Extra's Path To Demon King

Chapter 551: FALLEN

Sophia wore a grave expression as she looked at the demon.

No matter whether she used her full strength, her full arsenal of energy to empower herself, or her nearly unbeatable techniques, she suffered a slight loss against Osiris in every respect.

For some strange reason, Osiris remained superior, no matter what she tried, as if it was simply supposed to be. The World itself made sure of that fact.

It was not that Sophia could not accept the idea of defeat; after all, she was no invincible being like the Demon Emperor.

But beneath the realm of the 5th phase, to the best of her understanding, none was supposed to be her match.

And neither was Osiris’s power so overwhelming that it reached closer to the 5th phase.

But there was something strange going on, something that she could not figure out completely.

Sophia narrowed her eyes and attacked once more, "Bloom of the All-Encompassing Darkness."

Right above the head of Osiris, where he was floating, a massive dark flower made of black thorns of the All-Encompassing Darkness manifested in an inverted position.

It grew larger by each fraction of a second, until it threatened to swallow the mighty demon like a jagged mouth of a profane worm, only in the visage of a dark blooming flower.

But with one simple slash of his greatsword imbued with violent dark red demonic flames, he cut through the blooming flower of Darkness.

Osiris spoke, his voice an echo of the true resolution that hid within, like an immovable mountain, "Your conviction is not strong enough, Valkyrie; you don’t even know who you are."

"Thus you do not know what you fight for. And as long as you do not know what you fight for, you can never match me...," added the demon coldly.

Sophia sneered, unbothered by the provocative response; even though it did hit a nerve, she also responded in kind, matching the demon’s tone, "And yet, here I am, even with your so-called superior conviction, you are unable to kill me."

Those words were like the last fuse that had been lit.

And both parties disappeared from their spots.

They tore through the air, sending more shockwaves across the battlefield.

The battle, which had been a soft push and pull between both sides like a testing phase till now, turned ferocious. Their killing moves spread out, causing the heavens to rumble nonstop.

The very layer of space itself strained to the extreme under the load of these mighty beings, letting out a destructive flurry of attacks.

In a battle of this scale, where both parties had combat power equivalent to peak 4th phase, everything unfolded too fast, too loud, too destructive, too grand and bloody.

However, it was just like what Osiris had said: Sophia could not hope to win against him, as she had been somewhat losing in every single exchange.

But at the same time, Sophia was also right; Osiris’s strength was not eclipsing to such a degree compared to her own that the demon would be able to kill her.

No matter how much, or how many times Sophia got injured, due to her resilience and innate monstrous healing capacity, she would always recover. She was in certain ways almost as tenacious as Fenrir, the Immortal Wolf itself.

The bloodied Sophia grinned in a monstrous visage, and just as she was about to launch her brutal retaliation.

An unprecedented sense of danger made her bones tingle; her mind spun at the speed of light as she realized what it was: an extremely masterfully crafted ambush, a sudden targeting by a third party to take her life.

Sophia, for the first time in a long time, felt true fear, for experiencing the complete weight of killing intent from an unknown entity who was infinitesimally close to the state of 5th phase, a presence so marginally higher than her in terms of quality that there was simply no hope of being able to contend against it.

Even with all the power and potential Sophia wielded, she knew that the gap between the 4th and 5th phase was so insurmountable that she might as well be an insect in the eyes of such beings, albeit a slightly larger insect—still, an insect to be crushed in the end.

Even if she broke through to the third phase, it was doubtful if she could still reach near the might of a 5th phase entity.

Suddenly, a string of words, spoken in the purest of Ghost tongue, echoed across the entire battlefield: "Mind Shackle..."

The moment those words echoed in Sophia’s brain, she was paralyzed, overwhelmed with terror; she could not move, and using that moment of chance, Osiris shoved his greatsword right through the heart of the Valkyrie, and the great pain actually helped break free of the paralysis.

Blood trickled down her mouth, wearing an incomparably vicious countenance just as she was about to yank out the sword that pierced her chest.

Unexpectedly, the space on her right side rippled and stretched as if something was forcefully tearing through it, coming from an unknown distance.

Before Sophia could even formulate a response, a deathly cold palm of dead bone hands grabbed her divine face.

Marking her face with disgusting black marks like a criminal being branded with heated metal bars.

