Wrathful Resolve.
Intense anger and unwavering resolve to never give up. To leave the prison he had been trapped in. To make sure he reaches the top so that this would never, ever repeat itself again.
These had been the emotions that led his elements to break through, and it had done the same for his spiritual elements. Now, Atticus had entered the second fold, Integration.
The world unraveled before his eyes. He saw Xal'zereth not as the massive alien he appeared to be, but for who he truly was, the complexity of his existence drawn into an elegant interwoven thread.
His fears. His pride. His hopes. And finally, his weakness.
The gaps in his movements that all had considered perfect. The fractional delay when shifting his weight. The stutters in his energy flow. The microfractures in his defensive construct.
The inconsistencies that were imperceptible to the naked eye, hidden beneath a layer of mechanical precision.
All the things that should have remained invisible.
All the things that no one was ever meant to see.
Atticus saw it all.
Because of this, he moved with purpose.
Black-crimson energy trailed behind him like an afterimage of death, his every movement distorting space.
His katana appeared like an extension of himself, natural and fluid, as fire, water, wind, and earth combined.
Xal'zereth's drill-like mana arms surged forward in droves, spiraling violently and parting the air with terrifying force.
Walls of energy. Barriers layered upon barriers. A barrage that had no openings, no gaps, no room to breathe.
But Atticus moved with the burst of fire, the flexibility of water, the freeness of air, and the unshakable sturdiness of earth.
He slipped through the impossible, flowing past the onslaught.
And then, his katana danced.
A sweeping arc.
A flash of steel.
A line of blue blood sprayed into the air.
Another cut.
Another thread severed.
Xal'zereth's trembling black eyes widened in the backdrop, flickering with utter confusion and shock.
His arms lashed again, faster now, desperate. The dimensional world warped, but Atticus was already within his guard.
His blade moved like lightning through fabric, weaving clean cuts through flesh and energy alike.
Slashes carved into Xal'zereth's frame, one after another and bluish blood painted the collapsing world.
And through this historic moment, the word came to Xal'zereth's mouth once more.
"…An anomaly."
But this time, there was no robotic sound, no disdainful voice. Just pure and raw emotion.
It was a sound that shocked Zenon and every sergeant who knew just who the Zorvans were.
But just as quickly, Xal'zereth's eyes narrowed, and his gaze firmed.
A cloak of mana erupted around him, shielding his battered form before he vanished, disappearing and reappearing far across the battlefield.
His voice thundered,
"A being like you is a threat to all the Zorvans stand for. You will be eliminated."
His countless drill-like mana arms suddenly stopped, no longer spinning. Instead, each began writing glowing glyphs in the air with blurring speed.
His array of abyssal-black eyes gleamed with a sudden golden hue.
Zenon, who was watching from afar, felt his chest clench. His lips moved, mouthing with dread,
"The Order Eyes…"
'He can use it? Shit…'
The Zorvans were the Overlords of Mana, entities whose power had transcended manipulation and entered the realm of imposition.
In a world where mana was the essence of existence, the Zorvans were those whose hands had touched upon the power to command it with laws.
And now, Xal'zereth spoke, his voice filled with nothing but absolute authority.
"No flames shall burn."
Atticus's fire flickered, then started dwindling.
"No earth shall rise."
The ground beneath him weakened. His body felt light, weightless.
"No water shall flow."
His movement grew rigid, unnatural, restrained.
"No element shall manifest."
All elemental force around him faltered, disappearing like smoke in wind.
"No mana shall respond to will."
Across the battlefield, every recruit, every sergeant, felt it, their control over mana gone, snapped like twine.
And then;
"No emotion shall affect power."
A quake surged through the world, a rippling force that collapsed around Atticus like a judgment.
His body flickered. His form wavered. His elements started crumbling away, as if ripped from his soul.
Zenon's expression darkened. His fist clenched hard.
"This is bad…" he muttered. Laws were absolute. Atticus's newfound power came from his elements, without it, how would he survive?
But then, he saw it.
Atticus's gaze hadn't even flickered.
His twin purple eyes burned brighter than ever, piercing through the collapsing world, locking onto Xal'zereth with the force of a storm held in silence.
He made no moves. He simply stood.
But he saw everything.
Because one truth remained immutable.
One could only impose law upon their inferior.
And Atticus… was inferior to none.
A single thought, nothing more, and then, a crimson glow roared to life, wrapping around him like a cloak of vengeance.
Every law Xal'zereth had imposed shattered like brittle glass.
The elements surged back to him like starving beasts to their master.
Xal'zereth's gaze trembled.
But Atticus gave him no respite.
He moved.
A vacuum tore through the skies, a rift in sound, a distortion in space, and then, he stood before the baffled Zorvan, his voice calm, final, akin to a death judgment.
"Echo Manipulation."
Shadows split from him. Dozens. Hundreds. Thousands.
Each one was an echo of himself, appearing behind, above, below, all wielding gleaming katanas.
And then, as one, they moved.
Their blades flashed, and the skies were filled with an uncountable number of slashes, each stroke parting the atmosphere around them.
Atticus's purple eyes blazed, and with a single motion, all slashes converged, fusing into one colossal crescent arc of doom that screamed through the air toward Xal'zereth like the hand of a god.
Xal'zereth's entire figure froze.
Reality was unfolding before his eyes, yet it seemed unbelievable, inconceivable, even by his impossibly complex calculations.
But disbelief didn't matter.
He was a creature of logic.
And logic dictated that whether something was possible or not, it did not change the fact that it was happening.
This was the truth.
And so, he accepted it.
In that infinitesimal pause, his next plan of action formed, calculated, processed, executed.
Zorvans were not perfect. Despite how they appeared, they knew this truth better than anyone. They were beings bound by precision and purpose. And to them, purpose outweighed pride.
When confronted with failure… they did not retreat.
They self-erased.
To a Zorvan, nothing was more important than the mission. And if they failed, they would rather die than be remembered as a flaw.
Xal'zereth closed his eyes.
A faint glow began to burn from within his chest. Then his entire form ignited, light pulsing violently through the cracks in his flesh.
Mana spiked, unstable, volatile.
His body began to expand, muscles twisting, contorting into grotesque shapes.
A single word escaped his lips once more, this time not in contempt, not in analysis, not even in understanding.
Just a whisper.
"…Anomaly."
And then, he exploded.
A blinding detonation surged outward, a supernova of energy tearing through the dimensional world.