Chapter 37 — Instinct vs Instinct
The Revenant turned its head away from Shin.
For a split second, Shin thought it was retreating.
Then he realized something was wrong.
The pressure in the air shifted—not lighter, not heavier, but focused. Like a predator abruptly locking onto a more dangerous prey.
Shin squinted, blood drying at the corner of his mouth.
"Huh?" he muttered, then scowled. "You f*cking giant @$$ pig, we haven't finished our fight yet. Who the hell caught your attention?"
The Revenant didn't answer. It didn't roar. It didn't even move.
It simply stared.
Shin followed its gaze.
And his breath caught.
In front of the Revenant—
Vaibhav's unconscious body was standing.
Not rising. Not struggling.
Standing.
His posture was straight, shoulders squared, feet planted into the fractured ground as if he had never fallen in the first place. Dust slid off his clothes and skin, drifting away from him in slow spirals.
His eyes were open.
Pitch-black sclera.
Pupils glowing a flat, lifeless white.
There was no aura explosion. No overwhelming pressure wave. No surge of energy that screamed power.
Instead, something far worse spread outward from him.
Silence.
A dead, unnatural stillness that swallowed heat, noise, even the crackling of molten stone beneath their feet. It felt like standing near a cliff edge at night—no wind, no sound, only the certainty that one step forward meant death.
Shin clicked his tongue, a crooked grin tugging weakly at his face.
"Argh… this bastard."
He exhaled slowly, then—almost casually—dragged himself over to a broken slab of hive crystal and sat down, legs stretched out in front of him.
"This guy," he muttered, rubbing his sore ribs, "stole a good fight from me."
Vaibhav didn't look at Shin.
Didn't look at Alicia.
Didn't look at anything human.
His gaze was locked onto the Revenant.
Shin leaned back, resting his elbows on the slab, watching the two figures face each other like mirrored nightmares.
"Hmmm…" he murmured. "A battle between two monsters who run purely on instincts."
A grin spread across his bruised face.
"Let's see who wins."
The Revenant moved first.
It didn't hesitate this time.
It roared—not in rage, not in pain, but in challenge—and lunged forward, claws tearing through the ground as it closed the distance in a blur of black-violet motion.
Vaibhav moved.
No windup. No stance adjustment.
His body shifted just enough.
The Revenant's claw missed by centimeters, slicing only air.
Vaibhav's elbow came up like a piston, slamming into the creature's chest with a dull, concussive thud. The sound wasn't explosive—it was dense, like metal striking stone underwater.
The Revenant staggered back half a step.
Only half.
Its eyes flared.
It countered instantly, knee snapping upward toward Vaibhav's ribs.
Vaibhav twisted, forearm dropping to intercept. Bone met bone. The impact cracked loudly, echoing through the shattered battlefield.
They separated.
Then collided again.
No techniques.
No wasted movement.
Just raw, brutal exchanges—grabs, strikes, counters—each motion sharp, efficient, merciless.
Shin's grin slowly faded.
"…Damn," he muttered. "He's not fighting like Vyuk."
Vaibhav's body ducked under a sweeping claw and drove a short punch into the Revenant's abdomen. The strike didn't explode—but the creature's torso visibly dented inward, violet fissures flaring erratically.
The Revenant responded with a headbutt.
Vaibhav met it head-on.
Their skulls collided with a sound like stone cracking.
A shock ran through the ground beneath them, spiderwebbing fractures outward.
Neither fell.
The air rippled with every exchange, heat warping around their bodies as instinct clashed against instinct—one born from a hive's hunger, the other forged from a lifetime of perfected violence now moving without conscious restraint.
Behind them, Alicia groaned.
Her fingers twitched.
"…Vaibhav…?"
Her eyes fluttered open, vision blurred and swimming. Pain screamed through her chest where her armor spirit had shattered, every breath sharp and shallow.
She turned her head slowly—and froze.
She saw Vaibhav standing.
Fighting.
Not just fighting—dominating space with every movement.
