Chapter 102: Chapter 87: A Mess Caused by a Freeloading Mad Witch

Hitz and Mensa were left speechless by Isaac’s question, but they respected his wishes and turned to Philo, who had just regained her composure. The decision was ultimately hers.

Even though Isaac was clearly making a concession, and even though he held the clear advantage, there was nothing to be done about it. After all, she was the princess.

As long as the Emperor of Terra lived, her privilege would remain.

"I ag—" Philo started to agree, shocked by the sheer scale of Isaac’s forces. Over a thousand Tier Two Demons... and they were all powerful Great Sword Ghosts!

A force of this magnitude was enough to annihilate a small nation!

The gap in power was immense. On her own, she stood no chance of winning.

But just as she was about to speak, she suddenly spotted Remington’s body among the horde of Demons. She froze for a moment before a realization struck her. ’This battle must be fought! Even if I’m certain to lose, I have to fight!’

The reasoning was simple. ’Isaac killed his own brother without a shred of mercy. There’s no way he’ll let me, the one who started all this, go free. He’s only backing down now because of my status. Once he grows stronger and no longer fears the Empire, he’ll definitely come back for me. So it’s best to fight him now. I can gather data, minimize his gains as much as possible, and buy more time for myself to grow stronger!’

"I want a direct confrontation!" Philo declared, her mind made up.

Mensa nodded. With a light tap of his finger, hundreds of three-meter-tall Obsidian Golems landed in the town with a deafening RUMBLE. Simultaneously, strands of muscle fiber flew from Philo’s body, coalescing into a small ball in Mensa’s hand.

Then Mensa looked at Isaac. "I’ve removed all of her Alchemy Golems, I assure you. As for that giant one, I’ll resume the flow of time for it shortly. However, this thing here isn’t suitable for combat. What do you want to do with it?"

Mensa held up the small ball, which was Philo’s Infinite Demon God Armor—the very core of her power and the one thing Isaac wanted most to either obtain or destroy. "This needs to be worn by Philo to function, so it’s not suitable for the battlefield," Mensa explained. "After all, blades can go astray in a fight." Although the chances of that happening with Mensa present were slim, they weren’t zero. It was always best to avoid unnecessary risks.

"Umm... just give it to me?"

Mensa paused. "...Fine."

After a moment of speechlessness, Mensa decided he couldn’t be bothered with it. To the astonishment of both Isaac and Philo, he simply tossed the ball to Isaac.

Isaac was still in a daze even as the object landed in his hand. ’Just like that... I got it?’

He froze for a second, then, clutching the small ball, he subconsciously glanced at Philo. Her face was a mask of resentment, but she didn’t dare say a word. A strange sense of satisfaction washed over him. He gleefully stowed the ball away and gave a grand wave of his hand.

"Alright, let’s fight!"

Mensa nodded. He turned to Philo, who was standing behind him, and handed her a Crystal Ball. "Your Highness, you’ll stay here with us and use this to control the Golems. Rest assured, I’ve already calibrated it. The control will be identical to your personal command—and certainly no better."

Philo was speechless.

’What a strange feeling... Is he really on my side?’

But she didn’t dare say anything more to Mensa. She silently accepted the Crystal Ball, infused it with her Magic Power, and commanded her Golems to charge the horde of Demons!

THUD! THUD! THUD!

"Tsk, tsk." Watching hundreds of Golems, each several meters tall, advance on him in a neat, orderly formation, Isaac couldn’t help but shake his head in amazement. ’No wonder Alchemy Golems have become so popular so quickly. They really are impressive in a fight.’ Their actual combat power and sheer presence were both impeccable. ’Quite intimidating!’

Unfortunately for her, against Isaac’s army of Great Sword Ghosts, "intimidating" was all they were.

As the Alchemy Golems marched forward with heavy, thudding steps, the Great Sword Ghosts charged them like ferocious tigers. Dark Magic Power swirled around their greatswords, unleashing waves of black Sword Qi. Before Philo’s twitching eyes, Golem after Golem was dismembered.

No matter how strong the Obsidian Golems were, they were still just Tier One constructs. Only their defense and raw strength bordered on Tier Two, making them no match for true Tier Two opponents—especially when the Great Sword Ghosts also far outnumbered them.

So, once the battle began, Isaac’s attention was focused primarily on the colossal golem in the center of town.

Now, as Mensa lifted the Time Stopping Magic from the colossus, a massive amount of Magic Power began to converge once more. From the palm of each of its seven raised hands, a beam of energy shot toward the rat floating in the center.

SQUEAK! SQUEAK! SQUEAK!

As the massive amount of Magic Power flooded into it, the rat began to let out painful squeals.

Its cries were so shrill that Isaac and the others could hear them from hundreds of meters away!

’Heh heh heh! Now you’ll know what it’s like to lose something!’ A pleased expression spread across Philo’s face as she listened to the rat’s agonized squeals.

Hitz and Mensa, watching from the sidelines, could only sigh. ’This is why they say all Mad Witches are lunatics...’

However, when Philo looked up, eager to savor the look of pain on Isaac’s face, she was shocked to find he wasn’t upset at all.

He was even smiling, playfully teasing the rat on his shoulder!

’Are rats really that fun to play with?’

’Your rat is about to die... Wait. He’s teasing a rat?’

Philo stared, stunned, at the rat on Isaac’s shoulder. Seemingly noticing her gaze, Isaac turned to face her and offered a warm, comforting smile.

