"No matter how much the world's laws suppress me, or how little power I have left… I only have one chance to strike.
The next blow—whatever the outcome—will decide everything."
Clutching his wounded shoulder, the Night-Blade God melted back into the darkness before Yudou once more.
If he tried to trade blows head-on, he stood no chance against Yudou's seemingly inexhaustible power. His only option was to hide within the night, wait, and search for another opportunity to deliver a fatal strike.
"AAAAAAAHHHHHH—!"
Perhaps because of the grievous injury he had just suffered—or perhaps because his opponent had vanished again—Yudou, fully consumed by blackened corruption, threw his head back and roared in fury.
The roar surged outward like a physical shockwave. The entire snow-covered mountain trembled violently. Those nearby clutched their ears in agony, terrified their eardrums might rupture under the sheer force of it.
Hidden within the shadows, the Night-Blade God watched the raging Yudou and curled his lips into a mocking smile.
Just as he had said before—no matter how overwhelming the power, without reason or intellect, one was nothing more than a beast.
And he, the Night-Blade God, would never lose to a mindless monster like that.
If his last assault had failed, he would simply wait for the next opportunity. No matter how strong the prey, even the mightiest creature must eventually falter.
And yet, the very "mindless monster" he had dismissed as irrational did something utterly unexpected.
After venting his rage in a sky-splitting roar, Yudou suddenly fell silent.
Then, he grinned.
From his mouth, he spat out the blood and flesh he had torn from the Night-Blade God earlier. His lips began to move, chanting under his breath.
"South—heart. North—eyes. West—fingertips. East—toes.Gather with the wind. Scatter with the rain.Bakudō Number Fifty-Eight—Summoning of the Tracking Sparrow."
This was a binding spell designed for pursuit. So long as one possessed something carrying the target's essence—and used it as a medium—the spell could trace their exact location.
A translucent sparrow formed in Yudou's palm. It shook its tiny head as though sensing something unseen—then abruptly took flight in a single, unwavering direction.
Still concealed within the night, the Night-Blade God initially failed to grasp the meaning of Yudou's actions.
But when he saw the sparrow flying straight toward him—without the slightest deviation—his expression froze.
He had been tracked?
Was it coincidence?
Or did that creature truly possess such a technique?
No… from everything he had observed earlier, Yudou had clearly lost all rational thought. So why was he capable of using such a complex spell?
Had he lost only his reason—while the instinct of battle had already been carved into his body itself?
When the half-transparent sparrow halted directly in front of him and chirped once—clearly alerting its master—the Night-Blade God's final shred of wishful thinking shattered.
He had been enduring in silence, refusing to reveal himself, clinging to the faint hope that the sparrow could only locate his general vicinity—not his precise position.
Yes, he could crush such a small spirit creature with ease. But doing so would expose him just the same. It would accomplish nothing.
Yudou saw nothing where the sparrow hovered.
But that didn't stop him from swinging at empty air.
"Six senses return to the body.The summit of martial perfection—Wind, Forest, Fire, Mountain: Secret Art—Bukyoku!"
Humans possess six senses: sight, smell, hearing, taste, touch… and the sixth sense—the mind's intuition.
Beyond those lies the mysterious seventh sense—Alaya-vijñāna—what some call the "microcosm."
It cannot be directly perceived. It cannot be grasped.
And yet it holds infinite potential.
In the past, Yudou had repeatedly tried to reach the true secret of Wind, Forest, Fire, and Mountain—yet always failed.
Now, having fully lost himself to darkness, he unknowingly unleashed that ultimate strike.
True to its name, the "Bukyoku" slash was simplicity taken to the extreme—yet it symbolized martial mastery brought to its absolute pinnacle.
At the highest level of the sword, technique becomes redundant.
The Great Way is simplicity itself.
Even in his corrupted state, as Yudou brought the blade down, a fleeting clarity passed through his heart.
But to the Night-Blade God—watching that utterly unadorned downward slash—what he felt was not simplicity.
It was death.
