Chapter 130 - Aspect of Time from the Celestial Eyes
Phill:
"In that case, the battle is over, and I win. You can mark that in the record," the boy said, turning his back as if it were nothing. The judge and I exchanged looks, completely dumbfounded.
This kid... he's crazy.
"Mark that he forfeited," I suggested to the judge, trying to keep my cool. But before the judge could note anything, the boy, still with his back turned, snapped his fingers.
KABOOM!
A deafening blast shook the ground, the air around us seemed to vibrate, and in an instant, everything went white. The roar that had filled my ears suddenly ceased, transforming into something distorted, as if it were being sucked into another place. I was forced to shield my eyes from the intense brightness that had appeared out of nowhere.
When I finally dared to open my eyes, the sight before me left me speechless.
"A lightning bolt...?" I muttered, confused and terrified. Giant bolts of lightning surrounded the entire battlefield, yet they were completely frozen, as if time had stopped around them. Each bluish spark, every flicker of electricity, floated in mid-air, as if time itself had been bent by an incomprehensible force.
What shocked me even more was how the world around me seemed to have transformed. The environment, the people—everything had taken on an eerie blue hue, like a fog had settled over the area, immobilizing everything and everyone. Time had been suspended.
"What's happening?!" I shouted, trying to make sense of it, but my voice sounded weak, hopeless. I was trapped inside a prison of lightning.
"SILENCE!" roared a voice, as powerful as thunder, reverberating through the air. The sound was so overwhelming that my body began trembling uncontrollably. My legs almost buckled, and my sword slipped from my fingers, hitting the ground with a muffled thud.
I slowly turned my head, and terror gripped me when I realized the voice came from behind me. A cold, merciless voice, filled with an authority that crushed me like a mountain.
What...? I tried to speak, but my body refused to respond. Something was holding me in place, as if the very air around me was suffocating me.
"You were the fool who dared command my mother at that banquet hosted by the king," the voice said, now icy and relentless, slicing through the silence. A chill ran down my spine as I realized I was no longer in control.
"Boy! Was it you who did this? What's happening? Why are people like this?" My voice was desperate, trying to grasp the situation as my gaze flicked between the frozen figures around us, all bathed in the same blue glow, like ghosts from another reality.
"Stop breathing, you're bothering me!" the voice thundered again, and in an instant, an invisible force tore through my body. My lungs stopped functioning, and I felt my entire being lock up. It was as if my soul had been ripped from me, leaving only emptiness behind. Every fiber of my being screamed in panic, but nothing—absolutely nothing—responded.
I was at his mercy.
That voice! The same one from that day! It's the boy!
I sensed the boy approaching, passing beside me with unsettling speed. In the blink of an eye, he stood right in front of me, his blue eyes glowing in the midst of the frozen lightning around us. Fear overwhelmed me like never before, a suffocating sensation, as if the air itself had been drained from my lungs.
"B-boy?" I stammered, trying to make sense of what was happening. He stared at me in an eerie silence, unhurried. His eyes didn't blink, and the longer I looked at him, the more my body wanted to shrink away, to hide from that crushing presence.
He slowly raised a finger, and as he did, I felt an invisible force crushing me from all sides. My body, beyond my control, responded to his will as if I were a mere puppet. His finger moved, and with it, my panic grew. When he finally pointed to the ground, he spoke, his voice calm but filled with crushing authority.
"Kneel."
Those words, simple yet potent, pierced my soul like a blade.
"What?" I managed to mutter, my body trembling. But without resistance, my knees buckled, and I collapsed, kneeling helplessly, at the mercy of this boy who commanded a storm frozen in time.
He walked slowly toward me, each step weighing like a ton on my body. My mind screamed, begged me to run, but I was paralyzed. His presence was suffocating, an invisible force that crushed my will. He raised his sword, an odd and threatening blade, and touched just the tip of it to my forehead.
