Chapter 82
Chapter 82
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 82
Chapter Title: Slaying the Night God
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The central region of the third Gardan tribe's territory.
As all the Gardan tribesmen quietly withdrew,
Havel faced off against Titan Gardan, the chieftain of the Gardan tribe.
His physique was extraordinary at first glance.
And with six wings spread to either side,
Havel appeared utterly feeble in comparison.
The aura emanating from Titan overwhelmed Havel, so the Gardan tribesmen were all convinced.
That Titan would emerge victorious.
But Havel, facing Titan head-on, merely stroked his chin.
'The Night God has descended?'
Havel's eyes suspiciously fixed on Titan.
'He just looks like a walking lump of calamity.'
It made sense that a god created by the Tower would be a mass of calamity.
But separately, there was something puzzling.
The fact that the calamity Havel had fed to his Star Sword was also present within him.
"Hey."
Curiosity was best satisfied by asking directly.
"Are you really the Night God descended?"
"I'm telling you, I'm the Lion of the Night. But I don't feel even a shred of awe from you."
That much was true.
What a cowardly way to fight—resorting to facts.
A real lowlife.
"Then we'll just have to see for ourselves."
Havel sheathed Elasia and drew his Star Sword.
"Whichever one of us falls first—that's the fake, right?"
Having lived through it all, he knew worldly truth: the victor defines justice.
The loser's cries were nothing but lies.
So Havel decided to demonstrate that fact to the Gardan tribe.
Titan sneered at Havel.
In that instant, a staff appeared in his hand.
The pitch-black staff brimmed with calamity.
Boom!
He slammed the staff into the ground.
What flowed from the point of impact was none other than night itself.
The encroaching night swiftly began devouring the surroundings.
"E-Everyone, get back!"
The Gardan tribesmen screamed and fled.
Houses and trees melted the moment they touched the night.
Vanishing as if spirited away to another world.
Before long, the night reached Havel's feet.
Havel made no move to dodge.
Instead, the night surged like a wave, engulfing him in an instant.
"Lord Havel!"
Elasia, watching from afar, cried out in scream.
But even she couldn't watch for long.
The night was already reaching for her position.
As she retreated, feeling a twinge of anxiety,
Within the space blanketed by night.
The night that had enveloped Havel began surging wildly on its own.
Crack!
A burst of light tore through, shredding the night around Havel.
His vision cleared, revealing the surroundings.
There was night—true night, not mere darkness, but a star-studded sky unfurled overhead.
In that moment, the stars in the sky began to tilt.
And those tilting stars turned toward them.
Meteors began raining down.
Havel's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Are you in your right mind?"
Havel turned to Titan and asked.
"If those come down as is, your entire tribal lands will be obliterated."
The ground trembled violently from the descending meteors.
Just as Havel said, everything would surely be wiped away the moment they hit.
But Titan let out a oily chuckle.
He showed not the slightest concern for his tribal lands being destroyed.
Titan's six wings unfurled with a whoosh.
Havel gazed steadily up at the sky.
The falling meteors looked ready to obliterate everything at any moment.
'At this level, it would've been pretty dangerous if I'd only transcended Endurance.'
Indeed, was this one of the Primordial Three Calamities, like the Demonic Palace?
As Havel had grown stronger, the Tower had adapted accordingly.
'If I hadn't become the lord of the Demonic Palace, I'd have died here dozens of times.'
Just like back then, when he'd challenged it with only regression.
That version of him would've repeated the same fate here.
Hearing Titan's words, Havel began raising his sword skyward.
As the creature said, the old Havel would've found this situation perilous.
A scenario where he might die repeatedly, endlessly, without guarantee of victory.
But sadly, he was no longer that man.
With every floor of the Tower he climbed, Havel grew ever stronger.
And now,
"I've been feeling off lately. Perfect timing."
He had reached a point where there was no one left to test his full power against.
A faint smile tugged at Havel's lips.
Titan himself had called this an independent space.
And Havel had sensed it too.
'Confirmed.' It was a place where space itself was severed, like the Tower's safe zones.
A power granted to the Night God by the Tower, no doubt.
In other words, even unleashing full power
Would cause no damage to the surroundings.
Havel hadn't properly unleashed his strength recently.
Why? Because moderate output solved everything.
No need to go all out.
But just as he'd survived the Demonic Palace as a calamity devourer,
Havel's nature favored battles where he poured everything into the fray.
Not lording over the weak in smug superiority,
But desperately toppling the strong—and reveling in it.
Yet after leaving the Demonic Palace, Havel had become too strong.
