"Go!"
Seeing the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads finally knocked away, Heracles retreated decisively. He swung the Nameless axe-sword faster and faster, smashing a massive breach into one side of the Great Altar's outer wall and calling for his comrades to pull back.
"Yeah, yeah, retreat! Move, now!"
Jason, who had been barely holding on, was overjoyed and broke into a run toward the breach.
The moment he stuck his head out, howling winds slammed into his face, heavy with damp clouds.
A glance downward showed buildings on the ground no bigger than ants. Only then did Jason remember that they were thousands of meters above the ground, with nowhere to brace themselves.
For heroes who couldn't fly, jumping down like this meant becoming a smear of flesh, if fear didn't kill them first.
"Careful!"
A stern shout rang out from beside the breach. Jason, frozen in place, was yanked back against the wall.
Zzzzz!
At the same time, dozens of wide-area annihilation weapons shot upward. Beams of light burst from their crimson crystal cores, narrowly missing Jason and scorching black marks into the area around the Great Altar.
Heracles, my brother!
Jason, having narrowly escaped death, looked at the mighty hero beside him with lingering fear and eyes full of gratitude.
"Phoebus Catastrophe!"
Atalanta turned back at just the right moment. With a sharp cry, she shot and detonated the wide-area annihilation weapons hovering in front of the breach.
Even so, the Argonauts only managed to suppress the enemy briefly. This escape route along the outer wall of the Great Altar was a tasteless, awkward option, hard to rely on yet hard to abandon.
After all, many of their companions still lacked the ability to fly.
The frontal battlefield was no better. Under the siege of powerful ocean-aligned fighters and Olympian soldiers, more than ten Argonauts had already been wounded. Their divine power and Ether were nearly exhausted, and fatigue was setting in.
Buzz buzz buzz buzz!
To make matters worse, as the air trembled, hundreds of wide-area annihilation weapons rose into the sky one after another, swarming toward the breach in the Great Altar.
"Roar!"
At that critical moment, a crushing roar shook the high skies. Revealing its full form, the Colchis Dragon, tens of meters long, dove straight down. With wild sweeps and claws, it turned the wide-area annihilation weapons into exploding fireballs.
"Listen up! Let that thing carry you away! I'll control the airspace. Diana will provide support. Leave just Heracles at the front gate. Too many of us here will only tie our own hands!"
Samael, beating his wings as he flew in, shouted toward the Great Altar. At the same time, he drew his bow and fired. Amid a rain of arrows swift as meteors, the ascending combat units burst into balls of flame.
The Argonauts hesitated for a brief moment, then, trusting him, turned and ran. Under the cover of Heracles and the Moon Goddess, they rushed through the breach and leapt onto the Colchis Dragon's back.
Once everyone on the list had boarded, along with the Leviathan whale sealed inside its Magecraft container, the Colchis Dragon spread its wings and dove downward, punching through the clouds.
Heracles grabbed two Olympian soldiers and fought as he retreated, holding the line while waiting for the Moon Goddess to leave first.
When the mighty hero heard the faint sound of a seven-stringed lyre, the blood-red hue faded from his eyes. He tossed aside the two half-ruined bodies, swung the Nameless axe-sword to smash down half the front wall of the Great Altar, and, while the enemy scrambled to respond, turned and jumped through the breach without hesitation.
As Heracles vanished into the rolling clouds, the sea god chariot driven by the brothers Peleus and Telamon raced forward and caught the falling hero cleanly.
As for the Moon Goddess, she needed no one to worry about her.
"Pursue!"
Before the Great Altar, the middle-aged demigod stared at the devastation before him, his face dark as soot. In a rush of fury, he charged straight toward the breach.
Clang!
Amid a shrill, grating metallic screech, a trident spike shot past the back of his head and slammed into the ground before the breach. Pulsing bands of deep blue light rippled outward, forcing several pursuing Sea God Temple warriors to stagger back.
"Your Highness… what are you doing?"
The middle-aged demigod raised a hand to his cheek, touching the gash carved open by the pressure wave. His body stiffened, his voice turning hoarse.
"Were you the one who mobilized the Machine God to bombard the Great Altar?"
Triton flexed his limbs and stepped out from among the Olympian soldiers, his voice cold and heavy, his gaze dark and hostile.
"Yes… yes…"
"And did you know I was inside?"
"Your Highness, Aphrodite's True Machine God can sow chaos. We only meant to take advantage of that to rescue you. We absolutely—"
Cold sweat poured down the demigod's forehead as he hurriedly tried to explain.
Boom!
Before he could finish, Triton took a single step forward. Wrapped in the authority of the sea, his form reappeared directly in front of the demigod, and a single punch sent him flying.
The initiator of the operation crashed miserably into the wall, coughing up a mouthful of congealed blood before dropping to one knee, his expression utterly defeated.
"What I asked was… did you know I was inside?"
Triton pulled out his trident. Beneath his calm tone, an overwhelming storm seemed ready to erupt.
"I… knew…"
"Did you consider the possibility that the operation might fail?"
"I—"
"Good. Pick up your weapon. If you want to live, then fight properly."
Thud. Thud-thud!
The trident struck the ground in a steady rhythm. The Olympian soldiers present, along with the demigod warriors of the Sea God Temple, all turned pale.
This was the signal for a sacred duel. Once it began, it would not end until one side was dead.
"Your Highness, no matter what, I saved you! You can't treat me like this!"
Seeing that there was no room for compromise, the middle-aged demigod scrambled to his feet and roared in grievance.
Triton remained unmoved. With another strike of the trident, a deep blue veil of water enveloped both of them, swallowing their voices and figures alike.
…
After dozens of breaths, a sharp tearing sound cut through the air. A dark figure was flung out of the water veil, impaled clean through by a trident and nailed to one of the Great Altar's pillars. Blood dripped steadily downward. His divine core shattered, the middle-aged demigod convulsed briefly, then went still, eyes wide open in unwilling death.
"Hmph. You destroyed two [True Machine Gods], mobilized more than half of our forces, and gained nothing. And you still dare talk about merit? Useless."
Triton snorted coldly. Without a change in expression, he stepped forward, pulled his trident free, and turned to the Sea God Temple guards who stood exchanging uneasy glances.
"If I remember correctly, you were among the first ones to rush in, weren't you?"
"Your Highness, please forgive us!"
Seeing their leader already growing cold, the Sea God Temple guards immediately fell silent, trembling.
"Get lost. Recover the remains of the True Machine Gods at once. If Father returns and learns of this, you can guess what your fate will be."
Triton's tone was filled with mockery. Realizing the magnitude of the cleanup ahead, the guards' faces all turned ashen.
"The barrier has already been activated. They won't be able to escape. Search carefully."
The Olympian soldiers dropped to one knee and acknowledged the order. However, their prince's sudden outburst and violent clash with the Sea God Temple's commander had already cost them precious time.
By now, the enemy's trail was impossible to follow. They could only resort to the most primitive method, searching from the upper levels down, one layer at a time.
Wave after wave of Olympian soldiers were dispatched. Combat units of every type scoured streets and alleys throughout the Interstellar Mountainous City, yet even after turning the entire place upside down, they found no trace of the intruders.
It was as if, after shaking off their pursuers, those outsiders had simply vanished.
Damn it. Where did they go?
The people of Atlantis were left utterly baffled.
...
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