And Another Starts...

Heian Ciemnosc's body hitting the ground became obstructed from plain sight. Smoke and dust lifted over a hundred meters in the air, and the contrail left by his flow backwards body was followed by a shadow of a cutting motion, which only dissipated halfway through the way his body traversed and scattered when the clouds from the dirt lifted into the air. However, trees— even hundreds of meters around the crashing site, fell like clay figures down a sink, submerging in the dust and smoke as the earth quaked for a few seconds.

“Interesting,” Kali Gura said with a big smile, caressing his Earth long sword’s blade before looking at Heian Ciemnosc. His fingertips lingered on a few traces where cracks and gaps suddenly appeared from one of its edges. “I have cut through many crystallized armors from cultivators in the Spirit Magna realm before coming here. Who would have thought your skin feels much tougher than any of theirs? Haha!”

“It felt much different. Ah, I feel much better after cutting you in half, ah~.” Kali Gura added, “You know. While my sword has a strange slimness, it is made from the hardest material to break in the Second Step. Many hammers, maces, and even Titan’s all-out bodily strength attacks at the same level as me have never caused damage to my sword. To think your skin alone made a few touches to it, and your flesh damaged my blade...”

“It feels much better to face you,” Kali Gura looked up with a ravishing smile on his already pretty boy’s face, turning him even more charming. His long sword’s cracks and damage showed as he stopped caressing it gently. Some ruptures were ‘z’ shaped, while others were cones wider or narrower, with nothing in between. Some parts looked like time wasted them and became rusty instead, layering off a millimeter from the slim blade.

“Think I can enjoy this more before going after that Empress and her daughter. How did you call it? Playing pretend or something like that, right? Well, you missed your chance, but I won’t. I’ll play husband next and daughter-dad relationship, hahaha!” Kali Gura said, laughing his ass off but speaking with a genuinely pitying tone as if he knew Heian Ciemnosc would surely think of wishing he had done the same after realizing he wasn’t going to live past today.

“Grrr…” However, what he received instead was a growl from the clouds of dirt. Kali Gura’s eyebrows went up, and he tried sensing into the dust and smoke. However, his face slightly fell when he realized he couldn’t not only not find Heian Ciemnosc, but neither could he detect anything within the dirt clouds. Kali Gura’s mouth slightly opened as he became somewhat nervous, but not enough to worry him. “...!”

“You know. I can save you the beautifying details. If you’re too attached to them. It would make it more boring to you before dying, but at least you won’t feel cuc- !!”

Wheesh- shuaahuaaa~! Fwuh-pa!

Kali Gura seemed to see 2 dark spheres narrowing within the dust, but his scalp tingled and scurried around as a shadow rapidly moved out of the dirt clouds, flashing with immense strength as a pair of meters long dark energy claws poured towards him. His long sword moved to intercept the incoming threat, but his head heard the familiar sound that had terrified him before, and he thought. ‘A Soul attack!’

While Kali Gura was disbelieving due to how taxing Soul attacks are, even for peak Third Step cultivators, and became entrapped in it. Even then, his sword swung at the incoming claws and started slashing their structure to divide them and protect himself from being reached. However, another sound he hadn’t experienced before, but of which his instincts told him it was worse than he could imagine, went off, and the sensation paralyzed him.

Entering his inner being, Kali Gura immediately found the source of alarm, finding a sparkling flame hidden and latched into his Soul. This immediately surprised and scared him, which moved him towards his Soul to attempt grabbing it away from it, but the moment his right-handed fingers made contact, the awareness he sent inside returned to the real world, and he immediately felt pain on his backhand. Looking down, he watched as his right thumb became set ablaze by ordinary orange and yellow fire!

“!!” Kali Gura’s left hand held his long sword and kept cutting the giant, dark energy claws coming for him. Meanwhile, he no longer tried the same as before and used his Neutral Energy and Spirit Sense to extinguish this fire in his Soul. Kali Gura noticed his power sources consumed by it, but decreasing with his intention. Everything but his Soul were working to tone down the flame while he fought for his life in the physical world.

There was a stalemate in Kali Gura’s inner being as Heian Ciemnosc’s Darkning Igniting fared better than Kali Gura in Soul. This was, by far, the only advantage Heian Ciemnosc had on him, and he finally used it, but it wasn’t helping that much. Heian Ciemnosc’s giant, dark energy claws were less than a fourth of their original size when his body was finally seen by his enemy. Kali Gura’s eyes widened, but Heian Ciemnosc rushed forth after separating his darkened arms from the dark energy claws.