No worthy opponents, let alone reason to go all out.
Thus, his body had felt stiff and listless of late.
'It's been a while.'
Dawn began gathering on Havel's sword.
'Let's see how far I can push it.'
Witnessing this, Titan narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
Havel ignored the Night God's words, focusing solely on his sword.
The dawn energy cloaking his blade was fiercer than before.
Titan began sensing something amiss.
Something was warping around Havel.
A chilling unease crept in.
Anxiety stirred deep in his chest.
At the same time, Titan realized his own calamity was reacting violently.
'This is...'
And Titan grasped what it was.
The Night God's power contained the calamity Havel had absorbed via the Star Sword.
That calamity was now sensing Havel's power—and reacting.
Thus, Havel's strength felt far more vivid to him than to others.
Titan's feathers bristled all at once.
His legs instinctively stepped back.
But it was too late.
He should have turned tail the moment he sensed danger.
Flash!
Light poured from Havel, permeating everything.
Screaming, Titan hastily raised both hands.
But the light pierced right through them.
Even closing his eyes or shielding with hands did nothing to block it.
It was agony.
He hadn't known escaping the light could be this torturous.
'Why... why aren't the meteors falling?'
Too late, Titan realized the meteors had stopped.
He looked up from within the light.
In that instant, he saw the meteors frozen motionless in the sky.
'No, they're not stopped.'
The meteors were indeed moving—slowly.
Havel and Titan's calamities were of the same ilk.
Thus, Titan now shared the temporal perception Havel wielded.
And for Titan, it was hell.
He was endlessly pursued by Havel's light.
Unable to endure, Titan's body buckled.
This torment felt infinite.
The pain from the light showed no end.
In the horrific sensation of being eternally trapped in the space of light,
A voice wracked with pain escaped Titan's maw.
Titan's hunched body began to shrink.
His feathers had turned stark white unbeknownst to him.
Soon enough, Titan had dwindled to the size of a fist.
All his plumage shed, leaving him a pitiful sight.
As if weathered by eons of time.
And before him,
The dawn light from Havel's skyward sword condensed in a single instant.
As the light faded, Titan finally realized.
That he was about to die.
The Night God.
How meaningless to claim divinity with such meager power.
Realizing this, Titan stared blankly at Havel.
Titan had summoned the Night God.
Yet through the shaman, he'd heard one truth.
The Night God was a god without will.
A mass of condensed power.
That was what the Gardan shaman had called the Night God.
Thus, Titan had drawn forth that power to play the god.
But how could a mere energy clump claim godhood?
Its true nature was merely the Tower's power.
He was nothing more than a creation of the Tower.
But here, Titan came to one realization.
The Night God knew nothing.
Except, perhaps, who the God of Light was.
In his final death rattle,
Havel's sword at last reached its conclusion.
The swirling dawn light pierced skyward.
Kwaaaaaaaaang!
The descending meteors shattered into fragments upon the dawn light.
But the dawn did not stop—it continued surging upward.
When at last the dawn light touched the night sky,
The eternal darkness tore apart, spreading into dawn.
Beneath that blinding radiance,
Night could no longer exist anywhere.
Crack!
Simultaneously, the sky could not withstand the light and began crumbling.
Had this not been the Night God's independent space, but the outside,
It might have been a shockwave capable of erasing an entire Tower floor.
Within the space where light particles rained down,
Havel shifted his gaze.
To where Titan had stood moments ago.
But no one was there now.
Reduced to dust before Havel's dawn, vanished forever.
Only the drifting calamity attested that something had been there.
Havel reached out and devoured the calamity.
― Strength has increased by 156.
― Agility has increased by 165.
― Endurance has increased by 145.
― Talent has increased by 160.
― Technique has increased by 163.
― Calamity has increased by 195.
The power of the Night God, they called it.
A massive influx of calamity poured in.
Some of it, naturally, was Havel's own.
At last, his Calamity stat had broken into four digits.
Once more, he had advanced to the next stage.
Pity there were no attributes left to sacrifice as offerings for now.
Transcendence would have to wait.
'Fine. I'll get it eventually as I climb the Tower.'
Havel emerged from the collapsing space and looked up.
The fleeing Gardan tribesmen came into view.
Their eyes were uniformly wide with shock.
Titan was gone without a trace, leaving only Havel standing alone.
"So, then."
Havel slung the Star Sword casually over his shoulder and smiled slowly.
"Any objections to me being the Lion of the Night now?"
No one in the Gardan tribe dared open their mouth.