Chapter 672: Progenitor godslayer vs Infernal Verdant III
Arthur’s blade sank deep into Vonun’s shoulder, piercing the same spot he had stabbed earlier, and destruction energy seeped into Vonun’s body. The flesh around the wound began to crack and bleed, the damage spreading.
Before Arthur could press the attack, Vonun lashed out with a tendril of wood, wrapping it around Arthur’s leg and yanking him away.
Arthur sliced the tendril off and spun, landing on his feet and regaining his balance instantly. As for Vonun, the earth around the man cracked open and tendrils of wood shot up, weaving together and growing at an alarming rate.
In mere moments, a new arm-lance took form, pulsing with the power of Vonun’s Pseudo-Authority.
Arthur dashed forward, Lostvayne flashing through the air as he aimed at Vonun’s chest, and the man met his slash head-on.
The two weapons collided with a deafening crack, and the impact sent shockwaves through the surrounding landscape.
The force of their clash carved deep trenches into the earth, sending chunks of stone and dirt flying in all directions.
’Tsk...I took too long. My body needs to cool down.’
Arthur thought this as he felt his energy circuits begin to grow hot.
The battle with Vonun raged on, but his newly ascended strength was already straining him. He’d gone from Sovereignty to Transcendence, then surged into the Intermediate stage without much pause.
Each advance increased his power well, yet his existence hadn’t acclimated to this intense leap. It was like forcing an engine to race after an upgrade; even the mightiest machine would overheat without a cooldown. It shouldn’t be forgotten that Arthur had been fighting for over 2 hours before achieving Transcendence.
The Inferior-to-Intermediate leap in Transcendence alone was vast—a gulf so immense that it easily eclipsed the total strength of an average Sovereign Realm.
With such a breakthrough, every cell and circuit in Arthur’s body had to adjust to withstand this expanded might.
Now, amidst the clash, he could feel his energy circuits heat up, signalling the inevitable limit before burnout.
Right after that sensation of heat, came a sensation of danger. Vonun thrust his arm lance at Arthur’s midsection, but having sensed it, Arthur ducked low and twisted to the side, his own sword lashing out in a devastating counter.
The slash cut through the air, and with a single stroke, Arthur carved a deep, gaping wound along the length of Vonun’s new arm-lance.
The wood splintered and cracked as if it were made of glass, but Vonun gritted his teeth and pushed forward, refusing to let his weapon break. The lance’s wooden fibres groaned, bending with an unnatural elasticity as Vonun twisted it, attempting to hook it around Arthur’s neck.
Arthur sidestepped to avoid the entangling strike, then pivoted on his heel, swinging his blade down.
The strike was so powerful that the very earth beneath him cracked open, a fissure forming along the ground, stretching out as far as the eye could see. The blade descended with the force of a hundred collapsing mountains, sending a shockwave through the air as it clashed against Vonun’s lance again.
Vonun twisted his lance mid-air, giving it grooves like a screw and then making it spin like a drill as it met Arthur’s slash.
The weapons collided again with a thunderous crash, the shockwave sending another blast of force through the battlefield.
Arthur summoned Celestia into his other hand and attacked with a flurry of rapid strikes, each one slicing through Vonun’s lance and side, leaving nought but a trail of silver light where it moved.
Yet Vonun retaliated, his lance moving with the speed and strength of an avalanche, striking with an intensity that threatened to overwhelm Arthur at every turn.
Each time their weapons met, a violent explosion of dust and debris filled the air.
Arthur swung Celestia and Lostvayne in a cross slash and red blood sprayed in the air. Without a break, he sent cosmic energy down the length of the two blades, releasing it as blasts that knocked Vonun away and sent him tumbling.
Chasing after the tumbling Devil, Arthur swung the two swords with all his might and Vonun raised his lance in response.
The clash of their weapons created a deafening sound—a violent crack that sent a ripple through the air. The ground cracked beneath them, massive chunks of earth breaking free and flying through the air like projectiles from the force of their blows.
Vonun pushed back and thrust his lance, piercing Arthur’s left wrist and causing Celestia to fall from his hand. Then he pulled back and swung the arm lance again, morphing the curved edge into a flat blade.
The arm-lance slammed into Lostvayne, the power of the strike shattering the ground beneath their feet. Arthur’s feet dug into the earth as he held his ground, his muscles straining as he pushed back against the pressure.
Both of them poured energy into their weapons, sending shockwaves so powerful that the trees in the distance were uprooted, crashing down like matchsticks.
Pulling back, Vonun morphed his lance back into a drill and thrust it with all his might. Arthur parried the thrust, but the momentum forced him back. He barely had time to react as Vonun followed with an overhead swing.
The blow grazed Arthur’s shoulder, slicing through his flesh, but before the wound could deepen, Arthur’s left eye glowed.
’Rewind.’
The wound vanished in a moment, the flesh knitting together as if the injury had never been inflicted.
In that short moment Arthur spent to heal, Vonun pressed the attack, forcing Arthur to jump to the side to avoid having his chest pierced, however, the tip of the drill lance grazed his leg, shredding off flesh.
