Mount Kailash, Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon
When Yhwach was teleported back home, it didn't take even three seconds until he was bear-hugged by his mother, who had a worried and pissed expression on her face... both of them at the same time.
It seemed that she indeed wasn't pleased with his incursion into the Underworld just like he predicted, and it was nothing good. Logically speaking, she was right; the Underworld, where the Devils and Fallen Angels resided, was probably the worst place where he could end up, considering that he was the son of Thashamal, the Seraphim of Doom and Damnation.
Someone who slaughtered the Devils and Fallen Angels by tens of thousands during the Great War of Supernatural and was one of the leading generals of Heaven under the Yawheh during the war.
She was his strongest and most powerful Angel, together with Azrael, the True Seraphim of Death, and Michael, the True Seraphim of Justice.
They were the three most powerful Level 7 beings that were under the command of Yahweh, and any of them could easily fight against the Original Satans sans Lucifer.
Though today, only Michael remained.
His mother grew somewhat a bad reputation even in Heaven among the angels themselves for the unbridled genocides that she carried out on entire cities and armies of Devils and Fallen Angels, so her marriage with his father came in rather handy to leave Heaven behind.
The same could be said about Azrael, who apparently disappeared the moment Yahweh died, for similar reasons to his mother. To this day, his mother never had good words about Heaven and often called them hypocrites and said that they should die on the battlefield...
Yhwach immediately knew that this would end rather badly for him, for many reasons, and obviously, the consequences of his mother's anger were not really good. He had already come into inner peace with the idea that the future prospects of having some kind of freedom were right now zero and null.
"Don't think that you would get away from this easy, young man!"
His mother said with a stern voice, completely not befitting her current appearance, before she looked at Valiana, who was standing a few meters behind Vritra. Just a few seconds ago, she was worried about him, and in a split second, her personality took a sharp turn, and she started scolding him heavily.
"And who is this half-devil?... She has the same aura as my eldest brother."
Immediately, Thashamal's eyes turned cold as they preened into Valiana's very own being as if they were scrutinizing her very own existence. It was clear that the young half-devil girl was very uncomfortable, and Thashamal's eyes were looking at her intensively.
"Great-Granddaughter of the Morningstar, she was escaping from the Old Satan Faction when I met her around the ruins of the Lucifaad and she asked for the Asylum in the Hindu Pantheon."
As Yhwach said that, Thashamal's eyes narrowed slightly as the young descendant of Lucifer because she didn't really have the best memories of her eldest brother. His mother was one of the 1st-Generation Angels that were created by Yahweh, so aside from her, there were not many in the 1st Generation.
Luciel, as he was called once, was the eldest and most powerful among them, born with the Denial of the Divine, which made even some of the strongest Gods to take him seriously, despite being Level 8 being, far from the strongest Gods of the Draconic Deus.
And much less of the 1st-Generation Angels that were created by Yahweh managed to reach the level of strength of Thashamal. Not many were able to reach the True Seraphim Level because it was a very, very hard goal to reach.
"That would be for the Council to decide if they accept the request for the Asylum."
Though she said that, there was a very high chance that Shiva and Indra would agree, for various reasons, obviously. Shiva was most probably out of compassion because Thashamal could see with the naked eye that the girl went through a lot, and Indra probably would want just to piss off the devils.
Devils, with the addition of the Evil Pieces, were not really liked among the supernatural factions and the Pantheons. While the Evil Pieces managed to relieve their population problems at least partially, they made far more enemies than they could count.
If not for the Devil race having powerful Cosmic Lifeforms such as Sirzechs Lucifer, Ajuka Beelzebub, and Zekram Bael, who were able to tap into their True Forms as Super Devils, then the situation would be vastly different.
Even though the two of them were not the most powerful among the other Level 8 Beings, Ajuka Beelzebub was rather a pain in the ass to fight against due to the Kankara Formula that was widely famous as one of the Anti-Skills that was extremely hard to deal with.
