SSS Awakening: I Can Devour Gods to Evolve My Goddesses

Five hundred meters.

The Black Banner force stopped for the first time.

Not because troops had come out of Forgotten Shrine.

Quite the opposite.

The main layer still looked almost empty.

Beacon Watchtower stood on the gray slope. Only a dozen or so ordinary guards moved around Oath Hall. No complete battle line was visible near Muster Hall.

No Rocketiers.

No Aurelia.

No Celia.

No main Stormlance force.

Exactly what the five scouts had reported earlier.

But the Black Banner Lord carrying the Spatial Lock Scroll suddenly looked up at the dark-silver observation ring atop Beacon Watchtower.

"Has that thing been turning the whole time?"

The scout beside him froze.

"Watchtowers turn."

"I’m asking—"

The Lord kept his eyes on the observation ring.

"When you were scouting earlier, did it ever stop facing you?"

The group went silent.

The first scout to return with a report changed expression.

"Twice."

The other Black Banner Lord snapped his head around.

"Why are you only saying that now?"

"There was no alarm."

"No alarm doesn’t mean it didn’t see you."

He raised one hand immediately.

"Move faster."

"Get to three hundred meters and open the Spatial Lock at once."

The several hundred troops who had been spread out began pulling inward.

The Lord carrying the Scroll was boxed between two heavy-shield units.

An entire squad of Epic swordsmen shifted toward him at the same time.

They were trying to protect the most important piece on the field.

Atop Beacon Watchtower, Cassian watched that patch of formation grow denser.

He still did not move.

He had never planned to chase these people away.

They had walked into Riftward, crossed an internal route, and come all the way to Forgotten Shrine’s doorstep.

Cassian wanted more than a retreat.

First—

the Scroll.

Second—

the person who had opened the door for them.

"They’re getting suspicious," Veyra said from below the tower.

She did not look up.

Ever since leaving the Deep Layer, she had made no move to bring Eclipse out.

Two hundred Legionnaires.

Nine Praetorians.

All of them were still inside.

"Mm."

"Do I open my line now?"

Cassian checked the distance.

Four hundred seventy meters.

"No."

Another hundred and fifty meters forward and the Spatial Lock would actually be deployed.

If this volley merely broke the formation but failed to kill the Scroll carrier, Forgotten Shrine’s Warden Gate would be sealed first.

The high-grade main force in the Outer March would not be able to return.

Cassian could have fired earlier.

But the enemy had been spread out earlier.

Now several hundred troops were voluntarily compressing around the Scroll.

That was what he had been waiting for.

This time Veyra did not ask why.

She turned her head toward the Deep Layer entrance.

"Rocketiers."

"Front firing positions."

All twenty Dwarves had already reloaded.

They did not run out along the main-layer road.

Instead, they came through the Deep Layer exit closest to Muster Hall and moved directly into the rear firing positions.

Outside, the Black Banner force saw only twenty launcher barrels slowly rise.

Four hundred fifty meters.

The Lord carrying the Scroll went pale.

"Scatter!"

Too late.

Cassian said one word.

"Overload."

Dark-red engravings lit all the way across twenty Rocketiers at once.

White-hot exhaust erupted from the rear of their launchers.

BOOM—!

Not one rocket.

Twenty.

Mental Guidance corrected twenty trajectories in midair at the same time.

The first six drove into the center.

The other fourteen did not pile into the same impact point.

They spread toward both wings, the rear ranks, and the high-grade squad already trying to break away.

This was not firepower meant to hammer one Boss.

It was meant to wash an entire patch of ground clean.

The foremost Black Banner Lord did not even have time to unfold the Spatial Lock Scroll.

The first rocket hit.

BOOM!

The second.

The third.

A heartbeat later, the entire gray field disappeared under white-red explosions.

The twenty blasts did not stack into one instant.

They came in staggered layers.

The soldiers who had started running left slammed into the second wave.

The high-grade swordsmen retreating backward were caught by the third.

The heavy-shield line trying to force its way right was blasted back toward the center by the follow-up rockets.

The ground of Forgotten Shrine’s main layer trembled faintly.

Veyra watched pillars of fire rise one after another in the distance.

"When you used them to wash Demons before..."

"I already thought their range was a little unreasonable."

Cassian said nothing.

Through Beacon’s vision, hundreds of moving markers were going dark in clumps.

After the first wave of explosions cleared, a little more than a dozen high-grade targets were still alive.

Then the second layer of shock hit.

One swordsman squad stood out sharply from the surrounding troops.

They had survived the first wall of fire.

Epic armor and defensive light flared across their bodies at the same time.

They did not survive the second.

A rocket struck from behind and to the side.

BOOM—!

The last standing figure was thrown back into the center of the blast.

Less than five seconds.

Beacon Watchtower swept the battlefield again.

No clusters of moving targets remained.

Only fire.

Broken armor.

