Mystical Journey

"This time, if you can still beat me, all the grudges and debts between us will be called off." Nadia looked at Garen, who was not far away. Their battle had begun casually, then it grew frustrating due to her inability to descend upon him, then that turned to admiration and respect, and finally recognition. She had recognized him as someone worthy of the same title, a lord of the Nine-Headed Dragon.

Suddenly, she did not want to kill Garen that badly anymore. They both had the will of the Nine-Headed Dragon, she wanted to see just how far Garen could go with it.

Garen looked at her, having already vaguely sensed the changes in her.

It could be said that in the beginning, Nadia had coincidentally discovered his bloodline and thus decided to retrieve the will of the Nine-Headed Dragon by casually killing him. But after failing so many times, she seemed to have changed her mind.

"Come. Show me just how strong your true form is!"

Garen's body abruptly sank into the Buddha Mother's shoulder, following a crevice of mud that had opened up automatically, he arrived directly at the very core of the Buddha Mother, the control center.

The moment he sat on the seat, the whole Buddha Mother gave a huge jolt, a faint golden glow appearing all over its body. It had already been about a hundred meters tall, but now it grew even larger, copious amounts of soil flying up from the ground and gathering on its body, making its body seem even larger and more intimidating.

"Come, it doesn't matter who wins or loses."

Garen's voice boomed like thunder, coming from the mouths of all three of the Buddha Mother's heads.

In that instant, it was as though the whole Buddha Mother had become Garen's incarnation. The two merged into one, the golden color of the Holy Phoenix Scriptures melding onto its body, making it even bigger and stronger than it had been way back in the underground garden.

Ker-chak!!

A bolt of lightning flashed past.

Nadia's long sword also moved in that instant, there was no telling if it was lightning or the gleam of a sword in the night sky. But in the blink of an eye, the huge long sword had landed abruptly straight onto the center of the Buddha Mother's chest.

The blade seemed to extend infinitely in a moment, and made the Buddha Mother shine with a crack like a white light from top to bottom.

Bam!!!

A gigantic baton landed with a crash, sending Nadia flying away. One of the Buddha Mother's arms gripped a long baton tightly, with an explosive power that even Garen could not match.

With a low roar, the Buddha Mother's giant body flew into the air, chasing after Nadia, its six arms all holding different weapons that it sent crashing mercilessly into Nadia at the same time.

Clang!!

The huge long sword emitted a sword gleam that turned into a giant silver sword, crashing into the six weapons one after the other. The Buddha Mother was actually fighting with Nadia in mid-air, the three heads and six arms turning like clockwork, while Nadia's giant sword was also insanely strong.

Even more strangely, the wound on the Buddha Mother's body from the Ominous Space Path was quickly being regenerated by the soil flying up from the ground, as though it was never wounded.

Garen sat in the center, controlling the Buddha Mother as though it was a peak-level secret technique master. It unleashed all sorts of attacks -- grabbing, tapping, punching, holding, knocking -- effortlessly, like a true martial arts master. Matched with the Buddha Mother's six weapons with different effects, and it was practically a flawless, unbeatable war machine.

After a long time, the giant Buddha Mother and Nadia had both flown away from the original site of the battle, ending up in the sky above some unknown forest somewhere before they landed. Like an extreme coincidence, Hochman's desperately escaping form just happened to appear beneath them. Watching the huge shadow descend from the sky, he threw his head back and roared in despair.

Baroom!

Many trees were squashed, and a large round crater large enough for two people to stand in had appeared on the ground. Hochman had already disappeared completely, turning into a mess of blood and flesh. A wisp of black smoke leaked out from beneath the Buddha Mother's foot, darting into the Buddha Mother's huge body.

Nadia's body was covered in blood, she looked quite heavily injured.

And the Buddha Mother's giant body was covered in wounds as well. Two of its arms had broken off, and one of its heads was gone. There was a large gash in half of its waist, which was rapidly absorbing soil and trees to recover itself.

Roar!!!

The Buddha Mother roared instinctively. The remaining two heads lowered, emitting a wind like a typhoon. The intense wind pressure instantly blew the grassy area where Nadia was standing into a crater shaped like a meteor.

Faced with the giant that was the gigantic Buddha Mother, Nadia held up her long sword again. In that instant, her eyes lit up.

Large swathes of shadow gathered behind her, forming a giant shadow Nine-Headed Dragon.

At the same time, as though in resonance, a black light lit up in Garen's eyes from where he was sitting inside the Buddha Mother. Countless shadows like black oil extended from underneath him, these shadows quickly spread out from the Buddha Mother's huge body, turning into nine dragon shadows of different sizes.

This was pure aura, and it also came from the battle of the Nine-Headed Dragon Wills. It had nothing to do with their bodies, just the connection between wills.

"Dragon's Roar!!"

At nearly the same time, Nadia and Garen both chose the ability at the very core, in the deepest recesses of the Nine-Headed Dragon's bloodline and will.

Two terrifying Nine-Headed Dragon shadows, each up to a thousand meters tall, raised their heads at the same time, and roared furiously at the other.

Roar… Brr!!

In the end, the roars simply became a sound of pure vibration.

The invisible tremor began with the two of them in the center, but instantly spread up to several thousand meters around them. All living creatures around them were instantly decimated by this huge spiritual tremor.

