"Hmm? Bring a shelter here? Is that even possible?"
Not only Lia but even Raphael had no idea what Azekiel was talking about. How could they bring a shelter here?
"It's not going to be easy, but I think it's possible," Azekiel affirmed.
"I still don't understand how you're going to bring a shelter here. If you could do that, why didn't you do it at the start?"
That was the biggest question in Lia's head. From what Azekiel said before, he didn't like rain at all. If he could really bring a shelter here, she didn't believe he would've waited so long before highlighting it.
"I didn't mean bringing a shelter here in a literal sense," Azekiel softly stated. "What I meant is making a shelter for our own. It's better than nothing."
He could see many trees in their nearby vicinity that were just lying on the ground, uprooted. There were tens of such trees right beside them, with more being in the distance.
"There are many uprooted trees here. Since there is no better option, we might as well make a shelter ourselves, at least something that could protect us from rain, giving us time to go through the new maps."
Azekiel carefully moved toward the closest tree.
Unlike before, he didn't walk without care. Before taking each step, he tapped the Ground ahead with his foot to make sure there wasn't a hole in the ground like before.
Because of this excess caution, it took him quite some time to cover a small distance.
"As expected. There are more." Noticing another puddle of deep water, he changed his path a bit before moving forward.
Throughout the time, the heavy rain hadn't slowed down even a little. It was like an eternal rain that remained constant, not intensifying but not slowing down either. Unfortunately, there was no way to avoid this rain.
Azekiel stopped before one of the fallen trees, merely a few inches away from him.
"Making shelter from them will be time-consuming." Raphael theorized. "Especially in this rain. If only you could summon me now, I could've taken you straight to the shelter I found through the air."
"I don't have enough energy to summon you. I can only do a Spiritual Summon, which won't help you much. Unless I have some secret wings that you can bring out, but I doubt."
He opened the System Screen, going straight to his Weapons.
"Let's see how sharp the Gauntlets are."
He called out his Weapon of Sin, which now had another form unlocked... The Hammer of Gluttony. However, he didn't plan to use the Second Form, which was more suited for battles. Currently, he needed the Gauntlets themselves, which were as sharp as blades.
The two metallic Gauntlets appeared around each of his hands. The two books remained tucked inside his clothes as he kept both his hands free.
"I'm already hungry, and now this... This wasn't how I expected this day to go."
After slight complaints, Azekiel got to work and started slicing the massive tree, making it thinner and sharper from the bottom.
Initially, it was confusing as to what he was doing as he kept slicing. What was amazing was the Gauntlets which worked even better than a sword, giving him more control on the slices.
It was only after the tree started shaking shape did it become clear what Azekiel was making.
"He's making something akin to a spike. Possibly to be used as pillars. Not bad. This boy..." Lia smiled. "He is not half bad."
Raphael stood still, having his arms folded as he watched Azekiel working all alone, somewhat dejected that he couldn't help Azekiel.
Finally, Azekiel managed to finish with the first pillar, giving it a thickness of just over twenty inches. He made the bottom of the tree as sharp as he could so it could easily penetrate the ground.
"That's one."
He moved over to another tree, creating something similar. One after another, he kept grilling the trees, making them take the shape that he needed. He created eight spiked pillars and four pillars without any spike at the bottom.
After creating the pillars, he moved over to other trees which were even bigger in size, slicing them flat to create something that could be placed on the roof.
After around half an hour, he finally stopped, letting out a sigh of relief. "That should be enough. I'm done."
He would've been covered in sweat after working for so long if his body wasn't already wet due to the constant rain.
Finally, he sent the gauntlets back, freeing his hands before sitting on a fallen tree to get some rest.
Raphael sat on one side of him while Lia sat on the other.
"Are you alright?" Lia inquired.
"If I'm not alright after this much, how will I achieve my true goals? There is still a lot I need to do in this World. Many scores to settle... Many lives to take... This much won't affect me."
"I hope it's all worth it, and the map doesn't just show a path to where you found the shelter. That would be pretty upsetting." He stood up, having only a short rest before moving to the spiked pillars.
He grabbed one of the pillars. The pillars were so heavy that it would've usually taken multiple people even to pick one up, let alone carry it from one place to another.
Fortunately, even though Azekiel hadn't cleared as many floors as other Kings, he still had equal stats to most of them, if not more. All because of his Soul Snatch and became he had killed Two Kings already.
He had many times more strength than an ordinary human was supposed to possess. Picking up the pillar wasn't very hard.
"Here I go."
He aimed the spiked end to the ground before stabbing it with his full force behind.
The ground was already not too hard, and the rain only worked to make it easier for the spike to penetrate the ground.
Azekiel stabbed the spiked pillar three meters deep into the ground and only stopped after making sure that the spike was firm enough.
He picked another spike and selected a different direction to stab it.
One after another, he stabbed three pillars in a straight line, barely two meters away from each other. Similarly, he stabbed three more spikes in a parallel line, leaving a five-meter gap between the two parallel sides. Ultimately, he stabbed one each to complete the edges of his shelter.
While Azekiel was making a shelter, the two Spirits were distracted by him, not focusing on anything else. In any case, they hadn't expected anyone else to come here.
If they were more aware of their surroundings, they could've seen another figure appear in the distance, not too far from them.
It was the figure of a girl who had an intriguing yet strange mark on her head. The young woman gazed at Azekiel, who was attempting to make a shelter.
Lenora had just destroyed the two statues outside to enter the Temple of Gods, only to end up in the same place as Azekiel.
There was barely twenty meters of distance between the two sides.