Capabilities of the Zekram Bael were largely unknown; the sole thing that was known about the man was that his Destruction capabilities should be higher than Sirzechs Lucifer and that he was very powerful, but the old devil avoided fighting people and was keeping his cards hidden for the time being.
Aside from three publically known ones, there was the unknown stance of the Rizevim Livan Lucifer, who was reported to be Level 7 Super Devil, but apparently, he was able to fight even some Level 8 Beings under some circumstances.
Or someone like Mephisto Pheles, who was probably as ancient as Zekram Bael himself, but his strength was also a very big unknown. Among the Three Factions of the Biblical Factions, the Devil race was undoubtedly the most powerful one.
The Heaven had, on the other hand, an impregnable fortress as their Dimension was impossible to breach for anyone below Level 9.
Only the Fallen Angels were on the end of the spectrum, though they had the highest population and were rather average in terms of powerhouses they had. Though they had Azazel and they were technologically the most advanced out of the Three Factions.
"Come on, both of you..."
With that being said, she led them to the top of Mount Kailash, which was stated within the Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon, which houses the entire cosmology of the Hindu Pantheon.
The Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon was their personal Dimension and it was a place where Yhwach was spending most if not all of his free time. While it clearly wasn't at the standards of Heaven in terms of defenses and fortification, as they lacked anyone like Yahweh, it wasn't actually that far.
For the past several years, Yhwach has been doing what he could by giving suggestions on upgrades, fortification, and enhancement of the Magic Formations and Wards. The faction's Magians then took care of the rest and implemented the suggestions.
It was one of the parts of the future war preparation, as their Dimension was their stronghold, and it was the lifeblood of every single Pantheon. It was also the reason why the Pantheon was much stronger than other factions, because within the Pantheon, its people were receiving boosts and boons to their power.
Mount Kailash was the home for Shiva, the God of Destruction, one of the strongest Gods in the entire Draconic Deus, now that the 1st-Generation Primordials were slumbering or in deep hibernation.
Only a few of the 1st-Generation Primordials were active, but those who were were not typically intervening in the matters of the Lower Dimensional Lifeforms because it was far beneath their stature and power.
His father was very close to ascending to the realm of the 1st-Generation Primordial Gods any time soon. Yhwach had to admit that the two races, Gods and Dragons, were indeed darlings of this universe due to the benefits they were receiving and almost zero to no constraints.
While they were passing through Mount Kailash and ascending to the top of the Mountain, where Shiva's abode was located, they were greeted by countless Asuras that were in the service of the God of Destruction.
Valiana could sense the power of the Asuras who were living in Mount Kailash because countless of them were at Level 3 and higher. She could sense not only their raw power but also the dread that their aura was radiating.
The might of the Asura species was really above the charts because, in one short stroll, Valiana could sense a whole bunch of the Level 4, Level 5, and even some Level 6 Asuras and Asura Gods.
This was already higher than most of the devils could put together, not to mention the Asuras were stronger than the devils of the same Level for one simple reason.
Combat.
Every single member of the Asura Race was a killing machine; they were warriors and fighters without an equal, tempered in the seas of blood and slaughter. From the earliest age, the Asuras were brought up in the ways of combat and killing; they lived for and in combat...
This made their entire species extremely dangerous, and even though they often didn't have any special abilities, that was true, at least for the large part of their species or those who were not members of the highest caste of the Asuras.
Not to mention, all Asuras were very capable Magicians and were taught the best Combat Magic in the world. It was true, though, that they were no Magic Scholars, and only a few of them really developed into the depths of the Magical Research; many of them knew how to use Magic as their weapon to kill.
And they were very good at that.
Albion was quietly observing everything from his prison of the Sacred Gear because this was the first time he was in the Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon. When he was alive, the Hindu Pantheon was one of the few places that he had to tread carefully around.
Their Gods were powerful, especially the leaders of the Pantheon were extremely powerful, reaching the level where even Heavenly Dragons fell short. Not to mention Shiva, but there was also Indra, the Heavenly Emperor, who could just smite him in a bunch of lightning bolts.
