MIGHT AS WELL BE OP-Chapter 475: Zauren
"Die, you wretched firebird!"
Velmira, the last remaining subordinate of the Demon Monarch, cried out fiercely as her sabre descended in a deadly arc toward Zauren, the final Primarch Of Reality.
With effortless precision bordering on disdain, Zauren's scimitar swept forward.
Steel clashed against steel, igniting a shower of brilliant sparks.
"How dare you belittle me"
Velmira hissed, her voice laced with fury as her sabre abruptly shifted its course, aiming for Zauren's ribs.
Zauren's gaze sharpened, his eyes following the deadly strike with unerring calm. With practiced grace, his hand moved in perfect synchrony, guiding his scimitar to intercept her blade once again.
Zauren's second scimitar rose above Velmira's head, then descended with the weight and finality of a divine judgment.
The words on Velmira's lips froze. Her instincts took over, and she moved to evade, her steps fluid and precise.
But Zauren's follow-up was seamless, as though predicting her every motion, his second blade pursued her without hesitation, like it was the most natural course of action.
Velmira's eyes narrowed. This time, her sabre rose to meet the descending scimitar in a desperate block.
The impact reverberated through her entire frame, a crushing weight channeled through steel and bone.
Yet she held her ground. The earth beneath her feet cracked and gave way, buckling under the sheer force of the clash.
Noticing the opening in her stance, Zauren drove his knee forward in a vicious strike.
But Velmira was no novice; she was a battle-hardened demoness, her instincts forged through countless conflicts.
Though her gaze remained fixed on the scimitar above, her body moved with practiced intuition, intercepting the knee before it could land.
A thunderous bam echoed through the battlefield as the impact detonated a wave of force, shattering the surrounding air barrier in a concussive burst of wind.
"Bastard! I'll rip out your soul and torment it for eternity, then imprison it in the body of a Kākāpō bird!"
Velmira's voice rang out across the battlefield, sharp and venomous, as she exchanged blow after blow with Zauren.
Their blades clashed and parted in a successive rhythm, steel singing with each strike.
Yet Velmira refused silence. Her voice cut through the air, laced with fury and dark humor, hurling insults without pause, as if trying to unravel Zauren's composure, to bait him into a fatal misstep.
Then, for the briefest moment, Zauren's expression, normally carved from stone, shifted.
A faint crack of amusement, or perhaps something darker, flickered across his face as a thought took root.
If Velmira enjoyed shouting curses, he would give her a reason to scream.
Among the three Primarchs Of Reality, Zauren was widely regarded as the strongest.
His talent was Destruction itself, a force so absolute that entire legions had perished with a mere wave of his hand.
Zauren sidestepped yet another strike from Velmira's sabre with fluid ease. She was already preparing to follow up, when something unseen cracked against her face.
Her instincts screamed.
She knew Zauren's talent all too well. Destruction, wielded with terrifying precision, capable of unraveling matter with nothing more than a glance or thought. Without hesitation, her form blurred, vanishing from her position in a burst of motion.
One hand flew to her face, desperate to understand what had changed.
At first, her expression twisted into a frown. Then came the shock.
And finally, pure, unfiltered rage.
"YOU FUCKER!"
Her voice thundered across the sky like a war god's roar, shaking the very air. Her aura flared violently, and in the next instant, her Sword Intent exploded into existence, razor-sharp and seething with fury.
She could scarcely believe it.
Zauren… had destroyed her makeup.
Hours of meticulous effort, reduced to nothing in a single, casual glance. A masterpiece of artistry, shattered without a second thought.
Her face contorted with wrath, not from pain, but from sheer, incredulous rage.
Zauren stared at her, his face blank and unreadable, but behind those expressionsless eyes, thoughts stirred.
Weren't make up meant for women humans and women of other races, why was a demon wearing it. Was she trying to seduce other demons? Seeking a partner in the midst of chaos and war?
