Chapter 7171: The Dark Mouth - Mass Release Day 5/5 A very awkward silence ensued after the Dark Apostle asked his bizarre question. For a moment, both humans and giants grew confused. Even Ves froze after hearing his alter ego utter those outrageous words. Admirably, the Unshakeable King still managed to maintain his cool. His face which looked as if it was chiseled from marble looked completely unflappable. The only visible change was that his stare towards the Dark Apostle had intensified. "Pardon?" "Are you deaf? You heard what I said? How loose are your underpants beneath that thick raiment of yours? As Ascended Giants, we grow and shrink in size in proportion to our former mortal forms. This means that if you were a big boy from the beginning, your ascended form will proportionately remain the same. So tell me, how much free space is there inside that section of armor? I bet it must be big enough to fit more than a dozen humans in that cavity. Did you use them to fill up the free space? You must have done so, or else you wouldn’t have enough padding for your raiment." "..." "No response? Then you admit that the body is naturally inadequate in this area! It must have been so bad that no amount of medical treatment could have solved this congenital deficiency of yours. It appears that not even becoming a giant has remedied this shortcoming, because you wouldn’t be such a shameful coward who thinks about surrendering our people to the Red Cabal. Instead of letting us rule over ourselves, you would rather sell your fellow Ascended Giants into slavery just so that the phase whales can appoint you as their puppet satrap! To call you a giant is a misnomer due to how frail your masculinity must be to think that serving the native aliens is the best future for our people!" The Unshakeable King was clearly putting a great amount of effort to reflect his name. No matter what, he had to remain unmoved by the Dark Apostle’s provocations! Ves and many others still grew perplexed at the Dark Apostle’s effort. Why would he issue such juvenile insults at this time? It was unlikely to work against an opponent of this caliber. Soldiers dealt with profanity and insults many times during their career. They might appear nothing less than professional when facing a friendly audience, but in private they could be a lot rougher underneath their uniform exterior. When Ves tried to figure out this puzzle, he came up with a few theories. One reason may be to make the Unshakeable King angry enough to prevent him from conceding the match too soon. If the Ascended Giant gave up too quickly, then the Dark Apostle would lose his chance to end his opponent’s life. Just because the Unshakeable King was used to insults did not mean he liked it. He hated the Dark Apostle a lot more than before! Another reason may be to publicly declare his stance in order to reassure Ves and the Red Collective that he would not go traitor anytime soon. It was an unexpectedly clever move. Whether the Dark Apostle was sincere or not, his public declaration had committed him to this stance. Everyone would expect him to follow through on his words. In the end, the Divine Harpoon stepped forward and interceded for his troubled colleague. "A leadership challenge is fought through arms, not words. Please save your accusations for when you are able to assert your leadership over us. Your words are empty so long as you have not proven yourself to be strong enough to earn our obeisance. Please arm and armor yourself. We have waited long enough." The Dark Apostle did not bother to argue with the Divine Harpoon. The challenger instead turned to the locked container that held his wargear. It slowly parted open after transmitting a command. Panels of solid and protective metal slid apart. Slowly but surely, a rack that held up a fairly heavy raiment along with a thick backpack module emerged upright from the middle of the container. The armaments also appeared upright and by the sides. The large and prominent long spear along with a slim but ominous knife completed the ensemble. Everyone grew silent as they beheld the finished works. To many people who had been able to catch a glimpse of the design schematics or was involved in the development of the raiment, the current works looked drastically different from what they had last observed! 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚 The developers of the raiment exhibited the greatest degree of shock. "What is that?! This is... this is completely different from what we have made on the chief councilor’s behalf! This raiment looks as if someone has taken our work and let a moody teenager warp it beyond recognition! The armor has sharp angles where it should have none! There is absolutely no reason for those spikes to exist! Its energy readings have also become much more volatile than before!" The ’Flame Lord Raiment’ was supposed to be a clean and efficient product. Despite being developed in a hurry, the red-coated armor incorporated many best practices in the fields of infantry armor design and mech design. Although it lacked many frills such as integrated weapon modules and so on, it managed to make the best out of its limited capacity by adding in the most essential functions such as a hyper shield generator based on the fire element and a strong but compact space suppressor. Much of the internals had been designed with care so that the internal architecture could best transmit the potent amount of energy produced by the reactor backpack module to the other parts of the machine, such as its flight system. The developers all became pleased at how well they managed to put their design together in so little time. To see it all perverted by an unknown influence was like a nightmare come to life! "What happened?!" What few people noticed was Blinky’s disturbingly human-like smirk. Demoncasting happened. Though Ves was only able to