The giant python in the forest fell off the tree branch, utterly lifeless. The forest leopard tried its hardest and ran several steps away, but then it crashed into the ground head-first, and could no longer get up. The birds and black eagles flying in the sky stiffened instantly, and fell down like a rock, their bones shattering as they landed.

The moment that roar and tremor blew past, it was as though the large area of green grass and trees was covered with a layer of grey, filled with a silent aura of death.

In that invisible yet terrifying howl, the Buddha Mother instantly fell apart. It shattered into countless pieces, raining down everywhere.

The piece at the very core collapsed completely, and a black shadow flitted out of it, it was Garen.

All the muscles on his body were bulging up horrifically, as though forming armor plates on his shoulders. His body was several times taller than an average person, and he emitted a powerful aura, like that of a huge monstrous beast.

Falling down from the sky, Garen stretched out his right arm, and pressed down hard.

Bam!!!

Amidst a loud, deep sound.

That giant, boa-like arm crashed into a huge silver long sword.

Garen's expression did not change, his left arm making a light noise like a flying bird, and somehow carried up a gentle, warm wind, with a vague sound like that of crisp wind chimes.

He instantly used the Waterbird Fist's Final Profound, the Flight of the Evil Phoenix, with one hand.

Garen's left arm seemed to morph into a giant flying phoenix, flapping its wings and carrying a huge, terrifying power and penetration as it rushed for Nadia.

At the same time, Nadia raised her left knee, and met Garen's left arm.

There was another flash of golden light.

A circle of black shadows erupted between the two of them. The two huge shadowy Nine-Headed Dragons wrestled with each other, biting ferociously. In the middle of the shadows, there were Garen and Nadia.

Bam!!

Nadia was sent flying several dozen meters away, crashing past many trees and finally sinking into a mountain wall. Many rocks rolled off the mountain, nearly burying her whole.

"This is absolute power."

Garen stood on the spot, his body as large and terrifying as a demon god.

The mask on his face had shattered completely by now, revealing the face underneath. Strangely, his forehead was currently covered in golden lines, like so many golden veins, and it made him look unnaturally gruesome.

The Holy Phoenix Scriptures state allowed his spirit potential to reach its explosive maximum for a short period of time, gathering in his aura, so it had an extremely powerful destructive power.

And right now, Garen in the Fifth Star state had already achieved the peak of this body. The deficiency in his soul had also been filled up, but to his surprise, there was no movement in his mind at all. The Demonic Book, that had been one step away, was now beginning to sprout after absorbing Hochman's successful soul primer.

Once it sprouted, he would have truly created another Soul Seed.

"Black Sethe, do you see that? The second Seed is finally almost complete…" Garen glanced at Nadia's direction, murmuring softly.

But strangely, Black Sethe did not respond at all.

Garen suddenly felt something amiss.

"Black Sethe?" he called again.

There was nothing. An ominous feeling grew in his heart.

Hah!!

There was a flicker of black light in front of his eyes, and Nadia suddenly appeared in front of him, slicing at him with her sword!

Blocking the blade with a clang, Garen's other hand reached for her head fiercely.

Just then, the dragon shadow behind Nadia bit down on Garen's dragon shadow.

Garen grunted once, and retreated several steps back, a piercing pain coming from his brain.

Steadying his footing, Garen called Black Sethe a few more times quietly, but there was no response.

Standing beside a field of tree stumps, he suddenly lost all desire to fight.

"To think that you still disappeared in the end." He did not feel sorrow, just the same sort of sorrow he felt in the Totem World. He was left alone again…

Facing Nadia, he already knew the outcome of this match.

"There's no need to fight anymore," he said suddenly.

Nadia was also standing between the trees, covered in blood and breathing fast.

"You won." She sat down on a tree stump, and raised her head. "Don't want to fight anymore?"

"This body of yours is the main reason you descended here," Garen said calmly. "This is not your body." It was not her true body, meaning it could not be revived, it only had one life. It was simply one level stronger than a projection, that was all.

"You noticed?" Nadia laughed. "Let's call it quits, then. That friend of yours disappeared? Hahaha… You feel it now, don't you? Our very own Void…"

"Is this how you've been living for the past ten thousand years?" Garen asked softly, his body slowly returning to his normal height. Now that the victory had been decided, the two of them became like good friends. With no intention to continue fighting, they actually stood together and began to chat idly.

"It repeats over and over again, like a cycle. I've gotten used to it a long time ago," Nadia said with a carefree smile. She was beginning to bleed from all the orifices on her face, evidently her internal injuries were acting up.

First she had fought the Buddha Mother, which, under Garen's control, was equivalent to a larger, powered-up version of Garen, with terrifying power. After that, she fought against Garen's true self with the Fifth Star. This body that Nadia had descended with could no longer take any more injuries, it was already on the brink of collapse.

"You win again this time…" Nadia looked up at the sky, "You have to be careful, that golden secret technique of yours will be repelled by the planet. As you are right now, there's no way to resist that. Don't let yourself enter the Void carelessly, the war between the Warlocks and the Void is about to start again…"

Sitting there, her voice gradually grew softer, smaller, weaker, until finally she was completely lifeless.

With a smack, that huge sword also shattered completely, turning into countless dots of silver light that gradually faded into the air.

Garen suddenly had a feeling, that perhaps it was about time to leave again. That powerful sense of repulsion was getting stronger, and he calculated the time. When his Soul Seed formed, that would be the time for him to truly leave this world.