Rise Of The Infinite Sovereign

Chapter 325: The Battle Ends

"Again" his eyes filled with coldness. "I’m stronger than you"

*Klang*Klang*Klang

Exuding white lightning, Ezra matched Alvarach pace.

Moving about, they desecrated their surroundings.

But Ezra was still on the losing end.

In his peak form, Alvarach’s healing factor was too perverse.

All the cuts in his body healed almost instantly, and with fire in his veins, burning effects had little to no effect on him.

So Ezra switched things up.

Using lightning to augment speed, he would use ice for attacks.

This was different from combining elements and one.

He would have to channel two elements at the same time and maintain it.

Moreover, with the elements conflicting, he couldn’t combine them.

If his control tilted too much to either side, they could cancel each other out, or worse, disrupt his mana control, leaving him helpless for a few seconds.

That was enough time for Alvarach to make him into mincemeat.

It required keeping a delicate balance and a good sense of control to direct the elements without having them conflict with each other.

He tried it a few times in the past, but he had never succeeded.

But now he was at Mythic rank, it was worth a try.

"Tch" Ezra clicked his tongue in distaste.

He should have gone full power from the start and beheaded Alvarach while his guard was lowered.

No...he tried to do that, but Alvarach escaped.

In retrospect, Ezra hadn’t expected his hasty escape. Hence the late response, which formed the chain of events that led him here.

Sa!

Alvarach’s claws searing his skin brought him back to the present.

’This is not the time for such thoughts’ Ezra berated himself, readying himself to release his ice element.

His chances of winning without using ice were slim, as was his chances of winning using ice alone.

The chances that it could go haywire were also large.

But doing nothing wasn’t going to solve anything.

Gaining more injuries by the minute, Ezra took his chances and channelled his ice element onto his blade.

Then...

"Hup!"

His worry seemed needless as Skyfall glowed blue without any hiccups.

Ezra was momentarily stunned.

A terrible mistake.

*Sha!

Alvarach cut across his chest.

On instinct, Ezra landed an attack of his own. In one motion, he turned Skyfall into its scythe form and cut off Alvarach’s arm.

Unlike before, a layer of ice grew on the stump, delaying the regeneration for three seconds.

This is the result of using ice along with a top notch demonic weapon.

Without thinking, Ezra pulled his mana from the clarity and haste rune, focusing only on the condense rune.

It condensed his mana, amplifying its effects.

The bolts of lightning slithering about his body became frenzied, and Skyfall began exuding chilly winds.

Such change didn’t go unnoticed.

’Dangerous!’

Alvarach didn’t idle, he moved in close. This battle had gone long enough anyway.

When Ezra parried his claws, he widened his mouth.

Before he could do anything, Ezra tapped off the ground and drew an arc of lightning with his feet as he smashed it into the side of Alvarach’s head.

*Bam!

The demon was sent flying, and Ezra followed up.

He’d learned his lesson, he had to bend the flow of the battle to his favour, and that’s exactly what he did.

Ezra hounded Alvarach relentlessly, both sides slashing and cutting the other like rabid dogs trying to tear each other apart.

From the moment Ezra took initiative of the battle, Alvarach stopped playing.

Though, in all fairness, you can’t really call it playing when you’re in your final form. Or can you?

Ezra’s skin was increasingly burnt, but he was smiling like never before.

’I speculated this before’ thought Ezra, looking at Alvarach. ’But either he’s been out of combat for a while, or he wasn’t that good in the first place...’

Ezra’s eyes shone, grasping a weakness.

’His skills are lacking’

Losing more and more ground close quarters, Alvarach was desperate for some space.

Taking Ezra by surprise, he attacked, and let his claws retract at the last moment to deal a punch at the cost of having his shoulder pierced.

A successful hit knocked Ezra back a bit for more than ten feet, and he immediately rebounded, seeking to close the distance.

"Die!" Alvarach spun, and let off more than ten fire slashes.

He avoids the first with a small hop, turning Skyfall into its scythe form and either deflected or dispersed the rest.

*Pah!*Pah!*Pah!

The patches of vapour blocked his sight, but did little harm as Alvarach tore through and attacked.

Using his weapon to guard, he’s pushed back.

Breaking the floor as he ground himself to a halt, Alvarach in front of him the next second.

The scope of the battle changed as they attacked however possible, using cuts, kicks and occasionally, punches.

They were both skilled, parrying, dodging and blocking the others’ attacks.

Only twenty percent of all their strikes went through.

A large boom sent them twenty feet in opposite directions.

They stared at one another. No words needed, as everything had already been said.

Both fighters could feel it, this was the final exchange.

It was time to decide a winner!

Spinning his scythe, it broke into twin blades as Alvarach roared, his skin and nails reddened as a magic circle formed behind him and pushed him with a blast.

The meeting between the swords and claws was a blast.

*Boom!

Getting invested into close combat, both parties made every move with intent to kill.

Each attack, parried or not, destroyed the surroundings, and it only got worse.

The first ten attacks could be followed by the eyes of Peak Grandmasters.

After that, even they would have to surrender.

With each attack, they got faster, turning into afterimages seconds into the exchange.