The wind screamed within it.Fire roared.Thunder raged.Forest pressed in dense and suffocating.Earth bore down with crushing weight.And the trajectory—impossible to predict.
How could a single, straightforward downward cut contain so much?
As a god, he had never felt so small.
It was as if he stood before the vastness of the cosmos itself.
Human, demon, or deity—before the universe, were they not all equally insignificant?
If he did not unleash everything he had to block this strike—
He would die.
The Night-Blade God's instincts screamed this truth at him.
The question was no longer whether overusing divine power would cause the world to expel him.
The question was whether he would survive long enough for that to matter.
Yudou, already enraged by the Night-Blade God's earlier hit-and-run tactics, had no hesitation once the Tracking Sparrow pinpointed its prey.
He struck to kill.
As the blade descended, the Night-Blade God knew hiding was meaningless.
He revealed himself.
Dodging would only hasten his death.
Only by meeting it head-on was there a sliver of hope.
Ignoring the suppression of the world's laws, he erupted with a surge of divine power far beyond the SSS+ threshold—beyond the world's permitted limit.
He did not know what consequences would follow for defying the world's rules.
But if he didn't—
He would be dead before those consequences arrived.
His aura shot skyward, stirring the clouds into a colossal vortex.
His presence shifted—becoming sacred, untouchable.
This was a transformation of existence itself. The true essence of a god.
Gripping his scythe in both hands, his appearance altered and resplendent, the Night-Blade God roared and swung upward to meet that ultimate slash.
"CRACK—CRACK—!"
The instant blade met scythe, the surrounding space fractured like glass.
Spatial turbulence tore wildly in every direction.
The sky split in two as the colliding forces carved a chasm through the clouds.
The shockwave rippled outward with catastrophic force. The great snow mountain trembled violently. The ground split. Avalanches roared. Landslides erupted.
The towering snow peak—once standing proud—collapsed and sank, devoured by destruction.
In moments—
It vanished from the map.
At the epicenter, the two continued to struggle against one another.
The blade of divine blessing pressed downward.
And the Night-Blade God watched in horror as the curved edge of his Night Scythe began to crack.
Then, overwhelmed by spatial distortion and shockwaves too violent to endure, both figures were hurled backward in opposite directions.
When the Night-Blade God staggered to his feet once more, his earlier sacred aura was gone.
His presence had fallen to a pitiful low.
The tip of his Night Scythe—its crescent blade—was missing entirely.
Using the scythe to steady himself, he suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood.
The weapon was formed from his own divine power—it was part of him.
Its damage was his damage.
"ROOOAAARRRR—!"
A thunderous roar swept away the surrounding dust and debris.
The Night-Blade God turned.
In the distance stood Yudou.
One hand clutched his long blade as he roared toward the heavens.
The other—soaked in blood—gripped a broken fragment of scythe blade embedded in his left eye.
With a violent motion—and another furious howl—he tore the shard free.
Blood sprayed outward.
But in the very next instant, thick black mud—formed from the "Evils of This World"—surged forward and covered the wound.
The destroyed eyeball began regenerating at a terrifying speed.
"A complete and utter monster…" the Night-Blade God muttered hoarsely. "A pierced heart… a destroyed eye… and still he lives?"
He could feel his own weakness. He could see Yudou's injuries already healing.
There was no denying it now.
Even if he refused to accept it—
He had no path to victory.
He had used even the last of his hidden divine power. In that brief moment, he had surpassed the world's limit.
And yet not only had he failed to kill his opponent—
He had suffered backlash instead.
Watching Yudou momentarily preoccupied with the agony of his ruined eye, the Night-Blade God clenched his teeth.
Then, at last—
He slipped back into the darkness.
This time, not to seek another chance at a killing blow.
But to flee.
His power was nearly spent. The world itself was beginning to reject him.
As much as he despised admitting it—
He had been defeated by a lower-world creature he once looked down upon.
"We will meet again," his voice echoed faintly through the night."And next time… I will harvest you for certain."