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Chapter 146: An Odd Paradox V
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Yup, as Ian noted, this Aquaman is very different, seeming quite savage, but still a bit emotional because he started the battle right there and then, showing why he can contend against Diana, barely so.
And as predicted, the only reason he could put up a fight against her was the Trident Of Neptune, one of the strongest artifacts on earth.
With a swing of his Trident, the ocean rose to the sky. Not just that, Aquaman enveloped himself in a massive sphere of nothing but water, hovering in its center. To reach them, one would have to enter where he shines most, water.
All while numerous Tsunamis started to form around them, seeking to devour them whole. Diana however wasn't worried at all. Instead, she was warry, not of Aquaman but of Ian who had an odd smile on his face.
"Exquisite. Lovely. Fascinating. Wonderful! God, I love my life." Ian let out a small laugh before vanishing, deciding to finish things quickly.
"I've wasted enough time, so excuse my rudeness." Ian's voice reverberated through the area as he emerged right next to Aquaman, his staff already seeking destruction.
However, as expected, it wasn't easy to take down the lord of the ocean as instantly, Ian felt the water around him become heavy, so heavy in fact it brought down his speed a few notches.
Aquaman was nowhere near his speed, but he made up for that with his Trident. In fact, Ian speculated it to be acting on its own, protecting its master because Aquaman seemed to barely react to his movement.
With near perfect coordination, Aquaman moved away with the water, squeezing his Trident so hard his hands bled. He barely evaded Ian's blow, but still chose to deliver one of his own, knowing that Ian might just be a bit more dangerous than he first assumed.
In fact, Ian even used his Divinity to make sure Aquaman's Trident was hitting a deadly spot, a sure instant kill by redirecting its trajectory slightly.
That was Aquaman's mistake. Well, it wasn't a mistake per se because how could anyone ever assume water would fail the lord of the oceans himself? He never imagined his powers to fail him even in his worst dreams.
Indeed, Ian felt the heaviness of water suddenly disappear. He could even perceive the body of water surrounding him and Aquaman falling down. Even the Tsunamis lost their guiding forces.
Only a moment passed as just as Aquaman's eyes started to widen at his missing connection with the oceans, Ian moved faster than he could perceive, driving his staff through the man.
"Shush, it'll be alright. This didn't happen, so everything will be alright." Ian gently spoke, comforting the man while sucking his life force.
"Ho..w?" That was the last thing Aquaman spoke before Ian finished the job with a swing, tearing him apart.
"How huh? I absolutely have no idea. Do you?" As usual, Ian had no idea what happened that saved his life, so he turned his attention to the Trident in his hand, the one he had just taken from Aquaman.
He felt it vibrating, releasing such an incredible force it threatened to tear him apart to the point he had to focus on pumping all of his Death force into the Rose of magic, switching from Divinity.
Every speck of his magic was solely focused on resisting the force of the Trident as it sought freedom from his terror.
'A bit annoying. It could take hours to fully envelop in my Death force.' Ian saw something like this coming. The Trident after all chooses its master either by fate or on its own accord, and it definitely didn't want him.
He wanted to send it to the black Rose dimension to deal with it later, but something else he predicted was that it will take quite a while to do so.
You see, everything has a resistance, some more than others. Something, he can envelop in his Death force in a matter of a minute to teleport to his dimension.
Other things would take hours, days even depending on their power and resistance, and well, the Trident was quite the powerful artifact, and it was resisting to the point it seemed desperate to get away from him.
Ian spread his wings, knowing he could no longer use magic to move about. Speaking of things that are resisting his control, Lucifer's wings were one of them.
So much time has passed since he acquired them, and he rarely stops feeding them his Death force, yet they are still not under his full control.
He can certainly use them to fly at some unimaginable speed, even surpassing his speed force if pushed too much, but he knows it's nowhere near their full power.
He knows Lucifer is broken, so how could they be so weak? To dare to move at only a few thousand times the speed of sound, utterly pathetic.
But it will happen, eventually, everything will be given to him because of how much he gives away. Ian is extremely proud of how charitable he is, so it's within expectation for the world to give back.
"Wanna have dinner while I get this bad boy under control?" Ian asked the cautious Diana.
"I see, you're an angel, quite the ruthless angel. Makes sense, gods are cruel, so why wouldn't angels be the same?" Diana shook her head with a bit of exasperation, disbelief even. Her arch-nemesis has died just like that.
Moreover, she could see now that Ian wasn't using his full arsenal against her, likely meaning he never wanted to hurt her, "I have no idea how, but him almost successfully killing you led to losing his connection with the ocean?"
Diana couldn't help but rub her temple, facing the oddest circumstances ever, "I even saw it clearly, the butterflies swimming about, guiding his Trident to cleanly kill you... I'm kind of speechless."
"Just kind of?"
She ignored him and continued with her speculation, "Let me guess, your divinity likely has something to do with redirection, redirecting attacks either away or to you.
It seemed restricted though, only able to redirect one thing at a time, and the angle of redirection seems limited as well.
You were truly trying not to kill me before, using your divinity to avoid your death, thus my death somehow... This is utterly ridiculous."
"Ah, not really? If you think about how kind I am to try and fix the entirety of time myself, then it's no longer strange. The universe loves me, as do I... Sometimes."
"No."
"No what?" Ian asked, confused.
"No dinner. I'm afraid of losing my sanity talking to you, so if you can please just leave and never come back." Diana seemed serious, her eyes never leaving his, a bit apprehensive of him going back to her home.
However, much to her relief, Ian just shrugged and turned around, preparing to fly away.
"Wait... You have yet to tell me. Why did you kiss me? None of this had to happen if you didn't." Despite the circumstances going largely in her favor, Diana was still curious.
"Kiss? Ah, right, I did do that... Perhaps because you're lovely?" Ian seemed to be in a hurry because he just spurted some nonsense before vanishing into the horizon.
"Liar and you didn't want dinner in the first place," Diana grumbled softly to herself before eyeing the patch of skin sticking to bones floating in the ocean, Aquaman's body.
It was unfortunate she didn't get to do it herself, but her next action at least brought some satisfaction to her, Her lasso found itself around the body, circling it numerous times before she tightened the Lasso with all of her strength.
The result was the body becoming pieces of flesh and bones, painting the ocean red. It started to rain, thunder, lightning, and nothing but enormous waves. The oceans seemingly wailing in distress of his passing.
"I really don't know what just happened..." Diana let out a sigh before hastily going back to her home just in case things get worse.
"I really don't know what just happened..." Ian let out a sigh, kind of annoyed by how little control he has over his Anti-Death powers.
And he didn't have much time to contemplate things because the world was dying at an accelerated rate, much faster than Lucifer anticipated, quite odd, isn't it?