The disparity between various top-ranking members of the Top 10 in the past was too huge. While all of the Top Ten were basically Level 8 Beings, the disparity between each Rank on the list was enormous.
For example, Shiva, as the first ranker of the list, could kill the person on the 10th Rank with a single powerful attack rather easily. Brahma and Vishnu were also beyond the capabilities of the Heavenly Dragons.
While the Heavenly Dragons, Albion, and Ddraig were rather powerful among the other Level 8 Beings, they were still very far from reaching the peak of Level 8 and testing the limits to reach Level 9.
The Hindu Gods had one tremendous advantage over some others was that they were still widely worshipped, having access to the continuous stream of the Faith, meaning that they could constantly refine the Faith and increase their Divine Energy bit by bit.
'Indeed, the Hindu Pantheon is befitting the title of the strongest faction of the Draconic Deus.'
While the Hindu Faction was actually smaller than some others, like the Celestial Court, which was several times bigger, or even the Shinto Pantheon, which was bigger, in terms of powerhouses, the Hindu Pantheon was at the top.
Even without taking their leaders into consideration, they had the highest numbers of the High Gods among all other factions present, and they were very careful when it came to the utilization of the Faith, so they were not letting themselves be corrupted by the Faith of their worshippers as the Greeks had done.
From a certain point of view, the Faith was indeed poison that could kill the Gods.
***
Mount Kailash, Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon, Some time later.
Several weeks have passed since Yhwach's unplanned incursion into the Underworld.
Immediately after he returned back from the Underworld, he was effectively grounded at Mount Kailash, and he was forbidden to leave the Mount Kailash at all for the foreseeable future, which wasn't actually that much surprising.
It was even worse than before because previously he could at least go to the other parts of their Dimension, but nowadays, he was confined strictly to the Mount Kailash, and his mother personally assigned several Level 6 Asuras to oversee his every step from the shadows.
His mother was pretty much very angry at him that his experiment went that wrong, so while he wasn't entirely forbidden from playing with Magic because that would be rather impossible, nowadays, he was properly supervised by someone older when he was conducting his experiments.
This wasn't really the best solution, but it also wasn't the worst one; at least he could still continue experimenting with Magic. Even though the supervision that his mother arranged for him was watching his every single move and he was cursing it at every single opportunity that he got.
The good thing was that, as he predicted, Valiana got asylum from the Hindu Pantheon rather easily. As he thought, his father was rather compassionate after hearing her out, and Uncle Indra just wanted to piss off the Three Biblical Factions at a later date...
He was saving it for a later date; he knew that once in the future, this would be an excellent way to piss off the Abrahamic Pantheon greatly. He knew that the living descendant of Lucifer, the Morningstar, was something that nobody actually wanted to see.
Neither Heaven, because he was their greatest adversary and traitor; for the Fallen Angels, he was the threat to their very own existence, and for the devils, he would basically destroy the entire status quo.
Especially if the said descendant of Lucifer managed to awaken his own ability, the Denial of the Divine and Demonic Brilliance of Evil Light. It was rather public knowledge that even Rizevim Livan Lucifer was someone who awakened only a watered-down version of the Denial of the Divine, the so-called Soul Gear Canceller.
Not to mention that he failed to awaken the Demonic Brilliance of Evil Light at all and everything that he was left with was enormous reserves of the Demonic Energy and already mentioned Soul Gear Canceller.
Even though the Soul Gear Canceller could be used on more things just than the Sacred Gears, it was incomparable to the Denial of the Divine that belonged to the Lucifer Morningstar.
And still, coupled with the fact that Rizevim Livan Lucifer managed to reach Level 7 Super-Devil Class, it put him on the ladder of some of the most dangerous beings in the Draconic Deus.
Fighting someone of his intellect, strength, cunningness, and ability to basically cancel Sacred Gears and even other types of soul-bound equipment was a literal nightmare. Even though he didn't inherit the Clan Trait of the House Lucifer, Demonic Brilliance of Evil Light put him on the ranks of stronger powerhouses.
