Chapter 122 - 122 Look Around You
After saying this, a vortex formed by burning runes rolled around William’s body. The transparent crystal staff in his hand instantly turned dangerously red.
“You…”
The latter half of Coles’s sentence was smashed back into its throat by a flaming sword that appeared out of thin air.
A ten-meter-tall Fire Giant phantom appeared behind William. Its body was smelt with armor that emitted a red light, and scarlet magma constantly flowed between the armor’s gaps.
!!
William raised his staff and made a waving motion. The giant imitated William’s actions and raised the Flaming Sword in his hand before slashing at the nearby Coles.
Boom…
The strike sent Coles flying into the sea from midair. The impact of the huge sword stirred up quite a tidal wave as it retreated to the sides. As for the flames burning on the huge sword, they evaporated tonnes of seawater into a mist.
“Presiding Judge, tell me, how did you do it?”
Amidst the hiss of seawater evaporating, a voice sounded under the Flaming Sword.
William’s eyes were dyed with a faint layer of green, allowing him to see the scene under the thick fog.
Through the white fog, William saw Coles cross the white claws in his hand to block the huge Flaming Sword.
Although the two sides were extremely different in size, the balance of strength between the two was completely opposite.
Coles didn’t even look at the Fire Giant summoned by the Divine Realm Fire-type, Doomsday. Instead, it looked at William, who was controlling the giant in midair, and said casually, “Tell me, how did you ignore everything that was happening around you and act as if victory was in your grasp?”
With that said, Coles waved the sharp claws in its hand and slashed upward. A few beams of white light flashed, and the entire Flaming Sword cracked inch by inch in the giant’s hand.
The Fire Giant phantom casually threw away the hilt and swung a millstone-sized fist at Coles. However, just as this punch was about to smash the other party’s head into his chest, Coles’s body turned into thousands of black crows that gathered into dark clouds that surged at the giant.
Tens of thousands of pairs of sharp claws and beaks formed an endless storm that gathered beside the giant. In less than a few seconds, the giant was dismembered into burning fragments that filled the sky and fell into the sea.
The hissing crows quickly gathered into Coles and appeared not far from William.
“So, are you here to avenge Blake?” Coles asked.
The response it received was a dark-blue—nearly black—lightning spear. This lightning spear first struck Coles’s chest before silently cracking. Even the surrounding space shattered like a mirror.
However, a black crow appeared in every spatial fragment. They turned into a black fog and spread out before gathering into a human form.
Coles, who didn’t even wrinkle its clothes, continued, “I didn’t kill him. Moreover, I gave him a choice. The authority of the King of Hope and Despair can be shared between two people. He made the wrong choice. I’m the true victim in this matter. He ambushed me first…”
An ice-blue nexus appeared under Coles’s feet. Then, the space around Coles slowly froze like amber.
It tried its best to open its mouth as if it wanted to say the last few words, but its voice was also frozen in this space.
“The only wrong choice he made was not to kill you completely back then,” William looked at the frozen Coles and said.
With that said, he drew Judgment 4 from his waist and came in front of Coles. Without hesitation, he stabbed.
However, the Moon Realm existence imprisoned inside suddenly moved.
Coles’s white claws blocked the sword in William’s hand, preventing it from advancing at all.
“This is my domain. Spatial Imprisonment is meaningless to me… But you really want to kill me,” Coles said, sounding regretful.
Although the Fire and Lightning spells used by the Presiding Judge could injure it to a certain extent, they couldn’t injure the essence of a high-level Moon Realm existence.
However, once he began to use Judgment equipment, it meant something entirely different. Even if Coles’s corresponding domain wasn’t the King of Death and Blood that corresponded to Judgment 2, it was really possible to completely kill it when it was in an enfeebled state.
“I originally thought that you would say things like ‘turn back. It’s not too late,’ or ‘it’s fine, we can start over.’ To persuade me to return to the right path,” Coles said.
“Not interested,” William replied tersely.
The muscles in his arm instantly bulged. Under the state of Power of Dragons, Judgment 2 in his hand broke free from the restraints of the claws with a crack and stabbed at the other party’s neck.
