Xingyue, is Xiaokai also considered Kai?

I can't feel the magic...

Just as Tsuna was pondering this in his heart, he sensed the presence of light in the darkness, like twinkling starlight, distant yet countless.

But he felt that these points of light were still too small to illuminate or dispel the darkness, and that he needed the brighter light of stars.

That is--

"Please allow me to introduce myself once again. I am a believer of the Lord, and the former judge who was granted a physical body and left in the world, Amakusa Shiro."

Golden Heroic Spirits.

Revered as the strongest god in the Americas, the existence of the fifth sun—

Those who had failed to become saints nodded powerfully to him and bowed again with deep respect to the darkness where the light was.

The next second—

The transformation of all things into new life manifested in the pitch-black world. Tiny rays of light, like grains of sand, extended into even finer filaments, intertwining and coalescing, instantly transforming into a massive ray of light that burned away the darkness, like daylight—the sun appeared.

“Not bad, very good.” Standing beside Novia, Traloc, who had changed from his civilian clothes into priest’s attire, gave Amakusa a cold look. “Skinning him or taking his heart... the problem is that you can’t have both.”

As soon as the black-haired girl finished speaking, as if she had guessed what Novia was going to say, she immediately leaned close to his ear and whispered:

"After all these years, your temper has improved quite a bit. What? Back when we first met, you dared to fight me and severely injure me. Now, as your god, I have violated the rules you set and willingly accepted your punishment, yet you used Joan of Arc's words to excuse yourself. Since you, as my master, are so lenient with me, then it's only natural for me to skin these guys or take their hearts at will."

There was no malice in Tralock's voice, only pure provocation, like a serpent tempting an angel to fall.

He seemed a little annoyed that he hadn't been able to find a reason to 'punish' Novia yesterday.

Earlier, before Amakusa made his voice, the people inside the room were Tralock, Abigail, and Novia.

Novia hadn't originally planned to decorate the interior like this, but due to Tralock's insistence—

"As the fifth sun of the Americas, the strongest sun that commands us, we must let these heretics know our reverence for you."

Although Novia could have refused Tralock's request outright, she figured it wasn't a big deal, so she let her have it and lent her her abilities to Amakusa to demonstrate the Fifth Sun's status.

"How about we summon Quetzalcoatl to show off our power? Hmm... and my brother, getting him to perform the old eulogy shouldn't be a problem, although he might not want to, but he has no choice but to do it because of your request. Alright, that's settled then—"

"Forget it, it's just meeting someone, there's no need to make such a fuss."

Novia used this as a way to refuse when the girl was making plans with great interest.

"That won't do. If other pantheons see this, they'll think we're not united. We must have Quetzalcoatl and my brother, no, also the Lord of Skinning, and those animals from the north—"

"You are enough for me."

Although it was a simple sentence, it still made Tralock's heart skip a beat. Her cheeks flushed a rosy hue where Novia couldn't see. She looked at Novia with expectant eyes, but then the look vanished.

"Then I'll change into the priest's robes..."

Abby, who couldn't possibly get a word in edgewise, had a multitude of complaints in her heart.

Whether she was unhappy or happy, she wanted to unleash all those emotions through words, turning them into a bad child.

That's clearly the case.

Looking at my brother's face now, I can't think of a single curse word.

She felt that as long as her brother was there, everything would be alright.

As long as my brother is by my side, that's enough.

Abigail shook her head and continued eating her dessert.

Back to the present, after Traloc uttered that 'provocative' remark, Novia merely glanced at her before addressing Amakusa below in a dignified tone:

"In the rules of America, to have a dialogue with God requires the determination to give one's life, Amakusa Shiro."

Amakusa showed no displeasure or surprise at this; he simply nodded firmly again and said:

“Of course I know him, the fifth sun god of the Americas, Favia Tonatiu.”

"You actually know that name...?"

Wearing her priest's robes, Tralock had done a good job with the matters concerning the gods, and she said this after Amakusa finished speaking.

Over the years, this name has long been buried in the river of time.

"Because I have been to the Americas."

And so, Amakusa began to tell his story.

Sixty years have passed, and Amakusa, who has gained a physical body, has traveled to many places, including the continent known as America.

Arrive at Tenochtitlan, a city that has existed since the past and is now known as the floating city of Mexico.

As he witnessed many fellow believers living in harmony with those of the American faith, which should have been considered heretical, Amakusa, sitting on a chair somewhere in Texcoco, also known as the Lake of the Moon, gently enveloped by the music of the ceremony, saw white fluff and colorful confetti falling and fluttering, more beautiful than snowflakes.

Just seeing this scene made the boy so happy he almost cried.