"Ahhhhhh!" A scream of agony escaped me as the tip of the blade seemed to pierce my very soul. The pain wasn't physical, but transcended anything I had ever felt before. Strangely, the sword hadn't even moved—just its mere touch brought on unbearable torment.
"Silence, mortal," his voice thundered, and instantly, my mouth snapped shut on its own. I no longer had control over my own body. The searing pain in my forehead was unbearable, as though acid were burning through my skin and boring into my skull, but terror kept me frozen in place.
Inside, I was screaming.
HELP! My thoughts echoed in my mind, but no one could hear me. No one but him—this boy who shouldn't have this power, and who now dominated me effortlessly.
"Never again speak to my mother, or anyone I know, like that," he said, his voice low and controlled, but brimming with an unspeakable menace. "In another life, I would have cut off your head and that of your king, but I'm feeling more merciful this time."
With that, he removed the tip of the blade from my forehead, and the pain vanished instantly, but the terror—this overwhelming fear of being in his presence—remained as strong as ever.
I tried to move, to speak, but my body was completely out of my control, paralyzed by fear. My heart pounded uncontrollably, and every attempt to act was smothered by an overwhelming sense of dread.
I'm terrified… utterly terrified...
His presence became even more oppressive as he approached. Slowly, without hurry, he brought his face close to mine, and whatever courage I had left evaporated. I was suffocating, unable to breathe, as if the very air had been sucked from the environment.
"Are you afraid, mortal?" he asked, his icy gaze boring into me. Sweat poured down my face, my heart pounding, each beat heavy and strained. I tried to look away, but the weight of his judgment was unbearable. He grabbed my hair, forcing my head up, making me meet his gaze—those piercing eyes that seemed to look straight into my soul.
HELP! HELP!, I screamed internally, overwhelmed by a primal fear, a feeling of absolute insignificance in his presence.
"You only survived that day because I chose to live a normal life. Remember that," he said, his voice steady and controlled, every word laced with threat. "If you cross my path again, you won't leave alive. I am a force of nature far beyond your comprehension. Do not dare challenge a storm, for you will not survive its fury."
He started to walk away, but before leaving completely, he glanced back at me one last time.
"Breathe," he said, casually.
"Ah!" I gasped, finally releasing the breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. Desperation took over, and I sucked in air, gulping it down, nearly choking in the process.
What is this boy?
I still couldn't speak, couldn't understand how he had such absolute control over me.
"If you tell anyone about this conversation... I don't need to explain what will happen to you, do I?" he said, his tone deathly serious.
"Y-yes," I replied automatically, the words slipping out before I could even process them.
He turned and began to walk away, his steps slow, but with each one, my urge to dig a hole and vanish grew stronger. The weight of his presence, even with his back turned, was still overwhelming. I couldn't look at him for long; my head instinctively lowered, as if it was wrong—unworthy—to look at someone like him.
All I could see were his legs and feet moving further away. The boy stopped for a moment and, still with his back to me, spoke with chilling calmness:
"I think this is where I left off before."
The sound around me, which had been slow and distorted, began to accelerate. Time was returning to normal, but the dread in my chest only intensified.
"Rest well," he said, his words echoing in my mind.
Rest? What does he mean by that?
'KABOOM!' The thunderous sound returned, and in an instant, the world around me regained its colors.
Before I could comprehend what was happening, I was hit by a crushing force from above. My body was violently thrown. I felt the brutal impact as my back slammed into a wall. All my strength drained from me instantly, and my eyes began to close, slowly succumbing to darkness.
No one here realizes… but they are in the presence of a monster.
Those were my last thoughts as my mind faded away, swallowed by unconsciousness.
Viktor Saul:
I was watching the boy who seemed to fascinate everyone, especially because he possessed the rare and powerful thunder element. Even the beautiful girl, who had caught my attention earlier, couldn't take her eyes off him. There was something strange in the air, a sensation that made my skin tingle with anticipation.
"In that case, the battle is over, and I win. You can mark that in the record," the boy said, walking away from his opponent as if it were nothing.
