True Angel (DxD/ Overlord): Chapter 57

I remained silent, enduring the disappointed looks from my siblings while Gabriel stood in front of me with her hands on her hips.

“Well?”

“What?”

“Nothing to say for yourself?”

Anger bubbled up within me as her glare met my stare.

Explain what? That I took care of the idiots from Olympus who wanted to kill me? That I had Raphael mobilize a thousand angels to protect an innocent girl in Kyoto from falling into the hands of the devils and their plan? That I sent one of my Gatekeepers to protect Mephisto according to our deal so that we can sniff out where that bastard Rizevim and his groupies are hiding?

Gabriel pointed at me with her finger and shouted.

“That! That right there! That expression of yours that says you don’t understand what you did wrong-“

“I did nothing wrong. Gabriel. All I did was ensure that they would never get in our way again.”

The silence that followed my words was deafening. What she said next nearly made my heart stop.

She tilted her head down as her fists clenched. Her words were whispered softly, but they might as well have been bombs that went off within my heart.

“...Then, will you kill me as well? If I stand against you?”

“Gabriel!? What are you-“

“Answer me, please.”

The despair in her eyes made me stop just before I could place my hand on her shoulder.

“Will you kill me? Will you kill brother Michael, Raphael, Uriel, and the rest of us if we decided to oppose you?”

Will I kill them? Will I kill my own siblings that I found for myself in this new chance at life? Will I willingly deprive myself of my family this time around?

The answer is quite simple and straightforward.

“No. Gabriel. I will not.”

She gave me a wry smile at those words.

“Then, it is only the lives of others that do not matter to you, yes?”

“...Gabriel, where is all this coming from?”

Michael walked forward and placed his hand on Gabriel, who started to shake with her suppressed sobs, twisting my heart in pain.

Why? Why are they all suddenly acting like this? What did I do wrong?

“Brother. I think it is time that we had a serious talk about your actions until now.”

I chuckled at Michael’s words.

“Come on. It's not that bad, Michael-“

“Brother. Please. I am not joking, and neither is this a laughing matter.”

That seriousness on his face. That stoic look. There was disappointment in his eyes.

.....Why is he looking at me like that?

The anger in my chest continued rising along with a strange emotion that I have not felt since I woke up so long ago in this world.

......Is this desperation? Why am I feeling desperate? What is this?

I remained silent as Michael continued speaking.

“Brother, everything you have been doing until now, we did not say much about it because we knew that you had your heart in the right place, even if your actions were a bit extreme. But what you did now, especially after we talked about repeating those actions with the Shinto, they crossed the line.”

“I just got rid of the threats that were targeting us.”

“That is not the point. If you had simply killed Zeus, Poseidon, Hades, and the other gods, we would not have said anything about it. Father used to kill gods all the time back in the day. But you did not just kill them, you erased them. Making sure that they will never reform.”

I fail to see the difference here? So what if I killed them permanently instead of killing them temporarily? Aren’t the results still the same?

It was Metatron, of all people, who spoke up.

“Brother. What you just did is a big no-no in the supernatural world.”

“What do you mean?”

“It means that you’ve broken an unspoken taboo.”

Hearing those words, I could not help but scoff.

“And? What about it-“

“You do not understand, Brother. And, I don’t blame you for it.”

Gabriel’s soft words and her despairing face once again made me feel like someone was stabbing my heart.

She gave me a wry smile as she continued speaking.

“It is our fault. My fault. For not telling you about it, knowing that you forgot a lot of things due to your imprisonment.”

“What she is trying to say, brother, is that by permanently killing Zeus and Poseidon, you have created a power vacuum in their respective domains.”

“....And?”

“Watch this.”

Michael raised his hand and made a screen appear in front of me, showing the news channels from the human world.

It was utter chaos.

“-We have never seen this kind of freak storms in the history of Greece-“

“-Evacuation orders have already been issued across Athens and every other coastal city-“

“-Experts estimate that the earthquake will be a magnitude 9 within the Mediterranean Sea-“

“-The thunderstorm has rendered most electronic devices useless-“

“-loss of life estimated to be in the hundreds-“

The entirety of Greece was in absolute chaos.

Earthquakes, floods, unexplained downpours, and thunderstorms.

Shipping routes were gone due to the turbulent seas, with the water level rising by the day. The skies have been darkened for two days now, leading to the death of a lot of crop life, thanks to the lack of sunlight combined with the relentless rains.

Hundreds of humans have already died.

“This, brother, is what happens when a god dies for good. And I don’t mean when they fade, which is a natural thing, but when they are killed by others.”

Words failed me as I tried to comprehend what I was seeing.

“This is impossible. The Gods and the devils do not belong on Earth. They are not the native species of this world. If the death of nature spirits, like the Dryads or Nymphs, that were born from this planet, caused this with their death, I could understand. But the world should not react like this with the death of gods!”

Michael smiled wryly at my words.

