Chapter 246
The clashing forces existed in a different dimension.
For that reason, every living creature in the surrounding kilometers lost sight and sound. Two powers, the Serpent of Apocalypse and Four Stars in Vast Heavens, collided in a realm mortals could not perceive, and only the aftershocks spilled downward from a higher plane into the lower.
Ordinarily, the Serpent would have overpowered the clash in a single overwhelming sweep, but several factors balanced the scales.
First: the power Morse summoned was only a fragment of Drom Dubh—no more than scraps compared to its true body.
Second: the world’s own defensive mechanisms lent strength to Four Stars in Vast Heavens, directly opposing the incursion of an exodimensional force.
The light of Divine Judgment also burned fiercely within Leon, urging him onward to destroy the abomination.
Even with all this help, the best I can manage is being equal to it...?
Leon felt the crushing pressure travel through his hands and tear up his organs. He forced down the blood rising in his throat, as he didn’t even have the luxury of spitting it out.
He wasn’t a transcendent being, so like everyone else, he lost all five senses. Only because he was fused with the Four Stars in Vast Heavens, he alone could still grasp its flow.
The piece of the tetrahedron that the Serpent had bitten off created a massive crater on the surface of the earth. The drops of its blood, shed from the puncture wound from Leon’s attack, corroded the land, revealing the mantle of the planet. It was an utter catastrophe.
—Its existence itself is a manifestation of turning something that exists into nothingness. Perhaps, Drom Dubh’s actual body is close to a black hole the size of a universe.
El-Cid muttered a plausible explanation, but Leon couldn’t afford to pay attention to him. Losing even the slightest amount of focus would mean the end of it all. His mentality, sharpened to the absolute maximum, kept the tip of Four Stars in Vast Heavens effective.
However, a sound, so unfairly ominous, rang through the air. Its source wasn’t a physical phenomenon; Leon had merely interpreted the Four Stars in Vast Heavens losing its stability as an auditory signal.
No! Not yet! I have to last at least five more minutes...
The Serpent of Apocalypse and Four Stars in Vast Heavens were still in a standoff. Light sheared away darkness, and darkness devoured light. It was closer to mutual annihilation than cancellation. If two forces were equal in rank, then the next deciding factor was their amount.
Leon barely kept the scales from tipping, but the forced elevation of rank accelerated the consumption and increased the strain. At this rate, the balance would collapse in fifteen seconds. The Serpent would swallow the Four Stars in Vast Heavens, erase Leon, and wipe out the rest of his companions.
I can’t let that happen, he refused to accept that outcome.
Someone once said that a person’s true potential awakens when they face a crisis. Someone else said that only at the boundary of life and death can one glimpse the far shore.
Most people died before seeing such a moment. But Leon grasped a single thin thread—so faint he didn’t even know he held it.
—Good. Focus on that sensation.
In his trance-like state, only two things remained in Leon’s awareness: the sensation of the sword’s hilt threatening to tear his hands apart, and a voice—someone’s voice—echoing inside his mind.
The Grand Chariot had seven secret techniques. He’d memorized all the stances and applications, but up to now, he had only properly used four.
—Move your wrist and elbow as though you’ve become one with the blade. Break the boundary between body and Aura. If you can’t collapse that distinction, you’ll never reach the Circle. Once drawn, a circle no longer has a beginning or end. Your blade’s flow must be the same. It’s perfectly continuous.
Not a shred of Aura could be wasted. A rotation physically impossible, amplified with centrifugal force—this was the sixth form of Grand Chariot: Mizar.
“Grand Chariot.”
The tip of the sword traced a smooth circle. The apex of the Four Stars in Vast Heavens began to rotate, each revolution increasing its speed and strength.
As the shape that had been collapsing under the Serpent’s pressure solidified, radiant light burst forth, forcing the darkness to retreat several meters. That was the beginning.
“Chained Secret Technique, Five Star Chariot.”
The chained technique that surpassed the Four Stars in Vast Heavens finally revealed its true power. The ominous sound echoed again inside Leon’s skull, but this time, it didn’t feel like doom. If anything, it sounded like a victory cry.
Morse must have heard it too, because he shrieked, —No... no! Impossible! That pathetic goddess of this pathetic world—her servant cannot surpass the power of Drom Dubh!
Reality was always cruel. It never waited for someone to accept the truth, nor did it wait for them to brace themselves.
Morse was no exception. At some point, the rotation had accelerated to an absurd extreme—the tip of the light now appearing like a cylinder as it pierced the darkness. The Serpent’s snarling head flew apart along with its gaping jaws.
It had the form of a serpent, but it wasn’t truly alive, meaning that it couldn’t exactly “die.”
Bursting out of the crumbling dark, Leon roared, “MOOOOORSE!”
The Serpent had only ever been borrowed power, merely a shard of Drom Dubh’s authority. Once negated, it was gone for good.
With his trump card rendered powerless, Morse was defenseless. The cost of summoning had been enormous. His body, once over ten meters tall, had shrunk to barely three. Only around a thousand souls remained. One direct hit would finish him.
He spewed, —It cannot end here! I will not be stopped by ignorant vermin who cannot fathom my suffering, my despair!
Hundreds of tentacles, chitinous plates of unknown material, and dozens of translucent barriers layered themselves around him in a desperate, frantic defense.
Seeing that only fueled Leon’s fury.
“You piece of shit! You value your own life so much, yet how many lives have you taken?”
As if agreeing with his rage, the Five Star Chariot delivered its final acceleration, smashing into the wall of exolaw protecting Morse.
With cracks and crackles, the defense that would have withstood the combined attack of eight Masters for minutes shattered like thin ice the moment it met the technique.
