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"Enjoy yourself? Invade Black Abyss? How arrogant!"
Soul Scale's distorted, shrill voice rang out again, seething with rage at being provoked. "Do you truly believe that because you got lucky defeating Zero, who was only powered by the strength I lent him, you can actually contend with us, the Eighteen Demon War Gods?"
"Today, the projections of myself and my five brothers each carry power far greater than what possessed Zero that day!"
"Let me show you what true despair looks like!"
As Soul Scale's voice faded, the six illusory demon projections erupted simultaneously with monstrous, malevolent Magic Power.
Pitch-black energy poured out from the palace like a rising tide, swallowing the sky above the entire Principality of Veronica in an instant. Day turned to night. Only the crimson light pulsing within that dark Magic Power offered any dim illumination.
The countless thin threads connected to the heads of the citizens suddenly blazed with light.
The people of Veronica, drained of blood and reduced to puppets, began to convulse violently. They were not merely puppets; they were sacrifices, fuel for the demon clones to fully descend into the world.
The threads converged upward into the six demon projections, feeding them, making their auras more terrifying and more substantial with every passing second.
At that moment, the clones of the six Demon War Gods had truly arrived.
Aside from Soul Scale, whom Noah had encountered before, the other five were the Thunder Demon, the Flame Demon, the Ice Demon, the Wind Demon, and the Earth Demon.
Thunder, fire, ice, wind, and earth. The five elements erupted in a boiling frenzy as the five Elemental Demons manifested. Combined with Soul Scale's power, the very air seemed to freeze.
A vast, crushing malice had already locked onto Noah.
Soul Scale's twisted voice rang out once more. "Noah, first, taste the lavish feast I have prepared for you."
With those words, the tens of thousands of citizens across the Principality of Veronica, all reduced to marionettes, turned their heads in perfect unison. Their hollow, lifeless eyes fixed upon Noah.
Immense resentment, death qi, and the despair wrung from forcibly extracted lives transformed into a torrent of gray death light that crashed down like a waterfall, aimed directly at him.
Before it even arrived, the power it carried had already begun to spread. It was the kind of force capable of corroding souls and eroding flesh and bone. The ground beneath it quickly withered and began to crack.
Noah stood perfectly still. He did not even look up at the torrent of Magic Power poised to annihilate everything below it. He simply raised his right hand, slowly, fingers spread, palm facing upward.
Then he clenched his fist.
Centered on Noah, an immense azure Magic Array unfurled in an instant, expanding outward until it covered the entirety of the Principality of Veronica.
The combined force of Magnetic Field Power and Magic Power radiated with overwhelming strength. It was powerful enough that even the six demon clones, who had been certain of their victory only moments ago, felt a sudden chill of dread.
The surging Magic Power in the sky was seized as if by an invisible giant hand and scattered apart. The threads connected to the heads of the citizens snapped one by one, and the blank-eyed puppets, like marionettes with their strings cut, crumpled to the ground.
The death force Soul Scale had prepared for Noah dissolved into nothing.
"Attack together! Tear him apart!"
The first to strike was the projection of the Earth Demon, a creature as massive as a mountain, its body riddled with enormous mouths. It opened the largest of them and unleashed a torrent of sand-breath that devoured light, flooding toward Noah like a collapsing dam. Space itself splintered with cracks wherever it passed.
Noah did not dodge. He swung a single fist at the oncoming tide of mud and sand, and from that motion, a subtle gust of wind was born, one that instantly grew into a storm that tore through the heavens and earth.
Demonic Martial Arts: Wind Slash Blade!
The wind shed its formless nature and became countless azure wind blades, each one shimmering with cold light, spinning and cutting in every direction. They shredded the Earth Demon's attack with ease.
The storm of wind blades, undiminished, drove straight into the Earth Demon's clone.
"No!"
The Earth Demon's terrified wail lasted only an instant before his massive form was carved apart by countless blades, stripped completely clean in a flash.
One move.
The clone of Earth Demon, one of the Eighteen Demon War Gods, had been annihilated.
The remaining five demon projections went still. For the first time, something resembling genuine horror flickered in their eyes.
In that moment of stunned silence, Noah was gone.
The next instant, he stood before the clone of the "Flame Demon," a lizard-like creature cloaked in pitch-black demonic flames.
"You are too ugly," Noah said plainly, glancing at the Flame Demon's form. "An eyesore." Then, with fingers held like blades, he swung his hand in a single casual motion.
Demonic Martial Arts: Extreme Fire Blast!
Searing heat and a burst of explosive flame engulfed the Flame Demon in an instant. His pitch-black demonic fire was powerless against it. Before he could even struggle, more than half of his body had been blasted into a sky full of ash.
Two moves. Another demon slain.
Noah didn't spare the Flame Demon a second glance. He turned and drove his fist backward.
Behind him, the Ice Demon had lunged in with a giant fist armored in thick ice, attempting a sneak attack. The two strikes met at precisely the same moment.
What followed was not the sound of impact. It was the dense, rapid cracking of ice.
The Ice Demon's entire arm shattered. The force behind Noah's seemingly ordinary punch tore straight through the Ice Demon's clone. Beneath that unremarkable fist, the Ice Demon's solid armor was as fragile as glass.
"How is this possible?! My body..."
He never finished the sentence. The Ice Demon's clone collapsed completely, fading into the air with a look of disbelief.
Three moves. Three demon clones of the Eighteen Demon War Gods had fallen, as effortlessly as a tiger walking through a flock of sheep.
The Thunder Demon and Wind Demon turned on Soul Scale, the one who had brought them here. "Soul Scale! Is this your plan?! Is this the 'slightly stronger human' you told us about?!"
Soul Scale himself was shaken.
He had known Noah was powerful. That was precisely why he and his five brothers had used the entire Principality of Veronica as a sacrifice to summon their clones and construct this killing trap. These clones carried roughly seventy percent of their original bodies' strength, yet Noah had dismantled each of them with a single exchange.
Less than a year had passed since they last faced each other, and Noah's strength had grown to a degree Soul Scale could not comprehend. Was this being truly human?
Soul Scale forced himself to calm down. "Stop panicking! We are only the bait to draw him in. Have you forgotten that Wheel of Fate and Ankhseram are still waiting behind us?"
Wheel of Fate, the strongest of the Eighteen Demon War Gods, whose power surpassed all the others, a terrifying existence capable of standing against Ankhseram, the God of Life and Death himself.
Hearing the name of their leader, the Thunder Demon and Wind Demon steadied themselves. Soul Scale was right. They were the bait. The ones truly intending to kill Noah were Wheel of Fate and Ankhseram, waiting behind them.
Because Noah's existence had made both of those beings uneasy.
Soul Scale exchanged a glance with the remaining two Demon War Gods. Frenzied Magic Power ignited within all three of their bodies.
Just as Noah braced for a final stand, the bodies of Soul Scale and the Wind and Thunder Demons exploded. They dissolved into a surging torrent of blood-colored mist that poured down and swallowed the earth below.
Within moments, the space surrounding the Principality of Veronica came apart under a strange and terrible power.
And then, the entire Principality of Veronica plunged heavily into the boundless blood-colored mist below, leaving behind nothing but a vast, seemingly endless abyss in its place.