Chapter 403: The Despair of the Elderly

The Angel of Death, Noah, had delivered the death penalty to countless elderly people according to his own set of laws. Even after he was thrown into Darvaza Prison for his crimes, he still maintained that he hadn't done anything wrong.

He had a code of conduct that he strictly abided by, and regardless of what anyone told him or what the consequences of his actions were, he was convinced that he was doing the right thing.

Among all of the people that Adam had seen, he was the most mentally twisted one, so his anomaly was also unprecedentedly powerful.

If it weren't for Diana's inclusion in the part, Adam wouldn't have chosen to have a second go at the Angel of Death at this time.

"Why do I have to stay out here again? I want to fight as well!"

Shae was fiddling around with the controller with a displeased look on her face, but despite her dissatisfaction, she knew that she was the only one who could take on this role and there were barely any normal people present in the room.

"Just how powerful is this anomaly, Adam?" Ever since Rabbit was saved by Adam last time, she had noticed a problem. "It seems like it's becoming more and more a struggle for us to keep up with you lately. Why have your opponents suddenly become so powerful?"

"My enemies have always been this powerful, it's just that back when I was weak, I couldn't afford to face them directly," Adam explained. "Once the battle begins, just stay on the edge of the battlefield and assist us from there. Given how powerful that anomaly is, it'll be very difficult for any of you to inflict substantial damage onto it."

"Is the anomaly more powerful than Hebi no Miko?" Diana asked.

She had set Hebi no Miko as her target, so she liked to compare Hebi no Miko against all of her opponents.

"I'd say Hebi no Miko is still more powerful. We wouldn't be able to beat Hebi no Miko by ourselves. If I had to compare this anomaly to someone, then I'd say it's close to Wax Figure's level, so it's a very formidable opponent in its own right."

"You mean that waxy guy?"

"That's right."

"I'm starting to get a little excited! Four Wax Figures should be evenly matched in battle against Hebi no Miko... Let's begin."

Shae connected everyone together, and the group entered Noah's psychic world.

Thus, a giant dragon and four animals appeared at the same time in a retirement home.

.

"Damn, there's not a single normal person among them. They're all psychic mutants!" Shae sighed as she watched the projection in the real world. "How are they supposed to win the public's trust when they look like that? How can they be expected to vote for a squirrel as their mayor? If I was from the southern congress, I'd make a big fuss out of this..."

Even though Shae was complaining about the appearance of Adam and the others, she was highly focused and alert.

She had heard about this Angel of Death quite early on, and she knew if they could take it down, then Adam would receive a significant boost to his powers, placing him among the top adapters in the world.

At the same time, Shae had a feeling that things weren't going to be so simple.

……

"Green Heaven?" In the psychic world, Mole was looking up at the sign above his head with a perplexed expression. "This place gives me a really strange feeling. The air is so fresh, and the environment is so harmonious. Shouldn't the psychic worlds of these freaks be really forbidding and filled with a foul stench?"

"His psychic world is like this because he thinks he's doing the right thing."

Prior to coming here, Adam had taken the time to pay a visit to the Green Heaven Retirement Home in the real world.

Just as he imagined, in the real world, the retirement home was a tiny apartment-style retirement home with old and outdated facilities. Furthermore, even following that incident concerning Noah, the retirement home was still operating and hadn't been shut down.

There were simply far too few places where impoverished elderly citizens could choose to spend their final years.

The wealthiest people in the world were able to enjoy physical immortality, while those who weren't quite at that level of wealth, but were still quite wealthy in their own right, were enjoying life as cyberliches in the Metaverse. Even the middle-class citizens were able to attain immortality by working as laborers in the Metaverse.

Even though immortality in the Metaverse for the majority of middle-class citizens was a complete scam, they didn't know that themselves.

The data compression matter was a secret, and it was virtually completely unknown by anyone aside from the higher-ups of the Gaia Organization.

In this world, only the most impoverished elderly individuals went to retirement homes. They didn't even have the money to hire a mechanical carer, so they could only be managed in a centralized system.

Due to how impoverished they were, even businesspeople didn't want to have anything to do with this sector, which was why there were so few retirement homes in all of Sandrise City.

There was perhaps only a single retirement in one area, so these old people had no options, and that was why Green Heaven was still operating as normal even after the Noah incident.

After visiting the retirement home once, Adam was struck by the urge to visit it again as he could sense a unique aura of despair there, so it had to have been a perfect place for nurturing anomalies.

However, that was Green Heaven in the real world, whereas in Noah's psychic world, Green Heaven had been imagined to be like a true heaven.

"Where's the anomaly?" Diana asked in her dragon form, and her voice was booming like rumbling thunder. "It's been a long time since I've had a good battle!"

"It was in that palace-like building the last time I came here, but I'm not sure where it is this time, given anomalies are free to move around in the psychic worlds of their hosts as they please..."

Before Adam had a chance to finish, Diana had already soared into the heavens and was flying directly toward the holy palace.

After arriving above the palace, she opened her giant mouth to release an almighty breath, and the black flames instantly destroyed the roof of the palace, creating a massive hole.

Right as Diana was about to completely destroy the pristine palace with her draconic technomancy, a scale suddenly flew out of the building from the hole that she had just blasted into the roof.

At the same time, a burst of holy light erupted forth from within, alongside an authoritative declaration: "Let me see into your heart, newcomer."

The scale drew to a halt as it arrived before Diana, following which it began to emit a type of strange suction force.

Diana wanted to resist, and she was even attacking the scale with her flames, but to no avail.

The strange mist continued to pour out of her body before surging onto the two ends of the scale, where one side measured pain, while the other measured happiness.

Of course, Diana's life was one in which pain far outweighed happiness, but from down below, Adam noticed that Diana seemed to have experienced far more happiness than he had.

It seems like she really enjoyed her time with Arthur.

Adam heaved a faint sigh as he observed this from afar, and at the same time, he invoked Sludge before fusing with it.

After the fusion was complete, the scale had also arrived at its verdict.

All of a sudden, a massive angle with a pair of black wings crashed its way straight out of the palace's roof.

"Your life is one of pain. Particularly right now, your pain far outweighs your happiness. I will do you the kindness of putting an end to your life so that you can escape this torment," the angel declared, then invoked a morning star mace that it swung down toward Diana's head.