Vol 6. Chapter 160: Abyss of Night

Leon’s eyes lit up.

“Safina has a solution?”

Kaiser nodded.

“What is she planning?” Leon asked, unable to hide his urgency.

“She specifically told me not to tell you,” Kaiser replied flatly.

He paused, then added, “All we need to do is hold Atos off until the Dragon Kings arrive. Their strength is needed to help Aurora.”

Leon frowned slightly.

“Safina clearly came up with a way to keep Aurora from ascending the throne... So why won’t she say how?”

But the battlefield was heating up. Since the siblings didn’t want to talk about it, Leon didn’t press.

“So, all we have to do is keep Atos from reaching the Temple of Time until the Dragon Kings arrive. Right?”

“Exactly.”

“Good.”

Leon ran his hand across the Thundercloud Blade. Instantly, a layer of blue lightning coursed along its surface.

Compared to just moments ago, his condition had visibly improved.

Aurora had hope. Kaiser and the Homeland Faction were now backing him. All that remained was to stall Atos until the reinforcements arrived.

Atos could wait no longer.

He strode toward the three of them, dragging his demonic sword. The blade scraped across the ground, casting up violet sparks as it went.

“I never thought I’d see the two of you cooperating.”

He stopped no more than thirty meters away.

“But... the strongest man of Samael, and the strongest Void warrior... I am looking forward to seeing what kind of surprise this so-called alliance of ‘the strongest’ will bring me.”

With that, Atos swung his sword. The sound howled across the battlefield as immense Void energy surged outward, flooding the area.

The pressure crashed down like an invading army. Some weaker combatants on the field immediately coughed up blood.

The violent energy storm blew apart nearby wreckage and corpses alike.

And yet—Leon, Kaiser, and Elle stood firm.

“There’s one more thing I should tell you, Leon,” Kaiser said quietly.

“Go ahead.”

“Even if the three of us join forces and fight with everything we have... we won’t be able to do anything to him.”

Kaiser dropped into a crouch. His longsword pulsed with a deep, dark Void glow.

“In short, we’re facing an enemy that can’t be overpowered, and can’t be killed. Do you understand?”

He said this crushing truth with unsettling calm.

Leon, though visibly shaken at first, took a breath and reset his stance.

“I had a feeling it would be something like that.”

He spoke softly.

“It’s fine. Our goal isn’t to kill him anyway. All we need is to buy time for Aurora and your sister.”

Kaiser gave a small nod and lowered his gaze, thoughtful.

After a brief silence, he replied in a low voice.

“Yeah... that’s right.”

“All right then... let’s go.”

Leon had always taken pride in his power. Not arrogance, not cruelty, not delusion—just a pure and honest pride. A boy’s pride in his strength.

In every battle he’d faced, even against powerful enemies like Shadow, he had never truly felt there was someone he couldn’t defeat.

Until now.

Atos.

A tyrant fused with the Void Realm itself. Undying. Unbeatable.

His very existence shattered Leon’s sense of reality. Even he—Leon Casmod—had to admit it: there was always someone stronger. Always something beyond.

The gap wasn’t just real—it was monstrous.

In any other moment, the sheer weight of it might have broken him.

But now wasn’t the time.

Behind him stood Kaiser and Elle. Beneath his feet was his homeland.

So even if the enemy could not be overcome—

He would still raise his blade and fight.

After a tense moment of silence, Leon and Kaiser vanished from sight.

They reappeared on opposite flanks of Atos, launching a pincer strike.

Thundercloud Blade and the Abyss of Night lashed toward him in unison.

Arcs of lightning and flashes of violet energy screamed through the air, both strikes aimed straight for Atos’s vital points.

But Atos didn’t even lift his sword.

He merely tapped the ground with its tip—a burst of dark flame exploded outward, blasting Leon and Kaiser back simultaneously.

“Tch. Too slow.”

Atos raised the blade and spun it.

The sword cut a ruthless line through the air, a deadly trajectory aimed straight at Leon.

The sharp edge hissed forward, leaving behind a gleaming afterimage.

But instead of pressing the attack, Atos turned toward Kaiser.

Kaiser barely managed to stabilize himself midair.

Before he could land, Atos was already in front of him.

“Shit!”

Kaiser brought his sword up and raised his other arm to guard his head.

His instincts were sharp. He knew to protect the vital points first.