And black cloaks that no longer had owners.

Only then did the battle report begin pouring in.

[Dwarf Rocketier has killed Black Banner Lord: Ronan Greaves.]

[Dwarf Rocketier has killed Black Banner Lord: Silas Crowe.]

Hundreds of ordinary battle notices flooded the panel and were immediately collapsed by the system.

Several hundred troops.

Two Lords.

And the Epic swordsman squad that had forced its way through the first layer of fire.

The system did not reduce a fight like that to one Scroll.

A compact settlement appeared beneath the collapsed reports.

[Black Banner Strike-Force Settlement]

[Battle Essence: +2,180,000]

[Major Recoverable Loot: Complete / Repairable Epic Swordsman War Sets ×12]

[Rare-grade Lord Main Equipment: ×6]

[Rare / Elite Troop Equipment and High-Value Materials: 200+]

[Rare Loot: Spatial Lock Scroll ×1]

Two million one hundred eighty thousand Battle Essence.

Two days ago, the thousand Ironback Wolves in Galegrass Expanse had settled for only three hundred sixty thousand.

Far fewer targets had died here.

But two Lords and an entire Epic swordsman squad had forced the Quality difference straight into the settlement.

Now that was a settlement worthy of those five seconds.

Cassian did not spend the new Battle Essence.

All 2,180,000 went straight into his existing balance.

He did not start sorting through the two hundred-plus pieces of equipment either.

The first thing he looked at was still the Scroll.

A dark-silver scroll dropped from the loot panel into his hand.

[Spatial Lock Scroll | Rare]

[Effect: Temporarily seals Waygate / Warden Gate and other spatial-transit functions within the target area.]

It had been brought here to lock Forgotten Shrine.

Now it was in his hand.

Cassian stored the Scroll.

Veyra was already looking at the twenty Rocketiers.

The moment Overload ended, all twenty showed the same state.

[Temporarily Combat-Incapacitated]

"Fountain."

That was all she said.

The twenty Dwarves hoisted their launchers and headed back toward the Deep Layer on their own.

No one had to carry them.

No one had fallen.

And Eclipse still had not appeared on the main layer.

From the moment Black Banner entered five hundred meters to the moment the fight ended, the only new asset Forgotten Shrine had publicly exposed was the twenty Rocketiers who were supposed to still be in the Outer March.

Cassian was about to leave the tower when Beacon’s observation ring turned again.

West.

A faint distortion of light was retreating from outside the blast zone.

Not part of the main force.

One of the original five scouts.

He clearly had not pushed in with the several hundred troops.

And when the explosions started, his first instinct had not been to help.

It had been to run.

Cassian’s gaze sharpened.

"Blackfang."

Pack Dominion carried the order out instantly.

"Don’t kill him."

"Follow."

Two Blackfang had been lying behind the gray slope below the tower.

At the command, they flattened against the terrain and slipped out.

Veyra looked up.

"You’re leaving one?"

"Leaving a trail."

"To the person who opened the gate?"

"Mm."

Veyra looked once at the field the rockets had just turned over.

"Then let him think he got away."

She turned.

"Eclipse stays inside."

Cassian looked at her.

"You don’t want to come out and finish things?"

"There’s nothing left out there for my line to finish."

Veyra’s tone was flat.

"And if they paid this much just to find out the Rocketiers came back..."

"Don’t give them me for free too."

Cassian nodded.

"Good."

This time, Cassian had not told her to keep hiding.

She had chosen on her own to preserve the second layer.

Ten minutes later, the Rocketiers were already inside the Fountain recovery area.

The fire on the main layer had begun to die down.

The Regional Channel, however, exploded for the first time.

Tobias messaged first.

[Tobias Reed: What was that noise to the southwest? I heard it from here.]

[Rowan Ashford: The unfamiliar requests on the southern supply line stopped at the same time.]

[Elara Vayne: Black Banner?]

Cassian did not answer immediately.

He checked Warden Authority first.

[Current Registered Lords: 402]

No new Inbound Domain Relocation.

No new legal cross-Region arrival.

Yet several hundred Black Banner troops and two Lords from outside Riftward had appeared less than a kilometer from Forgotten Shrine—from the direction of Riftward’s interior.

A Warden could control Domain relocation in and out.

He could not see every private Waygate opened inside every Lord’s Domain.

Private Gate-use records still belonged to the Lord who owned the Domain.

Which left one route that made the most sense.

Among the four hundred and two registered Lords, someone had let Black Banner pass through their gate first.

Cassian opened the Regional Channel.

[Cassian Vale: Two Black Banner Lords and several hundred troops just appeared from the Riftward interior. My judgment is that they entered through an internal Riftward Waygate first.]

The channel paused for half a breath.

Then messages surged upward.

[Anonymous Lord: Internal?]

[Anonymous Lord: They didn’t come through the Sable March border?]

[Tobias Reed: Told you. No large force passed my southern road.]

