THE VILLAIN'S POV Chapter 735: The King’s Eye vs The Hand of the Ruler (4)

Wesker possessed the cursed eye, a gift bestowed upon him by the Demon King himself.

As his final moments approached, the ultimate technique of the King’s Eye was triggered.

The entire world came to a standstill.

The flow of time ground to a halt.

The surrounding void faded into a dull gray.

In this realm of absolute stillness, the King’s Eye remained the solitary living thing, pulsing with a faint rhythm...

...until dark energy and corrupted blood began to coalesce around it once more.

Wesker’s physical form was reconstructed.

A look of pure irritation was etched into his features.

Everything in his vicinity remained frozen in place...

Gehrman, Abraham, and every living soul across the globe were locked in stasis.

"Ah... damn it.

That bastard actually pushed me to use the King’s Eye in the end.

Gehrman, you servant of Nameless...

You are truly the most irritating adversary I have ever encountered."

By activating the King’s Eye, Wesker had discarded Gehrman’s final attack, completely erasing the phenomenon from existence.

Such was the Eye’s true power—

To deny any reality that posed a threat to its owner’s life.

"It was a commendable struggle...

But you have lost, Saint.

You failed to end me—and you are still trapped within my domain."

"Abraham Starlight won’t be able to interfere again,

And I still have enough Qi and aura to launch my most devastating techniques once more."

Wesker reached out his hand toward the immobile Gehrman.

"How tragic... but this is the conclusion.

A power granted by King Agaroth himself is not something you can overcome."

Wesker prepared to deliver the finishing blow...

When, at the very last second...

His vision caught something utterly impossible.

An occurrence that defied all logic.

Here, inside the gray reality suspended by the King’s Eye...

Wesker should have been the only entity capable of motion.

The only being that still held color.

And yet... for the first time...

Something else began to move.

It wasn't a whole person.

It was just a single limb.

Gehrman’s right hand.

The hand that had remained unused throughout the entire confrontation.

The limb encircled by those clock-like rings, their hands rotating without end.

Even within this frozen, monochromatic world...

The blue clock rings kept spinning, completely unaffected by the stasis.

Then...

Right before Wesker’s stunned eyes—

The clock hands stopped for the first time.

Signaling that the end had arrived.

And the moment they ceased their movement...

A sound reached Wesker’s ears that chilled him to the bone.

Laughter.

Gehrman was laughing.

He had violated the taboo.

No...

He had completely shattered the law-breaking technique itself.

Gehrman lifted his head within the frozen gray world and stared directly at Wesker.

"Finally...

You decided to reveal that cursed eye."

Gehrman grinned.

It was a terrifying expression...

The smile of a predator that had at last trapped its quarry.

Wesker attempted to strike... but realized he was the one now frozen, unable to budge without even knowing when it happened.

Innumerable rings, identical to the ones on Gehrman's hand, manifested around his body... and around the King’s Eye itself.

This time, it was he who was trapped in stasis.

Not his enemy.

"Impossible!!! The King’s Eye is absolute!! Only I and Demon King Agaroth should be able to move in this world—how can you do this?!" Wesker screamed in a fit of rage as Gehrman walked toward him slowly.

"You place far too much faith in your precious eye, Demon of the Fourth Rank," Gehrman remarked with a calm tone.

"Let me share something fascinating... a lesson my master, Nameless, taught me many years ago... so long ago that the years have blurred together."

Gehrman’s grin grew wider as memories of the past flooded back to him.

"Once, I posed a vital question to my master Nameless.

I asked: What is the genuine weakness of the incredibly powerful Top Ten Demons?

I wanted to understand what those eyes behind his mask actually perceived.

Do you know how he replied to me that day?"

Gehrman let out a loud laugh, holding his right hand out in front of Wesker’s chest.

"The very powers they were given by Agaroth."

"That was his response... an answer that left me standing there in shock, unable to grasp his meaning at the time. Hah... the irony."

This was a rare sight; Gehrman was laughing without restraint, showing a side of his personality that almost no one had witnessed.

"It took me many, many years... but I finally grasped his meaning," Gehrman went on, his voice growing louder.

"And I can only stand in awe—because my master Nameless viewed the world from a vantage point far beyond anything you or I could imagine!"

Wesker’s expression twisted in agony as the King’s Eye was suppressed entirely, leaving him defenseless.

"What the hell are you rambling about, you bastard?!" Wesker hissed.

Gehrman spoke on without pausing.

"The abilities to break the boundaries of the world that Agaroth gave you are immensely powerful... so strong they are among the most lethal weapons in existence.

But you depend on them far too heavily. To such an extent that the second those abilities fail to work as you intend..."

He stopped, his smile vanishing, replaced by a cold, ruthless gaze.

"...you lose instantly."

"Even you, Wesker, never once dreamed that a day would come when someone would neutralize your eye.

Maybe you expected it from the Demon King... or from Nameless himself.

But never from a person like me."

Gehrman’s eyes turned into slits.

"Unfortunately for you... I have a similar power."

"This is the Hand of the Ruler."

"It functions much like the King’s Eye.

Your eye can reject events that threaten your survival.

As for my technique... once it is active, I can reject one specific phenomenon during a fight."

"However, the price is that I cannot use my right hand to fight for the duration of the battle."

"It is a lesser version of your King’s Eye."

Gehrman narrowed his gaze further, a trace of bitter humor touching his face.

"Before I became a subordinate to my master Nameless... before my death...

I faced Agaroth himself when the demons tried to invade Irithyll... my home."

"In that conflict, I used the Hand of the Ruler against Agaroth."

"Do you know how he responded?"

Once more, Gehrman erupted into a loud laugh... a stark contrast to his typical stoic demeanor.

"He reflected everything back at me using his King’s Eye!!

Can you believe it?"

"In the end..." Gehrman said, still chuckling,

"the one who uses their power first is the one who loses."

"That was the deciding factor in our duel."

"The person who inspired the strategy to defeat you...

The one who finally made me understand what my master Nameless meant all those years ago..."

"...was none other than your own sovereign—Agaroth himself!"

"A truly twisted fate, wouldn’t you agree?"

Between the sound of Gehrman’s laughter...

And Wesker’s state of shock...

The truth became evident.

The King’s Eye.

The Hand of the Ruler.

Two abilities that mirrored each other perfectly.

And whoever used theirs first—could have it turned back upon them by the other.

In the past, the King’s Eye held by Agaroth had beaten Gehrman’s Hand of the Ruler.

But this time...

The victory belonged to Gehrman.

Against Wesker, the second person to wield the King’s Eye.

Gehrman laughed...

And laughed...

And laughed...

Then—at last—he went quiet.

"Yes... fate certainly enjoys playing with us," Gehrman whispered, reaching out with his hand.

And in that heartbeat...

BOOOOOOM!!!

The thunderous sound of annihilation ripped through the air as time resumed its course.

Black, foul blood sprayed everywhere as Gehrman crushed Wesker’s chest with a strike of impossible speed.

"Even until the very end..." Gehrman muttered,

"...it toys with us."

As Wesker’s corpse plummeted from the heavens...

Gehrman remained standing, held up by his failing vessel...

Claiming his triumph.