Why was there so much prejudice? Who could tell what kind of twisted thing was hidden beneath that seemingly serious exterior?
After all, Yazuki had seen far too many of these kinds of gods.
What's more, he had previously used the soul power left behind on the Twisted Staff he had remotely controlled to crudely and directly read the memories of a female evil god, and was utterly disgusted by what he saw.
That female evil god was the one who had previously violated the rules to summon Yukino. In the past, she could be considered a relatively decent goddess, but eventually fell onto a depraved path.
As a result, he witnessed all kinds of revolting behavior.
In her memories, she harbored deep jealousy and hatred for a goddess named Ariadoa, the Goddess of Seal. She viewed her as just another hypocritical goddess—only better at pretending.
Of course, that was just her own biased perspective, and without personally seeing the Sealed Goddess's memories, there was no way to tell what was true.
As for the God of Violence, Merseys, from what he gathered through the fallen goddess's memories, the gods on Merseys's side were far more involved in illegal summonings.
So since Merseys refused to open her memories to him, he had no reason to be polite—who cared what her past story was?
Although the summoning magic circle used on Yukino wasn't exactly the same as the one he encountered before, as long as there was the slightest connection, Yazuki only had one policy toward these beings: "Better to kill a thousand by mistake than to let a single one go."
Besides, they had already violated the rules—how could you expect them to be doing anything good?
Why didn't he forcibly read Merseys's memories? If he could, he would have done so already. After all, Merseys was on a completely different level than that fallen trash goddess.
Originally, he planned to play dumb and trick Merseys into merging her remaining soul power into him so he could infiltrate her soul and peek into her deeper memories. Who would've thought she'd detect something was off?
And earlier, when he pretended he was about to leave the world, it was actually a ploy to lure out hidden players. Both the fallen goddess and the demon king he'd killed had clearly been unknowingly manipulated or observed—by none other than Merseys.
Unfortunately, she still got away.
In the end, he had hoped to show Yukino just how disgusting gods really were, to make her understand there was no such thing as a perfect deity.
But unexpectedly, this Goddess seemed to actually be just like the ideal compassionate goddess from otaku culture, one who sincerely wanted to save the world?
Though there were some decent gods out there, this was the first time he'd encountered one that came so close to the ideal.
Had something gone wrong here? This was supposed to be reality—there shouldn't be such a goddess in reality.
So now he was left with this sense that not only had he failed to pull a fast one, but he'd ended up slapping himself in the face.
He had intended to make Yukino stop trusting gods—yet the opposite happened. Great, now it had backfired completely.
"Is there really still any point in spying? Just admit it already, Sir Knight whose prejudice is through the roof,"
Yukino's words silenced him, who had stubbornly continued resisting the truth.
In truth, the moment the soul crystal came into contact with Ariadoa's soul, he had more or less understood everything. He just didn't want to admit it. He didn't want to accept this kind of reality.
He even came dangerously close to thinking something as childish and ridiculous as—"Why wasn't I the one who got saved?"
This was a goddess who had genuinely saved over a hundred worlds.
"You—!"
Yukino's eyes widened as she prepared to shout in anger.
"Shut up and stay quiet if you don't want her to die."
Why did Yukino look like she was about to go berserk? Simple—he had suddenly thrust the holy sword into Ariadoa's abdomen.
Looking closely, there was no blood or wound.
At the same time, a magic circle unfurled—a magic circle filled with divine power. The sword that emitted a holy light was transferring that light downward.
The previously frozen Ariadoa was now thawed, and the black miasma spreading across her body was gradually fading.
...
Gods of the Unified Divine Realm were generally immortal. That was because the Divine Realm had a special place called the "Soul Vault", which stored the souls of the gods.
The bodies gods usually used were like remote-controlled puppets, so even if one was destroyed, the soul remained intact. However, if one encountered a special enemy, that enemy could follow the connection between body and soul and destroy the soul inside the Soul Vault, truly killing the god.
As for fallen gods, the Soul Vault was a sacred place that no longer offered them sanctuary. Their souls were forced to return to their physical bodies, making them truly vulnerable.
At present, Ariadoa had been struck by the Demon King earlier. Her dark power had genuinely infected her soul.
Normally, to survive, she would only need to fully embrace the darkness and become an evil god.
But there was no way she could accept that fate—so she resisted the transformation. As a result, the divine power of her soul clashed with the evil spirit energy, leaving her soul riddled with wounds.
Now, she was like a dying flame in the wind—on the verge of extinguishing at any moment.
"I'm really sorry…"
Inside her spiritual space, Ariadoa's sorrowful voice rang out.
She felt deeply ashamed toward the gods who had helped her and toward the humans who had been implicated because of her.
She didn't even know how they were doing now.
Looking around at her spiritual space—once a beautiful garden full of flowers—it had become a field of wilted blossoms and rotting, miasma-ridden earth.
Looking down at herself, black blotches of dark corruption riddled her soul body. Her spirit, once admired by other goddesses for its beauty, now looked ghastly—literally full of holes.
"I'm really sorry~"
Her voice had become tearful—like a little girl. And now, she was beginning to feel fear.
Facing true death… was terrifying.
"Quit crying, it's annoying as hell!!!"
Suddenly, a harsh voice cut in, making Ariadoa freeze.
She saw her ever-shrinking soul space—full of holes like cheese—suddenly tear open, and a sword glowing with divine power pierced through.
Immediately after, a magic circle unfurled. Holy light particles shone down on her, repairing her battered soul.
At the same time, the dark force eating at her seemed to sense something even more appetizing, and flowed toward the sword, trying to infect its wielder instead.
"Wait, this is—mmf—!"
Ariadoa tried to stop him. She could tell this was a kind of "exchange magic" that essentially swapped the disease onto someone else in exchange for their health.
However, before she could speak, he accelerated the extraction. She could only bite her lip tightly.
Her soul had already partially fused with the dark force. Now that it was being forcibly separated, even though it didn't directly harm her soul, it left her with an indescribable, overwhelming sensation.
"MmAhh"
Finally, she couldn't help but let out strange noises.
Especially now, when her body was semi-conscious while her soul was reacting—this kind of soul resonance with her physical body made the sensation even more intense and strange.
Of course, she now understood the reason.
That dark force came from a succubus, and had been intended to corrupt her into a lustful goddess. Even though it was being cleansed now, the residual effects still lingered.
The more she regained her awareness, the more uncontrollably lewd the sounds escaping from her damp lips became—enough to make any male god swoon. And the more this happened, the more she wanted to crawl into a hole and die.
"…You did this on purpose, didn't you?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
A faint, meaningless exchange echoed between them.
No matter how you looked at it, in front of her savior, she was no longer a goddess—but a degenerate, lust-filled pervert goddess.