Dragon's Awakening: The Duke's Son Is Changing The Plot-Chapter 174 - 173 - That Escalated Quickly.

Omnisect was an anti-divinity weapon.

No matter what kind of divinity you had, you wouldn’t be able to defend against Omni.

The death angel-like goddess Raven fought, had activated five divinities.

One of them was the tale called ’One With Fake Immortality.’

The second one was ’The One Who Binds Everyone.’

Then, there was the third one, which attacked his mind. Raven still didn’t know its name, but it didn’t matter now.

Two tales remained, and if Raven’s calculations were correct, one was a defensive tale.

That was why Raven had used Omni to deliver the killing blow. It was because no matter what kind of divine tale it was, it wouldn’t be able to resist Omni.

However, that was the first step.

Because Raven knew that the fight hadn’t ended.

The first and probably the strongest tale Raven had heard about couldn’t be stopped by merely cutting the goddess’s head off.

The tale ’One With Fake Immortality’ was activated only after its owner’s death.

It wasn’t something even Omni could stop.

Or, well, he could if Raven were to leave Omni pierced in her heart or stuck between her neck and her head.

However, by doing that, he wouldn’t be killing her but merely delaying her revival.

So, Raven had thought that he would stand next to the goddess, and the moment she revived, he would kill her again.

He had thought of doing that until he had another idea.

This one was risky but less bloody.

He stood above the goddess’s corpse, back in his human form. He had deactivated the Voidborn transformation because he didn’t know when he would need to use it again.

His chest rose and fell slowly, but his hand remained tight around Omni’s hilt—its tip poised a mere inch above the woman’s heart.

Raven didn’t blink, he didn’t flinch, nor did he move.

Because he needed to keep an eye on the goddess before him, and the moment she so much as twitched, he’d stab.

That was the rule now.

"If you move, I kill you," he said under his breath. "If you twitch, I kill you. If you breathe funny, I kill you. If your divine soul so much as sneezes, I double kill you."

He repeated it like a mantra, voice cold and firm but strangely tired, as if the weight of the entire moment sat on his shoulders like a drunk elephant with a trust fund.

The goddess’s severed neck was slowly knitting back together.

Vein by divine vein.

It was... slow.

Unnaturally slow.

Something that shouldn’t be happening to a being like her.

Raven, however, wasn’t bothered by it because he knew why it was happening.

It was because the chains—once snapping and thrashing through the air like divine thunder—were now coiled around the goddess’s body.

They were pulsing like tight restrictions on her body.

Raven had bound the goddess with those while leaving Omni stabbed in her heart.

This was his second plan.

He had thought of it mid-fight.

While fighting, he had seen how even the goddess avoided touching them.

She had flung them wide, never letting them wrap around her. It hadn’t seemed strange back then, just... tactical.

But there was this suspicion in his mind whispering, ’What if those chains could work on her?’

Now, looking at how slowly her regeneration was functioning, Raven became sure that it worked on her.

The problem was that it was supposed to make one turn into a mortal with no powers, so how was her immortal tale even working?

"That’s ’cause of the tale grading system," Omni explained, his steady voice echoing in Raven’s head. "You remember what I told you, right? Any tale—no matter how OP—can get clapped if a higher-grade tale shows up."

He paused, letting the truth settle in.

"That’s what’s happening now. Her fake immortality tale is just ranked higher than the binding tale, plain and brutal."

’Oh!’ Raven exclaimed. ’That makes sense.’

The only reason she could heal was because of the complex workings of the tales.

Just then, the goddess’s throat clicked as it reconnected, letting out a dry sound like broken wind chimes.

Then, slowly, her eyes, which had been staring at Raven forever, blinked.

That same gloomy calm stared at him—but deeper now. Tired. Less divine. More... human.

The crazy light in them, however, didn’t vanish.

Her gaze dropped to Omni.

Then back to him.

"...That sword," she said softly, her voice a hoarse whisper, "is dangerous."

"Thanks," Raven replied. "Got it from a greedy merchant god by threatening him."

Omni vibrated, smug. "At least she knows my value."

The goddess didn’t smile. She didn’t blink.

She merely stared at the weapon above her heart.

Then she turned her head—just slightly—and looked Raven in the eyes. The dangerous shine in her gaze hadn’t dulled.

It was still there like a lion deciding whether or not to eat the man who fed it.

"You know this can’t last," she said. "What can you even achieve by doing this? Nothing changes. You can never kill me. We will forever remain at stalemate."

Raven didn’t respond right away.

Because... she wasn’t wrong.

He couldn’t kill her permanently.

And she couldn’t kill him right now—not with the divine law suppressing them both.

It was a stalemate.

But was Raven done yet? No.

"...We’re both in this mess because of Grandpa," Raven finally said. "He summoned me. He sent me here. This whole divine law cage match setup? It’s gotta be a test. That’s how he operates. Tests, schemes, trauma—it’s like his hobby."

He narrowed his eyes.