It was Leon’s final strike. He plunged through the forest of disgusting tentacles and chitin. Past them, he saw Morse’s pallid face. He summoned the last remaining fragment of strength in his body and thrust the Holy Sword.
He had exhausted everything—the Light of Divine Judgment, Corona’s amplification—everything. All he had left was the inertia from charging with the Five Star Chariot.
Like an arrow released, Leon fell from the sky, and his sword—the Holy Sword, El-Cid, the nemesis of exolaw and the blade symbolizing the order of the world itself—pierced Morse’s heart, driving straight out through his back.
Morse let out a scream no longer recognizable as human as he stumbled backward, scrambling away from the Holy Sword that had pierced straight through him. But it was already too late.
His body began to collapse from the core where the sword had run him through. The ectoplasm making up his form melted and hardened in turns, shrinking rapidly. Freed souls drifted upward, scattering faint light. Limbs gone, body splayed on the ground, Morse glared up at Leon and cursed him.
—My power... my strength... my authority... disappearing! You—filth like you—vermin who’ve never even questioned the worth of your miserable life...!
“I told you,” Leon said.
He no longer had the strength to stay on his feet. He dropped heavily where he stood, looking down on Morse just as Morse once had looked down on him—with not a shred of mercy, only contempt. He sneered at a sinner destined for the deepest hell.
“That I’d shred you to pieces.”
He watched until the very end. He didn’t even have the strength to raise the sword, much less swing it, but he would confirm Morse’s death with his own eyes. Leon’s breath was ragged as he glared down at the collapsing villain.
El-Cid, however, seemed to notice something.
—Eh...?
What’s wrong? Leon asked silently.
Then, a flickering spatial rupture tore open on the ground between Leon and Morse. Perhaps it was the leftover turbulence from the clash between the Serpent of Apocalypse and the Five Star Chariot. Perhaps the land and air, corrupted by Drom Dubh’s power, had weakened the dimensional barrier.
It wasn’t a major problem. Leave it alone, and the world’s dimensional stability would close it within minutes. But the timing... was catastrophic.
El-Cid shouted, —How the hell are you this unlucky?
Morse, on the other hand, was ecstatic.
—H-haha... hahahahaha! At last, fate smiles upon me!
He immediately began crawling toward the rift. There was no other choice. Staying put meant death.
“You filthy bastard, crawling away even at the end...!”
Leon tried to lift his sword to stop him, but he had nothing left. His muscles screamed, refusing to obey. The spatial rift appearing exactly between them was the worst possible outcome. Even if he threw the Holy Sword, it would hit the rift and never reach Morse.
Just as Leon was beginning to wonder if he was really going to let the monster escape after all this, a familiar voice came.
“Hero Leon!”
Leon turned instinctively toward the voice and then caught something thrown by Elahan. It was the amulet Grania had given him.
Did I drop it when I was fighting the Death King?
In the endless battles, its cord must have snapped, and Leon had forgotten it entirely. It was an artifact that had already used two spells, leaving only the third, eighth-tier spell.
“What a timing...”
Was it really a coincidence that the amulet—just barely light enough for Leon to throw even now—returned at this exact moment?
There was a thing called “cause and effect.” Justice was bound to take place in the end. Even in an age where few believed in karma anymore, righteousness still existed to strike down evil.
Feeling the weight of the amulet in his palm, Leon raised his arm. And he cast it.
“Arcane Burst.”
He spoke the activation for the third spell and hurled the amulet toward Morse, who was nearly at the threshold of the rift.
Grania had said that although its range was small, it could kill anyone. The amulet vibrated once at the center of the spatial rupture. Then, space collapsed inward around the amulet.
From the eighth tier onward, magic stepped into the bounds of the transcendent. It was still one level below dimensional phenomena, but it could still interfere with space.
The rift forcibly closed and began sucking everything in. Morse, who had been crawling like a worm, was yanked into the air.
—W-what!? How can a Hero of the Holy Sword use eighth-tier magic!?
Leon watched Morse thrash hideously and muttered, “You still don’t get it. That artifact belonged to Master Grania—the man whose disciple you corrupted and turned against him.”
—W-what?!
“And another thing—you’ve misunderstood from the start. Your death isn’t a misfortune. It isn’t unfair. You’re dying under the weight of your own sins. Don’t blame anyone. Blame yourself.”
Morse could not even respond. Because when he opened his twisted mouth to spit a final curse, Arcane Burst activated.
Space within several meters contracted, then violently expanded. Morse’s remains burst apart into fragments. Everything that had been sucked in suffered the same fate.
Ectoplasm was a materialized soul. When it shattered alongside his form, his soul too was annihilated, erased beyond reincarnation, leaving not even dust.
For someone who had enthroned the Mad Emperor and drenched the Clyde Continent in blood, it was a surprisingly anticlimactic end.
“Is it... over...?”
Leon waited several more minutes, but the scattered remains didn’t move. The largest fragment was no bigger than a palm, and soon, even that lost form and faded into nothingness.
To exist between matter and non-matter required an anchor, which was the role of the Death King. With Morse—the core—erased, nothing remained.
“Ugh.”
Even after nearly ten minutes of resting, Leon’s knees nearly buckled when he tried to stand. It had been that brutal a fight.
Pulling off a chain of five techniques of Grand Chariot was a major achievement, but recovering from it would take time. Barely managing to straighten his body, Leon looked toward his companions.
For some reason, they were all staring in the same direction. Leon instinctively followed their gaze.
“Huh...?”
His eyes went wide at something he wasn’t expecting to see.