This, though, made Yhwach often ponder if Valiana would be able to awaken both of the abilities of the Lucifer. Both the Denial of the Divine and Demonic Brilliance of Evil Light would be powerful additions to her arsenal.
Coupled with the Divine Dividing, meaning Albion's abilities, she would be a powerhouse to make even some of the strongest Gods think twice when it would come to fight against her.
Though, that would take some time. Right now, she was acclimatizing to the new environment in the Divine Realm of the Hindu Pantheon, and he had to admit that she was doing very well in Mount Kailash.
From the first days she arrived, she was training with the Asuras that served his father, and even his mother had grown very fond of Valiana, even though she was a descendant of the Helel, someone whom his mother hated.
She was getting slowly used to Valiana's presence...
Though it was the undeniable truth that the Three Abrahamic Factions were weak, while on the surface, they looked powerful, only a few knew that they were weak.
Without the presence of Yahweh, one of the most powerful Level 9 beings in the entirety of the Draconic Deus, Heaven was doomed to extinction for sure as the Heaven's System was according to Thashamal just piece of crap.
Obviously, without the presence of one of the strongest Gods of the Draconic Deus, they lived on borrowed time because everyone needed to have a strong backer in this cruel world that was ruled by strength.
Yhwach knew that overall, the strength of the Biblical Pantheon declined sharply, with Lucifer and Yahweh perishing and the Four Riders of the Apocalypse being permanently sealed as no one aside from Yahweh could control them.
Other mighty beings of their Pantheon, such as Azrael the True Seraphim of Death, disappeared, Thashamal left, and Michael was constrained too much, now that he was forced to shoulder the full responsibility of the Heaven System.
Azazel still stuck at the Level 8, Sirzechs and Ajuka were too young to properly utilize their powers. While they were powerful compared to some Level 8 Beings, they were far from the top to ensure their race's prosperity and safety.
What made it worse for the Biblical Pantheon was that they didn't really have anyone in the Top Ten Ranking, as all the spots were occupied by powerful Primordial Gods, from which almost all had some level of hostility against Yahweh and his creations.
Though Yhwach was confident that Sirzechs Lucifer and Ajuka Beelzebub had enough talent to rank among the Top Ten, but it would take them centuries to reach that level and defeat someone from the Listing.
The Primordial Gods that were on the Rankings were no slouches and lately, Crom Cruach has reached the Tenth Place of the Top Ten after he reached the Heavenly Dragon Level.
The only saving grace was that they lived in a peculiar age where nobody wanted to have another Great War of Supernatural as the last one really destroyed too much and weakened all factions participating in it.
Not to mention, The Three Factions had a very high number of soldiers, so any conflict would also be very devastating for the attacker. One could say, that they were living in a very fragile balance of power, where nobody really wanted to do anything against anybody to not spark greater conflict.
If not for that, Yhwach was sure that Hades would have long ago started a crusade against the Devil out of his enormous hatred for their very own species and everything that they have represented.
***
"What are you doing here, Valiana?"
Yhwach raised his brows when he heard footsteps in the library of Shiva's Abode on the top of Mount Kailash. This wasn't the first time that she had disturbed him in the library; the place was mostly empty.
There were not many people who would be coming here on the daily matters. When Yhwach wasn't training, he spent most of his time in the library studying the ancient tomes of Magic and other things and topics.
As they said, the knowledge was power.
"Calling you for the training... you have been cooped here for the whole day already..."
Hearing that, he frowned a bit because the girl was becoming too annoying for him, but there was nothing else he could do about that. In fact, Yhwach was becoming a bit fond of the girl because she was one of the few people who wasn't acting on tiptoes around him.
It was rare and refreshing, considering the fact that almost all the people around were scared of his parents and background.
"I will be joining you after I finish the book."
Yhwach started, while Valiana cocked her eyebrow as she sat next to him and started looking around the tomes that were on the table. He had been reading here the tomes related to the space magic for several hours already.
