Moments earlier, after Revant had delivered a jaw-dropping response to Koll—well-deserved, no doubt.
The Broken Tyrant’s stance on Koll and his master’s "kingdom to come" had been bluntly stated. Koll practically dripped with pity for the Tyrant.
He had even sneered:
"You are a broken fool with shattered pride. You should be groveling at my feet to save yourself, yet I offer you abundant kindness, and you—being the broken wretch that you are—dare refuse."
His words oozed luxury and richness, almost making Revant think his refusal had wounded Koll more than necessary.
Did the bastard actually believe, even for a moment, that his offer would be accepted?
Revant couldn’t help but consider this Tyrant a complete fool if he truly did.
They clashed again. This time, the battle proved less captivating than before. The vessel Koll wielded was an endless refraction of light. Hence there were no organs for Revant to harvest.
No matter how many times it shattered, it simply refracted back into existence. Worse still, Koll could endlessly employ his reflection Tyranny as well.
It became devastatingly clear that reflection and refraction formed an appalling, lethal combination.
Revant had never anticipated facing such an absurd battle.
Koll embodied the apex of self-sufficiency while being utterly debilitating—terribly trying to counter the nature of Revant’s tyranny.
Perhaps that was the most maddening obstacle to overcome. But it wasn’t as if Revant was making any significant progress either.
Despair proved difficult to channel when it met a hollow shell of seemingly endless, flowing light.
Both warriors locked in temporary stalemate, though their environment suffered viciously for it—as did the strange Essence Manifestation Koll used to fight him.
The pale shell would buckle with cracks from one of Revant’s punches and shatter at the next. The vessel managed, at most, to withstand five blows before shattering completely—only to refract itself back into multiple existence and descend upon Revant again.
The battle stretched across kilometers. Standing ice mountains collapsed under the weight of their assault, shattered peaks tumbling into oblivion. The landscape was beyond saving.
Even so, Revant was gaining the upper hand—as far as hands went.
Until terrible havoc wrecked the depths of his soul. Revant felt the strings tying him to a much greater, vaster soul suddenly snap.
He froze mid-strike, fist suspended above Koll’s inhuman head.
Of course, the cunning Tyrant wasn’t gullible. He didn’t care what had happened and wouldn’t waste such precious fragments of seconds.
He drove a vicious spear of light into Revant’s ribs, tearing through flesh. Crimson blood erupted outward.
Revant snarled, groaned with raw indignation, forcefully tore himself from the spear of light, and leaped back.
The spear was merely refracted rays of sunlight that Koll had bent and wielded like a blade.
He scowled for a moment, glaring down at the strange creature.
’That damn Dante—even in death, still irritating...’
Revant didn’t concern himself with matters of the world normally, but because of his third eye, he and Northern shared a link. Everything Northern knew, he simply knew.
Of course, the fool had no idea he was doing such—or maybe he did but had forgotten, or found no way to stop it.
Curse it all. Revant knew far too much despite caring about nothing. However, he was more troubled by the severed connection he could no longer feel than irritated by the chaos Dante’s Essence Manifestation was wreaking upon him.
Revant’s anxiety spiked for a moment. He had no explanation for what might be wrong and feared desperately for Northern—though he could at least sense his presence, distant as it was.
While he ached to fly away and find Northern, to confirm what was wrong, he simply couldn’t.
He had one simple order.
Defeat Koll.
And that was exactly what he would do.
Blood leaking from his ribs, Revant pressed his lips against the pain and lunged at Koll.
Koll lunged forward as well. They collided at the center, unleashing a massive shockwave that violently disturbed the snow below, sending it rolling outward in powerful waves.
They disengaged and soared higher into the sky, colliding again. The shockwave rippled across the heavens.
Now Revant was slightly disadvantaged. No matter how hard he tried to ignore it, the wound in his ribs hindered his movement at an alarming level.
Worse still, with his connection to Northern severed, the endless flow of essence was abruptly cut off. He was dangerously low on power.
His movements had become sluggish compared to moments before.
Koll struck again, folding a single hand that multiplied into a hundred fists, all crashing down on Revant simultaneously.
The sensation of a hundred punches landing at once was indescribable—certainly not in any pleasant way. It was a gruesome experience that made Revant want to start cataloging the most horrific and absurd moments of his existence.
He slammed into the ground with a shockwave that cracked and pulverized the earth hundredfold. Snow, debris, and stone slabs exploded skyward as he descended.
His lungs compressed for a moment, as if the force had crushed them together. Blood burst from his nose and mouth—he nearly choked on it as Koll descended upon him, creating a massive web of cracks that spread across a nine-hundred-meter radius.
But then the world quaked.
The Tyrant didn’t know what was wrong, but something felt ominously amiss.
Revant felt it too. Desperate now, he worried less about the disturbance and used Koll’s momentary hesitation to throw him off and roll to his feet.
Barely a heartbeat later, a vicious, fiery-red invisible cleave split the ground where he’d lain—that was caught amidst an endless straight cleave into the ground.
He stared at it with a petrified, disbelieving expression.
Then looked up at the falling mountain-sized horn of an abomination that marched forward like a colossal beast devouring both heaven and earth.
’A Leviathan?’
It had to be.
Revant squinted.
’And is that... Master?’
It certainly was.
A wry frown creased his brow.
’My foolish master nearly killed me? Not even my opponent!’
Revant stared in disbelief.
He was so distracted that he didn’t see Koll approaching. The Tyrant crashed into him, dragging his head across the ground for several kilometers screaming at Revant with indignation.
"You wretch! If you have time to gawk at the sky while battling me, then you might as well eat dirt and enjoy the view from beneath my greatness!"