Chapter 407: Fading Consciousness
Northern's senses heightened as he noticed the strange resonance between his Void essence and the surrounding darkness.
The uncomfortable feeling grew stronger with each passing moment, as if the very fabric of reality was shifting around them.
But Northern was too preoccupied with saving his own life to spare a second thought to this feeling.
Koll was stubborn till the very end, pummeling him endlessly as they fell freely through the darkness.
His attacks came faster, spears leaving trails of scarlet flame that cut through the gloom. Northern parried and dodged, using every trick and ability at his disposal to stay alive.
Despite it, the unease in his soul only got worse, ultimately trying so hard to divide his focus. The darkness around them seemed to thicken, almost palpable in its intensity.
Northern gritted his teeth, refusing to be distracted. He channeled more Void essence into Soul Taker, the blade pulsing with dark energy.
As Koll lunged forward, Northern met his charge head-on.
Their weapons clashed in a spectacular display of red and black sparks.
The impact sent shockwaves through the falling debris around them, shattering smaller pieces into dust.
Using the momentary distraction, Northern activated [Travel] once more, disappearing just as Koll's spear was about to make contact.
He reappeared behind his opponent, Soul Taker already in motion.
Koll spun with inhuman speed, but not fast enough.
Soul Taker's edge bit into his side, drawing a spray of golden ichor.
The inhuman warrior hissed in pain but didn't falter, immediately countering with a vicious swipe of his spear.
Northern barely managed to dodge, the tip of the spear grazing his cheek.
He felt a sharp sting and warm blood trickled down his face, but there was no time to dwell on
it.
As they continued to fall through the endless darkness, trading blows and dodging attacks, Northern felt the unease getting stronger and harder to ignore.
It was getting incredibly hard to not be distracted, and more importantly, the feeling was beginning to reveal itself and for some reason, Northern felt like he was getting scared. 'Koll? No, that can't be...'
Suddenly, the darkness around them began to shift and warp.
Tendrils of darkness reached out, as if trying to grasp them. Northern's eyes widened as he realized that the darkness had suddenly taken shape.
Koll also seemed to be in as much shock as he was. Both combatants shot away from each other with force.
But where could they even run to-as they flew away, another tendril curled out, Koll was fast enough to outspeed one, leaving afterimages.
Northern, before he could rebound for another race, his essence failed him in that moment. That millisecond was enough for the darkness to immediately clasp him within its tendrils.
Koll landed on falling debris and grinned viciously as he watched Northern get pulled deeper into the darkness.
"You damn bastard!! Was this your plan the whole time?!"
"Rest, child. Your fate is sealed, that darkness is where you shall meet your end."
Koll leaped off the large chunk of stone. As he did, a large white feathery wing tore out of his back. He stumbled mid-air.
But in the end, managed to fly away with just one wing on one side of his back.
Northern watched Koll fly away in pure disdain.
'The bastard could fly all the while... So this was a trap?'
Northern gritted his teeth as he thought of everything that had happened up to this point.
Could it be that Koll never expected to win, but this was his last resort?
'No,' Northern clicked his tongue in denial.
Koll was strong, very strong, there was no way to decide the fate of the battle.
'Then he never planned to fight till the very end from the beginning? Since he wanted to go and rescue his damned daddy.'
Northern groaned in pain as the tendrils of darkness wrapped harder around him.
To make things worse, he was out of essence.
'Well, that should be a simple one...' he thought and closed his eyes, attempting to enter the Limitless Void.
However, Northern felt his entire body shiver and his eyes flew wide open to the same darkness.
"Huh?"
Much worse, the darkness began to tremble, vibrating rigorously. The tendrils began to spread around, consuming him.
Northern tried to use all of his copied abilities but each time he did so, he would feel his body vibrate and nothing would happen.
It was like the darkness was overriding all of his abilities in a way.
'This should not be possible,' Northern groaned as he tried to resist the hold of the darkness.
However, with each ratio of strength he used to resist, the tendrils doubled and spread over his entire body, now slowly covering his face.
Northern, with the Chaos Eyes, tried everything to get out of the darkness. Even though the majority of his body was submerged in darkness, he tried hard to fight it but it was to no avail.
As the darkness fully covered his face, Northern managed to tear one hand out of the darkness. He moved his thumb and index finger and was about to snap, but smaller tendrils stopped both fingers from meeting each other.
Northern tried to push through but a larger portion of the darkness surrounded his hands and folded them together as his face was fully covered.
Without being able to do anything about it, Northern was swallowed into the darkness.
He felt his consciousness slowly drift away. No matter how hard he tried to hold onto it, he could feel it slipping away.
He tried several things, thoughts about moments from his old life, to his birth and the strangeness surrounding it. He thought of how his birth mother would look like.
'If it is even once... I would love to meet her...'
He thought of Shin and Eisha, thought of his little sister, if she happens to really be one.
'I do hope they'll name her Silver, then she'll get angry when she finds out I am the reason she was named Silver, and I'll tease her about it...' his thought went low for a beat, '... I want to be around to protect her, to show her she has a strong dependable big brother.'
He thought about everyone he had met, Annette, Ellis, Mr. Fluffy, Night Terror... Raven,
Helena, Terence...
He thought of Raven again.
'What a twisted fate both of us have... I wouldn't have minded getting to know why she turned
out to be a piece of shit...'
Northern felt like this was the end.
And every single moment he had lived played before his eyes.
Strangely, one of those moments predominantly stayed on his mind.
Meeting those two beings before he was reincarnated.
'I wonder if I will be reincarnated again...'
His mind trembled.
'I don't want to die...'
With that, Northern couldn't hold on any longer. His consciousness slipped out of his hands
and faded away.
[THE VESTIGE OF VOID IS RESONATING WITH THE ORIGINATION OF VOID]
[THE VESTIGE OF VOID IS ABSORBING THE ORIGINATION OF VOID]
[THE VESTIGE OF VOID IS OUTGROWING THE VESTIGE OF VOID]
[VESTIGE OF VOID HAS EVOLVED TO SEED OF VOID]
[A SEED OF ORIGIN HAS BEEN PLANTED IN YOUR SOUL]