There was a whole bunch of them at the table in front of him, and Valiana started looking bored not even half a minute after she arrived there. Spending time in the library wasn't for her, even though he was aware that sooner or later, she would need to start studying Magic seriously.
Her potential for that was enormous in this aspect, so it would be a waste for her not properly to utilize everything that she had in her disposition.
"Did you hear? Crom Cruach has just fought Thor and defeated him in a single combat, so the new 10th spot of the Top Ten belongs to the new owner."
Valiana stated after several moments and in fact Yhwach wasn't tht surprised by the outcome of the battle. His father met the Dragon some time ago and told him that the madman had managed to reach Heavenly Dragon Level.
So, the Top Ten List had a new name on it...
1. Shiva - The God of Destruction
2. Okhwang - The Jade Emperor
3. Indra - The Heavenly Emperor
4. Brahma - The Creator / Vishnu - The Preserver
5. Odin Borson - The All-Father
6. Amaterasu Ōmikami - The Goddess of Sun and Universe
7. Hades - The God of the Dead and Underworld
8. Aten - The God of the Eternal Blazing Sun
9. Scáthach - The Queen of Shadows
10. Crom Cruach - The Crescent Circle Dragon
As he wished, a translucent window appeared in front of his eyes, showing the Top Ten List.
It was one of the owners of the Draconic Deus Dimension, as it was recorded by the Will of the World and Gods of Destiny. The requirements to be listed on the Top Ten List was to be Level 8 Being and be the strongest?
The list was showing only the active personnel, so no beings that were either Sealed, Slumbering, Sleeping or otherwise Inactive were no listed and would not be shown regardless of their strength or achievements.
At the same time, once someone reached Level 9, they would be removed from the list, as their power reached a degree where they could destroy entire planets as easily as breathing, so it wouldn't be appropriate to rank them.
Right now, his father was standing at the top of the list, though he doubted that it would be for long, as he was very close to reaching Level 9 and thus would be soon enough removed from the list.
Interestingly enough, there were other for people from the Hindu Pantheon on the Top Ten List, which was also one of the reasons why they were considered as the strongest Faction in the Draconic Deus.
"Father mentioned that the Crescent Circle Dragon is very powerful... who would have thought that he would directly jump into the Top Ten after reaching the Level of the Heavenly Dragon not long ago."
Yhwach muttered, because while not really surprised by this piece of information, it was rather nothing short of miraculous. It seemed that he gained much during the ascension to the Cosmic Lifeform.
It was one almost iron-clad rule that the Lower Dimensional Lifeforms could resist against the might of the Cosmic Lifeforms. The Beings that reached Level 8 were not only changed from the perspective of power, but also their very own fundamental nature was changed towards something higher and stronger.
***
Training his martial skills was something that Yhwach was doing every single day since his father judged that he could undergo some strict training and punishment. This was for the reason, of course, because his Lineage gave him tremendous potential.
He was the son of one of the strongest Gods in the entire Draconic Deus, and his mother was the 1st-Generation Seraphim, who bore the Divine Blood of the Yahweh himself. Only the Seraphims that were created in the so-called first generation were given the Divine Blood of their creator.
The rest of them didn't; this was also the reason why the 1st-Generation were the strongest ones among all of the Angels. They were created to be the strongest Angels of all, as in the grand plan, they were supposed to be Yahweh's commanders and leaders of the Heaven and entire Pantheon.
While the presence of Yahweh's Divine Blood in them bound them even in a stricter way than the ordinary Angels, if they managed to assimilate Yahweh's Divine Blood completely, they would obtain unprecedented power and unlock their full potential.
Till now, only a few of them have managed to achieve that, including his mother, who had external help from Shiva or The True Seraphim of Death, Azrael, who disappeared after the Great War of the Supernatural to some unknown place together with his Legion of the Forsaken.
Still, due to that, combined with the strict training regime and his skills, he managed to reach Level 3 in a meager ten years. This was already an unprecedented achievement, as the only thing that he lacked right now was the appropriate combat experience.
