Chapter 49: Grab your Power or Lose it Forever

The infinite darkness offered no sound, no wind, and no physical form.

Raphael floated in a vast, weightless void. His body felt strangely intact here, devoid of the shattered ribs, burning flesh, and torn muscle that had broken him inside the physical world.

In the absolute quiet of the void, a singular light burned far in the distance.

Positioned at the epicenter of the endless dark sat a colossal, dark stone throne. Resting upon it was a figure of absolute, terrifying presence. It was a man draped in long, obsidian-woven robes, his arms resting on the armrests, his dark hair falling in quiet drapes across his carved shoulders. His eyes remained closed, and his head hung slightly low in a state of eternal, slumbering authority.

Yet, despite the vast, untraversable distance separating them, Raphael could see every line of the stranger’s face as if he were standing inches away. The sheer, suffocating gravity of the figure’s presence rendered physical distance entirely meaningless.

The man on the throne did not raise his head. He did not part his lips, and his eyes never opened, but a voice, deep, resonant, and vibrating with the weight of shattered worlds, echoed directly into the deepest chambers of Raphael’s soul.

"YOU HAVE REACHED THE FIRST THRESHOLD. GRAB YOUR POWER... OR LOSE IT FOREVER."

The command hit Raphael not as a suggestion, but as an absolute, irrefutable law of existence, causing a primordial compulsion to seize his consciousness, screaming at his soul to reach out. Raphael extended his hand toward the slumbering figure, thrusting his fingers through the dark void, reaching for the invisible thread of authority hanging in the space between them.

His hand closed around a burning, ice-cold current of pure, unrefined Sovereign power.

THUM-THUM-THUM!

A violent shockwave of violet light exploded through his mind, and the dark void shattered into a million glittering shards of glass.

...

In the physical world, inside the ruined pinnacle throne room of the dark castle, the Old King stood over Raphael’s broken body.

The eight-foot, void-armored tyrant raised his massive greatsword above his head, pointing the razor-sharp tip down at Raphael’s exposed throat to deliver the final executioner’s strike.

Outside the shattered iron doors, Vanessa slammed her staff frantically against the unbreachable domain wall, her violet eyes filled with horrific desperation, as the Old King brought the crimson sword plunging downward.

SNAP!

Raphael’s silver eyes snapped wide open.

They were no longer merely glowing, but burned with an intense, terrifying violet-and-silver fire that illuminated the shadows of the broken throne. Guided by a sudden, hyper-instinctual spatial perception that far exceeded his previous limits, Raphael didn’t panic, but tilted his torso by a micro-inch to the left.

THUN-BOOM!

The seven-foot crimson blade plunged deep into the floorboards, grazing the side of his neck by less than a hair’s breadth, shattering the stone floor right beside his cheek.

Before the Old King could register the impossible dodge, Raphael relied on raw, explosive leverage. He whipped his right leg around in a swift, vicious low-angle strike, driving his boot straight into the soft, unarmored seam of the Old King’s groin armor.

CRACK-BOOM!

A concentrated shockwave of high-frequency Sovereign mana detonated on impact.

The Old King let out a distorted, agonized grunt as the sheer, agonizing force of the low blow lifted him off his feet. The tyrant stumbled backward three long meters, his balance utterly shattered as his armored hands instinctively dropped from the hilt of his weapon to shield his lower torso.

He had let go of the greatsword, and Raphael didn’t waste the opportunity.

Ignoring the dull aches lingering in his newly realigned body, Raphael scrambled forward across the rubble. His pale hand shot out, his fingers locking firmly around the thick leather hilt of the Old King’s seven-foot crimson greatsword still embedded in the stone floor.

THUM!

The weapon’s corrupted void-mana flared violently, attempting to reject a foreign hand, burning Raphael’s palm with dark lightning. But the newly awakened Sovereign authority surging through his veins crushed the sword’s resistance, rewriting its allegiance in a fraction of a heartbeat. The crimson lightning turned from dark red to a brilliant, terrifying silvery-violet.

Raphael ripped the massive seven-foot blade out of the floor with a single, sweeping arm.

"My turn," Raphael growled, his deep baritone carrying an icy, terrifying authority that shook the very dust from the castle ceiling.

He blurred across the stone floor.

His godlike neural processing speed operated at a level he had never reached before. He saw the Old King trying to reset his guard, saw the slight gap in the tyrant’s void-plate armor near his left shoulder, and saw the exact angle needed to break his stance.

Raphael swung the massive crimson greatsword in a rising diagonal cleave.

SLASH-BOOM!

The mana-infused edge sheared straight through the Old King’s left shoulder plate, spraying black, corrupted sparks into the air as the tyrant was thrown back another five feet.

Raphael didn’t give him a single second to breathe.

Integrating the fluid, kinetic transitions of Tier 3 Dual-Weapon Mastery with a weapon that wasn’t even his own, Raphael stepped smoothly into the Old King’s guard. He reversed his grip, using the flat face of the massive sword to smash the tyrant across his horned helmet, sending his head snapping back.

CRACK!

Before the Old King could regain his footing, Raphael pivoted on his back foot, drew the crimson blade back, and executed a rapid, devastating combination of three successive, high-frequency thrusts.

STAB! STAB! STAB!

The broad point of the sword pierced through the tyrant’s chest armor, the right thigh guard, and the left side of his neck. Concentrated, silvery-violet Sovereign mana detonated inside every single wound, blowing chunks of void-plate armor off the Old King’s frame and sending him crashing hard onto his back.

The tide of the battle had completely inverted. The ancient tyrant who had brutalized him moments ago was now pinned to the floor, bleeding dark void-smoke from a dozen shattered armor plates.

Outside the crumbling hall, Vanessa stopped her assault on the domain barrier, her mouth slightly agape, her eyes wide with absolute, breathless awe as she watched her master stand over the fallen tyrant, holding the king’s own blade above his head.

Raphael stood tall, his dark, messy hair shading his glowing violet-silver eyes as he pressed the tip of the heavy crimson sword directly against the Old King’s cracked visor.

"Let’s see who dances now," Raphael whispered.