She dragged herself weakly across the ground, grit scraping her palms, until she reached the broken slab where Shin sat.
Her voice was hoarse.
"Shin… shouldn't we help him?"
Shin didn't look away from the fight.
He shook his head once, slow and firm.
"Nah."
Alicia frowned weakly. "But he's—he's not conscious—"
"That's exactly why," Shin cut in.
He leaned forward slightly, elbows on his knees now, eyes sharp despite his injuries.
"Even if we try, we'll just get in his way," he said quietly. "Those two aren't fighting like humans."
The Revenant lunged again, grabbing Vaibhav by the shoulder and hurling him toward a jagged pillar.
Vaibhav twisted mid-air, planting one foot against the pillar and rebounding instantly, driving his knee into the Revenant's jaw with mechanical precision.
"They're fighting like beasts," Shin finished.
Alicia watched in horrified awe as Vaibhav's body flowed from strike to strike, movements stripped of hesitation, fear, emotion.
Pure execution.
"…He's terrifying," she whispered.
Shin snorted softly. "Yeah."
His gaze darkened.
"And that's not even his fighting style."
Meanwhile.
In a dim chamber, illuminated by a single hanging light.
Cold metal walls. No windows. No sound except the faint hum of machinery buried deep within the structure.
Two figures sat across from each other.
One was clearly visible.
Erik Johnson.
His posture was relaxed, but his eyes were sharp, calculating—eyes that had seen too much blood to flinch easily.
The other figure sat in shadow.
Its form was obscured, face hidden, voice distorted into something artificial and hollow.
The voice spoke calmly.
"Why did you kill Arvind Nyxer?"
Erik's jaw tightened.
For a moment, he didn't answer.
Then he leaned back in his chair, fingers lacing together.
"Because he was the biggest threat to our plan."
Memories flickered behind his eyes—fists moving too fast to follow, bodies dropping before techniques could even be named.
"Most strong cultivators," Erik continued, voice steady but edged with bitterness, "use traditional martial arts as inspiration."
He scoffed quietly.
"But Arvind didn't use them for inspiration."
He looked up, eyes hard.
"He modified them. Perfected them. Stripped away waste. Removed weakness. Turned them into something beyond human."
A humorless laugh escaped him.
"Even Zhao Kenjiro or Arun Nakamura couldn't beat him."
The unseen figure remained silent.
Erik went on.
"I… and Marcus… and a few others—we betrayed him."
His fingers clenched slightly.
"We couldn't defeat him in a fair fight. So we backstabbed him."
His eyes darkened.
"Even then, he killed everyone except me and Marcus."
A pause.
"We barely survived."
The silence stretched.
"But I wanted his martial arts," Erik said softly. "They were too strong. Too perfect."
His gaze lifted, burning.
"And no one that perfect is allowed to exist."
Elsewhere.
A large private training hall, sunlight streaming through high windows onto polished stone flooring.
Daichi bounced on his feet, fists raised, eyes blazing with excitement.
"Come on, Big Brother Prabhat!" he shouted. "I'll take you head on!"
Prabhat sighed, rolling his shoulders once. "Alright then."
On the sidelines, a gorgeous woman clapped enthusiastically, eyes bright with anticipation. Arjun, Theo, and Vivan stood nearby, arms crossed, observing in silence.
Daichi charged.
Fast. Aggressive. Reckless.
Prabhat didn't move.
He inhaled.
And stepped forward just enough.
Nyxer Style — Kyokushin Karate.
Iron Mountain Straight Punch (Tekken Ichi).
A short, compact punch driven by full-body compression—hips, spine, shoulders, fist aligning in perfect unity.
SMACK.
The impact cracked through the hall like a gunshot.
Daichi flew backward, tumbling across the floor before skidding to a stop in a heap.
"Ouch!!" Daichi sat up, eyes watering. "Big Brother Prabhat—your father's martial arts are too strong…"
Prabhat dusted his knuckles calmly.
"You asked for it."
The woman clapped harder, impressed.
