Damien wasn't going to leave any problems unsolved.
Right now, the traitor was dead, but the Divine Order's scheming wasn't so shallow that it could end with just this.
Whether they had Giovani or not, they had the ability to use the 7th Sword as an excuse now.
Giovani had been specifically loud about his actions for that exact purpose.
Damien didn't really care about the actual act of destroying the evidence.
From the moment he decided to stand against the Divine Order, they were fated for destruction. He didn't actually need the homunculi as some sort of justification to make that a reality.
The only part that mattered was Giovani's presence.
That was where his plan hatched from.
First things first, he took Giovani's severed head and sent it into the Sanctuary along with a message.
Damian, Damien's second Avatar, took the head and the message to the main palace through the Sanctuary connection with Rose and the rest.
That happened within a second, and within the next few minutes, everything else was already set up.
The place had just been cleaned up, but the heads of the 16 traitorous Elders were already replaced with someone new.
When the common populace woke up in the morning, they'd eventually see it.
Giovani's head displayed on a stake, accompanied by a stele declared his sins.
With that, Void Palace not only had a response prepared for the declaration that the Divine Order would soon put out, but they also had an alibi for what came next.
The days were allowed to pass quietly for a bit after that.
As expected, the Divine Order tried to blame Void Palace for the cathedral's destruction and hid information about what was actually taking place there.
However, Void Palace's 7th Sword was also announced dead around the same time, his head serving as clear evidence that nobody could deny.
Controversy naturally brewed from the two extremely differing testimonies, with many unsure about who was in the right.
But everyone knew that this was the start of something big.
Actually, it had already started with this move.
With this, not only did Void Palace confirm their open hostility, but the Divine Order also realized that palace members were moving in their territory to take down the schemes they'd spent years putting into place.
In the days after the two great clans made their stances known, countless people spoke about the events they made so big, and opinions continued to split.
But that wouldn't remain the case for very much longer.
Hidden in the shadows, Damien moved fast and precisely while all of this was underway.
With the memories he devoured from Giovani, he gained the location of several homunculus development facilities all around the Southwestern Region.
After giving Nikolas a separate task, he started moving towards the nearest of said facilities.
Beginning at those near the cathedral and spreading further and further into the Southwestern Region, Damien infiltrated over fifty facilities.
But he didn't destroy them immediately.
He was now going to make the Divine Order's excuse completely fall apart.
After all, the 7th Sword was dead, but now, countless facilities disguised as historical monuments were going to fall.
It was a bit comedic that the order made every facility under a religious building. It gave Damien the perfect reasoning to disguise his actions as those of a religious hate group.
Damien had an absolute advantage.
His use of several different laws meant he could, by himself, emulate a group of Divinities with a variety of powers and styles.
But he waited first.
He needed Nikolas to leave the Southwestern Region before he could start.
He got confirmation about that after about a week. Since Nikolas was in the clear, there was no need to hesitate anymore.
It began on one fateful night.
Out of nowhere, a massive explosion erupted from the local church in another small city.
Flames burned through everything, decimating the church and leaving a hole so deep nobody could see the bottom of it.
The flames stayed contained within the church area but never spread further than that. And, if a civilian happened to get caught in it, they wouldn't burn.
Only the church burned, and only the homunculi under it would ever know the truth behind what happened.
That is, if any of them could magically gain sentience within the burning flames.
But, of course, that was impossible.
The fires burned until dawn, with any effort to put them out failing immensely.
No clues were left at the scene of the crime, but people began to tie it to the destruction of the cathedral quite rapidly.
Because it wasn't the only incident.
In the same night, three other historical sites collapsed in various ways. One was caught in a mysterious flood that, again, did not harm innocents. Another simply collapsed, as if the earth itself had given up on it. As for the last, it was caught in a storm of lightning of unknown origins, destroyed by Heaven's wrath.
Every few days, another incident would pop up. The destruction ensued at a rate that was impossible for a single person to cause, and, as the "motive" for the incident became clear, people started to forget about the allegations against Void Palace.
At least, before the media picked up the story.
Within the Southwestern Region, it meant nothing. Even if external media was introduced into their communities, they were too deeply brainwashed to ever consider the Divine Order in a negative light.
However, everywhere else, the people who'd been watching the commotion started to remember what the Divine Order had accused the palace of back then.
And that allegation was completely torn apart.
Combined with the fact that the accused perpetrator was dead at Void Palace around the time of the attack, crossing an impossible distance in just a few minutes, the continuous attacks gave the perpetrator a new face that was completely uninvolved with the palace.
The Divine Order had essentially lost its justification the moment they gained it.
As if that wasn't bad enough, their research into homunculi became obvious to the other great clans with a bit of investigation, so they'd been placed under an invisible pressure by not only Void Palace's allies, but others such as the Dragon Clan.
For the time being, they had no choice but to stay still unless they wanted to attract hostility.
They had touched a line by trying to mass-produce Gods.
If they stepped forward just one more time…
Well, the forced submission wouldn't last for long, but Damien was able to buy himself some unexpected time because of the whole situation.
He was also able to force the Divine Order to eat a loss, and from the memories of those like Giovani, he gained the same amount of information on them as they had against Void Palace.
Not to mention, he learned a lot about the homunculus creation process and was able to gain a body that had yet to house a soul for Rein.
Overall, it was an amazing move from Damien that only benefited him.
The Divine Order was definitely enraged, and their rage would only grow as they chased the invisible "terrorist group" that kept destroying their facilities.
There were still around 30 that Damien hadn't touched yet.
They'd all experience similar fates to their peers in the coming weeks and months.
But, that wasn't a story that needed to be told.
By the time 3 weeks had passed, Damien received word from Nikolas.
He'd successfully accomplished the task assigned to him.
So it was time for Damien to go meet him.
To get his hands on the wild card he'd been eyeing.
