Free Web NovelChapter 18: Clash Between EX-Ranks
The Eternal Ruin groaned like a dying beast.
Ancient black walls cracked under the pressure spreading through the underground battlefield. Stone fragments kept falling from above, and dust rolled across the chamber in thick waves. The surviving Revenants had already retreated far from the center, but even that distance did not feel safe anymore.
This was no longer a normal battle.
It had become a clash between beings capable of destroying the ruin around them.
Velmira stood in the middle of the destruction.
Blood dripped from the corner of her lips and ran across the silver armor near her chin before falling to the broken floor. Her ash-gray hair moved violently from the chaotic Spirit currents filling the chamber, but her crimson eyes remained steady.
Then she removed her restraint.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
The underground world shook.
A massive amount of Spirit Energy erupted from Velmira’s body, silver-white and dense enough to swallow the battlefield instantly. The released energy spread outward in violent waves, shattering pillars, splitting the floor, and bending the air beneath its pressure.
Several Revenants coughed blood immediately.
One dropped to his knees.
Another stared with widened eyes as his own Spirit trembled under the difference in level. They had served under Velmira for years, but many of them had never seen her release her power without limitation.
This was the weight of an Ex-Rank existence.
The grotesque black monster tilted its head slowly.
Its spiraling mouth widened slightly, almost like it was amused. Then darkness erupted from its distorted body. Pitch-black Spirit Energy exploded outward like living corruption, twisting through the chamber and distorting even the crimson ruin lights nearby.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
The two pressures collided.
The Eternal Ruin screamed.
The air ruptured repeatedly between them, producing sharp sounds that made the surviving Revenants flinch despite their ranks. Cracks spread endlessly across the chamber, and nearby stone structures collapsed from pressure alone.
Mark jumped backward several meters.
His Instinct had kicked in.
The moment Velmira raised Marvilas behind her body at a sharp angle, his pupils narrowed. He recognized the stance immediately. It was not a warning and not a display of power.
It was execution.
Spirit Energy surged toward Marvilas.
Silver-white energy coated the thin white blade before compressing tighter and tighter around it. The energy became denser with every breath, forming a shape that perfectly followed the sword’s edge. The compression was so extreme that the nearby space began to distort.
The black monster’s posture changed slightly.
Danger.
Even its instincts recognized that.
Velmira spoke.
"Reverse Calamity—"
BOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
The battlefield collapsed inward.
The pressure around Marvilas intensified further as Spirit compressed around the blade. The ground beneath Velmira’s feet cracked apart, and the air near the sword warped unnaturally.
Then she completed the technique.
"—Force Eruption."
She slashed.
No one saw the movement, the Revenants, Mark - No one.
Not even the black monster in a normal sense.
The slash exceeded perception.
But the grotesque creature had already moved.
Its ability activated at that instant.
’Instant Predictions.’
Countless futures flooded into its consciousness in less than a second. Attacks, reactions, evasions, counters, failures, and deaths appeared all at once. Millions of possible outcomes were compared immediately.
And in almost every future, it died.
So it moved before the slash fully emerged.
Then the attack erupted.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
A gigantic white crescent exploded upward through the underground world. The terrifying part was not only the slash itself. The force behind it dragged the surrounding space along its path, crushing and erasing everything caught inside.
Walls disappeared; Pillars vanished, Entire sections of the ruin ceased to exist.
Not shattered, not collapsed.
Erased.
The slash carved upward through the underground darkness until it vanished far beyond the battlefield. The surviving Revenants stared silently at the impossible destruction, their faces pale and covered in cold sweat.
But that had not been the true attack.
Velmira had moved at the same time.
The instant she unleashed the slash, she adjusted her body slightly. The movement was small enough that most people would never notice it during such destruction, but that single adjustment changed the result.
Then she threw Marvilas.
Not like a spear.
She threw it Flat.
At almost the same angle as the slash, but slightly displaced from its path.
The sword spun silently through the air.
Then the outward force generated by Reverse Calamity struck it from behind.
And accelerated it.
The black monster appeared behind the erased section of the ruin wall, exactly where its prediction had marked safety. Its grotesque mouth widened into a grin, believing it had escaped the slash. freeweɓnovel.cѳm
Then Marvilas arrived beside it.
The sword twisted vertically from an impossible angle and reached the creature’s side faster than thought. For the first time since the battle began, shock appeared in the monster’s hollow eyes.
Shhhkkk.
Its arm separated instantly.
Dark blood burst across the battlefield as the severed limb crashed onto the broken floor below. The Revenants widened their eyes in disbelief, while Mark’s expression hardened sharply as he understood what Velmira had done.
She had predicted its prediction.
She didn’t do it with any ability, she had concluded the moment it had evaded her slash, It was unavoidable after all. Even though the monster was fast, it shouldn’t have been able to avoid that slash...unless...unless it had an Ability that let it see or predict future.
The black monster staggered back while staring at its missing arm. Then its spiraling mouth slowly widened again.
In excitement.
"You... adapted..."
Its hoarse mechanical voice echoed through the collapsing chamber.
