The ceiling of the royal bubble blocked the way.

Under the White Mask’s command, the serpent tilted its head up, putting Rex upside down.

It charged a concentrated ball of energy in its mouth and launched it forward.

Boom—!

Just that one attacked alone tore a hole in the royal bubble. Not that big, but big enough for the serpent to go through. It was also healing, yet the serpent was already out and free. Once outside, two streams of voidal energy shot forward.

A mass of white cloud gathered to block the beams.

But charged with the Crown Embryo, the White Mask’s voidal energy overpowered it.

Boom—!

An explosion thundered.

And with it, the Black Rain was summoned.

<Notice: the user is under the effect of the Black Rain’s blessing!>

<All stats are increased moderately, and regeneration effects are significantly amplified!>

<Notice: the user’s berserk stat has reached 90%!>

<92%…!>

<98%…!>

<100%!>

<Notice: the user is overwhelmed with bloodlust.>

Rex laughed ecstatically.

He has never felt this good in his entire life.

The Blood Moon’s grace was akin to nourishment for every cell in his body. The Black Rain tingled a part in him that he never knew existed. And the erupting anger made his body pleasantly warm, forcing him to exert the excess through laughter.

It was a thrill unlike anything he had ever felt before.

From beyond the clouds, a dozen cannon heads marked with magical engravings emerged.

Danger signals were fired from every instinct inside Rex’s body.

“Stop this!!” Emperor Dominar’s muffled voice rang from behind. “We can talk about this!” His throat was hurting from shouting this hard—but seeing the cannons made him panic. “Those cannons are Sky Watchers! A barrage from them could heavily wound a Voidal Monarch! You’ll not survive!”

“As always, the losing side really likes to talk,” Rex guffawed raucously. He gave a middle finger at the emperor, “Catch me if you can, fucker!” His gaze turned to the cannons and the Sky People. Some noticed the commotion and came to look.

Unlike normal Spirits, they were larger and had crackling elements across their frames.

Some crackled with electricity. Some dripped with lava. And some even glow like the sun.

“I am Rex Silverstar, a knight of the Haeltara Empire!” Rex announced with an unrestrained glee. Now that he has their attention, he can start the empire’s doom. “I am here to take back an important person of the empire, whom you damn people have taken!”

“Hand him over!” His voice thundered as flashes of lightning erupted.

Emperor Dominar’s eyes bulged at what he heard.

He couldn’t believe how shameless Rex was to slander the empire like this.

In the next second, the heavens responded.

Not with thunder, but with a unified, earth-rending crack. Like the sound of a dozen lightning strikes made one. From the celestial armada—beams of annihilating blue screamed forth. Its energy alone made the air tremble.

For a single, frozen fraction of a second, the entire sky ignited in a pitiless azure glare.

In that stark, shadowless light, the silhouette of Rex and the serpent precisely where those beams were heading converged. A black mask manifested on one side of Rex’s face as he gripped the serpent harder, ready to take charge.

Rex activated the Minor Law of Foresight.

Now that Nivellen was fine, he didn’t hesitate to use this power of his.

His eyes flashed with an obsidian flare.

From the tip of each oncoming beam, an extension of perfect black shade lanced ahead, tracing its future path through the air like a pre-written sentence of death. Rex saw them all—the grim lattice of his own annihilation, drawn in shadows before the light could arrive.

He smiled. This is exciting.

Relying on his deadly-fast reflex, he wrenched the serpent into a fluid, violent dance.

The serpent swerved left, then right, a weaving evasion performed at blinding speed.

The beams screamed past.

So close he felt the sear of their heat on his skin and the ozone sting in his lungs.

But not a single thread of that deadly light touched them.

Just like that, the first volley was evaded.

“Is that all you got?!” Rex spread one arm to the side, taunting the sky. “I’m simply getting started!!”

“RAARGH!!”

From below, a scream resounded.

Rex glanced over his shoulder—and saw Emperor Dominar’s entire form was quaking with an emerald hue. Underneath, the city collapsed as he summoned a plot of magical, nature-evergreen garden. It was the real arsenal of the Spirit Emperor.

Plants the size of a building lashed out. Dozens of thorny vines rose like dark wood tentacles.

Sunflowers bloomed and fired beams of life energy.

Having only dealt with the volley from the Sky Watchers, Rex has no time to react.

Being pincered like this could even overwhelm his insanely fast reflexes.

Roar—!

A bestial roar tore from within the White Mask.

His power surged, coalescing around the colossal serpent to form a protective bubble of shimmering, translucent shadow. Then, from the surface of that darkness, hundreds—if not thousands—of Voidal Pawns and Knights erupted. They did not attack, but piled upon one another, stacking and weaving their forms into a dense, living second layer that guards their tail.

A shield of flesh and void was formed.

Beams hammered the shields as the serpent focused on enhancing its body to endure.

Rex’s crimson eyes looked up at the cannons.

All were being recharged for another volley, which would undoubtedly decimate them.

His beastly instincts knew that he needed to stop one side.

Boom—!

Boom—!

The beams from underneath arrived first, hammering the shield of flesh.

Hundreds of Voidal Pawns—and Knights died from each strike, but more crawled out of the darkness, replacing their fallen kin. Using the bodies of his children was a nasty plan—from the White Mask, but it was damn effective.

It wouldn’t last long, though.

Emperor Dominar knew that and fired more and more beams.

At the same time, the dark wood vines were in hot pursuit, and they were getting closer.

