"Arthur!" Li's voice boomed like a thunderclap as the space warp unraveled, dropping me unceremoniously onto solid ground. I stumbled to my feet, my body screaming in protest. The lingering distortion of Alyssara's power still clung to me like a vice, oppressive and suffocating.
I clenched my fists, my teeth grinding together. The bitter taste of inadequacy filled my mouth.
Too weak.
The words echoed in my mind, a cruel mantra that refused to relent. I was called the greatest talent of my generation—a title that felt more like a noose than a crown. But that was all I was: potential. Untapped, unrealized, unworthy. Standing amidst the chaos of titans clashing, my so-called brilliance amounted to nothing.
Even now, as the world fractured under the weight of Radiant-rankers colliding, I could do nothing but retreat. A mid Immortal-ranker could defeat me without doubt even if I gave everything I had. Alyssara Velcroix? She was a being far beyond comprehension. Her power didn't just dwarf mine—it swallowed it whole, leaving no trace of defiance.
Li's hand gripped my arm firmly, pulling me from my spiral of thoughts. His brow was furrowed in concentration, his gaze sweeping the battlefield as his astral energy flared to life. The protective cocoon of his power shimmered around us, a bastion against the carnage erupting all around.
"Stay with me," he ordered, his voice low but commanding. Despite the tension in his tone, there was an unshakable steadiness to it—a lifeline in the storm. I nodded mutely, forcing my legs to move as he led me away.
And then, the air screamed.
A concussive wave of energy rippled toward us, a feral, chaotic force unleashed without care for those caught in its wake. Alyssara's threads danced within it like crimson serpents, their hunger palpable.
Li's expression hardened. With a sharp thrust of his palm, his astral energy surged outward in a protective dome, its radiance unwavering against the onslaught.
BOOM!
The impact hit like a tidal wave crashing against a fortress. The ground beneath us quaked, splitting and groaning under the pressure, but Li's shield held. The astral energy didn't waver, absorbing and dissipating the chaos with the unyielding resolve of its wielder.
"We can't do anything about this," he muttered, his voice taut with frustration. His gaze flickered back to me, the weight of his decision clear in his eyes. "Let's go, Arthur."
Every fiber of my being rebelled at those words. Run? Again? But I knew he was right. My presence here wasn't just useless—it was a liability. The pride I clung to, the fire that drove me forward, meant nothing in the face of absolute power.
And yet, as Li turned, leading us away from the battlefield, I couldn't stop my hands from trembling. Was it fear? Frustration? Or something deeper—an ache born of the widening chasm between who I was and who I needed to be?
In the distance, the clash of titans raged on, their power reshaping the very air we breathed. I glanced back once, catching a glimpse of Alyssara's threads twisting through space, and the shimmering frost of Selene Kagu's glaive carving arcs of frozen destruction.
I looked away, swallowing the lump in my throat as we retreated.
The crimson threads came without warning, slicing through the air like death's own whip. Li's expression darkened, his eyes narrowing in urgency as his sword snapped into position. At its tip, plum blossoms bloomed, vibrant with the infused power of his Gift and lightning astral energy.
The blossoms flared as they met Alyssara's threads head-on, their petals crackling with power. For a moment, it seemed as though they might hold. But then came the tearing sound—the unmistakable scream of something beautiful being unraveled. The threads shredded the blossoms with an ease that mocked their brilliance, surging forward unrelenting.
I moved instinctively, my own sword already in hand. Hollow Eclipse flickered to life, its twin layers of astral energy glinting with the hungry edges of dark magic. I swung, pouring every ounce of power I could summon into the strike.
And yet, it was useless.
The thread met my blade and barely wavered. My strike wasn't at full strength—caught off guard, unprepared—but even at my best, I doubted it would have done more than slow its advance. My sword rebounded violently, the force of the collision nearly tearing my arms from their sockets. Pain shot through me, bright and sharp, as if every tendon and muscle in my body had been forcibly rethreaded.
Then the thread lashed out, faster than thought, and struck me.
The impact was cataclysmic. My vision blurred into a smeared canvas of light and shadow as my body was launched like a ragdoll. My mind registered the sensation of flight—the sickening weightlessness before gravity claimed me once more.
Crash.
The ground greeted me like an unkind lover, unyielding and unforgiving. My body screamed in protest as I skidded to a stop, pain erupting in waves that swallowed thought. Lucent Harmony surged through me, a desperate, instinctual reaction that patched together what it could. Without it, I wasn't sure I would've survived the fall.
