Chapter 671: An Ineffable Family (5) - Shia vs Sylas
Sylas finally stabilized himself in the distance, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth as he shook his head, trying to clear the fog of madness that Shia’s strike had inflicted.
His voice came out strained, laced with confusion and growing irritation.
"What... the hell is this...?" he growled, his double-edged sword trembling in his grip. "My thoughts... stop laughing at me!!!!!"
He charged again, but his movements were slightly off, as if the concept of his own coordination was being toyed with.
HUMMMMMM!!!!!
Sylas activated his power as the God Star of the Infinite Equilibrium, the air around him surged instantly with divinity.
He swung his double-edged sword in a wide arc, attempting to tilt the balance of the battlefield in his favor — forcing Shia’s momentum to falter, her attacks to lose their edge, and the very notion of motion around her to correct themselves against her.
WHOOOOSH!!!!!
The blade left a trail of silver light that tried to rewrite the flow of combat, seeking to restore "fairness" by weakening her overwhelming advantage.
But his mind was still too bungled.
The strike came out wild and unfocused, the corrective force scattering in chaotic bursts rather than a clean tilt.
The sword missed Shia by a wide margin, the silver light exploding harmlessly into the void and only managing to slightly slow a few nearby horrors.
Shia laughed — a wild, delighted cackle that echoed across the battlefield as she spun mid-air, her black eyes gleaming with pure battle lust.
"Oh wow..." she taunted, her voice dripping with mockery. "You’re.... truly pathetic."
Shia dashed forward in a blur, her arm already moving back as she closed the distance with terrifying speed.
BOOOOOOM!!!!!
A spinning back elbow caught Sylas across the jaw with devastating force, the impact sending a shockwave rippling through the air.
His head snapped sideways yet again, with blood spraying from his mouth as his body tumbled violently through the void.
Before he could even begin to stabilize, Shia was already above him, driving her knee down into his spine with brutal precision.
In this moment, Sylas tried to balance himself.... But it seemed as if the more power he exerted in trying to clear his mind, the more his mind was fracturing.
As Shia’s madness had sunk deep into his thoughts — every time he tried to focus, he heard laughter. Not just hers. His own. Echoing. Mocking.
’Why am I even fighting?’
’Just.... give up.’
’She’s too strong.’
’You’re pathetic.’
He shook his head hard, desperate to shake off the invasive thoughts, but Shia was already on him again.
Without hesitation, she seized the back of his head and smashed his face into a passing Existence warrior — a golden-armored Sentinel locked in combat with horrors.
The warrior’s helmet buckled instantly under the blow, his mind splintering on impact, eyes rolling back in a vacant stare.
But that wasn’t all — Shia’s madness poured into him through the brutal collision.
"HAHAHA!!!!!"
A crazed, unrestrained laugh tore from his lips as blood poured from his nose and mouth.
Clutching the remains of his shattered weapon, he spun on his own allies in a frenzied rage.
Meanwhile, Shia continued cutting down anyone in her path without hesitation.
In the midst of her destruction... Sylas managed to break free and attempted a counterattack, but his sword swings were still wild and desperate.
Even distracted, Shia slipped between them with ease, her black eyes alight with pure battle lust.
"Is this really the best the so-called Constellation of Infinite Equilibrium can do?" she taunted, her voice dripping with mocking delight.
BANGGGGGG!!!!
She drove a brutal uppercut into his stomach, lifting him off his "feet" before spinning into a vicious roundhouse kick that sent him crashing into another group of horrors.
They swarmed him immediately, but Shia didn’t even give them the chance to attack.
HUMMMMM!!!!!!
With a casual flick of her wrist, their minds snapped.
The horrors began tearing into each other with frenzied, mindless aggression, shrieking and ripping at their own kind as Shia’s madness spread through them like a virus.
Sylas forced himself back into the air, coughing up blood.
His thoughts were a storm now — rage, fear, confusion, and that constant, maddening laughter that kept echoing in the back of his skull.
He tried to focus his power again, tried to impose balance on the battlefield, but every attempt crumbled before it could take form.
And before he knew it... Shia was already coming for him again.
She chased him across the void like a wolf hunting wounded prey, laughing wildly as she closed the distance. Every time Sylas tried to create distance or stabilize, she was there — striking, taunting, breaking him down piece by piece.
"All that power.... you should have just stayed in Pantheos!"
Between the relentless explosions, the chaos in his own head, and Shia’s nonstop taunting, Sylas’s breath came in short, uneven gasps.
His vision blurred, the world tilting and shifting around him.
The voices in his mind were growing sharper, crueler, pressing in on him from every angle.
Every heartbeat seemed to drag him further from reality, his hold on the present slipping away bit by bit. And then, just for a fleeting, chilling instant, the noise vanished.
In that strange, hollow silence, one crystal-clear thought sliced through the madness like steel.
’This isn’t..... balance.’
And in that moment.... his double-edged sword slipped from his fingers.
It fell slowly, tumbling end over end through the void as Sylas’s hands went limp at his sides. His eyes, once sharp with determination, were now wide and unfocused.
Something inside him had finally given way—or maybe it was more accurate to say that something within him had suddenly come into sharp focus.
There was no roar, no wild rush forward.
No grand display of fury or force.
He simply... snapped.
Snap!
The sound was small — almost insignificant — like the quiet breaking of a single dry twig in a silent forest.
But in that moment, everything in the void froze.
