The impact was horrifyingly violent .. so much so that the moon’s surface warped far beyond its previous state.
Vayne was buried beneath the devastation, while Fulghor remained alone in the void of space.
"I heard you were stronger than the previous Rank Three High Demon," Fulghor said. Though his face showed no sign of mockery, his words dripped with it. "But after seeing you up close, I’ve begun to doubt the truth of that claim."
"I killed the previous one myself .. and he caused me quite a lot of trouble at the time. He was truly powerful."
"Compared to him... you’re little more than a child ruled by her anger."
Slowly, Vayne was revealed from beneath the wreckage of the last blow.
Her right arm was completely destroyed. Her body was grotesquely deformed. Her wings had been torn apart entirely.
All of that .. from a single collision.
Yet the most striking thing of all was the twisted fury on her face .. an overwhelming rage directed entirely at Fulghor.
He, however, remained utterly unfazed—and continued his provocation.
"Your pitiful state is proof enough. It seems the higher ranks have grown weak since the last war."
Like a final bullet of mercy, Fulghor’s words struck something deep within Vayne—causing the very void around her to tremble.
"You’re dead."
Vayne ground the words through clenched teeth, revealing a demonic visage straight from hell.
Her shadows erupted from within her body, engulfing her as her form began to change—warping and twisting until she became something that looked as though it had crawled out of a nightmare.
She grew far taller. Her face was swallowed by an abyss of darkness, replaced by a monstrous single-eyed visage.
Numerous tendrils burst forth from her back, her arms lengthening grotesquely.
The pressure she unleashed became far more terrifying .. so much so that the entire moon trembled in response.
Seeing this, Fulghor released even more aura, bracing himself for battle.
"So this is the form born from the fusion of the King’s Shadow and its host..."
Despite the sheer monstrosity of Vayne’s new appearance .. now nearly matching Fulghor in height .. he showed no reaction at all. Everything was proceeding exactly as he had anticipated.
"Then let’s see... what kind of power it is that was once said to have obscured Orested’s light."
Without any warning, Fulghor and the monstrous Vayne charged toward each other at unbelievable speed.
A beam of darkness collided with a beam of gold, unleashing a deafening explosion—followed immediately by a brutal clash of wills.
Darkness and golden light pressed relentlessly against one another, each force striving to overwhelm the other’s aura.
Vayne transformed her limbs into razor-sharp weapons, swinging them with blinding speed, while Fulghor answered with his dual spear, meeting her head-on in a violent exchange.
The shadow aura was clearly superior in quality to Fulghor’s golden power .. but the Shadow Sect’s monster compensated for that disadvantage by pouring out far greater quantities of aura.
In other words, he compensated for quality with sheer volume.
And that was what allowed him to force an even battle against a terrifying power like the King’s Shadow.
Amid that hellish clash, Vayne screamed incessantly:
"You’re dead. You’re dead. You’re dead. You’re dead. You’re dead!!!!!!"
Her screams sounded like a call from hell itself .. a nightmare made real.
Total madness. Overwhelming destructive power.
Slowly, Vayne began to gain the upper hand in the clash of auras .. the darkness starting to prevail, little by little.
Fulghor saw it clearly—so he slowly pulled back, deliberately drawing Vayne after him.
The beast of the Shadow Sect ran on all fours, wreathed in blazing golden light, while Vayne pursued him in the form of a dark beam.
"Vayne... the new Rank Three Demoness. You may possess tremendous power, but you have already lost the psychological battle," Fulghor said in a deep voice as his golden radiance expanded.
"And soon... you will lose the real battle as well."
As those words left his mouth, the two of them had already reached the far side of the moon, such was their speed.
There—upon entering a certain area—something astonishing occurred.
At a signal from Fulghor, eight towering pillars of gold rose skyward, stretching until they reached the very edge of space itself.
They surrounded Vayne completely, lured by Fulghor into the very center of the formation.
"Supreme Art: Uranus Shock."
In response to Fulghor’s signal, Vayne .. still in her monstrous form .. lifted her head toward the sky.
And catastrophe descended upon her.
From the farthest reaches of space—from a place so distant that no one even knew its name ..
a deluge of annihilating force came crashing down.
A roaring beam that crossed worlds, drawn in by the pillars that had sealed Vayne within them.
The demoness screamed and screamed—but she could not escape, nor break the formation in time.
"It’s too late, Rank Three," Fulghor said in a deep, unwavering voice, his eyes blazing.
"Unlike Gehrman and the rest of the Shadow Sect, I never died. I followed my lord Nameless of my own will. My power never diminished over all these years—on the contrary, it only grew."
"At present .. setting aside Alexander Rybak, who preserved his vessel in a near-perfect state .. I am the strongest within the Shadow Sect."
"Defeating the likes of you... is trivial."
The moment Fulghor finished speaking, it was as if the entire void fell silent.
A stillness that lasted only a few seconds—
before the torrent of aura descended, completely engulfing Vayne.
That colossal pillar of golden aura continued to pour down without end, incinerating the demoness’s body as she screamed in agony.
The flow lasted for long, agonizing seconds—until the beam of aura reached the very core of the moon itself.
Cracks and fractures spread across the entire lunar mass, pulsing with a terrifying golden glow ..
until something both astonishing and horrifying occurred.
The moon exploded entirely under the overwhelming pressure, unleashing a shockwave whose echo reached all the way to Earth.
Fragments of the moon scattered throughout space, and the golden aura beam finally subsided.
Despite having caused such a dreadful phenomenon... Fulghor remained perfectly calm.
After all, everything had gone exactly according to plan.
Provoking Vayne. Drawing her into direct combat. Forcing her to abandon caution.
Then luring her straight into the trap he had prepared in advance.
Everything unfolded precisely as the Shadow Sect’s War General had intended.
Fulghor’s body expelled an even greater cloud of scorching steam, having expended a colossal amount of his reserves.
"Uranus Shock is a strike that unleashes my aura reserves without restriction," he said, steadying himself. "That makes it extraordinarily powerful .. but it drains me severely. And luring an opponent into it is no easy task."
He gathered himself, trying to wield what little strength remained with care.
Under normal circumstances, releasing Uranus Shock once would not have harmed him to this extent .. but having given half of his power to Gehrman was now coming back to haunt him.
And to his misfortune... it seemed his opponent had clung to life until the very end.
Upon a massive fragment of the shattered moon, the Rank Three Demoness emerged once more.
She was in a horrifying state .. and it appeared she had exhausted most of her shadow’s power just to survive.
"I struck her with half of my full aura... and yet she didn’t fall," Fulghor muttered, hesitation creeping into his voice as he considered his next move.
Vayne was in terrible condition. Most of her body had been destroyed .. only the shadow held her together as a single piece.
But in exchange, Fulghor had depleted nearly all that remained of his own aura.
He had won the battle.
But killing his opponent... was another matter entirely.
"Do I continue pressing the attack... or withdraw?"
Fulghor pondered for a brief moment—before making his decision when he sensed something strange flowing from afar... from Earth.
"This... the Wheel of Death..."
His eyes flared for an instant ..then he closed them and slowly pulled back.
"Gehrman... I hope you know what you’re doing," Fulghor said as he surged back toward Earth, leaving Vayne writhing behind him amid the ruins and the void.
The War General of the Shadow Sect departed victorious—having inflicted a crushing defeat upon the Rank Three Demoness.