Marvilas curved through the air and returned to Velmira’s waiting hand. She caught it calmly with a metallic clang, but her expression remained cold and focused.
She had already understood the main problem.
This creature learned too quickly and its ability was... ridiculous.
Then it moved again.
This time, even Mark lost sight of it completely.
BOOOOOOM.
A black blur crossed the battlefield and appeared beside Velmira. Its elongated claws were already descending toward her throat before the air around it fully ruptured from its speed.
Velmira blocked instantly.
The collision detonated the battlefield.
Shockwaves spread outward, breaking nearby walls and launching huge chunks of stone through the chamber. Several Revenants stumbled despite being far from the center.
The monster attacked without pause.
Claws tore through the air. Grotesque spikes emerged from impossible angles across its body. Every movement carried enough force to kill an ordinary S-Rank instantly, but Velmira answered each strike with terrifying precision.
Marvilas moved through the darkness in white arcs.
Compressed bursts of Spirit propelled her attacks, giving every slash sudden acceleration. Each collision produced another shockwave, carving more destruction into the already collapsing underground ruin.
BOOM.
CRAAASH.
Shhhkkk.
BOOOOOOM.
The chamber continued breaking around them.
The surviving Revenants retreated farther. At this point, simply standing too close could kill them. The battle had become too fast to assist and too dangerous to interrupt.
Then the black monster twisted unnaturally mid-clash.
Velmira sensed danger.
But it was already too late.
A grotesque spike erupted from the creature’s shoulder.
Shhhkkk.
Velmira’s left arm separated instantly.
Blood exploded across the battlefield.
Several Revenants widened their eyes.
One shouted without thinking.
"Commander!"
Velmira leaped backward while clutching the bleeding shoulder. Her expression changed, but not because of pain. Black veins spread from the wound, and corrupted Spirit crawled beneath her skin like poison.
Her regeneration had stopped.
The black monster tilted its head.
Its spiraling mouth widened.
"You... cannot... heal..."
Blood continued dripping from Velmira’s severed shoulder.
Yet she smiled faintly.
"Hah..."
A quiet exhausted laugh left her lips.
Then she took out a bracelet.
It’s colour was pure white.
Ancient runes glowed across its surface, and heavy Spirit pressure pulsed from within it. The moment the black monster sensed the relic, its body stiffened.
Death.
Its instincts recognized the danger immediately.
Velmira pressed the bracelet against Marvilas.
Then spoke softly.
"...Marvilas—Semekrus."
The world turned white.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
Blinding light swallowed the battlefield as violent Spirit waves erupted through the underground ruin. The pressure shattered enormous sections of the chamber, and fragments of black stone vaporized before they could fall.
The bracelet dissolved into particles of white light.
Those particles merged directly into Marvilas.
The sword trembled.
Then it transformed.
The elegant blade stretched longer. Ancient white markings spread across its surface like rivers of light. The guard expanded symmetrically, and the weapon evolved into something impossibly refined.
Then a scabbard formed around it.
Pure white, so perfectly crafted that it felt complete.
If Marvilas had been beautiful before, this form no longer felt like a weapon forged by human hands. It felt ancient, absolute, and older than kingdoms.
Velmira gripped the transformed sword with her remaining hand.
Her breathing was heavy. Blood still dripped from her shoulder. But her crimson eyes remained unwavering.
The black monster stared at the weapon.
Then it activated Instant Predictions again.
Countless futures exploded through its consciousness.
Millions.
Billions.
Trillions.
Different attacks. Different escapes. Different reactions. Different futures.
Yet in every single one—
It died.
Its grotesque grin slowly disappeared.
Then, for the first time, the creature laughed hollowly.
"You... will meet..."
Its mechanical voice trembled unnaturally.
"...Him..."
Velmira slowly drew the transformed blade from its white scabbard.
Shhhhng.
The moment the sword emerged, the surrounding space distorted violently. Strangely, no Spirit Energy coated the blade. None at all, the weapon appeared blank.
Empty.
But reality bent around it.
The black monster continued speaking.
"The wielder... of the Primordial Co—"
Velmira moved.
Painfully slowly.
Even an ordinary child could have followed the movement of her sword.
But the monster understood immediately.
This attack could not be stopped.
Velmira’s exhausted voice echoed through the collapsing ruin.
"...Matter Ender—"
The sword descended.
"...Marking Fold."
The slash unleashed silently.
An invisible crescent spread horizontally through the Eternal Ruin while space folded around its path. Reality distorted beneath the attack’s existence, and the battlefield bent as if the world itself had been marked for separation.
The slash moved slowly.
Inevitably.
The grotesque creature smiled hollowly.
Then—
Shhhhhkkk.
Its body separated cleanly in half.
Silence descended.
The invisible crescent continued traveling through the underground world before vanishing into the darkness.
Then the Eternal Ruin erupted.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
Entire sections of the underground structure collapsed at once. Cracks spread through the ancient ruin. Walls vanished. The ground split apart. Pillars fell into the darkness below.
Amid the destruction, Velmira remained standing.
Panting and Bleeding continuously.
One arm missing.
But - Victorious.