But even with its aid, the damage was brutal. My bones felt like shards of glass held together by willpower alone. My muscles, my nerves—every fiber of my being—had been ravaged. And this… this was from one thread. Just one, casually flung in my direction by Alyssara while she toyed with Li from in between her fight against the Radiant-rankers.
The sheer helplessness of it was suffocating.
"You're at the bottom of the mountain," Luna's voice rang in my mind, steady but heavy with meaning. She appeared beside me, her five-year-old form shimmering into existence, violet hair cascading like liquid starlight. Her galaxy-like eyes brimmed with worry as she knelt beside me, her hands glowing with healing magic.
I forced my eyes to stay open, though they fought to close. Every breath was a labor, every blink a war. "Thank you," I managed to whisper, my voice as fractured as my body.
"It was close," she replied softly, her hands moving over me with a gentle precision. "If I hadn't softened the fall with mana…"
She didn't finish the sentence, but I didn't need her to. The weight of her words settled over me, heavier than the pain. I owed my life to her quick thinking.
The mountain loomed above me—immense, unscalable, and merciless. And here I was, broken at its base, staring up at the impossible climb ahead.
"How bad is the damage?" I rasped, my voice brittle as glass.
Luna knelt beside me, her hands moving with a steady precision as soft waves of healing mana radiated from her fingertips. Her violet hair shimmered like liquid starlight under the muted glow of the astral moon above. "Thankfully, you activated Lucent Harmony, and I'm here now," she said, her voice measured, though tinged with concern. "However, your body's too broken to cycle mana properly. You haven't completed the second body metamorphosis yet so you can't heal on your own. I'll need to stitch everything together… but you'll be fine, Arthur."
Fine. The word echoed hollowly in my mind. I would survive, yes. Not because of my strength or will, but because she allowed it. Alyssara Velcroix, with her playful malice and impossible power, had chosen to let me live. That thread—casually flung, almost an afterthought—could have killed me a hundred times over. It could've struck harder, severing Lucent Harmony's activation. Or crushed me outright, leaving nothing for Luna to heal.
It didn't. Not because I escaped it, but because she didn't want me dead.
"Goddammit," I muttered, the weight of it breaking something inside me. Tears, hot and unbidden, spilled down my face. I hated it—hated myself for the weakness—but I couldn't stop them.
In this world, I was supposed to be the strongest. The one who climbed from the bottom of Class 1-A, who clawed, fought, and bled to reach the top. The one who stood poised to become the Paragon of humanity.
But now? Now, I was nothing more than a plaything. A bug scuttling in Alyssara's palm, crushed or spared at her whim. The sheer helplessness of it choked me.
I needed more.
More strength. More power. More everything.
"Arthur…" Luna's voice was soft, hesitant. Her galaxy-like eyes searched mine, brimming with something unspoken, as though she wanted to comfort me but wasn't sure how.
I closed my eyes, forcing myself to reflect through the pain, letting it fade to a dull roar in the background as her magic worked. Was I as strong as I could be? By the standards of this world, yes. Stronger, even, than I had planned. Soul Resonance, Art's year of training, mastering the Laplace method, and now the Astraeus method—all of it had propelled me further than my initial trajectory.
But it wasn't enough. Not against her.
Somewhere along the way, I had started to believe the words whispered around me: future Paragon of humanity. I had let them seep into my soul, inflating my confidence until I mistook it for reality.
"Dumb, dumb, dumb," I hissed, the words like a mantra. The Paragon? So what? Paragons were just mid Radiant-rankers. Heroes of their generation, yes, but still shackled to the same system, the same ceiling. Even Julius Slatemark and Liam Kagu—titans of humanity—would lose to Alyssara Velcroix.
And the Demon Lords? Divine-rank monsters, each an abyss of strength. And above them? The Demon Overlord. The apex predator of countless worlds.
I couldn't stop at strongest in my generation, even if this was the greatest genertion. That goal was laughable.
No, I had to climb higher. Much, much higher.
"I will defeat the Demon Lords," I said aloud, my voice hoarse but resolute. Luna paused in her work, her eyes meeting mine.
"Good," she said simply, her lips curling into the faintest hint of a smile. "Because you'll need every ounce of that resolve for the journey ahead."
And so, I swore to myself. I wouldn't just survive this world. I would break it, shatter its boundaries, and rise beyond anything it had ever seen.
I would become more.