Theo scolded Daichi for charging blindly. Vivan shook his head. Arjun hid a faint smile.
Daichi sniffed, then looked up hopefully. "Can I get snacks?"
"NOOO!!!"
Somewhere else.
In a place where darkness was the only truth, a lone man floated horizontally in the void, perfectly still, as though he were simply resting.[1]
His eyes remained closed, expression serene. Long black hair drifted weightlessly around his face, a single thin streak of white catching the non-existent light. His high-collared black coat hung neatly, untouched by any wind.
Directly beneath him, from the darkness—
A monstrous creature rose, silent and colossal. Its maw stretched impossibly wide, lined with rows of serrated fangs and clusters of unblinking eyes set into its armored hide. Thick saliva stretched between its jaws as it lunged upward, swallowing the floating man in one effortless motion.
The next heartbeat—
A matte-black blade erupted from the center of the creature's body.
White cracks of power spidered outward from within.
In a single, soundless flash, the monster was cleaved apart from the inside.
Here is the final, clean, novel-ready version of your scene with the exact Vigil design you want:
From the ruin rose a towering thirteen-foot figure, its skin a flawless, deathly pale white stretched tight over inhuman musculature, every line carved like living marble.
Its right forearm ended in a seamless, pitch-black blade that began at the wrist and extended far beyond, edges so keen they severed the darkness itself. The left arm terminated in five long, curved obsidian talons. Four cold, eyes were arranged in perfect symmetry across its face. Beneath them rested a thin, silent mouth.
Directly above its head hovered the Chakra — an motionless eight-handled wheel, ancient symbols carved deep into its surface.
The man lay horizontally across the still wheel as though it had been forged solely to bear him. Long black hair spilled over the rim like liquid shadow, high-collared coat perfectly undisturbed.
Then his eyes opened.
Pure black sclera.
Glowing white pupils.
The corner of his mouth lifted, barely.
"Vigil," he murmured, voice low and calm, echoing into the endless void.
"Let's go."
Far away, on Ignis Prime.
The fight escalated without warning.
The Revenant lunged again, claws tearing through the air in a brutal arc meant to bisect Vaibhav where he stood. Vaibhav's unconscious body moved before the strike completed—no hesitation, no wasted motion. His left foot slid back, heel grinding into the cracked stone, torso rotating just enough to let the claws pass a breath away from his chest.
Then his elbow came down.
Nyxer Style: Muay Thai —
Meteor Elbow Smash.
The motion was tight and brutal, driven by full-body rotation rather than raw swing. His shoulder dipped, spine coiled, and the elbow crashed into the Revenant's collarbone with a sound like a hammer striking iron. The impact traveled inward instead of outward, collapsing structure rather than exploding it.
The Revenant staggered sideways, one knee scraping the ground.
Alicia sucked in a breath. "That wasn't random…"
Shin's eyes narrowed. "Yeah. That was drilled."
The Revenant snarled and swung again, this time grabbing—its claw clamped around Vaibhav's forearm with crushing force, intending to tear the limb clean off. Vaibhav didn't resist the grip.
He stepped in.
His free hand snapped to the Revenant's wrist, fingers locking with surgical precision.
Nyxer Style: Qin Na —
Fen Jin — Tendon Separation Twist.
There was no dramatic windup. Just a sudden, vicious rotation of the wrist joint paired with a sharp inward pull. The Revenant's arm twisted into an unnatural angle, tendons snapping loose from their intended alignment. A wet crack echoed as the creature's grip failed.
The Revenant howled—not in pain, but in rage at the loss of control.
Vaibhav released instantly and pivoted, his body already moving into the next sequence. His feet planted, hips settled, spine aligned. For the first time since he'd stood up, his posture looked completely still.
Then he struck.
Nyxer Style: Kyokushin Karate —
Iron Mountain Straight Punch — Tekken Ichi.
The punch was short. Direct. Deceptively simple.
His fist drove forward like a pile driver, compressing the ground beneath his feet as if the world itself were being used as leverage. The blow slammed into the Revenant's ribcage with terrifying density. There was no flash of light, no shockwave halo—just a deep, internal crunch as bone folded inward.
