Chapter 26: The Battle of Concepts
The roof of the Headmaster's Tower was a ruin of shattered stone and leaking magical energy. The wind howled through the gaps in the defensive formations, carrying the scent of ozone and Emperor-level blood.
On one side stood Silence, the assassin of the Arbiters. He floated a few inches off the ground, cloaked in armor that seemed to absorb the moonlight. His aura was terrifying—a Half-Step Demigod. In this Low-Level World, he was practically a deity. A being who had touched the threshold of Divinity.
On the other side stood me. Rudra Ye.
Fifteen years old. Foundation Establishment cultivation. Wearing a grease-stained chef's apron over my black robes. Holding a sword that crackled with black lightning.
It was, by all accounts, a ridiculous matchup. An ant challenging a boot.
"A student," Silence repeated, his voice vibrating with amusement. He tilted his head, his faceless mask reflecting the starlight. "Altair, you have truly fallen. You send a child to die in your place?"
Headmaster Altair, clutching his bleeding chest, tried to stand. "Rudra... leave... his Domain... it halts time..."
"Shh," I said without looking back. "Save your breath, old man. You look terrible."
I stepped forward, the rubble crunching under my boots.
"Silence, was it?" I asked, twirling Antakala in my hand. "You serve the Arbiters. That means you use Providence Qi. Borrowed power. Fake divinity."
Silence stiffened. "You know of the Providence? Who are you?"
"I'm the guy who cleans up the trash," I grinned, my silver eyes flashing. "And you are littering on my campus."
Silence laughed. It was a dry, rasping sound.
"Arrogant whelp. Die."
He didn't move. He simply looked at me.
Domain Expansion: The Silent Void.
The world turned grey.
Sound vanished.
Color vanished.
Time itself seemed to freeze. The wind stopped blowing. The dust motes in the air hung suspended.
This was the power of a Half-Step Demigod—the ability to enforce one's will on reality. Inside his Domain, nothing moved unless he allowed it.
I felt the pressure clamp down on my body like a vice. My heart struggled to beat. My lungs couldn't draw air.
Silence glided toward me, his dagger raised. He moved leisurely, enjoying the sight of his frozen prey.
"A Foundation Establishment cultivator resisting a Domain?" he mocked, reaching out to slit my throat. "Physics does not allow it."
"Physics," I forced my mouth to move, my voice cutting through the unnatural silence. "Is a suggestion."
Seal 3: The Sword Emperor.
Concept: Severance.
I didn't try to overpower his Domain with Qi. I didn't have enough.
Instead, I attacked the concept of the Domain itself.
I raised Antakala.
The black blade hummed. It wasn't constrained by time or space. It was a weapon forged to kill laws.
SHING.
I slashed downward.
It looked like I was cutting empty air.
But a black line appeared in the grey world.
CRACK.
The grey reality shattered like a glass window. The sound rushed back in with a deafening roar. The wind howled again.
Silence stumbled back, his Domain broken. He looked at the air in front of him, where a jagged tear in space was slowly healing.
"Impossible," Silence whispered, his composure breaking. "You... you cut my Domain? With a physical sword? That defies the laws of cultivation!"
"I told you," I said, stepping through the shards of his broken technique. "I corrected the grammar."
Silence's demeanor changed instantly. He realized I wasn't a normal student.
"Target re-evaluated," he hissed. "Threat Level: High. Terminate immediately."
He vanished.
This wasn't speed. This was Spatial Blinking. He folded space to appear directly behind me, his dagger aiming for my kidneys. The dagger dripped with Grey Qi—the toxic, soul-corroding energy of the Unknown Rulers.
"Rudra! Behind you!" Altair screamed.
I didn't turn around.
I opened the pores on my back.
'Technique: Heaven-Devouring Sutra.'
'Mode: Energy Siphon.'
When the dagger touched my robes, I didn't block it.
I ate the energy coating it.
Slurp.
The Grey Qi—the divine poison meant to kill an Emperor—was sucked into my body. My Void Soul devoured it instantly, breaking it down into raw fuel.
"Spicy," I commented.
Silence froze again. His dagger, now stripped of its power, harmlessly bounced off the Stellar Meteorite fibers I had woven into my apron.
"You absorbed the Grey Qi?" Silence gasped, retreating to the edge of the roof. "That is the breath of the Arbiters! No mortal can touch it without their soul rotting! What are you?!"
"I am what comes after the End," I said.
I attacked.
I utilized the War God's Step. I cleared the distance between us in zero seconds.
I swung Antakala.
Silence panicked. He summoned a shield of Grey Qi.
CLANG.
My sword hit his shield.
Normally, a Foundation Establishment attack would bounce off a Demigod shield.
But Antakala was eating the shield as it cut.
The black lightning on the blade chewed through the Grey Qi like acid.
"Argh!" Silence screamed as the feedback burned his arm.
He was terrified. He was a Half-Step Demigod fighting a boy, but every time he used his power, the boy ate it. He was fighting a black hole.
"You are a monster!" Silence roared. "You are the Anomaly Vex warned about!"