He had anticipated her reaction, predicted it with quiet certainty. In the end, women were all the same, regardless of their race or realm.
They all cared about their beauty and age.
A faint, almost imperceptible smile tugged at the corners of his lips as he watched her rage boil over, her screams echoing like a curse upon the wind.
Then, as quickly as it came, the smile vanished. His expression settled back into its usual neutrality, as though, for him, the moment had already passed.
Velmira surged forward, a blur of fury and motion, her speed now leagues beyond what she had shown before. This time, she held nothing back.
But, unfortunately for her… neither did Zauren.
Before she could even close the distance, before her blade could taste the air near him, he was already there.
In the midst of her charge, Zauren appeared before her, as if space itself had bent to his will. His movement defied reason, silent, instantaneous.
Zauren's hand clamped around her face like a flash of celestial punishment. In the next instant, he drove her down with monstrous force.
A thunderous boom cracked across the landscape as the ground beneath them crumbled, a vast sinkhole splitting open in the wake of impact.
But it wasn't Zauren's power alone that erupted. From the shattered point of collision, Velmira's Sword Intent detonated outward like a storm, shredding through the surroundings without hesitation or mercy.
Yet even in the heart of that chaos, she remained untouched. Her Sword Intent had cocooned her body in a protective aura, shielding her from the devastation she herself had unleashed.
"YOU FUCKING BIRD! I WILL KILL YOUR FAMILY, YOUR PARENTS, YOUR CHILDREN! I WILL ERASE THEM ALL!"
But Zauren remained unmoved by her furious tirade.
With nothing more than a single gaze, he shattered the Sword Intent that shielded her, reducing oblivion of nothingness.
Then, without hesitation, he descended into motion.
A punch. Then another. Then another.
Zauren's fists moved in a blur, each strike crashing into Velmira's body with brutal precision.
Head, chest, waist, nose, eyes, ribs, stomach, no part of her was spared. His blows came in rapid succession, a devastating storm of destruction.
Black blood geysered from each impact, splattering across him, but the moment it touched Zauren, it vanished without a trace.
Even the blood coating his fists disintegrated the instant they made contact, erased by his Talent.
Pain surged through Velmira's muscles, radiated in her nerves, and echoed in her very bones.
Her body convulsed involuntarily with each merciless blow.
With every strike from Zauren, they plunged deeper into the yawning sinkhole beneath them, the world closing in like a tomb.
She could not scream, her throat had been shattered. Just as it began to regenerate, Zauren's fist found it once more, crushing any hope of sound with brutal finality.
Helpless and broken, Velmira was trapped in a storm of unending torment.
Zauren finally rose from his lowered stance, his eyes calm as he watched Velmira's body twitch and slowly regenerate.
What had begun as a fierce duel had abruptly turned into a massacre, in mere seconds, she had been reduced from a warrior of countless battles to a shattered remnant.
He lifted his foot deliberately, his expressionless eyes locking onto her head.
Then, with cruel finality, his foot slammed down, accompanied by a sickening crunch.
Brain matter and blood splattered across the sinkhole's jagged edges, bones fracturing and scattering like shattered glass upon the earth.
Without hesitation, Zauren waved his hand once, and her broken corpse disintegrated into nothingness, erased as if it had never existed.
Zauren turned and walked away as if he were merely taking a stroll through a peaceful park, no sweat, no injuries, not a single drop of blood staining his form.
Had Kaelrix and Therionis been here to witness it, the expressionless masks they wore would have shattered, replaced by raw, unfiltered shock.
For Zauren had just slain Velmira with effortless ease, as if she were nothing more than a fleeting shadow.
This was a feat he had never achieved before. But now, it was possible, because he had transcended.
No longer bound by the limits of their shared mana rank, he was now a budding Supreme Monarch.
Yet, he harbored no intention of revealing this breakthrough to his brothers at least, not until they too had reached that point.
And he had no doubt they would.