The Revenant was launched backward, skidding across the battlefield, carving twin trenches into the stone before slamming into a jagged outcrop.
Shin let out a slow whistle. "Tch… so this is Arvind Nyxer's martial doctrine."
His expression sharpened, something between awe and unease settling into his eyes. "Damn scary, He's Old Man must've been a Monster."
Alicia watched Vaibhav's body advance again—calm, relentless, mechanical. "He's so strong…"
Shin nodded. "Yepp!"
The Revenant tore itself free from the rock, body twitching as it recalibrated. Violet fissures flared brighter along its torso, muscles tightening, instincts screaming to adapt. It charged again, abandoning finesse in favor of overwhelming force.
Vaibhav met it head-on.
They collided in a blur of motion—fist against claw, elbow against jaw, knee against abdomen. Each exchange was precise on Vaibhav's side, feral and adaptive on the Revenant's. Stone shattered beneath them as they exchanged blows at close range, the air warping with every impact.
The Revenant tried to overpower him with sheer mass, slamming its shoulder into Vaibhav's chest.
Vaibhav absorbed the hit by shifting his stance a fraction, letting the force bleed into the ground. His counter came instantly—another elbow, then a knee, then a short punch that hammered the creature's sternum.
The Revenant reeled, then snapped back with a vicious headbutt.
Vaibhav took it.
His head snapped to the side, blood misting the air—but his body didn't falter. He rotated through the impact, using it as momentum, and drove his forearm across the Revenant's throat, forcing it back again.
Alicia clenched her fists, half-risen despite the pain screaming through her body. "He's not even reacting to damage…"
"He is," Shin replied quietly. "Just not like a human."
He reached into a pocket at his side and pulled out a small vial filled with swirling green liquid. The glass caught the ambient glow of the battlefield, reflecting sharp highlights across its surface.
Alicia noticed. "Shin? What's that?"
Shin didn't look away from the vial. "My personally enhanced energy drink," he said casually. "Boosts stamina, adrenaline. Real nasty stuff."
He rolled the vial between his fingers.
The Revenant roared and lunged once more, this time aiming low, claws tearing toward Vaibhav's legs. Vaibhav stepped over the strike, pivoted on his heel, and delivered another Meteor Elbow Smash—this one crashing into the base of the Revenant's skull.
The creature slammed face-first into the ground.
Dust and fragments exploded outward.
For a moment, it didn't move.
Shin leaned forward slightly. "If that thing stays down—"
It didn't.
The Revenant pushed itself up again, slower now, movements less fluid. Its left arm hung at a wrong angle, tendons refusing to cooperate. Cracks along its ribcage pulsed erratically, violet light flickering like a failing circuit.
It was still adapting.
Still learning.
But so was Vaibhav's body.
He closed the distance again, movements tightening further, efficiency increasing with every exchange. Each strike landed where structure mattered most—joints, ribs, balance points. He wasn't trying to overpower the Revenant anymore.
He was dismantling it.
The Revenant swung wildly, desperation creeping into its attacks.
Vaibhav slipped inside the arc and drove another Iron Mountain Straight Punch into its abdomen. The blow folded the creature inward, forcing it to its knees for the first time.
The ground shook as the Revenant slammed one claw down, trying to rise.
Vaibhav planted his foot against its chest, pinning it briefly, and delivered a final elbow strike that sent the creature sprawling again.
Shin exhaled slowly, tension coiling in his shoulders. "This fight…"
Alicia whispered, barely audible. "It's like watching a weapon operate itself."
The Revenant dragged itself upright once more, breath ragged, body shuddering. Its violet eyes locked onto Vaibhav's empty gaze, instincts screaming both danger and challenge.
Vaibhav's body advanced without pause.
The battle raged on—fierce, violent, primal—two beings locked in a contest where instinct was the only law.
And neither showed any sign of stopping.
[1] Guys, imagine this Void Scene In black and white.