Chapter 343 |
“Child, have you really decided to let her use this Celestial Seed?” Inside Tiamut’s nest, the Mother of Earth asked Josh with puzzlement.
By Josh’s side was Margot, holding the Celestial Seed, looking somewhat uneasy.
Compared to Josh’s calm and composed demeanor facing Tiamut, Margot appeared more anxious when facing the Mother Goddess.
“Yes, Mother Goddess, I feel this Celestial Seed is still a bit too weak. If I only become the weakest Celestial, I don’t think it will bring you much help!” Josh replied.
“…Child, I never expected you to bring me too much help. You have already done more than enough. And you must understand that I am not able to easily condense a Celestial Seed now. This one has already consumed too much of my essence. I don’t know how long it will take to condense the next one, and powerful star soul essence is not easy to obtain!” Hearing Josh’s answer, the forgiving Mother Goddess did not show any dissatisfaction, only regret that Josh was giving up this opportunity.
After all, Tiamut was not yet fully matured and could not easily condense the Celestial Seed like veteran Celestials such as Arishem.
Although Margot was also human, a child of Tiamut, just as even the gentlest mother cannot treat all her children equally, in Tiamut’s eyes, Josh’s importance was far beyond Margot’s.
“I understand, Mother Goddess, but I can wait. I also believe I have the ability to find more powerful star souls and obtain their essence!” Josh said confidently.
“I see… then let us begin…” Seeing Josh’s insistence, Tiamut no longer said much and sighed.
Then Josh opened a spatial gate and returned to the surface with Margot, landing on a clearing on Fuerteventura Island. In the distance was one of the Ouroboros headquarters, also the sealing place of four unlucky dimensional demon gods, including the Black Panther god.
Although sealed for many years and annually drained by Ouroboros to create divine warriors, these four gods were still lively and kicking.
Dimensional demon gods, as long as their dimension does not perish, will never die — truly infinite power banks.
But this time, they would not be used.
Although according to Tiamut, when using the Celestial Seed to ascend, the more energy supplied the better, do not forget that Josh currently holds the Space Stone, which can provide the universe’s most primordial energy, much more efficient than those dimensional demon gods.
Only because of dimensional particularity do the Infinity Stones fail inside dimensions.
But as shown in the movie Doctor Strange, once entering the physical universe, even a high-level dimensional demon god like Dormammu cannot escape the Infinity Stones’ influence.
At this moment, Josh and company stood inside a huge magic formation, with the Space Stone placed at its center.
Next to the Space Stone was a figure guarding it.
It was another top-tier Earth wielder of the Infinity Stones — the Ancient One.
Yes, the Supreme Sorcerer had been dragged by Josh to do the heavy lifting again!
But there was no choice. On Earth, besides Josh’s beloved, the only other person Josh trusted not to covet the Space Stone was the Ancient One.
Also, Margot’s ascension would cause a huge disturbance.
After all, the birth of even the weakest Celestial would have power unmatched by the entire Ouroboros.
Only relying on the Ouroboros-affiliated Kirin Tor to cover the resulting disturbance was insufficient; only the Ancient One’s intervention could conceal most of the anomalies.
“Once again, master, sorry for the trouble!” Josh chuckled dryly, greeting the Ancient One.
“A mere trifle, just don’t forget your promise,” the Ancient One smiled.
“...Of course!” Josh’s expression immediately became serious.
“Then let us begin!” The Ancient One nodded and stepped out of the formation.
Josh nodded at Margot beside him.
Without hesitation, Margot, holding the Celestial Seed, stood at the center of the formation.
Seeing Margot ready, Josh withdrew from the formation.
When everything was prepared, Josh connected by sensing the underground Tiamut.
Golden celestial energy surged from below, instantly filling the formation, transforming into golden beams wrapping Margot, forming a giant golden cocoon! Simultaneously, the Tesseract was activated by the celestial energy stimulation, endless power gushing forth to continuously energize the formation.
With infinite energy supply, the golden cocoon expanded rapidly, soon surpassing the formation’s limits.
Seeing this, Josh and the Ancient One quickly retreated.
The golden cocoon finally stopped expanding after reaching several hundred meters wide and over a thousand meters tall but this change was no surprise to Josh.
Anyone who had seen the movies would know how exaggerated the Celestials’ size normally was; before Judicator Arishem, the entire Earth was just the size of a fitness ball.
Tiamut had long told him that even when a mortal body ascends to Celestial, the size would be extremely exaggerated.
But this size was not fixed.
Once Celestials mastered their powers, changing size would be easy so Josh had no worries that his future size would mismatch Margot’s.
Tiamut’s destruction of Earth during her manifestation was only because she could not control her body before fully maturing.
Before manifestation, the Celestial’s consciousness and body were somewhat isolated.
Their body instinctively absorbed all life essence on their nurturing planet, beyond their control.
Margot’s situation was similar now.
During the cocoon’s evolution, it constantly tried to absorb all surrounding life energy.
Fortunately, the entire formation’s perimeter was sealed by the Ancient One’s spell, with constant energy supply from the Space Stone inside.
Otherwise, not only this island, but possibly all living beings in Africa and Europe would suffer.
Fortunately, Josh’s preparation was sufficient. Under his and the Ancient One’s full efforts, Margot’s golden cocoon did not cause much harm to Earth.
“If next time it’s you, you absolutely cannot ascend on Earth!” After sensing Margot’s cocoon stopped absorbing energy, the Ancient One wiped sweat and scolded Josh.