All one could see were the exploding blades of Red and Blue desecrating the environment.

The two entities at the center of it had become bright flashes of light as they moved nonstop, the place of battle constantly changing.

What seemed like ages to the duo, was less than four minutes.

At the fifth minute, their silhouettes could be seen, and their attacks slowed.

The end of the battle was nigh.

*Kang!*Kang!*Kang!*Kang!

Clashing for the umpteenth time, Alvarach suddenly reinforced his nails, and forced out another inch, taking Ezra by surprise.

The sudden move let him pierced Ezra’s arm with the nails on his right hand, and take the sword out of his grasp.

In a fit of adrenaline, Ezra mended the blood gushing out of his arm into a long sword, freezing it with ice and plunged into Alvarach’s mouth, having it come out the other end. Successfully pushing the battle in his favour.

It took two seconds for Alvarach to dissolve the blade.

In that time, Ezra motioned the sword hit out of his right hand to pierce Alvarach’s head from above.

With acute senses, Alvarach placed his horns in the way, gifting one of them as tribute for such a wonderful attempt.

But for the shortest time, Ezra’s right side was left completely defenceless.

*Cha!

Without any dramatic effect, Alvarach ran his nails through Ezra’s heart.

The sound of it beating made it too easy to locate.

Right after...

*Sha!

He lost his head.

Lost in a momentary sense of victory, he’d missed the attack that cut his head off.

With his view upside down, Alvarach made a funny sound.

"Ah...?!"

It sounded as if he was questioning reality.

Only when his head hit the ground did reality begin to set in.

Moreover, flipping a few times with his one horn, he landed in a way that allowed him to view his headless body.

’That’s my body...’

It took a bit more to set in.

Ice grew over the surface of the exposed flesh on the headless body and over the gullet of the head.

’Be-Be-Beheaded???’ It hit him like lightning on a sunny day.

He would’ve shouted. But he had no vocal cords.

That didn’t make the shock any less though.

’I actually lost?! Me?! To that insect! Me?!’

Alvarach watched Ezra sever the arm that had punctured his heart with a sword of black and yellow...before falling to his knees right after.

The headless body slumped to the ground soon after, kicking up a pile of dust for all its worth. The glowing skin dimmed soon after.

His eyes closed in on Ezra, who was puking blood, the shock within his glare lay unhidden.

Making eye contact, Ezra forced himself to stop puking and mustered his strength to mutter a few words with a victorious smile on his bloody face.

Alvarach subconsciously read his lips.

’I won’

It would be conjectured impossible, but Alvarach’s head popped a vein.

’Dammit! How could I lose?! I didn’t lose! This must be a joke?! How could I lose to an abominable insect?! Me! ME! The demon lord of Pride! This cannot be my end!’

For all the tantrums he threw, what was done was done.

All his grievances were in his head, and reality didn’t give two shits about what anyone thought.

A minute went by and nothing changed.

Only then did it set in that he had become a corpse for another to step one like the thousands he stepped on.

’Ah...’

His life flashed before him like a dream.

Awakening from beneath hot dead soil, his first instinct was to devour.

It was the same with others as well, as such, by the time ten of them were out into the world, the first brawl began.

Some used teeth, others used rocks, he used his nails.

Sharp as a blade, he plunged down the throat of all the others, killing them off and sucking their souls to empower himself.

Till now, his whole life had been a repeat of that event, albeit with little changes.

He would fight, and eventually, he would win.

Slowly but steadily, he grew in power, killing demon after demon only to look behind to see thousands of corpses.

With the strength being the law, he became an Apex predator in no time, building his throne with corpses and leaving a legacy of bloodshed in his wake.

He killed his way to the top and he’d never had any qualms about it...until today.

Through the most absurd of events, he lay on the cold ground, beheaded.

There was no regret, just immeasurable anger at dying so pathetically, along with vast portions of denial.

No matter what tricks his opponent pulled off, the possibility, no, the concept of the possibility of failure never reached Alvarach’s mind.

’No...that’s not true’ he reflected.

Thinking back, there were multiple instances where he was on the losing end.

He even ran away to Quartez in fear of dying.

But every time, his unbridled confidence of being able to bounce back blinded him.

When he did bounce back, he wanted to make sure to torture Ezra, in contrast to neatly ending his life at the first opportunity.

Anger erupted again.

’I should’ve won!’

So many different times, he could’ve ended Ezra’s life, yet didn’t.

Staying at the top in his world for so long had deluded his senses, shifting his perspective away from reality.

He kept looking for satisfaction while in a battle to the death, toying with his opponent.

Now, after all his threatices, lay motionless, soon to die.

His pridefulness-his identity summarized in one word-had become his undoing.

He could almost a voice asking him, "Are you now satisfied?"

Beyond deplorable, his state of anguish was just pitiful.

Two Mythic ranks battled, and he ended up losing.

’How pathetic’ he thought, when he felt a strong pull on his life force.

That was his last thought.

Till death took him away, the concept of his loss was still inconceivable to him.

That he mustered his full ability and lost, was just a disconnect he could come to terms with.

What a way to go.