I Became The Pope, Now What?
chapter-232

Sylvester dropped a solarium-Light bomb on the ground without making much movement.

"Jump!"

He shouted and leapt to the side. Lady Aurora did the same and jumped to the other side.

Boom!

The bomb exploded, but the ear-shattering screams of the Demon suppressed its explosion. The light seemed to affect the creature significantly, as it was still screaming by the time Sylvester stood up and faced it.

However, Sylvester felt his feet freezing as soon as his eyes rested on the demonic monstrosity. It was gigantic, like a towering mountain in front of him. It had a giant blood-red body with no particular regular shape or form. It seemed like a tree root had come out of the ground and hovered in the air, with smaller roots still protruding out like tentacles.

There was no specific shape of arms or legs, just a giant face. Its two big red eyes were looking left and right due to the bomb. Its mouth was akin to a mess and only seemed full of uneven teeth of varying shape and position.

In a true sense, this thing could be called a demon as it was so nightmarish.

Sylvester kept his heartbeat calm as he focused on Lady Aurora. "Start blasting lightning on it! Use your strongest moves!"

He, too, began using the Wrath of Heavens. Thankfully, the Demon was too large. Hence, he could easily target its parts.

Boom!

His plasma-filled beam of light hit the creature right in the centre of the face. At the same time, Lady Aurora's thunder started to fall from the sky like precise meteors. Each time they fell, they'd leave behind a big burning spot on the Demon's body.

"Wraaaa! Filth! Human!"

"It can speak!" Sylvester muttered and rushed to meet with Lady Aurora. Staying together was the smartest option at the moment.

Lady Aurora was worried, though. "Our attacks did nothing to it!"

Sylvester was not panicking. "It's fine. Everything has a weakness. We just need to find it. I think you should start using your wide-scale attacks--like how Lord Inquisitor once destroyed mountains with one single move."

"I can do that too, Sylvester. But this thing won't die with it, and we'll only end up destroying the landscape. This is not a simple bloodline. This is a Soul Eater--the strongest and the most dangerous of all demons." She replied.

Sylvester silently thought about the next move. Direct attacks were of no use from the looks of it, and the mist was also returning. With mist, the air was going to become more pressurised, making them slow and an easier target for the Demon.

"Duck!" He shouted

The Demon started to use its branch-like tentacles to hit them. However, what Sylvester noticed was something that brought a possible hypothesis. "It's not moving a lot, Aurora."

She also focused while carefully dodging the tentacles. "Is it protecting something?"

Sylvester thought about the same thing. 'Does it have some sort of an extended piece of body dug inside the ground? Perhaps it's core or something? Or maybe the key from which the Demon was summoned?'

Boom!

Sylvester jumped back to distance himself from the Demon and Lady Aurora, for he wished to speak with Miraj. "Chonky, can that demon see you?"

"Umm... I don't think so. Only Amy can see me."

"Good. I will give you a small window in which I will make the Demon immobile. In that time, you are to run near the Demon, take a look at what's underneath it and run back to me. Okay?" He plotted the plan.

"Aye, Aye, Maxy!"

Sylvester was amazed by Miraj's resolve. 'He does not even question or show fear for what I just asked him to do. Does he trust me so much that he believes I won't ever let any harm come to him?'

Miraj was right if he thought that. He loved the good boy and would never let any harm come to him. There was no doubt about it.

"Good. When I say 'go', you run. Now, stand on my shoulder and watch me." He instructed and took out two solarium-light bombs.

"Lady Aurora! Catch!" He threw one at her and prepared one for himself. "Use fire magic, not lightning. Demons are usually afraid of light and fire magic. While your thunder is good, but it's too precise."

He lied to her, as he knew that her thunder was much more devastating–enough to kill him if struct directly. But he only needed to blind the Demon for now.

♫Ground or the sky, where you came from.

You can try, but to fire and light, you shall succumb...♫

Sylvester started to sing the hymn and prepared the Wrath of Heaven.

Boom!

He matched his attack to go at the same time as Lady Aurora's. She was using a concentrated beam of fire using fire and an air elemental rune.

"Wraaaaa! Filthy magic!" the Demon cried in its loud, groaning voice.

"Go!" Sylvester signalled.

Miraj launched from Sylvester's shoulder like he was lightning itself. Focused, speed, flexible, and mighty--the words described the furry white cat accurately.

Woosh!

"Meow!" Miraj jumped over the various branch-like tentacles and made his way. The Demon was blinded by continuous attacks from Sylvester and Lady Aurora, so it was busy. But in its groaning rage, it was also slamming the tentacles randomly.

"Nyo!" Miraj cried when he found a thin tentacle getting a hold of him.

"Grrr...!" But the boy was strong despite his small size and quickly chewed through the tentacle and kept running right towards the danger. No fear, only determination. Miraj had decided to become an essential part of Sylvester's fight. After all, he had adopted Sylvester.

