"You vile scum!"
The roar divided the sky.
Storm Lord's was wreathed in spiraling currents of blue-white lightning. Fury radiated from him, grief for his fallen kin twisting into unrestrained killing intent as he thrust one arm toward the heavens.
Thunder answered.
Bolts converged from every direction, weaving together into a colossal mass of crackling plasma that compressed around his clenched fist. The air scread under the pressure, as raw celestial lightning condensed into a single,
devastating technique.
"Skyfall Thunder Fist"
The spirit fist ford above him-massive, blazing like dragons desperate to escape.
Then it descended.
Sound vanished, swallowed by the overwhelming density of power as the three-cosmos strike hurtled toward the lone figure below.
Ery did not retreat.
He felt it clearly-the authority of a veteran grand elder who had stood at the peak of storm laws. Yet his eyes only burned brighter.
Excalibur rose.
The Dao of Heaven and Earth surged through him, light and darkness spiraling together along the blade in a perfect, violent equilibrium.
He stepped into the falling sky and swung.
"Dao Edge."
A crescent of impossible brilliance tore upward.
BOOMM!!!
The lightning fist collided with the blade-light in a detonation that blinded half the island. Thunder imploded inward before exploding outward, shockwaves rippling across Eclipse Island. Seas around the island heaved as if struck by a falling star.
Then, impossibly-
The fist split in two.
Ery's strike cleaved through the heart of the technique, the Dao-infused edge severing the lightning construct and continuing upward. The Storm Lord's eyes widened as he threw his other arm forward, forming a second thunder barrier with a desperate backhand blow.
The surviving arc of sword-light smashed into his guard, blasting him backward through layers of stormcloud, lightning scattering wildly around his body.
Shock-real, undisguised shock-crossed the elder's face.
Before the sky could settle, another presence surged upward.
A silver streak cut through the chaos as the Heaven's Will Sword Master ascended, silver robes snapping in the gale, his long blade already raised before his face in solemn fury.
"I will have vengeance for Caelthar," he declared.
He turned the sword in a slow, circular arc, each motion carving glowing sigils
into the air. Sword intent gathered, not wild like lightning, but pure, absolute- an executioner's will refined over centuries.
"Reversal of Fate."
The world dimd.
His blade ca down.
A single line of silver divided the sky. It bore the full authority of a three-cosmos swordsman.
Ery t it head-on.
Excalibur flashed again, Dao Edge reborn in blinding radiance. This ti, the collision did not explode outward; instead, the two attacks locked in midair, light and silver grinding against one another like opposing laws of reality.
The sky trembled.
For a heartbeat, neither side yielded.
Then both techniques shattered at once, fragnts of sword intent and Dao light scattering like dying stars.
The two figures closed the distance in an instant.
Steel t steel.
CLANK!
It was imdiately clear that the Heaven's Will Sword Master's blade was no less powerful than Excalibur-a true Tier 7 divine sword.
Their clash was no longer a spectacle; it was war at arm's length. Sword arcs carved spirals through the sky, each exchange birthing shockwaves that rippled outward in concentric rings.
Through these clashes, Ery could tell that the swordmaster was in the first layer of the Three Cosmos. Despite being in a lower realm compared to Stormlord, his technique and sword intent made him as formidable.
The Sword Master's eyes sharpened as he parried another radiant arc. "Magnificent sword... sadly held by an unrefined swordsman," he uttered coldly, pressing forward with a flurry that split the clouds. His blade slipped through a narrow gap, grazing Ery's shoulder and drawing a line of soul-deep pain.
Ery didn't fall back and fought even harder.
Blades flashed past faces by inches. Sleeves tore. Blood misted the air.
By this point, most of the guests had already fled.
The floating gardens and marble platforms had now stood half-ruined. From
tens of thousands, only a few thousand remained-Astiel guards in tight formations, allied factions too deeply tied to the clan to retreat, and a hardened
minority who stayed out of curiosity.
Whispers moved through them like wind through dry leaves.
"Who is that man? I've never seen a grand magus like him."
"He dares fight a Nephilim clan in the open... Could he be from the Azazel line?
Or the Aztebas?"
"What realm is he in? I can't read his aura at all."
"To release power like that... he has to be three cosmos, doesn't he?" Denard's composure was crumbling. Each explosion in the sky tightened his
expression, the reflected lightning turning the fear in his eyes into sothing raw and desperate. If that man, Ery, survived, he would definitely beco his biggest trouble in the future.
He turned sharply toward the forces around him, voice hoarse with urgency.
"Don't give him ti to breathe... surround him!... Kill him... Kill him now!" The three remaining royal guardians of Astiel answered the command without hesitation. They shot into the sky and spread out, surrounding Ery from three directions. Their domains ignited in distinct brilliance. One brought a tempest of slicing wind that shredded space itself. Another wielded lightning so dense it cracked like breaking glass. The last carried a suffocating tide of absolute frost that froze moisture out of the air and crusted the battlefield in
ri.
Three, two-cosmos grand magus, each a seasoned executioner.
Nearby, the Heaven's Will Sword Master hovered with his blade lowered. Pride
kept him from joining a coordinated assault after being stalled earlier, yet his
eyes never left Ery.
Individually, none of the royal guardians would have lasted long against him. Together, however, they beca sothing far more dangerous than the sum
of their parts.
Their laws did not clash.
They rged.
Wind howled first, a spiraling current that tightened around Ery like invisible coils. Ice followed, spreading through the gale in glittering waves until the air itself crystallized into razor-edged frost. Then lightning struck-not downward from the sky, but outward from within the storm, turning every shard of ice and every ribbon of wind into a conductor of violent current. What ford around him was no longer a battlefield, but a living catastrophe: a rotating blizzard-tempest dense enough to grind mountains into powder.
The synergy was flawless.
This was Astiel's unique [Sky-Soaring Array], a sacred technique that amplified all three elents of the sky.
Frozen wind sliced at Ery's defenses from every direction, while lightning
slipped through the smallest fractures in his aura, biting into his ridians and slowing the circulation of his soul force. The storm distorted perception, warped distance, and filled his senses with roaring static so loud it felt as if the world itself were tearing apart.
Ery felt the weight of it. Every movent required more effort than it should have, as if the air had thickened into shackles that resisted his will.
And unlike the Heaven's Will Sword Master, the Storm Lord joined in, recognizing opportunity the instant it appeared.
The Storm Lord's roar rolled through the tempest, lightning compressing
around his arm until it created a blinding spear of judgnt.
"Die!!"
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