Born In Ashes: The Enigma

By the time the Hollow Earth Worm had emerged from the ground and the Two-Headed Blood Ogre had fallen into its gaping mouth, Azrael had already escaped the collapsing terrain and taken cover behind a half-broken boulder.

Watching the two colossal monsters struggle madly, he activated his Infinite Comprehension trait and True Focus, sharpening his perception until every detail became crystal clear.

From the wounds on their bodies to the exact speed at which they attacked each other, Azrael calculated everything without missing a single detail and in less than three minutes, he had completely sorted out all the information in his mind.

He observed the two monsters for a few more seconds before using the active skill of his newly obtained Epic-level Artifact— Umbral Rift.

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---) Umbral Rift: Once per day, the user can step into a shadow and reappear anywhere within 300 meters instantly, ignoring all barriers.

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Using Umbral Rift, Azrael reappeared a hundred meters behind the Hollow Earth Worm, which still had half of the Two-Headed Blood Ogre clenched in its massive jaws.

Without wasting even a single heartbeat and still under the enhanced clarity of True Focus, he unfurled his Wings of Wind and shot upward, rising fifty meters into the sky, which was the maximum height his entry-level wings of wind could currently achieve.

A black light flashed in Azrael's right hand as the Fallen Star materialized. The instant the greatsword appeared, a green rune spun within Azrael's pupils, and the black blade of the sword erupted with a deep, radiant green glow.

Without conserving a shred of energy, Azrael recklessly channeled the vast reserves of his cosmic energy, 260 points gained after hours of relentless monster hunting. In an instant, that energy drained at a frightening rate until he only had few points left.

The green glow surrounding the Fallen Star burned as brilliantly as the sun, and a sharp, chilling aura surged outward.

Sensing the deadly presence behind it, the Hollow Earth Worm felt a deep sense of crisis and even while grinding the Two-Headed Blood Ogre inside its mouth, it turned its massive head back.

At first, neither the worm nor the ogre registered what was happening. But they quickly sensed the powerful fluctuations of energy descending from above and raised their eyes, only to see Azrael holding the Fallen Star in mid-swing.

Because of the Cold Blooded trait, Azrael's expression remained perfectly calm and without the slightest hesitation, the very moment the two monsters turned their gazes toward him, he swung the sword downward in a vertical arc.

As he swung the sword, a crimson aura flared along its edge and just before the attack fully erupted, a tyrannical force, vast and overwhelming as if it sought to annihilate everything in existence flooded the entire area.

Both the Hollow Earth Worm and the Two-Headed Blood Ogre felt a bone-deep chill and their bodies trembled as Tyrant's Intent engulfed them in an unprecedented sense of impending doom.

Feeling the immense threat, the Hollow Earth Worm began to loosen its grip on the ogre, and the ogre itself ceased tearing at the worm's flesh.

However, before either monster could act—

Tear!

A piercing, rending sound split the air as a long, hair-thin vertical rift taller than their massive bodies suddenly opened before them.

Unlike Azrael's previous attacks, this time, empowered by Tyrant's Intent, an aura of pure chaos, a force that desired nothing less than total destruction surged violently from the rift of the SkyRift Slash and from within it, a thin green blade, sheathed in crimson light shot forth like a flash of doom.

Screech! ROAR!

The Hollow Earth Worm and the Two-Headed Blood Ogre shrieked in panic at the sight of the hair-thin wind blade speeding toward them.

In a last, desperate attempt to survive, a blood-red energy erupted from the ogre's body, expanding outward to shield both itself and the worm still holding it in its mouth.

In less than a second, the SkyRift Slash, cloaked in Tyrant's Intent collided with the blood-red barrier.

Normally, it would have been extremely difficult, almost impossible for Azrael's attack to shatter the last-moment defense of a peak Epic-level monster.

But the instant the SkyRift Slash struck, the unstoppable force of Tyrant's Intent roared like a living storm, as though enraged by the very idea of being resisted.

Crack! Shatter!

In a mere microsecond, fissures raced across the blood-red energy conjured by the ogre and with a sound like breaking glass, the barrier shattered without offering the slightest resistance.

With no hindrance left, the thin, vertical wind blade carved through the massive body of the Hollow Earth Worm.

Empowered by the Fallen Star's passive 60% energy amplification and the overwhelming force of Tyrant's Intent, the SkyRift Slash sliced through the worm in a single, devastating instant.

But the attack did not stop there. The vertical blade, larger even than the worm itself cleaved straight through the Two-Headed Blood Ogre, still trapped within the worm's mouth as well.

The ogre's skin was far tougher than the worm's, but after their prolonged battle it had no energy left.

With nothing but its own battered body to rely on, it could not hope to defend against Azrael's strike.

Under the crushing power of Tyrant's Intent, the SkyRift Slash cut through the ogre as effortlessly as it had the worm.

Screech! Roar!

A final roar and screech, echoing with pure unwillingness reverberated across hundreds of meters.

From the sky, Azrael watched as a thin vertical line appeared across both monsters from head to tail and the next second—

Woosh!

Twin fountains of blood erupted, thick black blood from the Hollow Earth Worm and deep crimson from the Two-Headed Blood Ogre, spraying into the air as their bodies split cleanly into two halves and crashed to the ground, expressions of disbelief forever frozen on their faces.

At that very moment, Azrael felt a powerful surge unlike anything he had experienced before erupt within his own body and his strength began to rise, bringing with it a tearing pain that threatened to rip him apart.

But he had no time to dwell on the agony as the moment both monsters died, his face turned deathly pale from the enormous drain caused by using Tyrant's Intent, and his body began to plummet from the sky.