Woosh!

Chomp!

Miraj ate through several tentacles in his quest. What was just five seconds seemed like an eternity. But eventually, Miraj did reach underneath the Demon to look.

Then, a few seconds later, he turned around and made his way back. This was, once again, a straining battle, and Miraj had to be careful. Since now his back was facing the Demon, he could not look back.

"Jump!" Sylvester shouted.

Miraj did so and narrowly dodged a tentacle swinging low to the ground. Then, five seconds later, the furry boy made the last leap and climbed onto Sylvester's shoulder. He was panting like never before but also had a proud smile, likes of which never seen before.

"Retreat!" Sylvester roared to signal Lady Aurora.

With that, the two regrouped away from the demon. At the same time, Miraj was telling everything to Sylvester in his ears.

"Maxy, it's very ugly in there. I saw a big single root going into the ground, and the entire root had big transparent egg-like orbs, inside which I saw white people, from head to toe--just like Amy."

'Souls?' Sylvester thought of the first thing. Of course, a Soul Eater eats the souls and uses them to get stronger by absorbing the powers. This explained how it absorbed and utilised the strength of all the souls it devoured.

But, for the creature to be this strong, it had to have taken the soul of someone brilliant. And that puzzled him because, as far as he knew, there had never been any expert born or living in this village.

"Sylvester, what now?" Lady Aurora reached near him and asked. "I can try using the wide area destruction spells. I can summon a single bolt of lightning from the sky that will obliterate anything and everything in a radius of three hundred metres and leave behind nothing but sand-turned-glass. But that move will leave me completely drained."

'Hmm...' Sylvester thought about it. 'Even if she does it, can it kill the creature? Because unless the key that created the Demon is purified, the Demon shall remain. Not to mention, it has souls kept imprisoned.

"No, we don't need to do so. I have learnt that the Demon is connected with a single main root that contains the cocoons of the souls of the fallen. We must cut that root to kill the Demon and free the souls." He proposed a simple plan. This was what they were waiting for--a weakness.

"Fine, I'll do it." Lady Aurora decided unilaterally, as she was the strongest of the two, no matter if it was about being a knight or a wizard.

Sylvester didn't know if he should let her go. But the logical mind did tell him that he should since she was much stronger than him. 'Her strength is among the top of the clergy... I stand nowhere near her.'

"Fine then. I will give you a backup, my sister. Go and kick its ass... or whatever it has." He cheered her on and took out multiple solarium crystals. "Crush them in your mouth and recuperate."

She did so and started planning. First of all, she activated various knightly runes all over her armour, creating a faint blue shield all over the armour. Then, she lifted her sword and initiated some incantations under her mouth that made the sword shine in red.

"Provide backup, Sylvester." She requested and took a long breath. "Let's do it!"

Woosh!

She was fast, too fast for normal eyes. But Sylvester could vaguely follow her ever since he had ranked up while fighting the Shadow Knight.

Boom!

He, too, threw various solarium-Light Bombs at the Demon while also creating elemental fireballs to launch at the Demon's eyes.

"Wraaaa!"

Lady Aurora easily sliced through the tentacles as if her sword was a hot knife on butter. She also punched the various tentacles repeatedly, securing her free movement.

She was faster than Miraj and in no time reached under the Demon beside the root. After that, she started slashing her sword at the root, thicker than ten metres, wider than most trees out there.

Clank!

But, her sword was ineffective on it and sounded like it was hitting a stone instead. But, even a stone was not supposed to be a problem for her strength.

"Haaa!" She continued and used all her strength. First, she charged her body with electricity and sent it to the sword. Then she also used the only few solarium crystals in her mouth.

Woosh!

In a shining move, she struck with full might.

"Yes! Finally, a cut!" She cheered at the sight of a deep gash.

But, as she tried again, no more gashes appeared. That made her realise the grave situation she was in. Only solarium crystals were effective. "I... I don't have any more crystals!"

She still kept trying to cut it in a rage. However, no groaning voice of the creature came. All that did resound with the shining swings of her sword was a curse.

"Fuck! Sylvester--The souls can also..."

Boom!

A fiery, cloudy explosion appeared underneath the Demon, near the roots.

"God damn it! Where did she go?" Outside, Sylvester was bombarding the creature with the Wrath of heaven while staring at Lady Aurora.

He could not see her clearly, even less when the shining explosion came. His heart slowly sank as he felt the smell of death intensify excessively. "Where is she? What was she trying to say?"

"Wraaaaa! Ha! Ha! Ha!..."

Sylvester jumped back quickly as the Demon threw all its tentacles around as if in ecstasy.

But what next appeared destroyed all hope Sylvester had. "No! No! No!... Why can it manipulate electricity now? D-Did it devour he... Fuck! That would mean the Demon has gained her strength?"

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APE TOGETHER STRONG!