Chapter 505: • More Than Talent
He stared in disbelief.
A light construct was sothing only possible, wielded by one person—the Union president.
That was Galisk’s EX-ranked talent.
Aiku staggered, his body still rattled from the impact, eyes locked on Alister in disbelief.
“This doesn’t make any sense… None of this makes any sense,” he muttered, half to himself, half to the broken battlefield.
Then—in a blink—Alister vanished from where he stood.
A sharp crack echoed through the air, and before Aiku could even react, a presence like a mountain’s weight pressed down beside him.
He flinched violently.
Alister was there.
Standing right beside him.
The shift in space was so sudden, so precise, that Aiku’s already wounded balance gave out—he stumbled backward, collapsing to one knee with a grunt.
Golden wisps of mana coiled lazily around Alister’s fra as he looked down on Aiku, eyes still unreadable… but there was sothing new in them now.
Not rage.
Not smugness.
Judgnt.
The kind that weighed souls. The kind that made even proud n hesitate.
Alister said nothing at first, rely watching Aiku with quiet intensity—like a sovereign peering down at a broken man who had once believed himself invincible.
anwhile, Anya stood still—wind brushing strands of her hair across her face as her wide eyes remained fixed on the glowing crater where Aiku had fallen and Alister now stood.
“That punch… that golden fist made of light,” she murmured aloud, more to herself than anyone else. “It looked like the old man’s ability. That was a light construct—there’s no mistaking it.”
Her voice trembled slightly, disbelief sinking in. Only one person was known to wield that EX-ranked power. The Union president. No one else in recorded history had ever shown the capability to bend light into physical form like that.
Then, without a word, a certain dragon general walked up beside her.
Click. The sound of heels touching broken concrete echoed faintly as Terra approached, composed amidst the chaos. Her white and gold robes were untouched by dust, and her cosmic blue eyes sharpened behind her sleek glasses as she adjusted them.
She stood beside Anya, silent for a mont as she studied the lingering glow of golden mana across the ruined buildings.
Then she spoke.
“Calling it the property of that human Galisk is a very far stretch, Anya.”
Anya turned, startled. “What…?”
“That ability,” Terra continued, her gaze unwavering, “does not belong to Galisk. That light construct—that precision, that form—is an Authority.”
She turned her eyes to Alister, who stood over Aiku like a force of judgnt.
“Lord Alister obtained it from his father,” she said.
Anya’s brows furrowed, her voice rising with disbelief.
“Authority? What is that even supposed to an?” she snapped.
Terra let out a soft sigh. She pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose with a single finger and explained carefully.
“Let make this simple then.”
She gestured lightly toward the battlefield, where golden motes still shimred in the air around Alister.
“That ability Lord Alister just used—it isn’t simply an inherited skill or talent. It’s an Authority.”
She looked at Anya again, her tone steady and instructive.
“Think of Authorities like weapons—like a gun or sword, sothing that can be passed down, reclaid, or even stolen. This particular Authority originally belonged to the Dragon Lords. When Galisk was at his peak, he wielded it. But now that he’s weakened… that Authority has been passed.”
She turned her gaze back to Alister, who still stood in the distance like an immovable monolith.
“To Lord Alister.”
In all honesty, Anya still didn’t understand.
Not really.
She had heard Terra’s words, processed the analogies, and tried to tie them back to what little she knew of the world’s power structures. But her gut still churned with doubt. It all sounded too… abstract. Too grand. Like sothing out of a myth rather than reality.
Still, she wasn’t stupid.
She could tell pressing Terra any further wasn’t going to yield much more. If anything, it might just make her look like a fool. So she nodded slowly, pretending to piece it all together.
“Right. Authority… like a weapon. Got it,” she muttered, more to herself than to Terra.
…
…
The silence shattered.
Aiku lunged first, his body flaring with his golden mana as he swung a blazing arc of mana-infused cards toward Alister’s midsection.
The ground cracked beneath his montum, shockwaves rippling outward. His fists moved in blinding succession—rapid, precise, vicious.
But Alister didn’t move an inch.
Clang. Clang. Clang.
Each of Aiku’s blows was intercepted mid-strike, halted by a single open palm, or the shift of a forearm that barely seed to twitch. Golden ripples burst outward from each impact, dispersing Aiku’s force like droplets against a steel wall.
Aiku gritted his teeth. “Move—damn you!”
Alister didn’t respond. He simply stepped forward.
And that was all it took.
His right hand shot out, not with flair but with overwhelming certainty—striking Aiku square in the ribs. The impact rippled through Aiku’s body like thunder, lifting him off the ground and sending him skidding back across the cracked pavent, boots digging trenches behind him.
Before he could recover, Alister was on him again.
Another fist. Another hit.
This ti to the jaw—clean, rciless. The kind of punch that cracked bones and rewrote mories. Aiku’s head snapped back, blood and saliva spraying from his mouth as he stumbled.
He tried to retaliate with a sweeping kick enhanced by spatial pressure—but Alister stepped into it, letting the energy slide off him like water. He brought his elbow down into Aiku’s thigh, breaking the flow of power and crumpling the leg at the joint.
“Ghraaagh!” Aiku cried out, falling to one knee.
Alister’s expression didn’t change.
“You’re slow,” he said flatly, driving a knee into Aiku’s chest with enough force to cave the ground in beneath them.
“You’re reckless,” he added, catching Aiku’s wrist as the man
“You’re desperate.”
A final twist sent Aiku sprawling onto his back, gasping, the wind utterly knocked from his lungs.
And Alister stood over him once more—calm, composed, absolute, his dragon skull crest appearing in his eyes.
“Your luck won’t save you here.”
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