Heian Ciemnosc’s pale skin on his arms returned, leaving only his darkness Claws Out and his dark tail fluctuating before striking the air like a lightning bolt. His speed suddenly increased, but while Kali Gura finished cutting off the last parts of the gigantic dark energy claws, he wasn’t in time to slash Heian Ciemnosc’s body away like before!

WHOOOSH! Plank, plank! Slash, slash! Ting, ting! Punch, punch- palm, palm! Thud, thud, thudd, thudd! PSHIFT! Crack-... cruuuuushhh!

And like a quadruped Fauna, Heian Ciemnosc’s arms raised high. His legs bent and prepared to land on his prey. His feet’s dark claws attached hard to Kali Gura’s shoulders, but they couldn’t even crack his crystallized armor. Heian Ciemnosc slashed his upper dark claws at Kali Gura’s neck, but they only made tiny sounds with each of his 10 claws, rendering his attacks useless.

Heian Ciemnosc attempted punching with his right, closed claw and palming with his left at Kali Gura’s face, but while some of the impact traveled to the latter’s head, it didn’t do anything to the crystallized armor. Heian Ciemnosc palmed it and punched Kali Gura’s head simultaneously, interchanging between, punching with his left or right claw and palming with the other. But it was not working, and Kali Gura was only taking so much time recuperating because of the mind-focused All-Devastating Soul Art technique and his Darkning Igniting.

Thus, just as Heian Ciemnosc sensed Kali Gura’s long sword gaining enough mobility and he felt the latter’s mentality focus concentration on the physical world for a few seconds just to deal him another blow, Heian Ciemnosc concentrated his dark blood, veins, and Neutral Energy towards his head. Although they were just that: veins and whatever else, Kali Gura could see each of them tensing before… Suddenly, Heian Ciemnosc’s head turned completely dark, covered with a thick layer of the black monster’s unique energy.

‘No wonder… you’re called like that!’ Kali Gura thought when he saw Heian Ciemnosc’s ‘transformation’ with a face that looked empty and lifeless, simply darkness encompassing it. Heian Ciemnosc’s head looked like a portal, but without the blackness of it, something more, something stranger, something… terrifying. Before Kali Gura’s mind reacted, he felt the burning intensity within his Soul increase and started trying propagating elsewhere in his inner being. His blue eyes reflected a colossal dark mandible. “!!”

GRAWR! Heian Ciemnosc’s dark fangs and jaw projected in dark energy form and lunged towards Kali Gura’s face. The crystallized helmet’s face was bitten, and Kali Gura’s head slightly shook like crazy within it as a baby’s fist-sized gap appeared in the middle where his nose was, and web cracks appeared everywhere around it.

Heian Ciemnosc’s dark energy jaws dissipated like smoke, showcasing his pervertedly handsome, pale, dark-bloody face. His dark fangs felt itchy, so he licked them as if to appease this sensation. But in Kali Gura’s eyes, it was skin-shaking, hair-rising, and heart-chilling. Right after, Heian Ciemnosc ignored those blue eyes and used his dark claws to grab from one side to the other. Using all his bodily strength and pouring dark Neutral Energy into the mix, Heian Ciemnosc’s pale arms bulged, and his veins ruptured one after another as he widened the gap and let Kali Gura’s saucer-sized eyes feel the direct, natural breeze of the wind.

“Black mon-” Pum! Pam! Pam! Pam! Punch~! Slap! Pom, pom, pom, pom…!

Kali Gura opened his mouth to speak. His pretty boy’s face was as ravishingly attractive as before, but his condescending callout was interrupted, with his nose ending up broken after Heian Ciemnosc’s middle finger knuckle baptized the fair skin of that face. It did not end there. Heian Ciemnosc’s dark claws kept hitting that face, not letting it become tainted with stabbing wounds or cuts, preserving its beauty, but letting the fair skin all over it bruised and lose glamour.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Without a chance to defend himself, Kali Gura was busy receiving punches, slaps, and occasional pulling from his hair because he had to concentrate on saving his Soul and inner self from becoming set ablaze. Heian Ciemnosc took advantage and kept hitting and hitting, but he could feel his Darkning Igniting losing at last to Kali Gura’s efforts. Just when Heian Ciemnosc decided to use his claws after wasting enough Neutral Energy from the pretty boy. His dark claws faced Kali Gura’s eyes, ready to strike. The long sword moved from Kali Gura’s left hand into the air and spun before aiming at his back!

