FRUSTRATION

Leonel's gaze was completely different from the last time Eduardo had seen him.

In the Heir Wars he had been playful. In the arena, he had been somber as though he had lost all hope. But right now, his gaze carried a frightening sharpness to it, as though the depths of hell itself were hidden within him.

His Destruction Sovereignty erupted, plumes of smoke coming from the corner of his eyes and the soles of his feet.

Eduardo barely managed to snap out of his daze when a fist appeared before him.

'Was that a mental attack? What just happened?!'

Eduardo hurried to put up a defense, crossing his arm before him and preparing to summon his lion beast. Just when he formed a connection with his spatial device, it was shredded to pieces. It was like his mind couldn't reach any further forward even if it wanted to.

This feeling made Eduardo's eyes widen. Not having his beast by his side made him feel like he had lost an arm.

It had to be remembered that the beast companions of the Godlen family weren't normal beasts, they had come from the womb of the same mother, they shared life and death, they were closer than even twins would be. To say that they were like an extra limb was an exaggeration in the slightest.

Unfortunately, if his spatial device couldn't sense his intention to take his beast out, then the only other way would be to physically touch it, but Leonel didn't seem to be giving him that sort of leeway.

Leonel's strikes weren't exceptionally powerful, but they cut deep. It disrupted his flow of Force-no, it completely shattered it. It was as though all the Force he wanted to gather was burnt to ash in an instant.

This was impossible. It was all impossible.

How could someone in the Fifth Dimension suffocate his Soul Force?

How could someone in the Fifth Dimension, Destruction Sovereign or not, destroy his Force?

"Enough-!"

Eduardo roared, but Leonel directly turned a deaf ear to it. As quickly as Eduardo pushed Leonel back, Leonel closed the distance once more even faster.

Eduardo found himself being pelted from all sides, his arms, his torso, his head.

He suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood, the shock in his heart enough to make it turn over.

He could feel that Leonel wasn't powerful; if he was, a single one of his fists would have been enough to shred him to pieces. One punch wasn't nearly enough to cause any damage to him, but Leonel kept hitting the same dozen spots again, and again, and again, relentlessly and without even the slightest hint of fatigue.

The cold look in Leonel's eyes was only becoming sharper and sharper.

"Oof-"

A solid punch collided against liver. All the air was sucked out of his body and he could almost feel the flex of his ribcage.

His vision blurred, everything turning to white but that pair of violet eyes.

He felt that the moment he lost the initiative in the battle, he had been on the back foot. Like an army trying to come back against all odds, or a chess novice being cornered by a grandmaster, he was smothered and suffocated.

What he didn't even realize was that any attempts to make a comeback wouldn't have mattered in the slightest to begin with. That was because this entire time, while Leonel was raining a hail of punches on his body, venting his frustration of several weeks, there was a little mink hiding in the shadows. Content (C) Nôv/elDra/ma.Org.

Leonel's attacks could only pelt against his body and slowly accumulate damage, but a single surprise strike from this little mink would have ended his life.

BANG!

Eduardo collapsed to a knee, not capable of seeing clearly. He felt something grab onto his hair and suppress his will. Then he was ripped into another space entirely.

Leonel exhaled a breath, the coldness in his gaze taking quite a while to calm down. It seemed that he had suppressed more frustration than he even knew. That liver shot had been open to him for a while, but he purposely wailed on Eduardo for an extra few seconds.

He took another breath and exhaled.

His stamina was too great to actually need these breaths, but at the very least, they helped him calm down and pulled back the dark intentions of his Destruction Sovereignty.

Liver shots were quite effective against Third Dimensional existences, but they were less so against true powerhouses. The real reason that liver shot had shut Eduardo down completely was that he had built a Node there.

Eduardo's Dream Force control, and Dream Force protection methods, weren't nearly strong enough to stop Leonel from prying into all his secrets at this distance. He was practically an open book to Leonel.

Not only did Leonel know where that Node was located, he knew where all of Eduardo's Nodes were.

'That ability is more useful than I thought. While my Destruction Sovereignty is still in this weak state, its strongest benefit is in destroying Force it comes in contact with. If I know where everyone's Nodes are, I can easily crush them like I did him.'

"Yip! Yip!"

Little Blackstar landed on Leonel's shoulder, licking his cheek.

Leonel chuckled. "You're a mink, not a puppy."

"Yip! Yip!"

Little Blackstar licked more vigorously, his sounds of protest sounding something like: "I'm the master here, I can be whatever I want to be!"

Leonel smiled. He bet Blackstar had picked up this habit by secretly watching the interactions between the Godlens and their beasts.

"Alright, now I have an hour to figure out how to rob these bastards blind."

Leonel stood with arms akimbo, staring at the floating techniques. The more he stared, though, the more solemn his expression became.

He only had an hour to figure this out, but it didn't seem like things would be easy.

Although this place wasn't exactly like the Void Library, it was similar enough in that without a certain level of strength, most knowledge wouldn't be available to you.

The problem was that if he wanted to scar the Godlens, leaving a wound they would remember, he had to take their best techniques. But...

Their best techniques could only be touched by those in the Ninth Dimension.