In the suffocating darkness, Soren suddenly felt an eye, buried deep within the Fallen Land, staring straight into his soul. A tide of corrupt power surged up, brimming with a single intent….
There was no mistaking it.
Even though Mephisto's aura had twisted beyond recognition after gorging himself on the origin's corruption, there was only one being within the abyss who hated Soren to this degree.
Soren exhaled slowly, for his enemies, he had never known mercy. There was no compromise and only one ending… eradication.
Despite the terrifying pressure rolling through the Fallen Land, Soren was far from helpless. His understanding of the Time Gem and Space Gem had deepened immensely.
Time and space bent gently at his fingertips, ready to unravel the monstrous power Mephisto had stolen.
He didn't need to destroy an entire plane to kill Mephisto… but if it came to that… he wouldn't shy away.
"Hehahehe." A shrill laughter suddenly erupted from ahead.
"Soren, you've finally arrived! Tell me…." Mephisto's voice distorted wildly, "Should I feel honored? Or should I pity your foolishness for walking into your own grave?"
"Idiot." Soren approached, unmoved. Three cold, precise syllables.
"…!" The effect was immediate.
The Fallen Land convulsed violently as streams of corrupt energy surged like rivers, and Mephisto devoured every drop. His body swelled grotesquely, shapes writhing beneath his skin until even his facial features were swallowed by the boiling inside him.
Thin, jagged fissures form and heal in frantic succession. Every breath he exhaled seemed to grind against reality itself.
Soren felt his expression tighten for a moment at the sight… but his mouth remained sharp. "Mephisto, what did you eat to end up looking like that?"
"Constipation from absorbing too many losses? Don't tell me you still haven't healed from the beatings I gave you the last three times."
"AHAHAAH!" With a guttural, inhuman scream, he lunged at Soren. The space around Soren compressed instantly, crushing down with the weight of an entire plane.
Time stuttered…
Soren was locked in place.
Almost.
"Break!"
The command pulsed from him, and the Space Gem flared. Space buckled around him, snapping the abyss's pressure in an instant.
Mephisto's first strike tore past him as Soren flashed away, and the resulting impact punched through the ground.
A vast section of the Fallen Land collapsed, opening into a bottomless chasm. The shockwave tore outward, splitting the dead ground into jagged fragments.
"Not bad," Soren taunted, casually stepping aside as another blow from Mephisto shattered the bone-dry earth beneath them. "Swallowing half a plane finally gave you enough strength to stand up straight."
Every word was bait, thrown out with perfect skin-digging precision. And Mephisto took it exactly as intended.
The demon's distorted body trembled with rage.
He shook the dead land, and the corrupted origin he had devoured surged violently inside him. He struck again and again, each blow tearing fissures across the battlefield, each impact warping space to the breaking point.
The pressure of the entire abyssal plane pressed down, trying to crush Soren's body into stillness.
But Soren slipped between the collapsing spaces, cloak brushing past blades of the broken dimension.
Good, keep raging.
Mephisto's offense grew faster, but also more uncoordinated. He had seized the polluted origins of the Fallen Land too quickly, forcing the power into himself without understanding it.
Anger, hatred, and the hunger for annihilation fueled everything, but none were effective techniques.
Soren's every dodge and every seeming retreat was focused. He pushed Mephisto harder, forcing him to burn deeper into the unstable power boiling inside his body.
Because buried beneath Soren's sleeve, two magic circles slowly unfolded.
One, the geometric lattice of Space, forming patterns only Space Gem wielders could read.
The other a nearly invisible sigil spiraling etched in flowing temporal runes.
The Circle of Accelerated Time. A spell Soren had not used in far too long.
Mephisto didn't notice and he had stopped noticing anything. His intelligence drowned beneath, his instincts overridden by the sheer intoxicating madness of raw origin power.
Blow after blow missed and Strike after strike tore the battlefield apart. The Fallen Land splintered as Mephisto's force carved canyons deep enough to swallow fortresses whole.
Soren, however, was calm.
The power Mephisto stole had no weaknesses, but Mephisto himself did.
He couldn't control this strength.
The last piece of the time circle slid into place, glowing faintly.
"Exactly as planned."