Chapter 261: The Threshold of Despair
The night above the prairie was incinerated by a sudden, blinding brilliance.
The low-tier thralls of the Necrotic Realm, who had been greedily tearing at the
frame of No. 269, suddenly realized that their claws were striking something
harder than diamond. No matter how much force they exerted, they could no longer
chip a single flake of calcium from the Centurion.
No. 269's guttering soulfire erupted into a violent, sapphire inferno. The blue
flames shot upward, a localized sun that turned the surrounding fifty meters
into a glare of artificial day.
The "System" of the world screamed as his parameters shattered their limits.
Tier 5 Peak... Tier 6 Initial... Tier 6 Middle... Tier 6 Upper... Tier 6 PEAK!
The grey Mana-chains binding him didn't just break; they were vaporized by the
sheer pressure of his expanded Od.
Crack. Snap. Hiss.
No. 269 rose slowly, his joints emitting a series of crisp, rhythmic clicks. He
reached into the void, and the Bone-Cleaving Greatsword manifested in his grip
once more. Death energy flowed across the blade in visible, liquid ribbons,
radiating a haunting blue light that cut through the Crimson Purgatory.
The Centurion didn't roar. He didn't scream in rage. He simply turned his skull
toward the low-tier undead that had been feasting on him.
He delivered a single, horizontal sweep.
The resulting shockwave of force whistled through the air. The thralls were
instantly erased—their soulfire snuffed and their frames reduced to splinters
before they could even register a threat. Their fragments hit the dirt and
immediately began to vibrate, blue soulfire igniting in their shattered skulls,
but No. 269 didn't spare them a glance.
He turned and broke into a blur of sapphire light, charging back toward the main
vanguard. Every Necrotic unit that dared to obstruct his path was methodically
dismantled by a single stroke of his blade.
In the distance, Thanatos witnessed the anomaly.
He ceased his internal recovery and surged to his feet. The violet-gold soulfire
in his sockets pulsed with a jagged, irregular rhythm—the first time in a
thousand years he had felt the cold prickle of genuine shock.
In a single heartbeat... tens of thousands of Tier 6 powerhouses?
In the entire history of the Necrotic Realm, the number of Tier 6 units barely
reached a thousand. The million-man host he had brought today represented the
absolute apex of his world's military evolution. And yet, this Plane was
mass-producing Tier 6s like common infantry?
How? By what logic is this allowed?
Thanatos's gaze swept the tactical theater. The Imperial soldiers, once frozen
by his [Space-Time Cage], were now fully operational. They were no longer
soldiers; they were harvesting machines. Each Tier 6 Peak unit was a localized
apocalypse, clearing hundreds of meters of his army with every rotation.
And the conversion... the conversion was now a statistical nightmare.
Every thrall they struck down rose a second later under the Evernight banner.
And as they rose, they too were ascended to Tier 6.
It was a recursive, lethal loop. The more Thanatos sent into the meat-grinder,
the more Tier 6 enemies he created for himself.
Within minutes, his losses reached hundreds of thousands. Conversely, the
Imperial combat strength had ballooned from the initial tens of thousands to a
nearly half-million strong host of high-tier powerhouses.
Every single one of them was a Tier 6. Every single one was a deterrent-class
asset.
Thanatos's soulfire began to shiver. He had conquered a hundred worlds and
analyzed a thousand forbidden Authorities, but he had never encountered a logic
so warped, so terrifyingly efficient. This was no longer a Planar War.
It was a unilateral purge of the invaders.
Thanatos's gauntlets clenched and unclenched. He was calculating. He was
weighing the variables. As a Tier 7 Peak, he knew that power of this magnitude
must have a tax. The Sovereign of Evernight must be paying a monumental price to
sustain such a widespread ascension.
If I find the source... if I find the flaw...
But he realized, with a sinking feeling in his marrow, that he didn't have the
time to investigate. The tactical reality was decaying at an exponential rate.
His army was being liquidated. His strength was being turned against him.
If he remained, he wouldn't just lose the war; he would lose himself.
Thanatos made his choice.
Flight. Immediate Extraction.
"I cannot terminate here," he whispered. "I have yet to achieve Godhood. My
design is incomplete!"
He raised his hand. The Crimson Purgatory began to contract. The massive dome
that had once claimed the horizon shrank rapidly, drawing inward until it
covered only a ten-mile radius—just enough to shield his remaining million
thralls.
"ALL LEGIONS: RETIRE TO THE BOUNDARY!"
Thanatos's command surged through the link.
"MAGE-COVEN: COMMENCE DIMENSIONAL ANCHORING! OPEN THE PLANAR GATE IMMEDIATELY!"
"MOVE!"
The Necrotic host reacted with the desperation of a cornered beast. Units locked
in combat with Imperial soldiers abandoned their positions, turning and fleeing
toward the red glow of the boundary. Hundreds of Liches raised their staves in a
unified circle, chanting the forbidden geometry of planar transit. Grey Mana
bled into the air, slowly tracing the jagged outline of a massive rift.
Thanatos stood at the center of the retreat, his eyes fixed on the sea of blue
light outside his dome.
The Imperial soldiers didn't give chase.
They simply stopped. They stood at the edge of the Crimson Boundary, watching
the retreat with a cold, unsettling silence. Half a million Tier 6 powerhouses
formed a blue wall that blotted out the prairie.
No one spoke. No one cheered. They simply... waited.
Thanatos's soulfire flickered. He realized the meaning of their stillness.
They aren't finished with me. They're waiting for the Main Event.
They were waiting for the one who had mass-produced half a million gods. They
were waiting for the true Sovereign of Evernight.
Panic, a long-forgotten variable, began to claw at Thanatos's logic. He spun
around, roaring at the Liches.
"FASTER! ACCELERATE THE INJECTION!" "HOW LONG UNTIL THE GATE IS ANCHORED?!"
A High Lich answered, his voice trembling like a dry leaf. "My King... we
require two more hours for a safe transit."
"YOU HAVE ONE HOUR!" Thanatos screamed. "If that gate is not open in sixty
minutes, I will process every single one of you into Mana-batteries for my own
escape! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?!"
The Liches, terrified beyond the capacity of their undead nature, redoubled
their efforts. Grey energy surged through the air, the construction of the gate
accelerating into a blurred strobe of magic.
Planar transit was a delicate calculation—space-time coordinates, Mana
stabilization, atmospheric resistance. A single error could trigger a localized
collapse or send the army into the deep Void.
Thanatos knew the risks. But he had no choice. He could only gamble. He gambled
that the Sovereign wouldn't strike within the hour. He gambled that the
Sovereign hadn't reached the field yet.
Time bled away, second by agonizing second.
Outside the Crimson Boundary, the blue wall of Imperial soldiers remained
perfectly still. They didn't move. They didn't strike. They stood like obsidian
monuments across the prairie.
The eerie silence was more deafening than the bombardment.
Thirty minutes passed. The gate was halfway to stabilization.
Ten minutes remained. The outline of the rift was solidifying, awaiting the
final injection of Od.
Thanatos's gaze was locked onto the gate.
Almost there. Almost.
Just twenty more minutes of silence... and I can leave this cursed world behind.
☆☆☆
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