The paladin watched Liam walk to him in utter shock and horror. The man was calmly smiling but that only made it worse. It was the smile of a predator, one who had already closed the trap and was now watching his prey realize it far too late. "I have to admit," Liam continued, voice smooth, almost amused, "I thought you would have better mental strength than that. Dude, you folded so quickly. I have seen pigs have better mental resistance." "You are alive." The paladin repeated looking in a daze. "Ya, no shit, Sherlock. You really do think of me as an insect, don't you? Is that why your mind was so weak that it fell apart so easily? You don't think someone from a trash planet could stand up against someone like you or that bitch?" The paladin shook his head. "No, this is my priestess punishing me. I will not show weakness to my priestess. This is all just an illusion." Liam chuckled darkly, the sound echoing ominously through the void. "Denial? Cute. But I'm afraid this isn't one of your divine hallucinations. No judgmental goddess watching from above. No cleansing fire waiting to redeem you. Just you, me, and a whole lot of regret." The paladin's hands trembled as he instinctively tried to summon divine power—but nothing answered his call. No light. No warmth. No divinity. No guidance. Just the suffocating chill of nether creeping up his spine. "This... this isn't real," he muttered again, but the tremor in his voice betrayed the growing doubt gnawing at the edges of his mind. "You're not supposed to be alive. She... she erased you." Liam's grin widened, cruel and knowing. "And yet, here I am. Funny thing, really. You all walk around like you own reality, like fate and divinity bend at your feet. But you never stop to think, what happens when someone refuses to follow the script?" He stepped closer, nether rising in his wake, slithering like living ink. "What happens… when the 'villain' rewrites the story?" The next second, divine energy once again flooded the space and Liam's figure let out an agonized shriek before disappearing. The priestess made another appearance. "You disappoint me. I told you to get rid of that annoying pest and yet all you do is fail over and over again. You were defeated by the illusion of someone dead. Why should I continue wasting my time with someone like you?" A cold laughter resounded. The paladin shivered as he looked up again with hope in his eyes. He did not dare to believe this. He refused to believe this and yet this was the truth, so how could he not believe it? "You are pathetic. I told you to erase that world out of existence. No one should come to know what we have been doing. I told you to take care of it and yet nothing has come of it." The paladin's throat bobbed as he struggled to breathe beneath the crushing weight of her words. The divine pressure pressing down on him now was not just power, it was contempt. It was judgment. It was the slow, deliberate dismantling of what little worth he had left in her eyes. "My priestess," he croaked, trying to find some thread of redemption to cling to, "I would not have lost. I had the perfect opportunity to right all the wrongs and erase him once and for all, but the Elemental King…" "Excuses!" Snapped the priestess. "I will release you now. Consider what happened just now as a punishment for your actions. If you fail me again… Go take care of that blasphemous world and make it disappear from the myriad realms." "Yes, my priestess." The man answered with determination in his eyes. "It is only a matter of time. I have already conferred with the divine oracles. That world is not for long. Their elites are going to face a major catastrophe soon. None of them will survive it. I am sure of it. Even if their world is now hidden with the karmic link we have with the world it is impossible to evade our eyes for long. I will exterminate that world for you, my priestess. This is my unbreakable vow to you, my priestess " The priestess said nothing for a long moment. Then, with a cold flick of her hand, the pressure around him lifted, and the golden chains that had shackled his soul unraveled and vanished into the air like mist. The void pulsed once more with divine light before dimming. "Go," she said. "Cleanse the filth. Erase the shame. If that world still dares to breathe when the cycle turns, know that your existence ends with it. Wait. What about the system event then? Did you manage to locate what we needed?" The paladin's face immediately changed. His mind was in a mess again. Something snapped and suddenly he found himself shackled all over again in suffocating nether. "Tch. Tch. Two times in a row? Now that's really pathetic. What is wrong with you? At this rate, you are going to get some achievement for the best whistle-blower. You are so bad that everyone is going to think you simply giving me all the information I want willingly." Liam shrugged. "I think it's only a matter of time before that divine bitch pays for all of her sins." "No!" The man screamed in terror and agony. "Don't talk about her like that. An insect like you can never even get near her. Your body will vaporize before you even step into our world." Liam grinned, utterly unbothered by the paladin's panic. The suffocating nether continued to coil around the man like a thousand venomous serpents, constricting, sinking deep into his very soul. "That's good to know. See that's one more piece of information you have given me. So I cannot enter the divine realms without a body of a certain degree of divine affinity." The paladin looked slightly startled but he did not care. "It doesn't matter. You will never be able to reach my priestess." Liam smiled silently. He walked closer to him and then leaned in. "Sure, I might not be strong enough to ever step into one of your divine realms but she can come to me, right? You know that bitch very well after all. Don't you think she will come running to me if I toss a breadcrumb her way?" The paladin's eyes widened in horror as he bent his head low, unwilling to look up any longer. "Don't worry. Very soon she will be joining you. I will lay a trap for her so perfect she'll think it was her own divine will leading her into it," Liam whispered, his voice dripping with venomous promise. "All I need is the right lure. And thanks to you… I know exactly what bait to use." The paladin trembled, a low, guttural sound escaping his throat, half denial, half despair. Nether licked at his limbs, feeding off his fear, amplifying it. His connection to the divine was flickering like a dying star, and in this space, Liam's space, he was powerless. Liam's words continued to taunt him when another vicious cycle once again started. Liam's image exploded with a shriek and the divine priestess appeared in front of him yet again.