Coles retracted its claws faster to protect its neck and used the power of the strike to spread its wings before flying backward.
“Then are you interested in knowing why I did this?” Coles stared at the expression on William’s face and continued asking.
“My only interest now is killing you.”
As William spoke, a vortex formed by burning runes appeared around him. The dark clouds in the sky were lit up by a few meteors that were rapidly falling.
Upon hearing this, the calm expression on Coles’s face finally began to crack.
“Why?”
Before everything began, Coles had thought about what the Presiding Judge’s attitude would be when it encountered him again.
Would he be furious, wringing his hands and sighing, or expressing regret?
It was even with a small possibility that… he would express his understanding and support?
However, it never expected things to turn out like this.
There were no emotions, only cold killing intent.
No matter how much it provoked him previously, it couldn’t incite the other party’s anger at all.
No matter how it tried to leave him hanging, it couldn’t arouse the other party’s curiosity at all.
“There’s no why. Everyone has to be responsible for the choices they make. That’s all.”
William adjusted the direction of the meteors as he replied.
Coles transformed into a crow again and dodged the explosion caused by the falling meteor.
However, this time, it couldn’t even maintain its calmness of talking to the other party in human form.
“Then what about your choice? Could it be that your departure back then was a responsible choice? Look at the Vic Continent now, the so-called Empire, and the so-called Astral Laws. Who should be responsible for all of this?”
The dark clouds gathered by ten million black crows questioned in a hissing voice.
William paused for a moment before saying slowly, “Although I want to say that I’ve already done everything I could back then… you’re right. I do need to be in charge of many messes.”
Coles was about to say something when it saw William raise the magical medium in his hand and point it at the sky.
“I’ll start with you,” William said. Then, with him as the center, a pillar of fire that seemed to materialize charged at Coles.
As for the ten million black crows, they roared as the dark clouds gathered and stirred into a storm. Countless snow-white claws surged with incandescent lightning as they faced the magnificent pillar of fire.
The collision of the two equally majestic forces in midair triggered a light that shone like a supernova.
Just the aftershocks of the explosion calmed the storm in Black Crow Gaze for a moment. The distant lighthouse that should have been out of reach was almost extinguished by this force.
And the outcome of this clash—William was at the disadvantage.
William was blown hundreds of meters away by the aftershocks of the explosion. His sleeve was tattered, and his hollowed-out silver-white gauntlet was charred. Many thorn-like purple electric patterns appeared on his face.
The sound of something shattering made him look down at his left hand. The Blue Glory Ring on his thumb that was specially used to increase lightning resistance cracked.
“Look around you, William,” Coles shouted.
Four huge outlines were gradually approaching from the four directions of Black Crow Gaze.
A six-eyed spider covered in black muslin; a pale man hanging from a withered tree by the river; a pitch-black humanoid covered in filth; and a woman whose body was constantly rotting and collapsing.
However, William didn’t look away at all. He continued staring at the dark clouds, and the magical medium in his hand lit up with a spinning nexus.
“Look around you and you’ll know that you’re finished,” Coles continued.
What replied was two silver tornadoes. They stirred up a water curtain and surrounded the crows in all directions.
“Dispel this outward spell and look around. Presiding Judge, I’m begging you. Everything you’re doing now is meaningless. Immediately…”
Coles continued, but it was interrupted by William.
“There’s no need to look. I know that your reminiscing with me is solely to buy time. I also know that those Void Sovereigns were building a confinement barrier around Black Crow Gaze. Now, the entire Black Crow Gaze is sealed off,” William replied.
“So?”
Coles couldn’t help but ask when it heard the other party’s swashbuckling.
“Then, do you know why I didn’t put up any defense and took your strike head-on? Or rather, do you know what trigger conditions are needed for the strongest state I can reach in theory and what level this state is at?”
“What… do you mean?” Coles asked uneasily.
“Although I’m not sure how strong a quasi-Void Sovereign who hasn’t completed the ritual is, I don’t think it’s stronger than a Void Incarnation, right?”
According to the game’s settings, other than not having the immortality of the main body, the Void incarnation could reach about 50% of the main body’s strength.
“Do you want to guess how long my fastest record of killing a Void Incarnation is?”