Jeon Il-hyeok stared blankly at the sky.
The dark-blue heads that had been pouring down toward him and his squad members just moments ago were now caught in a shining barrier, thrashing about.
Despite having fallen from the height of a 10th-floor apartment, they maintained their form without a single part being crushed. They were no ordinary heads.
If those things had fallen on him as they were, wouldn't his own head have been crushed flat?
But the holy barrier was different.
Spread wide and thin, the barrier looked frail, yet it effortlessly blocked nearly ten heads without taking any damage.
'...What on earth is this? Did the military invent some new miracle technology?'
No, that seemed unlikely.
Then just what was this....
In that instant, a piece of information flashed through Jeon Il-hyeok's mind.
A rumor about an angel staying at the garrison where he was stationed.
He had thought it had nothing to do with him, so he hadn't paid it much mind, but....
"...That was close."
A beautiful voice, rarely heard on the front lines.
Jeon Il-hyeok irresistibly turned around, and saw.
An angel with two pairs of wings, approaching while scattering holy light in all directions.
'...Maybe I should go to church sometime, even without a Choco Pie.'
Even that thought crossed his mind in that moment.
*
I saw the heads falling from the sky, thud after thud.
Each one bruised dark-blue, looking truly like clusters of grapes.
They were human heads, yet their properties weren't entirely the same.
They screamed without necks, and the mass they contained appeared to be at least double that of a human head.
But they were all blocked.
And by a single barrier I had deployed.
'...This barrier, it seems stronger than what was described in the knowledge the demon passed on?'
The holy spell used this time was 'Veil of Grace.'
It wasn't such a great spell. Honestly, I hadn't expected it to block everything so perfectly.
Originally, I had planned to buy some time and then block them with a follow-up spell....
'This works?'
Though I was surprised using it, I had some idea why.
'It must be the difference between having divine authority or not.'
Divine authority is similar to a type of right.
You don't necessarily need divine authority to cast a holy spell, but a spell without it is only half-complete.
Even when casting the same spell, the output differs depending on whether one possesses divine authority.
Moreover, special holy spells called secret arts have usage requirements that essentially require possessing divine authority....
'The authority the demon possessed is presumed to be of the Revelation lineage.'
Since the demon couldn't have completely possessed holy power either, it was hard to imagine it wielding other authorities.
So for spells of other lineages, without authority, it must have only remembered them in a degraded state.
'Unlike the Revelation lineage, it only knew the secret arts of other lineages as pure knowledge from the start. And there weren't many of them either.'
I suspected it was probably due to reasons like this.
The spells the demon remembered and the spells I cast were fundamentally different from the ground up.
'...Well, if it's good, it's good.'
Didn't this all mean I could wield even greater power?
Besides, I possessed the divine authority of every lineage.
Meaning I could cast other lineages' authorities in an undegraded state as well.
"Aaaack! Aaaaaack!"
One of the heads that had crashed into the barrier spotted me and began screaming madly.
Judging by its short hair, it might have once been a soldier.
Whoosh!
As the soldier's head shrieked, the other heads spotted me as well.
In an instant, gazes focused on me.
I glared right back, not about to lose.
Normally, it would be a situation where I should feel fear, but now I was simply composed.
No, I was a bit scared, but not to the point of being overwhelmed. Rather, disgust surged up, if anything.
Perhaps partly because my mental protection had grown stronger upon obtaining divine authority....
'So what can you do?'
What could they do besides glare at me while tangled in the barrier?
Now I stood clearly above those monsters. They were no longer predators to be feared unconditionally.
Of course, I still didn't quite have a grasp on monsters like the Land Leviathan... but those things were nothing.
I stretched my arm straight out, aiming at the soldier's head.
Now it was time to test a Judgment lineage spell.
"Aaaaaack! Aaaack!"
The soldier's head, perhaps failing to grasp the situation, shrieked nothing but desperate screams.
Did it find the sight of my empty hand rather amusing?
But the past me who used to carry around nothing but a Glock no longer existed.
I had now reached a point where I no longer needed to rely on such weak weapons.
"Angel Death Beam."