Whoosh- swish! Pshift~!

Heian Ciemnosc somersaulted backwards and flew 3 meters away before immediately returning. His Spirit Sense caught sight of the long sword penetrating Kali Gura, but it went through him as it would to water or pure energy and didn’t harm its owner. Heian Ciemnosc was fearless as he returned at once to keep the fight going, but so was Kali Gura. With his broken crystallized helmet and a bruised, purple, blue, and black pretty boy’s face, he looked at Heian Ciemnosc with hatred!

Swish- cuuh! Crrreeesshhhhkk! Slash- swush! Phhshk! Phhshk!- Crrreeesshhhhkk!

And like a spark forming a flame, Kali Gura became reckless, letting the Darkning Igniting propagate however it wished and employing all his Neutral Energy to his sword as it mightily glowed! He caught Heian Ciemnosc beforehand and moved his long sword, cutting the air before putting a new cut from below to up on Heian Ciemnosc’s torso!

Heian Ciemnosc clanked the handle away with his left claw and rotated his body to the left, using his right claw to feel his wound, but Kali Gura, still covered with his gray-silvery aura along his long sword, immediately followed with a slash, but suddenly turned it into a stabbing motion that aimed at Heian Ciemnosc’s abdomen. He stabbed Heian Ciemnosc’s abdomen, once below each side of his ribcage, and spluttered short, dark-bloody torrents before following the momentum with another slash after the second stab!

Heian Ciemnosc’s left chest was torn wide open again, but the wound wasn’t deep enough this time, although it passed through his nipple and continued until leaving his body at the upper section of his left breast. Dark blood blurted out of the wound, and Heian Ciemnosc’s deep, diagonal injury in the middle of his torso hurt even more before starting to bleed more profusely. In the meantime, the air around him shot with incredible force that followed Kali Gura’s sword’s trajectory, leaving energy shadows that cut through the air and his clothes a little more.

“Puh!!” No matter how one put it when Heian Ciemnosc felt the deep cut from before, he understood he had no chance to win this fight. Even more so as Kali Gura’s aura remained stable and wasn’t consumed, unlike his Soul and Neutral Energy. But that wasn’t enough to put Kali Gura down, and if he used his Myriad Darkness Materialization, Heian Ciemnosc would just put another heavy toll on himself while still being slightly affected by the previous time against all those Spirit Magna 9th stage cultivators.

Whoooosh!... Swish! Fwuh-pa! PSHIFT- CUUUH!

“!!” Heian Ciemnosc’s dark tail semi-tiredly swung downwards in the air, like a marmot defending its territory from a predator to fly away as dark Neutral Energy covered his body. But Kali Gura followed suit with bursting speed and held his Earth grade long sword, bathed in his Neutral Energy like never before, with his elbows bent at his head level and his hands holding it behind his nape. Just before Kali Gura threw an attack, his eyes changed to tormented as they became bloodier and dark. The flame inside his Soul suddenly condensed arduously, but knowing it was Heian Ciemnosc trying to salvage his situation, he ignored it and hacked down!

Heian Ciemnosc’s darkest eyes widened one last time before he saw mere frames, images from Kali Gura’s move. A smallish energy blade came out of the long sword. All the gray-silvery aura around it disappeared, but it was quickly replenished from its handle as Kali Gura kept holding it, transmitting its share to it without losing any glimmer. After several frames, Heian Ciemnosc saw the gray-silvery, Neutral Energy blade land on him, just 3 millimeters from his heart on his sternum and collarbone.

While he felt his body being cut down, but in the process, flying downwards to the soil like never before in his life, he barely heard Kali Gura’s semi-crazed shout in the air. “No! I say you stay here! Kiss the ground! Ahaha!”

And then, then… Heian Ciemnosc’s body plummeted against the ground, this time worse than previously…

…whiiistleee~... … THUUUUUUDDDDD~~!! CRAAAAAAAAACK- BOOOOOOOOOOOM! Rumble! Rumble! Rumble! Ruuuuuuuumbleeeeeeee~!!...

Heian Ciemnosc’s body disappeared even before hitting the ground. The earth hundreds of meters around him broke apart, already more than it was, and continued gradually breaking with the following quakes that lasted for tens of seconds straight. Above, while Kali Gura gasped and held his long sword with his right hand, he finally got rid of the flames in his Soul, but his eyes showed excitement, and his tongue came out as if he couldn’t hold it back any longer, like an animal.

