I Have 10,000 SSS Rank Villains In My System Space Chapter 494: The Blood Crown

But just then..

"Kneel now before the altar, I.. " The archbishop, who had been standing just behind Sofia until now, suddenly shouted after watching Razeal walk away as though he did not even exist. His face had already been red with fury from the moment Razeal gave the order to destroy every church and temple in the kingdom, but being ignored like this seemed to break whatever little control he still had left. He rushed past sofia and Grace standing just near him the long white and golden robes around his body dragging across the marble platform as he moved. His steps were hurried, almost wild, and the holy staff in his hand struck against the floor with each movement. He did not care that Sofia had been trying to calm the situation. He did not care that Grace and the five great lords were still standing there in shock. He did not even care about the strange danger surrounding Razeal anymore.

To him, this had gone far beyond a disagreement between a ruler and the Church. Razeal had ordered the destruction of sacred grounds, insulted the gods, rejected the authority of the altar, and walked away while holding a crown that had not yet been blessed. In the archbishop’s eyes, it was the worst kind of blasphemy a mortal could commit. It was not something that could be forgiven with an apology. It was not something that could be repaired with gold or political agreements. Razeal deserved death, and as a loyal believer of God, the archbishop had already convinced himself that it was now his sacred duty to make sure that death came. There was hatred in his eyes as he rushed to stand in front of Razeal, hatred so deep that for a moment he seemed to forget who he was facing.

"You will kneel before the altar and beg for divine forgiveness! I, as the representative of.." His voice was loud enough to cross the entire platform, filled with the force and authority of a man who had spent his whole life watching kings lower their heads before him. He expected Razeal to stop. He expected the lords to support him. Perhaps some part of him even believed the crowd below would rise in anger and demand punishment for this godless ruler. But the moment Razeal slowly turned his eyes toward him, the rest of the archbishop’s words died inside his mouth.

Razeal did not shout. He did not move toward him. He merely looked at him, and the archbishop suddenly felt as though the entire world around them had disappeared. Those crimson eyes met his own, cold, still, and completely without mercy. There was no anger burning inside them, no wild rage that might pass after a few moments. That would have been easier to face. What the archbishop saw was something far worse a calm decision. His lips remained open, but no sound came out. His tongue felt heavy in his mouth, and the powerful words he had prepared suddenly seemed meaningless. His breathing stopped for a second.

A chill spread from the back of his neck down through his entire body, making his fingers tighten uselessly around the holy staff. He had stood before kings, generals, warlords, and condemned criminals. He had watched men kneel before execution and had spoken divine judgment over them without once trembling.

Yet now, with Razeal’s gaze resting upon him, his lips began to shake on their own. He wanted to continue speaking. He wanted to remind everyone that he represented the Church, that harming him would bring the anger of millions, that the gods themselves would punish anyone who dared touch him. But fear had already wrapped itself around his throat. His body understood the danger before his pride could accept it. No words came. He simply stood there, staring into those crimson eyes as his confidence slowly collapsed.

Razeal watched him for another silent moment before speaking in a voice so cold that it seemed to pass directly through the archbishop’s bones.

"One more word," he said, "And I’ll have your head." There was no threat of punishment later. No warning of arrest. No order for guards to remove him. It was a simple promise, spoken with complete certainty.

The archbishop’s body trembled visibly. The fear on his face was so clear that even the lords watching from behind could see it. Sweat appeared along his forehead. His grip on the staff weakened.

For one brief second, it seemed that he might finally understand and remain silent. But pride, faith, and humiliation fought against that fear inside him. He was the archbishop. He was the man chosen to crown kings in the name of God. How could he allow himself to be silenced before thousands of people? How could he step back after being threatened by a blasphemer? His lips moved again despite every instinct screaming at him to stop.

"Yo..."

The voice had barely begun to leave his mouth when a sharp, almost whispering sound cut through the air.

Flushhhhh~

No one saw a blade. No one saw Razeal move. There was only a thin line that suddenly appeared across the archbishop’s neck, so clean and perfect that for the smallest fraction of a second, his head remained in place. His eyes were still wide. His lips were still shaped around the unfinished word.

Then suddenly his head separated from his body and flew upward into the air. Aas the fountain of blood exploded from the open neck beneath it, shooting high above the marble platform in a violent red stream. The archbishop’s head turned once in the air, his expression frozen in disbelief, before falling back down.

A heavy sound echoed across the platform as it struck the marble floor.

Thud.

It bounced once, rolled several feet, and finally came to rest with the face turned partly toward the crowd. The unfinished word disappeared with him. For one impossible moment, the headless body remained standing where it was, the holy staff slipping from lifeless fingers and striking the floor with a sharp metallic sound. Blood continued spraying from the neck in powerful bursts, covering the white and golden robes, spreading across the marble beneath his feet, and splashing everyone standing close enough.

Then, as if the body finally understood that it was already dead, its knees weakened. It tilted forward and crashed heavily onto the platform with another deep thud.