Its formal name was the Judgment lineage secret art, Divine Pointer.
A thin light burst from the tip of my finger.
Truthfully, even the expression 'shot out' didn't quite fit.
It simply... was already pierced there.
In the center of the soldier's head.
—Wheeeng!
A beat late, the air split apart, and a whirlwind roared with a delayed thunderous sound.
Along the path the light had passed, the air twisted as if screaming.
"Aaaa...."
And that was the soldier head's death throes.
The soldier's head, its glabella pierced by the light, stopped moving entirely.
In that instant, the other heads that had been screaming noisily fell silent.
Did those monsters too fluster at the shocking sight?
The silence lasted for a while, then was broken by someone's voice.
"A head that wouldn't even get scratched by bullets...!"
A soldier who appeared to be the squad leader muttered thus.
Well, from a distance, the rifle rounds hadn't seemed to inflict proper effective damage.
Yet I had pierced a head with such toughness with a mere pointing of my finger.
Of course, the cost was quite high for something as simple as a flick of the finger....
'Its destructive power alone is incredible, though.'
Secret arts weren't classified as such for nothing.
The holy power consumption was high, but the return value exceeded it.
Moreover, no matter how high the cost, it wasn't a heavy burden for me.
After all, I was an angel with two pairs of wings.
I had gained an attack method that could be called something of a finishing move, but....
'Somehow, I feel like this will be somewhat inefficient in actual combat.'
It was definitely an amazing technique. An amazing technique, but....
'Of all things, the ones I have to face aren't beings that die from a hole in the head....'
That soldier head died when pierced, but Mimicry Beasts were different.
They don't die from a small hole in the head. You can't even tell if they think with their brains in the first place.
Besides, they had their uniquely tenacious vitality, so a hole the size of my finger in the head wouldn't incapacitate them.
'It has high power but narrow range, the cost is considerable for continuous use, plus there's an after-delay....'
Hmm, did I get scammed?
That complaint crossed my mind for a moment, but at least this was my debut stage, so my luck wasn't bad.
At least those grape heads were incapacitated when their glabella was pierced.
Of course, it would take quite a while to pierce the glabella of ten heads one by one....
As sighs poured out at the anticipated repetitive labor, something caught my eye.
'Hmm...? What's that...?'
Something pinecone-shaped, small, and even transparent, despite floating so high up.
I saw that it had essentially served as the stem from which those grape heads had hung in clusters.
I had thought it too would naturally disappear since the heads fell from the soldiers' gunfire, but....
'It's still there?'
Even though no more heads were attached to it, why did it keep floating in the sky?
Actually, there was no need to agonize over it.
It was probably right to shoot down something that suspicious first and ask questions later.
"Angel Death Beam."
Once again, a ray of light shot from my finger, this time piercing the transparent pinecone.
I turned over the heads fluttering in the aftershock, taking in the process.
"Aa, aaa...."
The head monsters all screamed.
But unlike their previous vigorous shrieks, their tone was completely drained of strength.
They had screamed just fine without vocal cords, but now it felt more like they were wringing dry throats.
"Aa...."
Their screams didn't last long.
They spat out words like death throes, and soon....
Psshhhk.
With a sound like air escaping, the head monsters' forms melted away like slime and collapsed.
'It's not a very pleasant sight to watch, but....'
That pinecone-shaped thing must have been the main body.
Since the other tough heads collapsed when it was destroyed.
This also served as proof that they weren't immortal beings like Mimicry Beasts.
'...I don't know about Mimicry Beasts, but those guys can be easily caught with Angel Death Beam.'
The secret art had successfully escaped being deemed useless.
Of course, catching just that one didn't mean the situation was over.
Right before me stood a horde of Mimicry Beasts, numbering in the dozens or perhaps even hundreds.
But it seemed I didn't need to worry about those either.
Psshoong-!
After hearing such a sound from somewhere....
Boom!
Bombardment fell toward the place where the Mimicry Beasts were gathered.
Boom, boom, boom....
Without cease, continuously.
Watching the Mimicry Beasts being cleanly pulverized, I suddenly had a question.
Why did the army, possessing such excellent means, only now launch a bombardment?