The spatial barrier that Ryu had put up shattered.
By now, of the hundreds of Martial God Sky Gods there had been, there were already less than a dozen. As for those that had been trapped in the barrier, almost none survived. The destruction of Ryu's battle with Mistress Holy Wing alone had been far more than what even a normal Sky God could handle, let alone those below that stage.
Elena shot through the skies like a blazing meteor, nearly crashing by Ryu's side in less than the blink of an eye. If not for her being worried that she would harm Ryu more, she really wouldn't have let up until the final moments.
She cupped Ryu's face with her hands, frantically looking for signs of life.
"Dammit! Work! Do what you're meant to do!"
Elena's fingers grasped at the Rebirth Crown. She knew what it could do and what was meant to happen. But, it was also because of this that she knew her actions were futile.
The Rebirth Crown mimicked the Talent of the Phoenixes, but to do so, it relied on the soul of the owner. Elena had seen her father's finger technique shatter Ryu's soul, so how could it possibly remain intact enough to power trigger the Rebirth Crown's rebirth ability?
In fact, that attack alone had blasted a hole through the crown, leaving it barely holding onto Ryu's forehead with a thin line of precious metals. Even if Ryu's soul was somehow intact, it wouldn't be able to work even if he poured everything he had into it.
The black scales on Ryu's body slowly receded, his body shrinking back down from three meters to two meters.
His clothes were beaten and ragged, his body was covered in bruises, and his neck hung limply from his shoulders. It was clear that his spine had long since snapped. The flesh around his neck already flushed with a deep purple, a harsh contrast from his almost ice-like skin. The internal bleeding only grew with each passing second, dyeing him in darkness.
It suddenly hit Elena all at once that there was nothing she could do.
"Why… You… You should have just listened to me…"
Elena collapsed onto Ryu's chest, nearly a billion years of emotion spilling out of her all at once. All those days she had met the world with a placid expression and a dull gaze were suddenly shaken, shattering like shards of glass and sprinkling down like hail that pierced at her delicate skin.
Her heart tore into pieces, her blood becoming like hot alcohol drenching her internal wounds.
Her sobs became cries, which soon became wails. Her throat ripped apart as though the vicious claws of grief and agony were tearing into it. However, even as blood leaked from her lips and her coughs and wheezing sputtered with crimson droplets, she didn't seem to notice.
The pain was the only sort of release she could find.
The last time Ryu died, she didn't grieve. Somewhere deep inside, she felt that he would come back, that he could come back, that there was a doorway, a pathway out there for them to take that could bring them back together once more.
But now it felt as though she was facing the weight of two deaths at once. The walls collapsed in around her, a dense darkness tinging the tips of her pink diamond hair black.
…
A darkness surrounded him from all sides. Ryu could feel that his life was slipping away, but there was nothing he could do about it, everything just felt so far.
With what small thoughts he could form, he realized that the only reason he could even think at all was because of the strength of his soul. Even after being shattered, he still had a soul even beyond the Indestructible Soul level. It was just too bad that such a soul only netted him this sort of small victory.
In the martial world, there was no such thing as absolute perfection. Even something titled Indestructible had its limits, and he had far surpassed them today.
Elena's father was a monster. What was a trillion years of progress in the face of a genius who had lived even longer than that? From the very beginning, the gap was too large for Heaven's Gate to close, even after being boosted by Black Veined Spirit Seeking Lilies.
It was almost funny. The man didn't even have a grudge against him, he wasn't even mad about how Ryu had slaughtered the Martial Gods down to practically their last legs. He hadn't even planned on killing Ryu until the latter insisted on getting revenge.
It was so petty, so insignificant to him, no different from stepping on a bug.
Ryu couldn't help but remember his last interaction with Sarriel in his final moments.
She ended up being right. The powerful could do anything they want, sometimes you had to know when to lower your head or you would end up dying for no reason at all.
A beautiful woman like Sarriel probably experienced that a hundredfold compared to Ryu. She probably got harassed just for existing, but then there was someone like him who sought out death even when it didn't come looking for him first.
What was this feeling? Regret?
The last of Ryu's fleeting thoughts growled. He, Ryu Tatsuya, would never feel regret. The person who could force him to feel such an emotion had already been born and she was his wife. There was no other existence in this world who could accomplish the same feat.
He wouldn't cower even in death!
"It's not bravery if it comes from a place of ignorance! And it's not heroism if it saves nothing but your own ego!"
The words roared in his mind.
Elena… Ailsa… Yuri… Mother…
What would they do with him gone?
He was supposed to hold the weight of the world on his shoulders for their sakes…
CRACK!
The ice seal, after nine cycles of a hundred million years, finally shattered.