“You are right, brother. Gods do not belong on this planet. They originated from their own realms connected to this planet. Just like us, who were created by Father in this realm that we call Heaven. However, in the past thousands of years, the gods across the world have had the time to merge their very essence with the lands that they call their territory. This merging of their divine essence with the land is one of the reasons why it is extremely dangerous to use Senjutsu.”

“And now, after such a long time of merger, this planet is no longer capable of sustaining its own ecosystem without the gods that govern the lands that they own.”

My anger turned into deep hatred as I heard those words.

Damned gods! They corrupted the earth to such an extent that the world can no longer exist without them?

Good! I’ll remove them from the equation entirely and then supplant their divinity with the Heavenly System’s power-

“You still don’t under? Brother?”

Michael’s words brought me out of my plans.

“You cannot replace them, brother.”

“I think I can. I will just have to use the System-“

“Is the heavenly system stronger than it was in the past? When Father was in charge of it?”

Gabriel’s sharp words made me recoil.

Is the System stronger and more versatile than it was during God’s time? Yes. But is it as efficient and intricate as it was during his time? No.

A lot of its subtlety and fineness has been lost over the millennia. In terms of sheer power and programming, it is superior to its original version. But in terms of delicate work and a few other utilities that are missing from it after God’s death, it is inferior.

My expressions must have been answer enough for her since she spoke once again.

“If it is not capable of the delicate work of managing an entire natural ecosystem, what makes you think you can achieve such a thing? Especially when Father himself failed to do it.”

....What?

Michael chuckled wryly.

“You have visited the Maya ruins with Gabriel, haven’t you?”

I nodded at his words.

“Then, have you noticed the excessive Holy Energy in the area?”

“....Yeah?”

“Do you know why such dense holy energy is there in the ruins of a foreign pantheon?”

....I don’t like where this is going.

“It is because of Father.”

Uriel’s words made me give him a shocked look.

“We do not know what exactly happened. What we do know is that Father fought the Mayan gods long ago, and you were there with him, along with Helel and Azazel.”

“He killed the Mayan gods, permanently. It is the reason why that land that once stood as a beacon of civilization, even if barbaric, in that continent is now a ruin overrun by nature, tainted with pure holy energy.”

“...You mean-?”

Michael nodded.

“The death of their gods plunged that land into absolute chaos. Father tried, he really did, to stabilize the land, but it was futile. The Maya civilization came to an end with thousands of humans, spirits, and other mortal races dead along with their gods.”

“This was the incident that taught Father why the gods of this world do not permanently kill each other despite their ability to do so.”

....Wait a minute, this taboo, is this the same one that Hades and the others were talking about two days ago?

I watched the news from the human realm as my heart started to pound wildly in my chest. Guilt now replacing my anger.

“....I did not mean for this to happen. I just wanted to get rid of threats towards our plans.”

“ Your plans, brother. And yes. I know you did not mean for this to happen. But now you see why you should have told us beforehand about what you were going to do. At least, we would have been able to warn you and stop you before such a tragedy would unfold.”

“...What do I do now? How do we fix this?”

Michael gave me a sad stare as Gabriel started to sob openly.

“You can’t, brother. You can’t fix this. It is simply impossible.”

“Michael, I am very strong. Do not forget that, with my magic and the system’s abilities, I can temporarily become stronger than Father-“

“It is not a matter of power or ability or domain or anything else, brother. This is a fundamental vacuum in reality’s concepts that you disrupted by killing the two gods that have had several millennia to strengthen their hold on that land. There is literally nothing you can do, brother.”

“Not even Great Red and Ophius can do anything in this case. This is just the way things are.”

I....I did not mean for this to happen.

I just wanted to protect this world. I just wanted to protect mortal races of this world from the power of the gods and devils who see them as playthings.

I just wanted this world to avoid the fate of my world. A dead world of steel and ash.

Is my wish wrong? Is it wrong of me to try and make sure that the odds are always in my favor? So that I can prevent the dark future that I know exists in another world?

.............Are my siblings right? Am I going too far?

If I am wrong, then what is the right approach?

What am I supposed to do?

I could not continue watching the scenes on the screen anymore.

With a burst of power, I disappeared from the place and returned to the throneroom in the Seventh Heaven.

For the first time since waking up in this world, I let my true nature come forth.

The nature of a coward who cannot face his own mistakes.

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Author Notes: Yeah. This is a depressing chapter. But a necessary one.

Aetherion needs to learn that there will be consequences to actions, and he needs to learn which consequences he can deal with and which ones he cannot do anything about.

He needs to stop walking the path of the villain and get his head out of his ass and start to finally see the world for what it is, instead of always looking at it through the lenses of his previous world.

This incident has caused a rift in his relationship with his siblings, which will be a lesson he will not forget for a long time.

Hopefully, this will be enough for him to finally stop acting like an ass and make something of himself.

And with this, we conclude volume 1 at about 100k-ish? words.

Thanks for all the support!