Won where? I thought, incredulous. This farmer thinks too highly of himself.
"Mark that he forfeited," the evaluator suggested to the judge. But before anyone could respond, a deafening blast ripped through the air, followed by a blinding white flash.
'KABOOM!'
The sound was so violent that my ears rang, and the entire arena was engulfed by lightning crashing down in every direction. Debris flew through the air, chairs in the arena lifted and fell as if the earth itself had been torn apart. I shut my eyes, trying to protect my vision from the intense brightness of the thunderbolts ripping through the space around me.
What the hell was that!?
When I finally managed to open my eyes, I was left speechless by the scene in front of me. Everything around was in chaos.
"You've messed up..." the beautiful girl murmured, still watching the boy.
"That wasn't my intention. I'm screwed…" he replied, his expression mildly guilty.
What the hell happened?
The arena was unrecognizable. The once-solid ground was now cracked and destroyed, with shattered pieces scattered everywhere. The stone protections had collapsed, and massive boulders lay all across the combat area. People who had been near the battle had been thrown to the ground and were now struggling to get up, clearly shaken by the impact of the explosion.
But what shocked me the most was the state of the magical barriers.
No fucking way...
The protective barriers, meant to shield the audience, were all shattered—not just the one in the arena where he fought. Every arena, every ongoing fight around us had been affected. The magical barriers of all the arenas were destroyed as if they were made of glass.
That boy... he broke them all.
The center of the arena, where the battle had taken place, was scorched, with black marks scattered across the ground like scars from the destruction that had just occurred. In the midst of the chaos, one of the guards lay unconscious, motionless on the shattered stones.
"Is he dead?!" an elf asked, visibly shaken, as he glanced at the boy with a mix of fear and surprise.
"Don't worry... even if I overdid it a little, it was just the air pressure that hit him. He'll be fine and will wake up soon," the boy replied, trying to calm the elf, though the casual tone in his voice only made the situation more unsettling.
I watched in disbelief, still trying to process what had just happened.
How did he do that? I didn't see any spell, no preparation... but the impact... that clearly came from the sky!
My mind raced back over the battle, replaying every detail. The only plausible explanation was that he'd prepared for this from the very beginning, when he first launched the lightning into the sky.
I looked up, and the shock hit me instantly. In the otherwise clear blue sky, between peaceful white clouds, there was a single dark cloud directly above the arena.
This is impossible... Did he control the lightning and keep it there, in the cloud, until the right moment? How could someone even do that? The energy from his element should have dissipated—how did he manage to store it inside a cloud?
As I stared at the cloud, rain began to fall softly, as if the sky itself was reacting to the boy's presence.
"What is that kid?" someone murmured beside me.
"I don't know, but that was terrifying," another voice answered.
Heat surged through my body.
Show-off! He might have a rare element, but I have two elements! If I had known he was going to show off like this, I would've used my own powerful spells!
My hands clenched into fists as frustration boiled inside me.
"I'm going to challenge that idiot to a duel," I muttered, noticing the pretty girl still staring at him.
Before I could act, soldiers began storming into the arena, alarmed and ready to take control.
"What happened here?" shouted the High Elf woman in charge of the event, her eyes scanning the destruction around her. Guards spread out across the arena, inspecting every detail of the chaotic scene.
"Was this some kind of attack?" one of the guards asked, concerned.
"The human royal princess took her test earlier and already left," an elf informed, trying to bring some order to the confusion.
The soldiers looked at the trail of destruction and then at the dark cloud hovering above us, still causing a light drizzle.
"Who did this?" the High Elf demanded, her voice firm.
Almost instantly, all the students around us pointed in the same direction—at the boy, who was now unsuccessfully trying to blend into the crowd.
The High Elf looked at him for a few moments, then sighed deeply, rubbing her face and massaging her temples.
"What did we say about not drawing attention?" she asked.
"Sorry..." the boy replied, shrugging sheepishly.