Cassian sent another message.

[Cassian Vale: The two Lords aren’t dead.]

[Cassian Vale: We captured them.]

Veyra had just returned from the Deep Layer.

Her steps stopped when she heard that.

She looked at the still-smoking ground outside.

Then at Cassian.

"Not dead?"

"The collaborator doesn’t know."

Veyra was silent for one beat.

The corner of her mouth slowly rose.

"Keep going."

Cassian sent one more line.

[Cassian Vale: Whoever opened the Gate for them, they’ll tell us soon.]

Five seconds.

A new golden request suddenly appeared inside Warden Authority.

Not a message.

Relocation.

[Outbound Domain Relocation Request]

[Lord: Edrin Cole]

[Current Region: Riftward]

[Destination: Sable March]

[Request Type: Emergency Outbound Relocation]

Cassian stared at the lines.

He did not reject it immediately.

Veyra saw it too.

"That fast."

"Mm."

"He could just be afraid Black Banner will retaliate."

"Could be."

Cassian did not convict a man from one request.

He opened Tobias’s Private Channel.

[Cassian Vale: How far are you from Edrin Cole?]

[Tobias Reed: Less than forty kilometers in a straight line. Why?]

[Cassian Vale: Blackfang is following one Scout who got away.]

[Cassian Vale: Meet the trail. Don’t enter his Domain. Just see where that Scout ends up.]

[Tobias Reed: Understood.]

Cassian closed the channel.

The Outbound request remained suspended in front of him.

He did not approve it.

He did not reject it.

He left it hanging.

Twenty-seven minutes later, the impressions coming back through Blackfang finally became clear.

Person.

Gate.

Stop.

Then Tobias’s message arrived.

[Tobias Reed: I’m outside.]

[Tobias Reed: That Scout went into Edrin Cole’s Domain.]

[Tobias Reed: I didn’t cross the boundary. Blackfang didn’t either.]

[Tobias Reed: But the road is covered in fresh heavy-armor tracks. Direction lines up with the route toward you.]

That was enough.

Cassian reopened the Regional Channel.

Messages were still moving fast.

Everyone was guessing who had opened the door for Black Banner.

Cassian sent one name.

[Cassian Vale: Edrin Cole.]

The channel went silent.

Three seconds later, Edrin’s name lit up.

[Edrin Cole: What is that supposed to mean?]

Cassian posted the still-unresolved request directly.

[Outbound Domain Relocation Request]

[Destination: Sable March]

Then a second marker.

Tobias’s position record from outside the Domain boundary.

[Tracked Scout final destination: Edrin Cole Domain boundary]

Cassian added only one line.

[Cassian Vale: Your relocation request is not approved for now.]

Edrin did not speak again.

Rowan did.

[Rowan Ashford: Emergency Logistics will no longer accept requests from Edrin Cole’s Domain, effective immediately.]

Tobias followed.

[Tobias Reed: Southern patrol will watch the external route. Same rule as before—I’m not entering his Domain.]

Elara asked more directly.

[Elara Vayne: What are you going to do with him?]

Cassian checked Warden Authority again.

A Warden could approve entry and exit.

Could appoint Officers.

Could control his own Regional transit system.

That did not mean he could turn someone else’s Domain into his property with one sentence.

[Cassian Vale: Watch the outer roads first.]

[Cassian Vale: Preserve the evidence.]

[Cassian Vale: If he opens another door for Black Banner, that becomes the next debt.]

Veyra leaned against Beacon.

"You gave them the name."

"Mm."

"You didn’t tell them how the Rocketiers came back."

"Mm."

"You didn’t tell them about the Deep Layer either."

Cassian looked at her.

Veyra rested Crimson Oath across one shoulder.

"Leave it that way."

"Everyone should know the collaborator’s name."

"That doesn’t mean we give away our hidden cards for free."

Cassian smiled faintly.

"You’re managing intelligence now too?"

"My line is hidden in there."

Veyra looked toward the Deep Layer.

"Who gets to see it..."

"Of course that concerns me."

She said it as naturally as she had once said, my line.

Only now, that line did not end at the front of a battlefield.

Night settled over Forgotten Shrine.

The main layer was quiet again.

All twenty Rocketiers had fully recovered from the Fountain.

Two hundred Legionnaires and nine Praetorians had never truly appeared.

Cassian had not called back the high-grade main force outside either.

Aurelia, Celia, the Highblood, and most of the Stormlance were still in Galegrass Expanse.

Eira was still with Elara.

Black Banner had tried to cut in while Forgotten Shrine looked "empty."

What had they actually seen?

Twenty rockets.

Cassian stood beside the Warden Gate and took out the Rare Spatial Lock Scroll again.

It had been brought here to seal his gate.

Now the gate was still open.

The Scroll was his.

And the person who had opened the door for Black Banner had exposed himself too.

Two things.

He had both.