He then learned the origin of the festival from the surrounding residents—

"The Sun God ascended to the sky to defeat the water monster Mipaktri, and then never returned."

In folklore, mythology refers to sacred stories about humankind and the changes in the world. In a broader sense, "mythology" can refer to any ancient legend that expresses a nation's ideology through stories. The gods in mythology are mostly depicted as having superhuman powers and are idealizations of primitive human understanding and desires.

Although it may seem false to ordinary people outside the mystical world, its meaning remains and has always existed there.

Therefore, in Amakusa's view, although it is fictional, it is also a very small, very grand, and very important fairy tale of love and courage.

Amakusa Shiro remembers saying the words he had to say when he joined the church: "We have always been a 'community,' and the 'community' of the Holy Church is established for each of its members, and for all those in the world who are suffering, unfortunate, or confused about the future. It was established for people."

That was not a covenant required by the Lord, but a covenant between the holy ones who were entrusted by the Son of Man to establish the church as an organization and those who joined the church.

When he first learned of this from Western merchants and missionaries, To this day he still thinks it is beautiful that someone could say such things, and that the world is beautiful because of it... Despite what has happened since, he still believes it.

Afterwards, the Arbiter, who had gained a physical body and traveled around the world, made a rare move after witnessing all of that. He felt that his actions were somewhat inappropriate, though it couldn't be said to be inappropriate, since there were also local church believers from the Americas participating in the ceremony.

In short, on that day, bathed in the dim, warm light of dusk, Amakusa Shiro softly said:

"The world you left behind is indeed beautiful... However, Lord, please forgive my praise of the pagan god."

Subsequently, through the Arbitrator's research on local beliefs, along with analysis from the magic community and within the association, it was learned that the fifth sun god of the Americas, Tonatiu, could be interpreted in other ways besides being a supreme being destined to be born in local mythology. This sun could be seen as a deity created by the people of the Americas after they came into contact with the church and adapted it according to their own system.

Or perhaps, the Central and South American pioneers, who only existed in the locals' mouths, were deified in the region, seemingly a mixture of the Church's God, the deeds of the Savior, and the name of the founder... But in any case, their existence was merely similar to that of the Church's God.

After the narration, Amakusa Shiro earnestly said to Novia:

"Your Excellency Favia, you are in the same boat, aren't you? The time when your legend was at its peak coincided with the Spanish invasion of Central and South America. Although the Age of Gods had already passed by then, according to my knowledge in the Church, even in the 19th century, monsters comparable to the gods of the Age of Gods appeared in the Gevadán region of France. They were eventually destroyed by the Church together with the Count of Monte Cristo."

Completely unsuspecting, Amakusa Shiro continued earnestly.

"It is not difficult to see from this that in the 16th century, in the isolated Americas, the monster did indeed come back to life, and you must have destroyed it."

So, Your Excellency Favia, you are well aware that selfishness, prejudice, and arrogance are irresistible aspects of human nature. You must have also witnessed the massacre of the Native Americans by the Spanish, the seemingly indifferent resurrection of the sea monster, so that you could find an opportunity to legitimately appear in an era where the divine age has vanished and eliminate the invaders who worship you…

Yet you have boundless compassion for everything, good and evil, those who deserve pity and those who deserve hatred, even those who wage war for profit, because everyone is just an ordinary human being, an ordinary existence, even the Spanish are no exception.

Yes, you must have chosen to have compassion for everything, to love everything, to believe in humanity, and to believe that they will one day reach 'there'.

Just like me, no, it should be that I am just like you, so right now I can end human sorrow ahead of time and usher in true 'redemption' ahead of time. The third method is the materialization of the soul, not a half-baked immortality, but a complete immortality that abandons the corruptible physical body. And it is not targeted at a single object, but shared by all of humanity. Regardless of good or evil, emotions and selfish desires will fade, vanity will become meaningless, and it will be perfect peace.

All humanity will become beings where only souls survive. The struggle for resources will disappear, and disputes arising from differing ideologies will inevitably vanish as well.

The chain of revenge will be broken, the world will undergo dramatic changes, and the direction of those changes will likely lead to eternal peace.

This is my plan; please help me, as I also yearn for a better future for humanity.

How should I put it? Amakusa Shiro, as expected of the judge who had waited sixty years, had managed to guess a great deal about the former Favia based on this information and his own insights, and the proposal sounded extremely tempting.

However, Novia responded immediately to this:

"I cannot condone this kind of redemption."

"Why are you so selfish? You shouldn't be like this..."

