Defiance of the Fall

ntly grew to over fifteen meters and it skewered almost as many soldiers without Zac even moving the axe.
There were less than a hundred members of the personal guard, so a good chunk of them instantly died from that sneak attack.

There was no way to maintain a fractal edge that long, and it disintegrated after Zac managed to kill just a few more of them.
But it did cause some chaos in the ranks, making the soldiers unsure whether they should empower their emperor or defend themselves.

Zac wouldn’t relent as he pushed forward, but an enormous fist appeared above him, slamming straight down.
Not only that, but it also formed an invisible restriction on him in an effort to stop his movement.
The fist contained some sort of Restrictive Dao, making the attack resemble [Nature’s Punishment] a bit.

A roar escaped from Zac ’s throat as he swung his axe up to intercept the incoming strike, but as he did he felt another of the stinging wounds erupt in his upper back.
If he didn’t have his high luck to warn him his heart would have been pierced, but he managed to tilt mid-swing enough so that the wound was mostly superficial.

An idea suddenly appeared in Zac ’s mind and he stopped his swing mid-motion.
Next, he instantly released his Dao Field of Heaviness, making the assassin slightly stumble when he tried to move away.
Zac took advantage of that brief window and grabbed him, instantly sealing his fate.

A crunching sound echoed out, and the next moment the enormous fist slammed into Zac, causing the whole mountain to shake.
A second later the fist disintegrated, showing a large crater five meters deep.
At the bottom was a mangled piece of flesh, crushed beyond recognition.

Next to it was Zac ’s bloody form, though in far better shape.
Zac got up to his feet with a groan and used [Loamwalker] to push out of the pit.
He had bet he would be able to endure the attack with his defensive layers, and he had been correct.
The next moment the was once again amongst soldiers and the carnage resumed.

’

The general who was still alive desperately tried to impede him, but he had just spent a huge amount of energy on his final strike, and he no longer had his teammate to share the burden.
Zac was like an enraged boar as he swung wildly, and the general only barely survived due to a dozen of the personal guards switching their attention to protect their leader instead of the emperor who was clearly in control of his battle.

But even with the help of the personal guard the general only managed to delay Zac in his goal to kill those who empowered Nenothep.
Zac knew that delay might be the difference between winning and losing the war.
Over ten seconds had already passed since he entered the shield, and he knew that he was almost out of time.

Energies blazed around him as Zac completely ignored his energy expenditure, aiming to completely and utterly destroy the remaining general.
His large gauntlets were already bloody scrap metal from Zac ’s assault, and he was barely staying on his feet as it was.
But his eyes burned with conviction as he glared at Zac.

”Empyrean Sacrifice! ” he roared with a hoarse voice, and Zac ’s senses almost immediately sensed danger.

He tried to move backward, but suddenly it was as though he was stuck inside tar.
The remaining 60 soldiers in the personal guard still in fighting condition all had their focus on Zac by now, and they seemed to be cooperating on some array with somber expressions.

An enormous ball of chaotic energies was quickly growing right between himself and the soldiers, and Zac knew he had to get away.
Zac ’s danger-sense only got more and more urgent, and Zac desperately fought to move through the restriction that had been placed on him.
His muscles strained as he finally managed to force himself free from the suppression.

But before he had a chance to activate [Loamwalker] the huge ball of energy exploded, turning the whole world white.

Zac barely had time to activate [Nature ’s Barrier] imbued with the Dao of Trees, followed up by imbuing himself with the Dao of Hardness.
He even activated a defensive option of his golden robe to cover him.
But even with all that, it felt like he was blasted into pieces when the explosion hit him, and he was thrown away like a ragdoll.

His mind was drifting away as he flew, but Zac barely managed to refocus his mind.
As soon as he landed he immediately got himself ready to once again assault the soldiers, ignoring the pathetic state of his body.
But the moment he saw the personal guard he knew there would be no need for that.

’

Almost nothing remained of the whole area where the personal guard once stood, apart from a crater and a few burned remains of bodyparts.
One of the few corpses that wasn ’t completely obliterated sported two mangled gauntlets, indicating that not even the last general had survived the final blast.

Empyrean Sacrifice seemed to have been the final attack of the personal guard, sacrificing their lives to take Nenothep ’s enemies with them to the grave.
And as he looked down at this burned body covered in wounds he knew that perhaps only himself and the two Dominators would be able to survive a blast of that magnitude.
He wasn ’t even sure he would have survived unless he had just gained a huge amount of Endurance down in the caverns.

The personal guard hadn ’t been the only ones affected by the explosion though.
A large number of soldiers from both camps had been too close to the battle and became casualties as well.
Even those who had maintained a healthy distance wasn ’t spared as their bodies were crushed by the shockwave.
It was clear that both sides had sustained catastrophic losses.

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His body hurt, but at least his first task was done, and the whole personal guard was eradicated.
Zac victoriously looked over at the main battle, but his brows rose in alarm when he saw the scene.
The situation was even worse than he ’d feared.
The large woman was lying dead on the ground, and the mage was barely alive from the look of him.

Even Ylvas was in dire straits, drenched in blood and missing a leg.
He somehow stood upright with the help of the Cosmic Energy, but his aura was chaotic.
If Nenothep hadn ’t received a backlash from his War Array getting ripped to pieces he might have already killed the Berum champion.

The fight was about to be wrapped up, and Zac didn’t even dare to waste a single breath.
Torrential amounts of energy gathered in his forearm while he launched a fractal edge at the emperor to buy some time.
It was as though Nenothep had eyes in the back of his head, and he immediately swung his spear in a wide arc.
The swing disintegrated the fractal edge even though it was imbued with the Dao of Sharpness.

“You actually survived the Empyrean Sacrifice.
You truly are a human cockroach.
But I do not need a War Array to handle the two of you,” Nenothep sneered at the approaching Zac.

Zac didn ’t bother with an answer, but the space above him suddenly cracked, and a huge wooden hand emerged.