THE VILLAIN'S POV Chapter 764: A - Written in Death (2)
Previously on THE VILLAIN'S POV...
Fulghor, Shadow Sect's War General, obviously yearned to leap into the fray—yet his present state made it impossible.
"I can tell you've depleted every bit of your aura in the clash with the Third-Rank Demoness," Gehrman remarked keenly.
As Gehrman hoisted himself onto Fulghor's shoulder, the latter gave a nod, and they departed the scene side by side.
"Forgive me, my old companion. If I hadn't taken half your strength, this setback wouldn't have struck," Gehrman uttered.
"No apologies are necessary," Fulghor responded steadily. "My energy helped bring down the Fourth-Rank High Demon, Wesker. That's more than enough justification to lend you all of it... much less just half."
Upon hearing those words, Gehrman released a soft sigh of ease while perched on Fulghor's shoulder.
Gradually, he twisted around to gaze upon the chaos of the battlefield trailing behind.
Frey Starlight dashed away in the other direction, bearing his kin... Abraham and Ada on his back.
Due to Amon's Transparent World blocking his teleportation abilities, Frey had to sprint physically out of its reach before activating long-range jumps once more. Inside that domain, his teleports were limited to brief hops within the barrier alone.
This forced Frey to flee on foot—hauling his family along while slashing through undead foes with his blade simultaneously.
Even amid the desperate circumstances, Frey kept his cool. His feelings scarcely surfaced now.
Observing this, Gehrman sensed a profound shift had occurred in Frey.
Then...
In that instant, as Gehrman fixed his eyes on Frey's vanishing form...
Frey spun about.
His sharpened awareness cut through the miles and turmoil, fixing directly on Gehrman... a stark sign of Frey Starlight's remarkable progress.
Gehrman's azure gaze connected with Frey's shadowy one.
Several wordless moments ticked by.
At once, both offered a mutual nod.
For the very first time, they met as equals.
No more the scheming tactician and the innocent mortal...
Instead, two genuine fighters locked in the same fierce struggle.
With that, the Shadow Sect pulled back from the fray, abandoning the field to the sudden arrival of a third force that stirred up mayhem with the demons.
Eventually, this whole clash would etch itself into legend...
The War of Shadows.
...
...
...
The clock kept ticking onward.
History refused to pause.
A complete day had elapsed since the skirmish concluded—and its ripples blasted through the globe.
Rumors raced far and wide at an alarming speed... not just over Earth, but across the vast realms beyond.
The key dispatches boiled down to these points:
The Shadow Sect has resurfaced, unleashing a brutal assault on the High Demons.
The results were jaw-dropping.
Its standout consequence:
The Shadow Sect managed to slay the Thirteenth-Rank High Demon, Geppetto... a prime asset in the demons' arsenal.
The Shadow Sect took down one of the Top Ten High Demons... namely the Tenth Rank, the Demons' War General... Zibar, wielder of the Soul of Reincarnation.
This revelation hit like lightning, jolting the world to its foundations. Ages had passed since anyone felled even one of the Ten High Demons.
But the real bombshell followed right on its heels.
Led by Saint Gehrman, who stormed back into the fight, the Shadow Sect also eliminated the Fourth High Rank—Wesker, holder of the King's Eye.
This bombshell ignited pandemonium everywhere—though the surprises didn't stop.
Thanatos had broken free.
One of the Original Soul Bearers had surfaced anew on Planet Earth.
All these updates flooded in over just one day... while Earth's war raged on.
Such developments rattled the world profoundly... particularly the tidings of Wesker's demise.
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Golmara — Home of the Ghouls
The tidings of the Fourth High Rank's end reached a primordial beast.
A creature boasting four limbs and a frame of deep scarlet muscle...
The third of the Seven Great Powers...
The Ghoul King, Radagon.
"That loathsome beast... Wesker... is truly gone?"
The Ghoul Sovereign stared in disbelief... struggling to accept it...
after clashing with that demon in person and failing to end him.
---
Meanwhile—
Lucaria, the mages' secluded realm cut off from the rest, caught wind of the reports too.
Still, the wizards brushed them aside, clinging to their seclusion and shunning the outer turmoil.
In contrast...
The updates snagged the interest of a figure freshly inducted into the Seven Great Powers,
now occupying the Fifth Position...
Sieghart, the Ascendant Prodigy.
"Planet Earth? That's entirely new to me..."
That marked his first thought.
But after grasping the events unfolding there...
The Ascendant Prodigy rerouted his path, aiming for a fresh goal.
...
...
...
The reports kept rippling outward...
though they bypassed Midir, the Foremost of the Seven Great Powers,
and Orested, the Runner-Up...
who had already ventured to the enigmatic landmass that materialized amid the stars.
That occurrence by itself was earth-shaking.
And now, Earth's dispatches only heightened the global strain.
"What's unfolding in the world?"
That query echoed on every tongue.
The rise of the baffling continent had lured myriad mighty entities,
and a colossal conflict loomed inevitable—
as demons and myriad other kin stormed the territory at once.
Concurrently...
A savage war ignited in a remote edge of the stars,
upon a vulnerable world named Earth...
a war pitting the timeless Shadow Sect against the High Demons, amplifying its weight tenfold.
After an extended spell of tranquility and serenity...
It appeared the era of conflict had dawned anew.
However, the world remained oblivious then
that the impending doom would eclipse all prior horrors...
that the looming disaster would engulf them utterly,
striking without notice...
and without pity.
...
...
...
The Day After the Battle
(The hour the announcement of Wesker’s death was made)
The showdown between Amon and Thanatos wrapped up without a clear victor once Neto stepped in.
The brawl dragged on endlessly, but Thanatos couldn't dispatch his foes owing to the missing pinnacle of his arsenal—the Death Soul—and the scarcity of mighty remains in his collection.
His personal might was horrifying...
Yet it fell short against Amon and Nito combined.
In the end, the clash concluded with every side retreating,
after much of the Empire lay in total ruin.
The demon side entrenched itself on Ultras Continent.
Thanatos, meanwhile, seized the Empire for his domain
and started assembling fresh forces from the local cadavers...
gearing up for his grand comeback.
To counter this, the Shadow Sect rescued as many people as feasible, steering them eastward.
Though they preserved throngs of Empire folk, plenty more ended up under Thanatos' sway...
He had emerged as a third autonomous player in Earth's strife.
The Shadow Sect took root in the east...
in the former domain of the Eastern Nightmare Lands.
Thus, Planet Earth split into three rival factions,
their intensifying battle fated to wreak mounting devastation.