How could you refuse like this? As the sun god who could have used the resurrection of the lake monster to solve the misfortune of the Americas, yet chose to destroy the monster to avoid even greater casualties, forced to watch people kill each other, how could you possibly refuse like this...?

"Is that so?" Novia said with a gentle expression after hearing this. "I can indeed be described as a very selfish person."

At this moment, Amakusa Shiro suddenly asked the man in front of him with a sense of guilt:

"...Aren't you angry?"

"No, because I don't deny that, and you only embarked on this path for the sake of humanity. However, Amakusa Shiro Tokisada, I have denied your dream, but even so—"

The blond man's smile looked so beautiful that Amakusa Shiro felt he truly meant it, and it wasn't just empty talk.

"I will still be watching you."

Even if your journey is destined to be wrong, it doesn't matter.

This brief, concise answer, coupled with the man's smile, looked so dreamlike.

In an instant, Amakusa's expression changed a little too quickly.

Joan of Arc just told Amakusa that the fifth sun before them was an enemy. Although Amakusa didn't know why this French saint would say such a thing, he felt that it wasn't true.

Although my dream has been denied, I've had enough time to delay. My true self is about to complete the transformation of the Greater Grail, and I will surely show you that this dream is absolutely correct.

However, for some reason, even though Novia's smile remained unchanged, Amakusa felt inexplicably uneasy.

The next moment, Novia slowly walked up to Amakusa and said:

"So, I've come to find you, Amakusa Shiro Tokisada."

In fact, Amakusa Shiro's use of the illusion technique of the red-side sorcerer, suspected to be the great demon Tamamo-no-Mae, was as good as nothing to Novia. However, ordinary gods could not see through it. For example, Tralok, who was next to Novia, did not notice it at all. Otherwise, she would not have just made a few words to 'provoke' Novia by skinning her and tearing out her heart. Tralok felt that this would undoubtedly be a great humiliation to Novia, and she would have been so angry that she would have skinned Amakusa and torn out his heart.

But only a deity descending to a lower realm or creating a split spirit could create such an illusion, just like the human body created by the Smoke Mirror.

At the same time, inside the Greater Grail is a space different from the real world, a place where the laws of physics, magic, and even existence itself have been stirred into something else, and the Arbiter who plans to transform the Greater Grail into the Heaven's Cup is in it.

It would be more accurate to describe it as swimming rather than walking, as Amakusa Shiro continued to move forward despite the sensation of his skin peeling off and his muscles dissolving.

Amakusa Shiro could still feel the pain in his arms, but for him, only this pain could connect him with reality and himself.

The world is still full of suffering. His father, mother, sister, and the 37,000 people who were brutally murdered wanted him to stop.

However, Amakusa refused to listen to their words of sympathy and rejected their invitation to stop. He covered his ears to avoid hearing what they were saying. He had naturally anticipated such temptations, and he thought that as long as they were lost here, their deaths would be in vain. He shook off these temptations.

Amakusa could not possibly not be in pain, could not possibly not be heartbroken.

However, he believed he would definitely arrive, because he held onto a desire that he was determined to achieve.

"I can walk, wherever I want, whenever I want."

Amakusa Shiro knew that he couldn't actually love everyone like the American sun god.

He hated them, hated them for killing his beloved, yet he also wanted to save her.

Therefore, in his journey, Amakusa Shiro poured out his deep love for those who killed his beloved, out of compassion for those he should have hated.

He forgot his hatred, transformed it, and even so, his killing intent remained so strong. But in order to save humanity, Amakusa Shiro decided to betray 'himself'.

His hatred will not disappear; he retains his way of being a human being there, and casts it aside, seals it away, and ignores it.

As the arbiter of these matters, he firmly believed, gazing at the Great Grail not far ahead.

His long-cherished dream is about to be realized—

Incredibly fragile, tiny strands of light intertwined and coalesced, arriving here from a distant place.

Amakusa Shiro subconsciously looked up and felt once again that these lights were too weak to illuminate the night; he needed the brilliance of brighter stars.

Next, the light from the converging filaments coalesced, generating a tremendous radiance that instantly transformed into a massive beam of light, scorching everything in its path, like a star—

A gigantic sun appeared in the sky above the Greater Grail space.

"I'm here to deny your dream, Amakusa Shiro Tokisada."

277: The Owner of the Greater Grail (5k)

"So, you had already anticipated this move?"

In front of Amakusa, Novia, with the appearance of a giant sun, stands before the Greater Grail.

"Yeah, I know, Amakusa."

He answered quietly, as if talking to himself.

"Even I, Amakusa Shirou, the arbiter of the Fuyuki Holy Grail War, who has waited sixty years for this day and planned so many things, did I?"