integrate a ’mere’ Minor Demon into the Flame Lord Raiment, it was enough to elevate its performance by a small but still significant degree! The Flame Lord Raiment did a better job of living up to its name. Red lines glowed across the exterior. They pulsed as if they were synchronized to a demon lord’s heartbeat. The sharper angles and the ’decorative’ spikes made it look much more menacing. What was most important was that its ability to attract fire energy had improved significantly. The reactor mounted on the rear benefited greatly from this as its energy output exceeded its standard norm! Perhaps it was due to the size of this raiment, but the degree of deviations was not as exaggerated as Ves expected. It was still very much usable, and the Minor Demon that unwillingly inhabited the red raiment was not strong enough to rebel against the likes of the Dark Apostle. The same applied to the armaments. Both the Teragon Plasma Spear and the Murder Knife had gone through a round of Demoncasting. The Teragon Plasma Spear’s tip had inexplicably lengthened in size. Spikes also jutted out along the shaft, which might make it a little more complicated to wield, but the fact that they were able to produce a weaker version of a plasma edge made them deadly to an unwary opponent! The plasma edge burned hotter and brighter despite its lengthening. Just as with the Flame Lord Raiment, the Teragon Plasma Spear was able to absorb more fire energy and thereby raise its output in so many different ways. This was a weapon that was capable of burning its targets with two different fires. How it would fare against the Unshakeable King remained to be seen, but the human phase lord in question’s expression seemed to grow a little more dour after catching sight of the demonized equipment. The final addition to the arsenal was the Murder Knife. This was in fact the only knife that Ves designed. It was meant to be used by him during all four duels, so he made sure that it remained focused and effective when used correctly. Although the wicked knife did not look like a big deal in comparison to the Teragon Plasma Spear, much of its potency was hidden in plain sight by design. Even its demoncasted form somehow maintained its subtle side even as its edge grew more menacing. The Dark Apostle began to equip his raiment. This was a partially automated process, so he did not encounter too many problems, even if the different parts of his armor were not as obedient as they should. "Behave." Ves commanded through Blinky’s body. Soon enough, the Dark Apostle looked like a true warrior this time. When he stepped forward again, the difference in equipment was incredibly stark. The challenger looked like a much more ideal embodiment of what the Ascended Giants strove for. His menacing red raiment radiated heat and power. Nobody dared to accuse him of being a pushover. Paired with the Teragon Plasma Spear held in two gauntleted hands, the Dark Apostle looked like a war god who had descended from the heavens in order to show the mortals how war was truly supposed to be waged! "You." The Dark Apostle pointed the unactivated edge of the Teragon Plasma Spear straight at the Unshakeable King. "You shall have the honor of becoming the first Ascended Giant to die at my hands. Do not even think of squirming away from my challenge. No matter whether you manage to save your life or not, I shall kill you and mount your head on a trophy. I must set an example to all of you who secretly aspire to betray your honor and your oaths just so that you can claim the bounty on my head and present it to the Red Cabal." The Unshakeable King did not attempt to defend himself or offer any response. He knew how the game was played, and he did not want anything to do with it. He would rather let his martial valor speak for itself. As the other three Ascended Giants began to retreat from the center of the dueling ground, the two duelists continued to stand on opposite ends of the metal plaza. The Unshakeable King’s raiment should have looked fairly impressive if Ves hadn’t stolen the show with his D-arms. Even so, his armor was still thick and reliable enough to withstand all sorts of attacks. He held his two Impact Hammers in a steady grip. Nothing about his stance betrayed any sense of frustration or rage. The Unshakeable King behaved as if everything around him was temporal and inconsequential. He was the only solid rock in a temperamental river. To him, it was a given that he would punish the Dark Apostle’s impertinent behavior. There was no reason for him to wind himself up when beating down the arrogant mech designer provided much greater satisfaction than any verbal response. The tension grew in the air as both sides readied to commence the duel. A single bot flew in from afar and stopped at the exact center. The bot projected a large countdown. [10] "You know, I respect you, Mr. Unshakeable King." [9] "You managed to climb your way up to become the strategos of the Ur-Titan Phalanx." [8] "This is an unexpected accomplishment given your congenital deficiency." [7] "Clearly the Oscillating Fist appointed you for a reason." [6] "I think I know why you don’t bother to say anything in response." [5] "You have dedicated your lips for a different purpose than speaking." [4] "Since the bottom half of your body has proven to be inadequate, you can only compensate with the upper side of your body." [3] "How many times have you bent the knee to the Oscillating Fist and greeted him with your mouth?" [2] "A hundred times? A thousand times? It must be a great number, for I can see no reason why you are allowed to keep your position when you are so lacking in spine courage in spine." [1] "Before this duel comes to the end, the last object your mouth shall wrap around will be the shaft of my plasma spear." [START] The Unshakeable King unexpectedly exploded into action at this time! "DIE, YOU CRETIN!"