“But—” Atos smirked, “It’s useless!”

The instant the words fell, Atos unleashed a devastating omnidirectional strike.

A wave of black-violet energy swallowed Kaiser whole—

And everything behind him.

The explosion carved a massive, ten-meter-wide trench into the battlefield.

Once it ended, Atos didn’t even glance at the damage. He turned back toward Leon.

Leon struggled to open his eyes, trying to steady himself mid-fall.

He spotted the sword flying toward him.

Reacting quickly, he raised Thundercloud Blade to block.

Just as the demonic sword was about to make contact—

A black shadow flashed in front of Leon.

Someone caught ★ 𝐍𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 ★ the blade by its hilt.

“So fast—!”

Leon didn’t even have time to finish the thought before Atos countered.

He flipped his sword upward in a deadly rising arc.

A towering slash of sword energy erupted from the earth, launching Leon into a massive boulder.

The rock exploded on impact.

The moment the energy wave faded, a secondary explosion rocked the land.

BOOM!

Flames soared into the air. The ground trembled. Smoke consumed the field.

Kaiser, Leon, and Elle—all repelled in under three seconds.

In that fleeting instant, Atos not only crushed the three of them—he seized total control of the battlefield.

Enemy or ally—it made no difference.

Everyone within Atos’s range—

Was annihilated.

Dozens of plumes of violet mist rose from the corpses, drawn like moths to flame into the demonic sword’s core.

Atos didn’t care who died. Dead or alive, they all became fuel.

He slung the sword across his shoulder and looked around at the ruins.

“What, are you all dead already? I haven’t even started.”

BOOM—

Two boulders collapsed in the distance.

Leon emerged from the rubble, coughing, his clothes in tatters. His face was streaked with blood.

He stood atop the debris and looked down at Atos.

“After this day, no one will dare throw a rock at me again. I swear... I’ll kill you.”

Atos raised a brow.

“What the hell are you...”

He was cut off by a sound from the other direction.

Kaiser rose slowly from the trench, bracing on his sword.

He dusted himself off, adjusted his stance, and looked at Atos.

“You trained me to be the strongest Void warrior. Even if the gap between us is vast, you should know—that last strike wasn’t enough to kill me.”

Atos snorted.

“Still spouting the same crap. You always could say the most infuriating things in the calmest tone.”

Kaiser flicked his sword into position again.

“You taught us that emotion is useless in battle.”

“Hmph. If you’d really followed my teachings, you wouldn’t have betrayed me.”

“That’s exactly why I left. I realized that teaching was a lie.”

Kaiser’s voice finally rose, trembling with power.

“Emotion gives us will. And will gives us the strength to rise again, to draw life from our repeated losses, and be reborn.”

Atos, whose mind had long been corrupted by the Void, could not understand the meaning behind Kaiser’s words.

He raised his sword and murmured:

“Then I’ll just kill you over and over again—until your will, your soul, and your Abyss of Night are all buried here.”

“I’m waiting, Atos.”

Energy surged around Kaiser, sending ripples across the battlefield. The earth shook as he poured all his strength into his sword.

Abyss of Night flared with radiant violet light.

“Take this!”

He exploded forward, blade raised.

Abyss of Night: Fatal Severance!

Seeing the move, Atos shifted into a defensive stance.

“You really want to beat me... bringing out that move right away? That’s the one that took down the last ‘strongest Void warrior,’ wasn’t it? Fine. Let’s see what your precious technique can really do!”

Thunder boomed behind him.

He turned to see red mist rising from the ruined stone pile. Mist laced with crackling lightning.

“Don’t forget me.”

Leon raised Thundercloud Blade high.

Waves of pressure rippled outward from his feet. Magic surged into the blade. The metal trembled with power.

He leapt forward like a living bolt of lightning.

Nine Gates · Nightwheel · Flash Severance.

One from the front. One from behind.

The strongest attacks from two worlds—together, they struck toward Atos.

Atos narrowed his eyes.

“That’s... the move that defeated Shadow...”

But the next moment, his concern vanished.

“Hmph. You must’ve forgotten... Back then, your Flash Severance only worked because of human support and Future Noa’s seal.”

“But now, you don’t have...”

Before he could finish, a small, black figure appeared behind him, leaping high into the air.

“Primordial Magic—Divine Radiance Aurora!”