He reached into his chest armor and pulled out a talisman. It was blood-red.
"I cannot kill you," Silence realized. "But I can take you with me. Sacrificial Art: Star Collapse!"
He crushed the talisman.
His body began to glow with blinding white light. He was going to self-destruct.
A Half-Step Demigod self-destructing would not just destroy the tower; it would vaporize the entire Academy and half the capital city.
"Die!" Silence laughed maniacally. "Let's see you eat this!"
Headmaster Altair watched in horror. "No... the city..."
I looked at the glowing bomb that was formerly an assassin.
"Eat a nuclear explosion?" I mused. "That might give me indigestion."
I sheathed Antakala.
"Ria," I spoke into my comms. "Calculations?"
"Detonation in 3 seconds," Ria's voice replied in my ear. "Blast radius: 40 kilometers. Survival probability: 0%."
"Solution?"
"Open the Ring."
I grinned. "Good girl."
I ran toward Silence.
"You want to blow up?" I shouted. "Do it somewhere else!"
I grabbed Silence by his glowing armor.
He looked confused. "You... you grab me? You will die first!"
"Not here," I said.
I channeled every ounce of my Qi into the Ouroboros Ring.
"World Shift!"
ZAP.
Space twisted.
Me and Silence vanished from the rooftop.
Inside the Ouroboros Ring.
We appeared in the sky above the pocket dimension.
We were ten kilometers up, high above the fake sun.
Silence looked around. He saw the floating mountains. He saw the mana sea.
"Where... where is this?"
"My pantry," I said.
I let go of him and kicked him downward.
"Have a nice trip."
I used the ring's authority to teleport myself back to the surface instantly.
The Headmaster's Tower.
I reappeared on the roof next to Altair.
"Cover your ears," I advised.
RUMBLE.
The air in front of us rippled.
Even though the explosion happened in a separate dimension, the sheer force of a Demigod self-destructing caused a shockwave to bleed through the spatial anchor.
The Ouroboros Ring on my finger glowed white-hot.
It absorbed the shock.
Inside the ring, the explosion detonated high in the sky, harmlessly dissipating into the void boundary of the pocket world. It probably scared the Star-Turtle, but the Academy was safe.
Silence fell. The assassin was gone.
I stood there, smoke rising from my ring. My apron was singed. My Qi was drained.
Headmaster Altair stared at me. He was clutching his wound, but he seemed to have forgotten the pain.
He looked at the empty space where the assassin had been.
He looked at my ring.
He looked at my eyes—which were slowly fading from silver back to brown.
"You..." Altair wheezed. "You moved him... to a sub-dimension?"
I sat down on a piece of rubble, exhausted.
"I threw him in the trash," I said. "Like I said. I'm the janitor."
Altair laughed. It was a weak, wet sound, but it was genuine.
"A janitor who wields the Sword Emperor's Intent and commands Space Laws... The Heavens truly have a twisted sense of humor."
He coughed, blood spilling from his lips. The Anti-Magic Poison was still eating him.
"I am dying, Rudra," Altair said softly. "The poison... it attacks the Golden Core directly. Even an Emperor cannot survive it."
I looked at him.
"You gave me a library card," I said, standing up and walking over to him. "And you protected me from Vex. I pay my debts."
I placed my hand on his chest, directly over the wound.
"This will hurt," I warned.
"Do your worst," Altair smiled weakly.
'Technique: Heaven-Devouring Sutra.'
'Mode: Poison Extraction.'
I pushed my Void Qi into his body.
The grey poison tried to fight back. It was sentient, malicious.
But my Void Qi was the apex predator. It swarmed the poison, latching onto it like piranhas.
Slurp. Slurp.
I pulled the grey liquid out of his wound. It flowed into my hand, forming a dark, writhing sphere of toxin.
Altair gasped as the pain vanished. His color returned. His Emperor aura began to stabilize.
I held the ball of poison in my hand.
"Rank-5 Anti-Magic Toxin," I analyzed. "Rare stuff. Vex really wanted you dead."
I crushed the ball, absorbing the energy.
Burp.
"Tastes like licorice."
I offered a hand to the Headmaster.
"Up you go, old man. We have a Tournament to prepare for."
Altair took my hand. He stood up, shaky but alive.
He looked at me with a gaze that held profound respect.
"Rudra," Altair said seriously. "Tonight, you saved the Academy. You saved me. And you revealed... far too much."
"I trust you," I said simply. "Because you hate the Arbiters as much as I do."
Altair nodded. He looked at the stars.
"The envoys arrive in two weeks. Vex will try again. And the teams from the other worlds... they are monsters, Rudra. True monsters."
"I know," I patted Antakala. "But they haven't met the Tenth Sovereign yet."
I turned to leave.
"By the way, Headmaster. Since I saved your life... can I get an extension on the library hours? Anya likes bedtime stories."
Altair smiled, the tension breaking. "You can have the whole damn library, kid. Just... try not to eat the books."
I jumped off the tower, vanishing into the night.
Altair watched me go.
"He isn't a Sleeping Dragon," Altair whispered to the wind. "He is the End of Days."