‘All this… all that might… it must be mine! Mine… Such body tempering, such Soul Art! And that… energy… yes, that energy… it’s miiine! It will be mine!’ Kali Gura thought as he watched the earth below him transform and lose any natural aspect it had just a minute ago. Instead of going in and searching for Heian Ciemnosc, because of the satisfaction he felt at freeing himself from the Soul-devouring flames, he floated in the air and waited until the smoke settled down minutes later.

“... cough…” Heian Ciemnosc struggled to open his pale eyelids. When he did, his Spirit Sense told him his mouth was coated with his blood, looking as if he had eaten pitch-black paint, his left shoulder was nearly cut off, and his limbs were unresponsive. His torso convulsed from within as his body had lost all capabilities to go on as usual. The skin at his chest and abdomen was nearly gone, layered off by that last strike, whose wound’s width was 20 centimeters at his shoulder and only became slightly narrower as it went down his stomach until his right hip.

His eyelids barely opened, showing him the sight of Kali Gura recomposed, and his Darkning Igniting was gone. His Soul was shaky, but his body was in a worse state. His Spirit Sense could still go out, but he kept it in his immediate surroundings. At least to where he believed he could react in time if something happened. Heian Ciemnosc watched Kali Gura’s blurry figure float down towards him, but he couldn’t even tingle the air with his fingertips or nails.

“You were almost a threat to me. Consider yourself talented enough. But your little rulership over your generation is over. When I rule this Region, I’ll make my new children surpass you with what you have. But don’t worry, they will never surpass me, nobody will! And this place will just be my beginning, a stepping stone to become the Change’s champion! Haha-”

PSHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIFFFFFFRTTTTTT~~ ROAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRR!!!

PAAAAAAAAAAMM!! WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHHH! Amidst Kali Gura’s speech, a sudden, bigger, terrifyingly mightier energy bout flashed into Heian Ciemnosc’s blurry sight and slammed onto the former’s body. The impact was so dully over the top that a sound of the air presiding an immense rupture went off, breaking the speed of sound as Kali Gura’s body was flown for a thousand kilometers, helpless to forcefully stop.

“...” Heian Ciemnosc’s lips slightly opened, only to reveal a speechless expression, though. Immediately, a familiar presence showed in his sight, and she flew down to hold him in her large bosom and slender arms. Her golden dress was slightly wet and became tainted with his dark blood. Heian Ciemnosc looked at her neck as she hugged him tightly before saying, “It’s not… p… ast 3 years… yet.”

“Mn, I know. I disobeyed you.” Shuna said as she failed to contain her crystalline tears from falling on his left cheek. Her Spirit Sense checked his body inside out, left and right, up and down, hundreds of times before her trembling arms softened. However, deep within her, Heian Ciemnosc sensed a raging fire about to turn the whole Region upside down. Shuna kissed his left temple after feeding him all the top-notch theriac pills he had made for her. Best in all of the Second Step.

Whoo- “Wait!” Heian Ciemnosc ignored the throbbing torment his torso was going through and lifted his left arm to stop Shuna from chasing after the possibly already heavily injured Kali Gura. She timely halted and looked back down at him. Heian Ciemnosc pressed his lips together before adorably asking with a weak, hurt voice. “Can you keep a drop of his blood essence for me? Just to check things.”

“...” Shuna was silent for 3 seconds before nodding at him with a casual expression. Well, casual for Heian Ciemnosc. For anyone else, it would be a rare, gentle, one-of-a-kind expression instead. She then left the area and Heian Ciemnosc to recuperate. After feeling a little better with breathing, he took an elephant-shaped Monster from his Covert Space bags and started munching on it with his left dark claw, plucking a piece of flesh and skin before downing it down his throat.

For several minutes, Heian Ciemnosc enjoyed his recuperative meal while the theriac pills he had made for her did their function on him. A thought appeared in his mind while enjoying the sight of Shuna slowly killing Kali Gura with Water energy dragons surging and nose-diving far in the distance in a forest with extremely tall trees. Shuna shoved Kali Gura’s mangled body up and down, hitting the ground, dragged underneath, and forced to face the pressure against the air as it soared back into the skies.

‘Damn, I have to make more for her. Ahh, whatever. Oh, Ishikyy will also need some for later,’ Heian Ciemnosc’s head turned towards the north as he ended that thought for a moment and returned to enjoy the show with his snacks.

…