’Stasis!’
Arthur gave a different command, freezing the wound in time and preventing Vonun’s wood law energy from seeping deeper into his body.
’Gravity, Lighten. Time, Accelerate. Null, Erase.’
Three commands to three powers and Arthur kicked off the ground, closing the distance faster than Vonun could pull back his lance and lashing out with a flurry of strikes.
In the split second before his sword landed, he amplified gravity tenfold, resulting in an impact like a meteor crashing to the earth.
His blade whipped through the air, slicing into Vonun’s body—an arm, a shoulder, a leg—each cut searing deeper, more decisive than the last.
Every thrust sent the silver energy of Null surging to the blade’s tip, creating a void-like puncture that left gaping holes where Vonun’s flesh once was.
Arthur reached out, grabbing Vonun’s wooden lance arm with his left hand and manipulating gravity, increasing its weight a hundredfold. Vonun staggered under its crushing mass, the weapon dragging him down, leaving him wide open as Arthur thrust his sword through his arm.
The flesh around the puncture dissolved, leaving not merely a wound but an empty space where his arm once was.
A flicker of horror crossed Vonun’s face as he realized these weren’t mere injuries; Arthur’s strikes were erasing parts of his existence altogether.
Desperation surged through him, and in a burst of energy, he blew Arthur back. But before Arthur could fully regain balance, a thick tendril of wood snaked up from behind, forcing him to sidestep to dodge.
Vonun absorbed the earth’s wood and plant life around him to regenerate the lost mass, but Arthur snapped his fingers and rewound Vonun’s body to his pre-regeneration state.
The Archdevil winced as the pain hit him once more.
’Each strike is severely damaging my soul!’
The soul damage from Arthur’s attacks was eating away at his existence, and with each passing moment, he felt his overall power dropping.
Still, Vonun fought fiercely, knowing he couldn’t let this fight drag on much longer.
He lashed out again with his arm-lance, a series of rapid thrusts meant to overwhelm Arthur’s defences. But Arthur was already moving—his sword cutting through the air in perfect arcs, his speed amplified by his time manipulation.
His blade clashed against Vonun’s weapon with an explosion of force, sending a shower of wood splinters flying in every direction.
Arthur’s silver energy sent cracks through Vonun’s arm-lance, but the Archdevil retaliated with his tail, extending it with his wood manipulation to strike Arthur’s back.
Though he jumped sideways to avoid the impact, the tail whirled with speed, catching Arthur off guard as it lashed across his chest, leaving another deep wound.
|¬Rewind! ¬|
Once more, Arthur’s body healed, the gash vanishing like smoke, but Vonun wasn’t finished. The infernal energy coursing through his body surged again, this time wrapping his tail around Arthur’s leg, trying to crush him in its grip.
The power behind it was immense, and for a moment, Arthur struggled to break free. Vonun lifted him off the ground, slamming him into the earth with a bone-crushing force.
Arthur gritted his teeth, channelling a stream of divinity through his leg to free himself, sending Vonun stumbling backwards with the force.
But the man was quick to recover.
He swung his lance again, aiming for Arthur’s throat, but the boy was already gone. A flash of cosmic energy rippled through the air as Arthur teleported to Vonun’s side, the movement so fast that Vonun didn’t even realize what was happening until it was too late.
Arthur’s sword lashed out, slashing across Vonun’s shoulder and causing his skin to crack and splinter off.
Vonun gritted his teeth and retaliated with a roar. He twisted his body, swinging his lance in a wide arc, creating a tidal wave of energy that swept through the air.
Arthur dodged, but the force of the attack sent shockwaves through the air, knocking trees from their roots and splitting the earth in two.
As Arthur grounded himself, Vonun lunged forward, aiming his lance straight for Arthur’s heart. But Arthur had already seen it coming, so he sprang into the air, sword raised high, and brought it crashing down with full force.
"Continental Split!"
His sword sliced through the air, and destruction energy radiated from Lostvayne as it cut into Vonun’s left arm, severing the limb at the shoulder.
Vonun screamed in pain, but the boy was not finished. As Vonun staggered back, Arthur shot forward, his sword aimed at Vonun’s chest, cosmic energy surging along the blade.
Before he could strike, though, Vonun whipped his tail around, catching Arthur’s legs and slamming him to the ground. The impact rattled through his bones, but instinct kicked in, urging him to roll just as a beam of energy struck the earth where he’d been a moment before.
Arthur forced himself up, only to be met by another beam from Vonun’s arm-lance. It tore through the ground and slammed into his torso, knocking him back and sending him crashing into the earth with a forceful impact.
The beam seared through his clothes and bit into his skin, leaving a fiery trail of agony across his torso.
It punched him backwards with brutal force, his body carving through the earth, burrowing deeper and deeper—over a hundred meters—until he was wedged within the fractured, burning depths of the ground.
Before he could recover, Vonun was upon him, foot covered in wooden spikes descending with the full force of a falling tree, stomping into Arthur’s chest.