“No need to say, master, I understand perfectly. I don’t want to ascend and destroy my own home!” Josh looked at the towering cocoon, still slightly uneasy.
He also genuinely felt how much Tiamut sacrificed for this ascension.
Just as they both breathed a sigh of relief, a strong spatial and energy fluctuation came from space.
The energy fluctuation was very similar to Tiamut’s and Margot’s aura, but incomparably stronger.
Josh and the Ancient One exchanged a glance, both turning pale, and raised their heads to look into space.
They saw a gigantic red figure with six enormous eyes — if those could be called eyes — glaring at them and Margot’s golden cocoon!
Although it was their first encounter, both Josh and the Ancient One were very familiar with this figure!
The First Celestial, Judicator Arishem had arrived.
Although before this, Josh had already suspected whether Margot’s ascension would attract the other Celestials and had prepared numerous contingency plans for it but when the other party truly appeared before him, Josh couldn’t help but feel a pounding heart.
The oppression brought by the strongest being in the physical universe was just too overwhelming.
In contrast, the Ancient One’s demeanor was much calmer. With a pinch of her magical seal, the light of the Time Stone flickered, and the space outside Earth twisted. The people on Earth, who had been terrified by the appearance of Arishem, suddenly could no longer see Arishem and also forgot the scene of Arishem’s earlier appearance.
Of course, this was not because the Ancient One had become powerful enough to pull Arishem into the Mirror Dimension. Compared to doing that, changing the light refraction in the outer atmosphere of the Earth was much easier.
As for forgetting the previous scene, it was simply a matter of rewinding Earth’s time by a few seconds with the Time Stone.
After doing all this, the Ancient One opened a space gate, signaling Josh to follow. The two then appeared in space, in front of Arishem.
“Welcome, great Lord Arishem, you grace us with your presence!” The Ancient One bowed very solemnly.
Josh also followed with a bow.
But Arishem did not respond to either of them.
It wasn’t that Arishem was arrogant, but at this moment he was communicating with Tiamut!
In the movie, Arishem wanted to capture several Eternals because Tiamut was already dead, so through the memories of several Eternals, he could determine whether Earth needed to be destroyed.
But now Tiamut was still alive and well, so Arishem could communicate directly with Tiamut.
The telepathic exchange between the two Celestials was very quick—only a few seconds—and Arishem understood Tiamut’s stance.
“I understand. Although I do not agree with Tiamut’s idea, I respect her choice and can accept the existence of this pseudo-Celestial race, but I will take this child away!” It was unclear what Tiamut said to Arishem, but after a few seconds, Arishem turned his gaze to the Ancient One and Josh.
“What? Take Margot away? Are you kidding?” At first, when Josh heard Arishem say he respected Tiamut’s choice, he breathed a sigh of relief, but what came next made Josh tense up immediately.
The pseudo-Celestial race that Arishem mentioned—the child—obviously referred to Margot, who was still in the cocoon undergoing her final transformation.
How could Josh possibly agree?
“…Don’t misunderstand, child, my prediction was somewhat wrong. Margot’s ascension is not complete, so in order for her to achieve the most perfect transformation, it is best for Arishem to take her away!” Just as Josh was thinking about how to stop Arishem, the very tired voice of Tiamut echoed in his mind.
“Trivial emotions. If it were not for Tiamut’s strong guarantee, this child would not be worth my effort. But Josh Kane, your deeds have been explained to me by Tiamut. I must say, your existence has great significance for this universe…Every Celestial existence is extremely precious, even if they are only pseudo-Celestials! I now entrust these Celestial Seeds to you, hoping you will make good use of them!” After Tiamut finished speaking, Arishem’s gaze flickered, and he spoke to Josh.
As he finished speaking, five Celestial Seeds, shining with a brilliance even greater than what Margot had used before, floated from Arishem’s hand to Josh’s front!
Feeling the aura on these Celestial Seeds, almost identical to that of Arishem in front of him, Josh instantly understood that these Celestial Seeds were condensed by Arishem himself.
These were the Celestial Seeds of the First Celestial God…Tiamut was also nurtured by these Celestial Seeds.
“Is this… a deal?” Josh swallowed nervously upon seeing this.
The current situation was completely beyond Josh’s expectations!
Arishem wanted Josh to help nurture the Celestials.
This also meant that Josh’s ability to connect with other universes had been exposed in front of Arishem.
After all, even Tiamut and the star souls of Pandora could sense the aura of other universes; how could Arishem not?
And for a being like Arishem, traveling between universes was not a rare thing.
After all, Marvel itself is a multiverse. Even the mages of Kamar-Taj know this; it would be ridiculous for someone at Arishem’s level to be unaware.
In fact, there was competition among Marvel’s multiverses.
If one could plunder more of other universes’ essences, one’s own universe would become stronger.
Normally, beings at the level of Arishem or other Celestials have such large targets that once they enter other universes, they are immediately detected by the strong beings of those universes.
The only difference was that the alternate universes Josh could connect to and the multiverse Arishem was thinking of were not the same thing at all.
Moreover, the existence of the Dimensional Trading System was obviously of a higher level than Arishem, so whether Arishem or Tiamut just considered this as Josh’s own ability—like Miss America in Doctor Strange 2—and not the existence of the Dimensional Trading System.
“If that’s what you think…I hope you understand one thing: you are a being of this universe!” Arishem replied.