Though he could tell that Rex would not be able to keep this up forever, the relentless drive defied understanding. The damage was already done—he’d successfully turned the Sky People against the empire, a rift that would be nearly impossible to repair with words.

Rex should’ve made one last attack and retreated to safety.

But instead, he kept climbing.

’Don’t tell me he really has a way to reach the Sky People…’ Emperor Dominar gulped. ’No way. It’s impossible.’

Swoosh—!

Emperor Dominar blinked and refocused when Rex blasted out from the shield of flesh.

Instinctively, he controlled the dark wood vines to grab Rex.

Just then, Rex threw his hands forward, and from them, a massive crimson sphere materialized.

It was akin to another blood moon.

His Blood Moon Echo thrummed with life energy to summon this crimson sphere. And the White Mask infused voidal energy into it, fueling it with a ridiculous amount of energy. Even the space on the edges of the sphere was cracking.

Beyond the sphere was what seemed to be a sea of blood.

“Blood Moon Genesis: Ravenous Maw of Magna!!”

ROAR—!

A titanic head of a wolf monster exploded out of the crimson sea, with its maw open to the limit. It was so massive that it covered the sky—from Emperor Dominar’s perspective. And burning from its skin was voidal energy that could even put pressure on the emperor.

Everything was dyed with a mixture of crimson, purple, and emerald.

Time dilated, stretching the second to an eternity-long.

Emperor Dominar’s entire body clenched like forged iron. His beautiful face was now marked with a crazed twist as the Soul Artifact, wrapping around his fingers, trembled violently. Not with instability, but with strain, as he poured torrents of life energy into his attacks.

Raw power burned through his Spiritual Veins like liquid lightning.

Pressure bore down on him, an impossible weight that came from Rex’s Echo Genesis.

He’s leagues stronger than Rex. He can kill Rex like an ant. This is unacceptable.

This is a head-on confrontation, and the emperor is going to win it.

“USURPER!!”

BOOM!

Everything quaked the moment the vines of dark wood collided with Magna.

First came the light, a ravenous, prismatic explosion that swallowed the sky. It drowned everything in blinding cascades of color. Then, silence for one suspended heartbeat before the sound arrived. It struck like the biggest thunder crack that shook the bones of the world.

A shockwave ripped outward in a perfect, expanding ring of distilled destruction.

The earth shattered like glass. Mountain ranges for miles around got disintegrated, their peaks vaporized entirely, and their foundations clawed open. The ground cracked apart in a web of fissures that plunged deep into the earth’s mantle.

And life was also not spared.

Be it voidal monsters or people. Be it fleeing or standing in defiance. All were erased.

For miles in every direction, nothing remained but a fine, settling ash, swept outward on a howling wind of pure force, and their traces cleaned by the Black Rain. Emperor Dominar’s eyes remained fixated on the sky.

Even through the blinding light, he remained vigilant and strong.

A trail of smoke burst from the cloud of smoke like a blur.

It was faster than the speed of Emeperor Dominar turned his head.

Rex emerged with a nasty grin—as his body spun mid-air. He was spotless. Or at least, the wounds he suffered from the collision were already healed. This instantaneous burst stemmed from his use of the Voidal Moonflow Acceleration.

The Red Dawn of Kaiser thrummed with power.

And with an uppercut swipe, Rex’s eyes sparked with a reddish, blinding light.

Emperor Dominar braced for Rex’s next assault. He had never seen Rex fight before, but his countless years of battling experience warned him of an incoming. He raised his arms into a formidable guard. Yet what came was the blinding white-hot flash that scoured his vision away.

His mind throbbed painfully.

Anger, which was not his, rose inside him like an erupting volcano.

In that blink of blindness, the world vanished.

And when his sight returned, he was too late to react.

A blood-red arc had already landed—a shattering impact against his left side that wrenched his entire frame sideways with the sound of breaking armor and grinding bone. He could hear the manic laughter from Rex as he spun and fell.

“How long has it been, Dominar?!”

Emperor Dominar could hear Rex’s voice echoing as his world spun.

He was falling, carried by the momentum.

“How long has it been since you felt death and destruction this close?! So, what if you’ve lived for eons? You’ve spent them on a throne. All that emperoring… It’s made you soft!”

Bang—!

Saliva burst from Emperor Dominar’s mouth as a golden halo slammed onto the side of his body.

It struck him right on his kidney, forcing his body to curl.

At that moment, Emperor Dominar understood: Rex’s awareness was outright monstrous.

In one fluid, devastating instant, Rex executed a triple-layered assault.

First, he employed the Voidal Moonflow Acceleration to burst out of the smoke cover. He also threw the Aegis of Moon Sentinel at the last second as he seized the emperor’s gaze. Before Emperor Dominar could reorient, the mental strike landed.

He used the Weaver of Madness.

A skill that relies heavily on the difference between his mental stat and the target.

Since this is the Spirit Realm, the comparison happened on spiritual points.

Normally, this skill wouldn’t work. But with the White Mask’s help, his spiritual points swelled—even nearing the emperor’s own. This made it possible for the wave of psychic chaos to crash into Dominar’s mind, rattling his focus for one critical second.

That second was all Inevitable Death needed.

An arc of condensed energy materialized and struck, biting deep.

And to seal the sequence, the Aegis of Moon Sentinel that he threw crashed onto the emperor.

Four moves. Two angles. One instant.

’How many battles had he fought to be this witted?! Who is he fighting?!’ Emperor Dominar glared at Rex in utter disbelief. ’What kind of life had he lived up until this point?!’