Sophia’s eyes widened in horror as she recognized the face of the lich. As the arriving figure’s long black coat fluttered in the wind, she barely managed to peek at the Lich’s skull face.

And the entity was none other than the initial-5th phase High-Lich who led the attack on the academy, the previously proclaimed Commander of the 24th Ghost Legion, the Undead creature who fought and lost against Alric Stragoy, the Deathly Hollow... Zabiur Ulpranak.

The empty eye sockets of the mighty Lich danced with nether flames, as he grabbed Sophia’s throat with his other hand; he looked at the Valkyrie with disgust, as if he were touching something dirty and sullying his own hands.

The High-Lich spoke, his voice a dark symphony generated from the scraping of dry bones against one another, "Wretched human, you were one of the main reasons why I had failed to accomplish my mission given by the Emperor."

"And because of you, I had to endure the Ghost Emperor’s endless wrath," added Zabiur as his bone hands tightened.

At the same time, with both of his hands, he continued to pull Sophia’s head, as if wanting to rip the head out of her neck through sheer force.

"Now... I have been forced to descend here and finish the incomplete job, with my foundation damaged as I have regressed to peak 4th phase from the 5th phase,... does an insignificant ant like you understand the immensity of it?" asked the Deathly Hollow with a malevolent countenance.

"Because of you and that hateful Lightbringer, I have been forced to experience devolution...." growled the once mighty Lich on Sophia’s face.

But then he grinned darkly, "Well... It doesn’t matter in the end, because this lacking power... is still more than enough to kill you... as well as all those ants that escaped from my hands on that day..."

Sophia’s heart trembled as she began to struggle madly, because the words uttered by the Deathly Hollow were indeed true, even though the High-Lich was not a 5th phase existence anymore; yet the fractional power of his once 5th phase status that remianed within him was more than enough to kill the Valkyrie truly.

But no matter how much she struggled in desperation, she could not break away from the effects of a spell as powerful as the Mind Shackle, cast by an entity on the precipice of 5th phase.

The Deathly Hollow was only amused by her struggle, like a human seeing a rat struggle, caught in a trap.

And in that moment, Zoromir Gorthak, who was watching all of this from the Ghost armies camp, grinned in delight.

The Strategist of the Third Ghost Legion never really trusted Osiris with the job of finishing off the Valkyrie. While the demon was indeed extraordinarily powerful, he was still not nearly strong enough to kill her.

After all, if the Valkyries were truly so easy to kill, the seven ruling races would not have let this lineage of the Strongest continue living. Because the bloodline of the Valkyries remains a threat to their absolute rule over the continent of Eldarion.

Given Sophia’s current state and strength, only someone who had touched the power of the 5th phase could do the job, and, at the same time, no genuine 5th-phase existences were permitted to enter the war, creating a unique challenge.

In the end, it was Zorormir who pleaded with the Emperor for Zabiur Ulpranak to be granted one more chance to regain his freedom and correct his past failure, though naturally at a steep cost.

The only reason Zabiur was even eligible to be given a second chance, rather than being killed, was because the High-Lich was an extremely valuable member of the Ghost race.

All those who carried the last name of Ulpranak amongst the Ghost race were beings with confirmed potential to reach the 6th phase.

After all, not every initial 5th-phase Ghost Race member could fight against a peak 5th-phase existence.

Certainly not an enemy as strong as Alric Stragoy, who was the fourth strongest human, right under the power of the three 6th-phase Great Kings of Humanity.

Zoromir laughed as he watched the carnage with great anticipation, and Zabiur did not disappoint him... proving the worth of his last name bestowed by the Ghost Emperor himself.

Crunch....

Squelch.....

Within a single second, before the gaze of countless onlookers from both sides of the war, before they could process what was happening, the unknown Lich who had appeared on the battlefield without notice made the impossible... possible.

The head of the Champion of Humanity, with one swift yank, had been ripped off cleanly, with her entire esophagus pipe being torn out, her blood and intestines flowing everywhere, in a disturbing manner.

In that moment, from the eyes of the onlookers, the Divine Valkyrie....

The near-invincible, prophesied Shield of Humanity...

Was torn to shreds....

Just like that....

SOPHIA EVERCREST... WAS....DEAD!!!