A whirlwind of emotions churned within Philo. She let out a self-deprecating laugh and tossed the Crystal Ball aside. She had lost... utterly and completely.

Thinking back on how smug and pleased with herself she’d been these past few days made her feel utterly ridiculous.

’After all this time, he hasn’t lost a single thing. In both scheming and raw power, I’m nowhere near his level, yet I’ve been dancing around like a pathetic clown...’

’How laughable...’

At this point, she had lost all will to fight. She raised her head and took a long, hard look at Isaac, burning his image into her memory. Sooner or later, she would surpass him. And then, she would kill him.

"It seems the princess has come to understand," Mensa said. With a flick of his finger, the Crystal Ball on the ground flew into his hand. He glanced at the defeated Philo before turning his curious gaze to Isaac. He was incredibly intrigued by Isaac. It had been years since he’d seen such a "pure" Mad Witch. The boy even dared to seize a Dimension—something most Mad Witches today wouldn’t even dream of attempting. And the most crucial part? He had actually succeeded.

So, he was genuinely curious to see just how far Isaac would go.

As for this so-called battle...

It was nothing more than a child’s game, obvious at a glance. Only a fool would watch it with any real interest.

Hitz glanced at the completely demoralized Philo with a sigh, then asked curiously, "Master Mensa, do you think he can handle that giant thing?"

Mensa was silent.

He shot Hitz a speechless look. ’Alright, I didn’t realize there was another fool here...’

"Just watch and you’ll see. For him, this is actually the easiest part."

"Oh?" Hitz’s interest was piqued, and he turned his attention back to Isaac.

...

"Squeak?" ’Why is it screaming so horribly?’

"Because that thing is stripping away its Divinity Network," Isaac said with a smile, withdrawing his gaze from Philo to gently poke Shushu’s nose.

"Squeak?" ’What’s a Divinity Network?’

"...Your food."

"Squeak!" Shushu nodded, as if it suddenly understood everything.

"Heh heh heh..." From atop Isaac’s head, Harmon cackled mercilessly. ’This stupid rat nearly died and didn’t even realize it.’

Liu Li, standing behind Isaac, also watched Shushu with a sense of speechlessness, but it was mixed with a hint of envy. ’Fortune favors fools, after all,’ she thought. ’Even though it’s a bit dumb, it gets to stay on Master’s shoulder all the time and receive his undivided attention. How wonderful... But being able to help Master defeat powerful enemies is also a great honor!’

Isaac was oblivious to the thoughts of his companions. He was too busy watching the colossus in amazement as it extracted the Divinity Network. He finally understood what Philo’s grand plan had been.

It wasn’t about God Creation, as Angel had suggested. If that were the case, the Emperor himself would have been the first to crush Philo. A battle between beings on that level? It was no joke. A Demigod might have power rivaling a Deity, but the lands of the Terra Empire certainly couldn’t withstand such a conflict. Would the nation even survive?

So, what Philo was actually trying to create was a Divine Species. Her ambition was just much greater; she wanted to create a massive one right off the bat. Her plan was to use this colossus as a vessel to create a Divine Species in the form of a Flesh and Mechanical Golem. Then, leveraging her convenient status as a princess, she would gather vast amounts of Faith. Given the golem’s sheer size, it could hold an immense amount of the Power of Faith.

With enough Faith, it might even have been possible for it to achieve true Becoming a God!

’But in my opinion,’ Isaac thought, ’there’s a fundamental flaw here—the age-old problem of control. A mere contract can’t restrain such a High-Level Existence.’ 𝒻𝓇𝑒𝘦𝘸𝑒𝒷𝓃ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝒸ℴ𝘮

’Of course, that’s just the problem as I see it. Maybe the Royal Family has some way to solve it. But even before that, Philo faced an even more critical issue: she couldn’t create a Divinity Network on her own.’

Even after all their in-depth discussions over the past few days, she still hadn’t managed to master the technique.

So, she came up with a new plan: she would just take Shushu’s Divinity Network by force.

Then, she’d implant it into the colossus. And just like that, her project would be complete.

It was a simple, brutish plan.

What she failed to understand was Isaac’s true capabilities. She had no idea that she could have simply bought one from him.

The low success rate of creating one was a problem for others, not for Isaac. To him, these things were currently little more than snacks for Shushu, a way to boost its power.

Unfortunately, her preconceptions led her to believe the technology was critically important to Isaac. And since Mad Witches have a penchant for taking things for free, the thought of simply trading for it never even crossed her mind.

Isaac hadn’t been sure of her exact plan beforehand, but he had vaguely sensed her excessive enthusiasm for Divine Species. That’s why he had specially created another Divine Spirit Rat. Before the ritual began, he used the excuse that he could only control one Servant Demon at a time and entrusted this new rat to Remington for "protection."

This had been their arrangement before the ritual.

And with that, the entire sequence of events became clear in his mind. All in all, it was nothing more than an embarrassing blunder on the part of a fellow Mad Witch.

But now that things had come to this, it was pointless to dwell on it. Remington was dead, Philo’s Golems were all but destroyed, and he’d slaughtered more than a dozen children of the Imperial Capital’s Nobility. A blood feud had been forged.

But all of that could be dealt with later. The most pressing matter at hand, and the one that truly interested Isaac, was—

Could Philo’s experiment actually succeed?