Stalemate

Within Takamagahara, a thick purple breath erupted from two of Yamata no Orochi's giant maws, directly swallowing Miketsu, who was entangled by numerous tentacles and aberrations. However, only a moment later, that purple breath completely solidified as if frozen, and then, like actual ice, it rapidly shattered and dissolved.

Above the purple light that dissolved like snow, a dark aura surged forth, quickly covering the entire sky of Takamagahara. Amidst continuous contraction and restructuring, the dark aura transformed into sky-covering wings over a thousand meters wide. Accompanied by long tail feathers spreading out, the illusory Ancient God of Darkness manifested in this world once more.

"It's you... It's actually you!"

The moment he saw the illusory Ancient God of Darkness appear, Orochi was momentarily stunned. Then, with intense emotion, he let out a loud roar. Clearly, although he had guessed Miketsu's identity as an ancient god before, he hadn't guessed which one specifically. The appearance of the Fate Weaver had clearly given him a massive shock.

Seeing the Ancient God of Darkness manifest in her pure divine soul form, Orochi immediately released his giant maws that had been tearing at the earth. All eight heads of Yamata simultaneously turned toward the Ancient God of Darkness, eight bloody maws opening as even more surging purple energy gathered wildly within them. Nearby, Amaterasu, who had long been puppeted, also rose into the heavens, once again transforming into a dazzling sun disk.

Eight thick, shining breaths erupted from the eight giant maws, while the sun disk in the sky also rained down high-temperature solar blaze. The extreme brilliance caused the entire world to darken in comparison. Nine torrents of majestic energy poured toward the Ancient God of Darkness. If this power were unleashed in the mortal world, it would be enough to completely destroy the lands of several nations, creating a new ocean and thoroughly rewriting the shape of the Japanese Archipelago.

Facing the incoming breaths, the Ancient God of Darkness slightly vibrated her phantom-like wings, causing the space around her to congeal. Just like the purple light before, these nine destructive energy beams were frozen in time and space as if they were ice, and then they melted and vanished just like ice.

Temporal stasis, causality severing—the Fate Weaver used her power to eliminate the attacks coming at her with effortless ease. Seeing this, Orochi's eight heads lowered simultaneously as he spoke in a stunned tone.

"Impossible! You clearly only have a divine soul. How can you still possess such powerful strength?"

As Orochi's expression turned to horror, the Ancient God of Darkness vibrated her wings again. Suddenly, an invisible wave of energy diffused from her, transmitting rapidly toward the surrounding space.

The Ancient God of Darkness wanted to freeze the time and space of the entire Takamagahara, but this objective met with an obstacle.

As the power of the Ancient God of Darkness expanded rapidly outward, an abnormality suddenly appeared in the space. Translucent, illusory blood vessels spread and emerged in the space around the Ancient God of Darkness, interspersed with wriggling flesh and organs, as if they were growing from the inner side of space and manifesting through a thin barrier.

The phenomenon of the shadows of blood vessels and organs severely delayed the Ancient God of Darkness's attempt to freeze time and space. They wriggled madly, displaying seemingly infinite vitality to slow down the freezing wave spreading through the entire space. Under these circumstances, the range of the Ancient God of Darkness's power was significantly reduced.

"Heh! You want to freeze this time and space? Unfortunately, this space has already been highly eroded by me; it can be said to be a part of me now!" Orochi said with a sinister laugh upon seeing the Ancient God of Darkness's influence on time and space being delayed.

Ultimately, Miketsu was left with only her divine soul. Without even her remains, she could not completely interfere with the causality of Orochi, who was a complete ancient god. Moreover, Orochi's power now permeated the entire space of Takamagahara, making this his home field.

Seeing that she could not thoroughly freeze time and space, the Ancient God of Darkness simply flapped her wings and charged forward. Her non-physical, dark divine soul moved incredibly fast, drifting before Orochi like a ghost in a mere instant.

Then, the Ancient God of Darkness opened her illusory claws and thrust them into Orochi's body. With the vibration of her wings, she flew upward, her claws dragging a pale purple translucent substance out of Orochi's body. Influenced by the Ancient God of Darkness's power, Orochi's movements also began to lag.

What the Ancient God of Darkness had seized was Orochi's divine soul. She wanted to drag it out directly, just as she had done when dealing with the Moon Feather Princess.

"Don't even think about it!"

Seeing the Ancient God of Darkness's attempt, Orochi's eight pairs of red eyes lit up simultaneously. He began to resist the pulling of the Ancient God of Darkness's divine soul with all his might. After pulling Orochi's divine soul out slightly, the Ancient God of Darkness could no longer continue to drag it further.

Ultimately, a fully revived Orochi was not easy to deal with. Back then, the Chang'e that the Ancient God of Darkness faced was not in her complete form, and to escape the control of the avatars of the six Chief Gods plus the White-robed Daoist, she had paid the price of damaging her origin. By the final moment, she had been extremely weak, so the Ancient God of Darkness, even with only a divine soul, had faced no pressure.

But now, the Ancient God of Darkness was facing a complete Orochi with only a single divine soul, and on Orochi's home field at that. This was very forced.

Facing the illusory Ancient God of Darkness who was pulling at his divine soul, the body-stalled Orochi roared once more, activating his power that permeated all of Takamagahara. Suddenly, the flesh ground beneath him began to wriggle madly. Thousands of giant snake heads, no smaller than Orochi's main body, grew directly from the earth, forming a dense snake head forest that was both bizarre and terrifying.

These numerous snake heads grew rapidly from the ground. Some opened their maws to pounce directly at the illusory Ancient God of Darkness, while others stayed in place and began to fire purple light beams. The sun disk in the sky also rained down solar rays like rain upon the Ancient God of Darkness once more.

Purple light, sunlight, and snake heads—the dense offensive came from all directions without any blind spots. Upon entering the range of the Ancient God of Darkness's ability, they were all momentarily frozen and dissolved. Not a single one could harm her.

In this manner, the Ancient God of Darkness pulled at Orochi's divine soul and stalled his main body, while Orochi counterattacked using the flesh-eroded Takamagahara and the puppeted Amaterasu. The two sides were momentarily locked in a stalemate.

However... this stalemate was unfavorable for the Ancient God of Darkness, for Miketsu.

"I want to see... without remains to anchor you, I wonder how long your pure divine soul state can last..." Orochi said with a slow voice, staring intently at the divine soul of the Ancient God of Darkness right before him.

...

Slightly earlier, in Earth's low orbit, aboard the Monitoring Pavilion space station, Eirin, who had just finished the energy irradiation on Suwako, stepped down from her seat in the control hall. Beside her, Toyohime approached.

"How are the preparations at the Lunar Capital?"

"Everything is ready, Master."

"Alright then, let's take a look together."

As she spoke, Eirin took Toyohime's hand. Amidst a flash of light, the two of them vanished from the spot.

...

In the Lunar Secret Realm, at the bottom of the giant pit originally created by the Moon Feather Princess, beside the pit leading to the Abyss of the Lunar Core, the figures of Eirin and Toyohime appeared within a Magical Array. Then, appearing before them was the cross-bridge that had been reconstructed at the top of the abyss.