Everything became silent. Not slowly. Not one voice after another. The entire place fell quiet at once. The crowd below had been whispering loudly only moments earlier, confused about what was happening upon the raised platform. Most of them could not hear every word clearly from so far away. They had only seen Sofia suddenly appear, the nobles gathering around Razeal, the archbishop shouting in anger, and the strange delay in the crowning ceremony.

Many were still discussing the archbishop’s declaration from moments ago, when he had threatened to place the entire kingdom under excommunication. That alone had caused panic among the religious people in the crowd. Families had begun whispering prayers. Old men had looked toward the temples in the distance.

But now, after seeing the archbishop’s head suddenly fly through the air and blood burst upward like a red fountain, every whisper vanished. Mouths remained open without sound. Eyes widened until they seemed painful. Even children who did not understand what had happened became silent after seeing the terror on the faces of their parents. The archbishop was not merely another noble or priest. He was the highest religious authority in the kingdom, the man believed to stand closest to God for them, the one who blessed rulers and judged whether a crown had divine approval. Many people had spent their entire lives believing that touching him in anger was a sin.

Killing him was something so unthinkable that their minds could barely accept what their eyes had just witnessed. Yet his severed head was lying upon the marble floor, and his blood was running down the steps of the platform.

"No... he just didn’t..." Sofia whispered to herself, the words leaving her lips like a prayer. She remained facing away from Razeal for a moment, almost begging herself to believe that she had sensed it wrongly. The movement had been too fast, too sudden. Perhaps the archbishop had fallen. Perhaps something else had happened. Perhaps Razeal had only frightened him. But the smell of fresh blood reached her, and the silence behind her was far too heavy. Sofia quickly turned her head back, and the moment her eyes landed on the headless body still collapsing onto the marble, she closed them again as if that could erase the sight. Her breath caught painfully in her throat.

She was not from this kingdom. She had not grown up worshipping in these churches, and she did not fully understand the power this particular man held over the people. But she understood enough. A man who had the right to crown kings in the name of God could not be unimportant. A man whose words could excommunicate an entire kingdom was not merely a priest. He was a symbol. He represented something far larger than himself. Razeal had not simply killed an angry old man who insulted him. He had killed the face of the religion standing inside this kingdom, publicly, during his own crowning ceremony, before thousands of witnesses. Sofia’s fingers slowly curled by her sides. A cold heaviness settled inside her chest as one thought became painfully clear there was no path back now. Destroying the churches had already been a declaration of war against the faith, but killing the archbishop made that declaration impossible to deny. Even if the order against the temples was somehow stopped, even if Razeal changed his mind this very moment, the Church would never forgive this. The believers would never forget it. The entire religious world would hear of what happened here.

Grace stood frozen with one hand covering her mouth. A broken gasp had escaped her the moment the head flew away, and now she could not lower her hand. Her young face had gone completely pale. She had known Razeal was dangerous. She had seen enough of his strength and cruelty to understand that he was not afraid to kill. But some part of her had still believed ceremony, politics, and the eyes of the public would hold him back. She had believed that even if he hated the archbishop, he would at least wait until they were somewhere private. She had been wrong.

The five great lords standing nearby were equally horrified. Their eyes seemed ready to come out of their sockets as they stared at the body on the floor. One of them unconsciously stepped backward, his heel sliding in the blood before he caught himself. Another lord’s lips moved in a silent prayer. None of them dared speak. They had governed lands, ordered executions, fought wars, and watched countless men die, but this was different. The archbishop’s death was not shocking because of the blood. It was shocking because of what it meant. In a single movement, Razeal had broken one of the oldest unspoken rules of the kingdom and shown everyone that religious authority would not protect a person from him.

The fountain of blood from the archbishop’s neck had sprayed across Razeal’s body. Red droplets covered his clothes, his hands, the side of his face, and even his crimson eyes. Several drops struck the crown he was holding, sliding slowly across the gold and jewels before gathering at its lower edge. Blood began dripping from the crown onto the marble floor. Razeal did not wipe his face. He did not step away from the falling blood. He did not even look down at the dead body. He simply stood there and allowed it to cover him, as though the death meant nothing more than the end of an unwanted interruption.

When the archbishop’s body finally struck the floor with a heavy thud, Razeal calmly walked past it. His foot stepped beside the spreading pool of blood, and the edge of his boot left a dark red print upon the marble as he continued toward the front. No one tried to stop him now. Sofia remained frozen behind him. Grace could only stare. The five great lords stood like statues.

Razeal reached the very edge of the raised platform and stopped there, looking down at the enormous crowd below. Every face was turned upward. Thousands upon thousands of eyes stared at him, wide with terror and disbelief. No one dared whisper now. Not even the most devoted believers let out a cry. They had all seen what happened to the man who spoke after Razeal warned him. Somewhere within that silence, the same thought moved through the entire crowd: if they made a sound, perhaps their heads would fly next.

Razeal looked across them without expression. His face was covered in blood droplets, making him appear less like a king waiting to be crowned and more like a conqueror standing over the ruins of something sacred. The wind moved lightly across the platform, carrying the smell of blood out over the crowd. The crown remained in his hand, wet and dripping red. For several long seconds, he said nothing. He allowed the silence to deepen until even breathing felt dangerous.

