the system?), or perhaps she just threw out another bargaining chip that was irrelevant to her:
"Plus one set of... gold cloth." Her voice was like a final judgment, settling the price of this life-and-death deal.
Boom! This last sentence was like the final straw that crushed all the uncertainty in Hiroki's heart!
A gold cloth! The value of this thing would definitely not be lower than 2 million points!
Also, Athena, if I take away the Cloth, you'll really lose it? Unlike the Saints, it won't just respawn later!
"Beep! Client's final proposal confirmed! Mission Objective (unchanged): Protect Kido Saori and assist in repelling Saga.
Mission Reward: Points: 2,000,000; Random Summoning Scroll x1; Special Item: One set of gold cloth.
Accept? Final confirmation!"
The system's voice was more urgent than ever, as if counting down the opponent's patience and Saga's imminent recovery from his mental split.
Saga's eyes became colder and colder, the chaos completely subsided, leaving only pure darkness and killing intent. The aura of death spread from Deathmask's hand, and Aphrodite's rose was already about to bloom.
At the very moment a trace of terrifying golden light gathered at Saga's fingertip, and a ghastly green hue lit up on Deathmask's fingertip—
A resolute, fierce light flashed in Hiroki's eyes. It was greed for wealth, and even more, a wild gamble on a massive return following a massive risk! He stepped forward abruptly and almost roared, his voice echoing at the edge of the battlefield:
"I'll do it!!!"
"System! Accept the mission!