Midra was called a Lord of Fire, yet he was the complete opposite of Nolan. If Nolan was fire itself, then Midra was more like kindling set alight.
There was no such thing as kindling that burned forever in this world, just as there was no fire that never went out in the world of Dark Souls. The fate of kindling was always to be burned away.
In that fraction of a second, Three Fingers remembered the Goddess and Lord who had once cast it deep beneath the earth. That murky darkness, that helplessness like the void itself.
It was as if it had returned to a time that had never changed since antiquity.
This was a stalemate. At least for Three Fingers, it was a stalemate. It had no way to deal with the young man before it.
Midra, the Lord of Frenzied Flame, was facing a new Lord who had reached the peak of human martial skill, yet he was utterly unable to launch an effective attack against him.
Even the all-pervasive Frenzied Flame, which covered the whole world at every moment, could barely touch the hem of this human's clothing, even when Three Fingers controlled and released it personally.
As for Nolan, the Lord of Frenzied Flame rampaging across the land now was defined by "distortion" and "power," but he was nothing more than an indestructible cockroach.
The Greatsword left wound after wound on Midra, but to the Lord of Frenzied Flame, it was no more than extinguishing one cluster of flames after another in a bonfire, making one loyal subject after another sacrifice themselves for him.
In those few minutes, Nolan had already attacked nearly a thousand times, swinging the burning sword nearly a thousand times. Those thousand slashes were enough to flatten Shadow Keep.
Because of that, the already low-lying and battered Abyssal Woods sank several more meters, and the earth itself had been carved into eerie smooth planes and sharp edges.
Yet the Lord of Frenzied Flame, the one suffering through it all, showed not the slightest sign of exhaustion. From beginning to end, that fire-eye remained fixed on the human who kept making him shatter and reform.
The enormous slash that had just cut through the Abyssal Woods was Nolan's final probing attack.
He fell back from the sky to the ground, now reduced to scorched earth. This time, he did not shatter the ground again and swing his blade at the mad Lord.
Nolan gripped the legendary deep-blue Greatsword tightly. The blade hung straight at his side, its still edge cutting through the breeze as he raised his head and looked at Midra.
The two of them stared at each other in silence. Neither said a word.
In that moment, both the Lord of Frenzied Flame and Nolan sank into stillness, even as twisted or magnificent fire burned around them without cease.
"Why did he suddenly stop?" Florissax narrowed her eyes.
The Flying Dragons looked at one another, afraid they might be blown away again by the storm stirred up by air torn apart by another slash.
They stared at the fire-wreathed figures on the ground, who had suddenly stopped moving, and their expressions turned strange.
Perhaps their nerves had been battered too long by the endless roar of slashes and rolling waves of air. Now that everything had suddenly gone quiet, an indescribable sense of anticipation welled up in the depths of their hearts instead.
Wasn't a peak duel between Lords supposed to continue like this forever?
Shouldn't the two sides keep clashing and killing amid earth-shaking roars and blinding flames until one of them finally fell and died? Wasn't that the only true ending?
"Don't ask me. How would I know?" Melina said in a low voice. Staying beside this Ancient Dragon was already her limit.
If she moved any farther away, she might be forcibly pulled back to that man's side.
She really did not know why Mother had set such a rule. Trina and Miquella were both spirit forms too, yet they were so free. Could Mother also be a fool?
"Are they... not going to fight anymore?" Florissax asked softly.
But the question sank like a stone into the sea. No one could give her a definite answer.
It was an absurd question.
The human Lord's ambition was this world. The Lord of Frenzied Flame's ambition was to destroy this world.
The war had already begun, and both sides were already standing on the battlefield. Whether for the throne, for this world, or for something else, this was the moment they should fight to the end.
They wanted different worlds. The only place they could stand together was the battlefield, and then only one side should remain standing. That was how it ought to be. There should have been no second possibility.
Perhaps they had been silent for too long, long enough that someone had to break the frozen scene.
So Midra looked at Nolan one last time, his fire-eye as emotionless as ever.
The wounds on his gaunt body had already healed. Under the glow of the dark yellow flames, his body trembled slightly, driving the surrounding heat wave back a step.
This time, Nolan did not stop him. He only raised his head and looked expressionlessly at his "cowardly" figure.
"What is that Lord doing?" Florissax suddenly pushed forward several meters, staring wide-eyed at the Lord named for the Frenzied Flame.
"That flame-headed... is he trying to run away? Why isn't Nolan moving? Is he going to let him go?" Melina looked confused. "Does Nolan have no way to deal with him? Has he given up...?"
"No." Miquella suddenly spoke. His voice was not loud, but there was no hesitation in it.
Miquella, who should have been the second most nervous person present, seemed unusually calm at this moment.
"The one who truly wants to stop fighting has never been Nolan, just as the one running away is not him."
Under the gaze of the entire dragon flock, Midra turned around. On that barren land, he stopped swinging his Greatsword and completely exposed his back to his opponent.
Nolan said nothing. In a way, this had opened his eyes. This was the first Lord he had ever met who ran away.
Then a dragon roar shook the heavens, and everyone saw fire spread across the earth.
It was fire from the human Lord, rising like a high wall and forcibly splitting the world in two.
Nolan quietly raised his head. For an instant, his body seemed to turn into burning charcoal, and he looked at the forced-to-stop Lord of Frenzied Flame as if remembering an old friend.
"I almost forgot. You were never a Lord at all, only a god through and through. And that Lord would never run. He would only suffer foolishly and call his beloved's name."
The entire Abyssal Woods were filled with that beautiful fire. Unimaginable heat and cold coexisted, light and dark filled every corner, and life and death lingered everywhere.
In that instant, true fire reached its ultimate form.
From the very beginning, Three Fingers had never intended to abandon this hard-won body here.
It had finally escaped from beneath the earth. It had finally gained a chance to embrace the truth.
So it ran. Nolan was right. It was not a Lord. It simply knew what to do and when to do it.
But now, it could no longer escape. That Lord had made up his mind to decide the outcome today.
It was forced to raise its sword, forced to charge, forced to stand in the place of a Lord, and as always, it failed to touch him.
The Greatsword shattered its body as before, but this time, there was something more.
Fire. Endless fire, stealing away its flames one by one.
Its body shattered as it always had, but it could no longer stand back up. The Lord who was no Lord was forced to die in a battle between Lords.