Then, slowly, Razeal raised his arm. The blood-covered crown rose above him, gold shining beneath the red stains as thick drops continued falling from its edges.

"This crown..." Razeal began, his voice low at first, but the silence covering the capital allowed even that first word to travel far beyond the raised platform. Thousands of people stood below him without moving, their eyes fixed on the blood-covered crown held above his head and the red droplets still running down the side of his face. Behind him lay the headless body of the archbishop, his blood spreading slowly across the white marble while his severed head remained several feet away, its lifeless eyes turned toward the crowd. The sight itself was enough to freeze anyone, but Razeal showed no sign that the dead man behind him mattered at all. He lowered the crown slightly and looked at it for one long moment, his fingers tightening around its golden edge.

This was the crown everyone had expected the archbishop to place upon him after holy prayers, blessings, and the approval of God. This was the crown Grace had carried upon a purple pillow, guarded carefully as though it were something sacred. This was the crown nobles believed could only become legitimate through tradition. But now it was covered in the blood of the very man who was supposed to bless it.

Razeal slowly raised his gaze again, his crimson eyes sweeping over the crowd.

"It was not given to me by any king or queen," he said, each word becoming stronger than the last. Then he pointed toward his own chest with the same hand holding the crown.

"I..." His voice briefly caught beneath the weight of everything he had done.. his expression hardened.

"I earned this myself." His declaration spread through the air with such force that it seemed to strike every wall and tower around the capital. The magic carrying his voice made sure that even those at the farthest ends of the crowd heard him clearly. The people who had been whispering in fear became completely silent once again. There was fury inside his voice, but there was also something that could not be denied a sense of right so strong that even those who hated him could feel it. He was not asking them to accept him. He was not begging for their support. He was telling them what he believed to be the truth.

"I earned it by saving this entire kingdom," Razeal continued, pointing to himself again while the blood-soaked crown remained gripped in his hand. His voice rose, becoming harsher and more powerful as he spoke.

"Its land. Its cities. Its fields.. Its future. Every man, every woman, every child." His gaze moved slowly across the crowd as if he were looking at each of them personally. People who had been returned from death stood among those still covered in wounds, dust, and dried blood. Some held the hands of family members they had thought they would never touch again. Some still wore torn clothes from the war. Others had been pulled from ruined houses only hours before. They all knew, whether they wished to admit it or not, that without him many of them would not be standing there.

"Every single one of you..." Razeal’s voice stretched the words until they felt heavier than iron. "Owes me your life." The last word thundered over the capital. "LIFE!"

Several people flinched. A woman near the front pulled her child closer to her chest. An old soldier lowered his head, his face tightening with shame because he knew Razeal was not entirely wrong. Even those who would want to hated him could not deny what he had done. He had even brought back the dead. He had stopped the destruction. He had taken control when the old rulers gave up.

Yet gratitude and fear struggled inside the crowd, mixing into something no one could easily name. The people remained deathly still. No one cheered. No one dared to protest. There was only silence and the terrible truth of his words pressing against them.

"So when I say this kingdom belongs to me..." Razeal said, his voice lowering again. That quieter tone somehow became more dangerous than his shout.

"Then It belongs to me." He stepped closer to the edge of the platform, until there was barely any marble left before the drop. The wind moved across his blood-covered clothes and lifted a few strands of his hair away from his face. His crimson eyes continued staring down at the countless citizens gathered beneath him.

"And when I say that I am your king..." His words began to build again, spreading through the streets and striking against stone.

"Then i am your king." The final declaration boomed across the capital with such force that many people felt it inside their chests. It did not sound like a request for loyalty. It sounded like a fact already decided by blood and power. Behind him, the five great lords remained silent. Grace still had one hand near her mouth, watching him with a mixture of fear and disbelief.

Sofia stood silent, her eyes fixed on Razeal’s back. She had heard rulers make speeches before. She had heard many lords or nobles speak about duty, inheritance, divine right, and there noble blood. But this was different. Razeal was stripping all of that away. He was not claiming the throne because of his family. He was not claiming it because the Church accepted him. He was claiming it because he believed his actions had purchased the right.

For several long moments, Razeal said nothing. His grip around the crown tightened until his fingers almost seemed ready to bend the metal. In that silence, he remembered everything the people behind him had expected. Kneel before the altar maybe? Accept the blessing.l? Allow the priest to place the crown upon his head? Lower himself before a god so that the people could believe his reign had been approved? He remembered the archbishop’s and Grace words.. and the way tradition had been placed before him like a chain. His expression became colder.

"No priest will bless my reign," he said. The words were steady, clear, and final. Somewhere in the crowd, a few deeply religious citizens quietly gasped.

"No temple will grant me authority." His voice sharpened. "And no god will crown me." He paused after saying it, staring down at the people as if daring anyone to challenge him.

The silence became almost unbearable. Then the fury inside him finally broke through.

"NO FUCKING GOD WILL CROWN ME!" Razeal shouted. His voice tore through the capital like thunder. It pierced directly through the chest of every person listening, forcing them to understand exact