"So, what if we just... call it? Finish the test. I passed. You passed. We don’t need to keep dragging this out."

He wanted to make a deal with the goddess before him. That was his final plan because he didn’t want to stay here forever.

Heck, he didn’t even know how long he could last.

He was but a human. He felt sleepy, hungry, and a need to pee.

He wouldn’t be able to hold on for long.

But his words didn’t reach their conclusion.

Because the goddess spoke, her voice soft yet firm.

"I am Grandpa."

Raven blinked.

Then blinked again.

Even Omni vibrated in confusion.

"...Huh?"

Raven’s brain stuttered.

"...Wha—hold on—wait—" He said, short-circuiting like a squirrel trying to understand taxes. "Did you just say you’re Grandpa_Hot_Pot?"

Her eyes didn’t waver.

"I am the one who summoned you."

"Oh, fuck me sideways," Raven muttered, mouth open and eyes filled with resignation.

The one he always thought was a stinky, moody, eccentric codger who hated tall women and relationships turned out to be this eerily beautiful goddess with low self-confidence, emotional issues, and gloomy energy.

The Goddess—now revealed to Grandpa’s true form—on the other hand, continued.

"Unlike what you think, the divine law wasn’t placed here to limit you because this is a trial. I placed it here... because I didn’t want to kill you by mistake."

Raven stared at her.

Jaw open.

Eye twitching.

Omni, finally breaking out of the shock of this grand reveal, whispered, "...Bro, I think we just got catfished by a god."

Yeah, he was.

The only problem was that instead of an old man pretending to be a girl, he was catfished by a beautiful goddess pretending to be an old man.

’Why do I always end up with strange cases?!’

He wanted to scream out loud, but no one was here to hear him, other than Omni, of course.

Raven stood there for some time, half in disbelief, half in spiritual exhaustion.

The goddess—Grandpa_Hot_Pot—lay bound in divine chains, now completely healed but still silent.

Raven still held Omni, its tip trembling slightly above her heart.

Then, a realization hit.

’If she could place the divine law...’

His thought trailed off, the dots connecting in his head like a cursed puzzle finally solving itself.

’Then she can remove it too.’

His hand loosened.

He sighed like a man who’d just run a marathon only to find out he could’ve just Ubered to the finish line.

"Goddammit," he muttered, pulling Omni back with a tired clink of metal. The moment the blade left her chest, he slumped to the ground beside the goddess’s calm form.

A long silence passed, filled only by the sound of divine chains pulsing and Raven’s soul being slowly crushed by cosmic absurdity.

"...Can I move now?" The goddess asked, her voice surprisingly polite.

Raven looked at her.

Her face was serene, too calm for someone who’d just been decapitated and held hostage a second ago.

He gave her a lazy nod. "Sure. I’m not stopping you. I’ve apparently never had control of this situation anyway."

Then, he sighed again.

"Would you like me to help you remove the chains?" He asked, trying not to sound too bitter.

She shook her head, smiling softly. Then, with a nonchalant shrug, she moved her shoulders.

The chains shattered like glass under a divine hammer.

Tink. Tink. Tink.

The pieces fell to the ground around her like the fragments of Raven’s ego.

Raven stared.

Deadpan.

"...Of course, she could break the chains," he muttered to himself.

She sat up, brushing invisible dust off her dress like a noble lady straightening herself after tea, not a woman who had just been stabbed, bound, and had her head roll several meters away from her body.

Maybe, to her, all of it had just been...

A game?

A test?

A theater performance?

Raven didn’t know anymore.

But he had one question. One dumb, burning question that refused to leave his exhausted mortal brain.

"...Why?"

The goddess turned to him.

He lifted a hand, palm up, face dead serious.

"Why did you go through all of this," he asked, "just because I sold one of your divine artifacts? You said that those items were useless to you! You gave them to me! I just—I just traded it with another goddess!"

That sentence had barely left his mouth before the world cracked.

One blink.

That’s all it took.

Suddenly, she was right before him.

No movement. No flash step. No transition.

Just space itself agreeing she should be there.

The air trembled violently as reality tried to keep up with her presence.

Raven froze.

The ground cracked under her bare feet. The wind stopped.

Her red eyes—dim until now—glowed like twin suns dipped in divine madness.

Her voice came out soft... too soft to be true.

"Why," she whispered, "would you want to go to another woman when you have me?"

Raven didn’t blink.

Couldn’t blink.

His spine instinctively straightened.

Omni, for once, was silent—probably pretending to be a butter knife to avoid attention.

The divine energy leaking from her was no longer calm.

It was possessive.

Insane.

Cosmic in a way that made his stomach churn and his heartbeat speed up like a dying squirrel on espresso.

Her gaze didn’t move from him.

It was like the universe itself had focused all its obsessive, betrayed ex-energy into a single god-tier woman standing in front of him.

Looking at those eyes, Raven—poor, exhausted, emotionally broken Raven—realized...

He might’ve just unlocked a divine yandere route.

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