Light and Darkness (3)
Ssff. Fwss.
Residual heat still smoldered across the scorched earth.
João. And Eclipse.
More than a hundred corpses lay sprawled across the ground in a scene straight out of a funeral painting.
"Dryas. Bury them."
Hajun gazed down at the bodies in silence before giving the order.
"…As you command."
Dryas waved a hand with a somewhat deflated air.
Why so glum all of a sudden? Is it because the Vine Barrier got shredded by João's arrows so easily?
Regardless of Hajun's musings, the vines surging up from the earth swiftly swallowed the corpses of João and the Eclipse ascenders.
"Hoo."
Watching the scene unfold, it was sinking in more and more.
I won.
Me. This body.
With my own strength, I broke one of the Seven Celestials with my own two hands.
An indescribable emotion swelled up to his throat. Not long ago, he had been a wretched nobody — and now he could feel, with startling clarity, that he had become a supernova tearing the very sky apart.
Whuummm!
Just then, a tremendous surge of mana began pouring out of the Barrier of Light and Darkness behind him, belatedly coming alive.
— It seems the barrier has reacted to the battle just concluded. Rather fortuitous, I would say. Bring out the Orb, lad.
Hajun immediately drew the Orb of Light and Darkness from his subspace ring.
Vmmm!
The orb was trembling — resonating with the barrier itself. He moved straight to the front of the shimmering wall of light.
The Orb of Light and Darkness has been verified.
A clear, chime-like voice rang through his mind — and with it, the center of the barrier split open, revealing a portal.
So this was the key.
Without a moment's hesitation, Hajun hurled himself through it.
"What did you say?"
James shot to his feet.
"You're telling me João mobilized Eclipse to attack Unknown?"
The report had reached him belatedly through Ascension.
"Where. Exactly."
James's eyes began to smolder with cold fury — fury at João, and fury at himself.
I handled this far too complacently.
João's scheming had blinded and deafened Ascension. The man had cunningly blinded James's own eyes and ears before striking at Unknown.
Eclipse — the unit raised specifically to fight Arjun. Unknown could be in genuine danger.
His heart lurched. He rushed out at once, sprinting toward the last point where Unknown's and João's paths were known to cross.
By the time he arrived, the battle was already over.
"……!"
Traces of combat stretched everywhere his eyes could reach.
"What happened here?"
Across the ground, where nothing remained but the scars of battle, the wreckage of over a hundred wooden vines lay strewn in chaotic tangles.
The residue of these vines is the power of the spirit Unknown commands.
Could it be… Unknown actually won?
Reading the battlefield's traces, one side had clearly been utterly crushed by the other.
That's impossible.
He swallowed hard, then tried contacting Unknown again through the Clarity Orb, his communication crystal. But the call had failed to connect ever since he'd arrived. If Unknown had won the battle, there would be no reason not to answer.
What on earth is going on?
And these vines — someone dug up what Unknown buried.
Within the disturbed earth where the vines had lain, bloodstains glimmered here and there in the light. No matter how he looked at it, it was a place where bodies had been buried. By the numbers alone, Unknown's victory was certain.
But then — where is Unknown?
James reexamined the battle traces with troubled eyes, but he could not find the slightest clue to Unknown's whereabouts.
In fact — only moments earlier, when Hajun had first stepped through the Barrier of Light and Darkness — a robed figure had appeared on that very battlefield.
"…The man is insane."
The figure muttered under his breath, voice faintly trembling. He was Li Shang — one of the Seven Celestials, the Chinese ascender known as Death Lord.
"Now I finally understand why He commanded me to capture the man alive."
Staring at the barrier where Unknown had vanished, Li Shang trembled in minute shudders.
"Inside the Tower, he can never be caught. He already possesses power a full tier beyond his peers."
At this rate, the entire plan would have to be revised from the ground up. Find the man's movements somehow — outside the Tower.
Now he understood, beyond any doubt, why China's government had strained itself so desperately to drag Unknown's true identity into the light.
"…At this pace, if the man merely reaches the seventh or eighth floor, he may rival the Seven Celestials in power even outside the Tower. No — he may well surpass us. The man defies all reckoning."
Even the power he had just witnessed was clearly not Unknown's full strength.
Find him before he reaches Floor 7 — without fail.
That person's will. Now, Li Shang truly understood it.
First, I withdraw.
But before that — Li Shang's eyes turned toward the vines covering the corpses of João and Eclipse.
An unexpected windfall.
To think he would come into possession of a Seven Celestial's corpse. It was a shame the man had died while still bound by the Tower's restrictions, but a Seven Celestial's corpse it remained nonetheless.
His own power was the dominion of the dead. What might crawl out of the corpses if he played with João's remains?
For the first time in a long while, excitement stirred within him.
The Ascender Community.
A single post appeared there.
When the post first went up, claiming Unknown had crushed João, nobody paid it any attention. Everyone assumed it was a delusional rambling.
But that lasted only a moment.
The ascenders had discovered that João's name had vanished from the Hall of Fame. There was only one reason a name disappeared from that board: the death of the ascender in question.
The death of a Seven Celestial swept the world like a sensation.
The whole world seethed. A torrent of articles poured forth, tearing into the mystery of João's sudden death.
At first, João's death was a shapeless shadow. But as eyewitness accounts of his movements surfaced one by one, people began to piece together the truth — João had died on Floor 4.
The original post was thrust back into the spotlight, yet people remained only half-convinced. The claim was simply too absurd.
However.
As the detailed accounts kept coming, reporters caught the scent and pounced. They raced to the location the informant had described — and sure enough, James and the Ascension guild were stationed there.
"Th-that's James!"
"It was real."
A lightbulb went off in every reporter's head at once.
"Sir James! CNS News here. Could we trouble you for a brief interview?"
"Reporter with Korea's SNK! Is it true that Unknown and João clashed here?"
"We're with the Ascension Daily! Were you able to locate João's remains?"
"We are a national broadcaster. Might we—"
The questions poured down like rain. Slowly, James's lips parted.
"One question at a time, please. I will answer to the extent of my knowledge."
"We need confirmation — did Unknown and João truly do battle here?"
James paused for a moment, then spoke.
"Yes. It is true that Unknown and João clashed on this ground."
The instant the words left James's mouth, the reporters' eyes went wide as lanterns. Had this been outside the Tower, a barrage of camera flashes would have erupted on the spot.
Because — James's answer corroborated the post that had appeared on the Ascender Community.
The world turned upside down in an instant.
Dozens, then hundreds of articles began erupting across the globe by the second. Not only Korea, but its neighbors Japan and China alike were rocked to their cores by Unknown's meteoric rise.
That the world was debating whether to recognize Unknown as a new Celestial was only the natural progression of things.
And while the world burned hot with Unknown's name —
Hajun himself was stepping into an entirely new phase of his journey.
"Come along quietly, human."
Surrounding Hajun stood a dozen or so figures of otherworldly races. Every one of them bore elegant, beautiful proportions and features — dark, dusk-brown skin and sharply pointed ears defining their striking appearance.
Yes. These were none other than—
Hold on. Why are Dark Elves here of all places?
The outcasts of the elven race. The Dark Elves.