Chapter 1077: Revant vs Koll [part 1]
"I thought we were here to assist him. What exactly is going on? I have never felt so useless in my entire life—and to someone who should be assisting us, no less."
Thalen sat perched on Eli’s back, gazing down as he absorbed every word. Below them stretched a gaping wound in the ice—a vast, dark chasm yawning where an enormous chunk of earth had collapsed inward, forming a dark pit.
He fell silent for a moment.
"I don’t think it’s only Sage Rian down there... I’m certain someone else has joined the fray. Something else is unfolding in that pit."
"Does it matter?"
Eli’s voice thundered with self-directed contempt.
"He’s still down there nonetheless, closer to the beating heart of all this than we’ll ever be. I’ve never felt like retreating back to being a Sage in my entire existence. This is a first."
Thalen’s brow furrowed in bewilderment.
"Why would you want to go back to being a Sage? How would that remedy our current predicament?"
Eli hesitated, the words hanging in the frigid air.
"It appears being a Sage carries more weight than being a Paragon, and perhaps—just perhaps—I overlooked something crucial about that path."
Thalen released a bitter chuckle.
"Has your perspective been warped because of Sage Rian?"
Eli’s voice cut through the silence again.
"Look at the impossible standards that boy sets."
His predatory golden eyes blazed like molten fire.
"If there was some essence of being a Sage that slipped through my fingers, I wouldn’t hesitate to crawl back and relearn everything. He even wields will with surgical precision! Something we could only dream of achieving as Paragons! Yes, there’s definitely a piece of the puzzle I’m missing."
"Don’t be so melodramatic, my friend. I don’t believe Sage Rian’s extraordinary nature stems from his rank as a Sage—I think it’s woven into the very fabric of his talent. You witnessed him unleash super speed, fire, and ice, didn’t you?"
Eli’s voice quivered like a plucked string.
"Yeah, how is that even remotely possible?"
Thalen pondered, letting the question marinate in the cold air.
"I haven’t the faintest idea. He’s never unveiled the nature of his talent. But I suspect he possesses multiple abilities, or at least his talents are as different as night and day. I truly can’t say."
Eli’s gaze drifted upward, studying the man seated on his back. He lingered in thought.
"I assumed he was supposed to be a member of your citadel."
Thalen didn’t respond immediately, letting a heartbeat pass.
"Well, it was born of convenience... he joined on his own terms and kept his abilities locked away like state secrets."
Eli nodded with deliberate slowness.
"Hmm."
His attention dropped momentarily.
"What about the girl, then? Do you know her?"
Thalen shook his head.
"I haven’t the slightest clue who she is. But that raven-black hair, those crimson eyes—it’s rare to encounter eyes that burn like pools of fresh blood. There’s only one bloodline that carries that haunting look."
Eli continued the thread.
"Kageyama... The thought has been gnawing at me since I arrived. She’s their spitting image."
Thalen nodded gravely.
"Hmm."
He stared into the distance, surveying the frozen wasteland from his aerial perch, and Eli mirrored his vigil.
Then something snared his attention like a hook.
"Wait... look there."
Eli’s gaze snapped to follow.
"The man Sage Rian nearly struck down."
Far to the north of the ice realm, shrouded by a maze of collapsed ice shards that had tumbled into a labyrinthine obstacle course, Koll moved like a ghost—his pale skin stark against his midnight hair as he navigated the treacherous path.
Thalen’s expression darkened.
"That must be the Tyrant who ignited this entire catastrophe. Perhaps it’s time we entered the dance..."
He paused, eyes narrowing to slits.
"But where is he headed? Is he fleeing like a beaten dog?"
As the thought crystallized, something plummeted from the heavens and crashed down upon Koll. A devastating shockwave erupted outward like an earthquake, obliterating every ice shard in its path.
Both Thalen and Paragon Eli’s brows knitted together in unison.
Standing before Koll was a figure carved from shadows—black hair, alabaster skin, and piercing blue eyes that were Northern’s exact mirror.
He looked like Northern’s twin brother, aged to lethal perfection.
Eli’s frown deepened into a canyon.
"I saw that man on the airship."
He studied the scene with hawk-like intensity, watching as Revant and Koll collided like opposing forces of nature.
***
Revant shot forward with blistering speed, his hands spread wide like steel jaws ready to ensnare Koll. But the moment they collided, Koll dissolved into thin air and materialized behind him. Revant’s face restructured in a heartbeat—features flowing like liquid as they molded from the back of his skull, hair sprouting across what had been his face. In the blink of an eye, his back became his front, and as obsidian swords rained down upon him, he simply raised his hand and shattered them like brittle glass.
Koll’s gaze turned black as midnight, and the fallen swords multiplied in an instant, breeding like a plague. Revant sprouted two additional sets of arms and exploded forward with bone-crushing force, pulverizing each blade with his bare hands as if they were made of paper.
Koll rocketed backward, unleashing torrents of black swords that sliced through the air like a murder of crows. Revant gave relentless chase, demolishing the weapons with surgical precision.
Koll’s expression darkened to storm clouds. With amplified power, he catapulted into the sky and put over five hundred meters of distance between himself and his pursuer.
The space separating Revant from those five hundred meters transformed into a writhing sea of black swords that devoured every inch of air. From their aerial vantage point, Thalen and Eli could see nothing but a churning void of darkness.
Revant, suddenly engulfed by the obsidian storm, came to a dead halt. He stood ramrod straight, his extra limbs dissolving into nothingness, his eyes cold as arctic steel and brimming with contempt.
He cast his gaze downward for a moment, trapped within a tempest of blades now descending like metallic rain to obliterate him.
He looked utterly revolted, as if the very air had turned rancid.
"How distasteful."
He sealed his eyes shut, and when they reopened, they had become twin pools of liquid shadow. The swords froze mid-flight, the storm itself grinding to a halt. Time seemed suspended in amber—though the occasional blink from distant onlookers proved the world still turned.
He peeled one glove from his hand and opened his palm like a flower blooming in reverse.
"Fall in."
Fangs erupted from his palm, and a hurricane-force wind dragged the sword storm inward. Everything was devoured by his hand with ravenous hunger until not a single blade remained airborne.
The mouth in his palm let out a satisfied belch.
Revant moved to replace his glove but hesitated, fingers freezing mid-motion.
"I’ll probably need to feast plenty today."
He cast the white glove aside like discarded skin, then lifted his gaze. In the space between seconds, he materialized before Koll, delivering a shock that sent the man’s eyes flying wide as dinner plates.
Revant’s hand descended toward Koll like an executioner’s blade, his voice cutting through the silence with glacial indifference:
"Stay still and die. Don’t force me to use my right hand."