The one who was in charge of Yhwach's martial training was one of his top-ranking Generals, Shix the Machinist. He was Level 6 Major God from the Asura Species, an old man who was always rather grumpy and a slave driver.
Still, he was an excellent teacher who taught Yhwach a lot, especially in the combat, because the man had many millennia of combat experiences. This was the reason why, in terms of combat experiences, the Nordic Pantheon and Hindu Pantheon were top-ranked ones.
Their people were the most experienced for one reason or another.
Right now, he was standing on the empty training field, which was located in the heart of Mount Kailash in the Hindu Divine Realm. Together with him, Valiana was standing there too, though, with much eager expression, because this would be the first time she was joining him in the martial training.
During the past weeks, she was either training only a bit, grasping the basics from the trainers, because old man Shix wasn't training anyone who didn't have the basics; he apparently lacked patience for that.
On top of that, he noticed that Valiana was an utter battle maniac, even bigger than Yhwach himself, because she really, really enjoyed the feeling of the battle and a good fight. Shix, the Machinist, was an older-looking man with three pairs of arms, reddish brown skin, and a white beard that was neatly trimmed.
"Now, as you are the new addition to my annoyance, we will start with the spar, so I have a better grasp of your abilities."
He stated with a calm voice, to the point where one would mistake him for a kind grandfather if one didn't know better, as he motioned for the plethora of weapons. Yhwach naturally picked the spear because it was his preferred weapon of choice, while Valiana abstained from the choice.
She didn't have any weapon training, as she mainly depended on the Divine Dividing, to which their "mentor" scoffed lightly but didn't say anything else.
When both of them were ready, he gave the command for the start.
In a moment, Divine Dividing appeared behind Valiana, as a futuristic-looking pair of white dragon wings with crystalline azure colors shone on the battlefield. He had to admit that the Divine Dividing really looked like it was cut out from some Sci-Fi movie.
In this spar, Yhwach knew that he was rather limited in his choices because most of his abilities would be highly lethal for her right now, so using any form of the Holy Power would be very dangerous due to her Devil Heritage.
Thus, he decided to stick to the usage of Magic and Martial Skills to fight, as he appeared in front of her, aiming directly at her wings with the spear he was holding. Yhwach also lightly enveloped the spear with his Destruction Energy, just a little bit to destroy the Divine Dividing that was manifested.
To his surprise, the descendant of the Lucifer dodged the spear strike rather easily, as she flew high in the air, observing her opponent for a moment, before she used the Devil Magic to conjure some fireballs that shot at Yhwach with fast speed.
Seeing her choice of move, he chuckled, using the [Divine Magic], as golden shield of the [Divine Magic] appeared around his person. All of the Valiana's fireballs smashed on the golden shield without damaging the shiled even a bit.
Divine Shield Spell was one of the most basic defensive uses of the [Divine Magic] in combination of the [Angelic Magic], as the Divine Shield that Yhwach cast was giving off the Holy feeling.
At the exact same time, Valiana appeared behind Yhwach, using the Divide Ability of the Divine Dividing, causing the Divine Shield to weaken a bit before he could react as he slashed with his spear at her, causing her to fly away from him.
In the next moment, his Divine Shield crumbled apart, as it was weakened by half, coupled with the several tens of fireballs that were falling on the Divine Shield. Suddenly, he teleported away with the Space Magic, appearing twenty meters away from his previous location as he used a spell named Blink.
Yhwach was somewhat proficient in [Space Magic], and together with the [Unique Skill - Great Sage], he was able to cast Magic several times easier than the ordinary Magicians because the Great Sage gave him terrifying computing capabilities.
However, Valiana's lineage was also showing itself in this aspect because Lucifer, or Helel before his fall, was famous for his mastery over the Magic, and during his life as Devil, he was the most powerful Devil Magician of their entire species.
After Valiana started focusing more on the Devil Magic, she realized that it was coming to her naturally and very easily, like it was part of her. This was also boosted by the fact that she was the host of the Divine Dividing that housed the soul of the Heavenly Dragon.