The world was unraveling.

Jin-Woo stood firm, his golden eyes locked onto the Arbiter, who remained unmoved by the violent storm of shadows and divine energy raging around them. The battlefield was no longer confined to mere reality; it had become something greater—a war waged beyond the constraints of fate itself.

The Arbiter took a step forward, and the very concept of distance distorted. Space compressed, shifting Jin-Woo’s footing even though he had not moved. The anomaly before him was neither a Monarch nor a Ruler, yet his power rivaled, perhaps even exceeded, them.

Jin-Woo clenched his fists. “You’re really starting to piss me off.”

The Arbiter’s voice was devoid of emotion. “Your defiance is meaningless. The balance must be restored.”

Without warning, he raised his hand, and the world itself shattered.

Jin-Woo’s instincts screamed as he felt the overwhelming force threaten to erase his very being. This was different from anything he had faced before—it wasn’t an attack aimed at his body but rather at his existence itself.

“Shadow Authority.”

Darkness erupted from him, his authority surging forth to counter the Arbiter’s power. The two forces clashed, sending shockwaves that bent time and space itself. The world flickered, rewriting itself with every passing second as their battle dictated the very nature of reality.

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Yet, for every strike Jin-Woo delivered, the Arbiter responded with precision. It was as if he were fighting something outside the confines of life and death—something absolute.

Jin-Woo narrowed his eyes. “If you think I’ll let you erase me, you’re dead wrong.”

With a flick of his wrist, Igris and Beru materialized from the shadows, their weapons gleaming with power. But before they could even take a step forward—

They vanished.

Jin-Woo’s heart clenched. It wasn’t that they had been destroyed; they had been removed. Their existence had simply been undone, as if they had never been summoned in the first place.

“Your shadows are bound to you,” the Arbiter intoned, stepping closer. “But if you yourself are an error, then so too are the things born from you.”

Jin-Woo’s breath came slow and steady. “That so?”

His power surged. Then I’ll just have to go beyond my limits.

The darkness around him changed. Jin-Woo could feel it, the primal force that had always been within him, waiting to be unleashed.

His authority expanded, warping the battlefield, consuming even the light itself.

The Arbiter hesitated. It was brief, but Jin-Woo caught it. A crack in inevitability.

Seizing the moment, Jin-Woo lunged, his fist crackling with unfathomable energy. He struck, the impact sending the Arbiter skidding back for the first time. The expressionless being glanced down at his form, a small tear in the fabric of his being where Jin-Woo had hit.

He could be hurt.

Jin-Woo grinned. “Looks like inevitability isn’t so inevitable.”

The Arbiter’s gaze darkened. “Fascinating.”

The world trembled as both combatants prepared for the next phase of their war—a battle that neither fate nor existence itself had accounted for.

Jin-Woo had defied destiny before.

Now, he would shatter it completely.

TO BE CONTINUED.......