BOOM—

The energy sphere tore through the air, trailing a golden tail of fire as it slammed into the fortress.

The explosion ripped the sky open. The shockwave snapped Bloodfiend Lord's cloak like a banner in a storm. His eyes narrowed, the chill in them sharp enough to cut steel.

"Bold," he growled.

Blood-red flames surged from his body, coalescing into a towering phantom—his power made flesh: the Bloodfiend Phantom.

"If you won't give me your secret," he hissed, voice like blades scraping metal, "then I'll peel your soul apart myself. Slowly. Carefully."

The world convulsed.

Lightning and bloodfire collided in midair, twisting into a storm of annihilation. Space itself tore like fabric, unraveling in jagged, collapsing folds.

And still, Ethan stood his ground.

His eyes burned with a feverish light, just shy of madness. The volatile fusion of Fairy light and Bloodfiend energy inside him surged out of control—but it didn't destroy him. It fed him. It devoured and transformed.

He raised his hand again, summoning orb after orb of energy, hurling them like meteors toward the earth.

Each impact detonated with a thunderous roar, shaking the sky until it groaned.

The weaker Bloodfiends didn't stand a chance. They were vaporized, one after another, reduced to clouds of crimson mist.

And that mist—those fragments of blood-energy—flowed back through the air, drawn into Ethan's body.

In that moment, he became a furnace, the battlefield itself his fuel.

His power surged—

Like the whole world was being melted down and reforged inside him.

Then, the air froze.

The Bloodfiend Lord's eyes narrowed. He'd noticed something.

"…Interesting," he murmured.

From beneath his armor, he drew a blood-red orb—alive, pulsing in his palm with a heartbeat that wasn't his own.

"Let's see if your body can handle this little gift."

He tossed it into the air.

POP—

The orb exploded.

A wave of blood mist burst outward, thick and writhing like living tendrils. It wrapped around Ethan in an instant, sealing him in a cocoon of red.

Pain hit like a blade to the spine.

His body was being torn apart—flesh, soul, energy, all ripped from him in pieces. Every bone felt like it was melting.

His strength drained. His mind began to slip.

He was being devoured.

Ethan's heart dropped.

This mist—it wasn't just corrosive. It was hungry. It was pulling his soul out of his skin.

If he stayed in it even a few seconds longer, he'd become part of it. Just another smear of blood in the fog.

Gritting his teeth, he fought to steady his breath, to gather what power he had left. A golden orb began to form in his palm, flickering—

But before he could release it, a familiar light tore through the mist.

"Master!"

Feylora.

She burst from the sea of blood like a comet, her wings blazing with emerald fire.

Before Ethan could react, she thrust out both hands. A terrifying suction force exploded from her body—

And the blood mist began to collapse inward, sucked into her like a vortex.

The mist churned inside her, her eyes flashing deep crimson.

It was a dangerous fusion. One that could break her.

"Feylora! Stop—!"

Ethan shouted, but she only clenched her jaw, forcing the energy into a tight, pulsing sphere of blood-red light. She hurled it toward him.

"Take it! Use it to stabilize your power!"

The orb hit his palm, searing hot.

He hesitated—but only for a heartbeat—then closed his fingers around it.

Warmth surged through his veins.

The chaos inside him began to settle. The storm of energy slowed, then stilled.

He could feel it—his power knitting itself back together, reshaping, refining.

And rising.

The barrier between levels—the wall that had held him back—was starting to crack.

Ethan's pupils flared with sudden light.

"It works…" he murmured, eyes flicking to Feylora, who was still locked in battle with the blood mist. "Feylora—can you make more of those orbs?"

"The one the Bloodfiend Lord detonated—it shattered into thousands of fragments," she panted, her wings trembling with strain. "I can absorb them. Convert them into something we can control."

Even as she spoke, she drew in another shard of blood-energy. Light and crimson swirled around her like a dance of petals and blades.

Ethan's battle-lust ignited fully.

He spread his arms, mimicking her motion, and began to draw the blood mist into himself.

The air trembled. The sky roared.

Energy surged around them, fusing and burning like wildfire.

Fairy brilliance and Bloodfiend fury clashed inside him—then, with a thunderous jolt, locked into unity.

BOOM.

A golden dragon burst from his back, a phantom of pure power, spiraling into the sky.

Its roar split the heavens. A vortex of light and blood churned in the air above.

In that instant, Ethan's aura shattered through its limits—

Tier 21. Peak.

The Bloodfiend Lord's eyes contracted sharply.

"Impossible…!"

His voice cracked with disbelief.

"That's my power! Mine! How can you—how can you absorb it?!"

Ethan didn't answer.

He hovered in the air, eyes cold, hands blazing with light.

The energy inside him was a tidal wave, crashing through his veins, deafening in its force.

Below, Feylora looked up, breathless—and saw him.

In that moment, Ethan's presence had fused with the world itself.

"You want to study me?" he said softly. His voice was calm, but it struck like thunder. "Then survive me first."

The Bloodfiend Lord's expression darkened to pitch.

He said nothing.

He simply raised his hand.

A sword began to form—slowly, deliberately—shaped from pure blood. Its edge shimmered with the promise of annihilation.

The sky howled.

Lightning danced through the clouds, illuminating the moment like a divine omen of ruin.

The Bloodfiend Lord stood tall, sword in hand, bloodlight flowing over him like a river that breathed.

His voice boomed across the battlefield:

"Everyone who's ever defied me has turned to ash. You will be no different."

The blade flared, blinding.

The air turned foul—thick with the stench of corpses, oceans of blood, and the yawning mouth of the abyss.

Ethan didn't flinch.

He tilted his head back, brought his hands together, and summoned the storm within.

Behind him, golden light and deep crimson fire twisted together, forming a massive disc.

It spun slowly—like a sun, or a gate to judgment.

With every rotation, it devoured the energy of the world around it—then hurled it back, magnified and monstrous.

BOOM—

The disc let out a low, guttural roar. A shockwave tore through the sky.

And then the two forces collided.

Gold against bloodfire. Creation against destruction. The heavens changed color.

As the storm spread, the armies below clashed.

Fairy wings met Bloodfiend claws. The air filled with shredded feathers and screams torn from throats.

There was no mercy. Only slaughter.

Both sides were stained by blood. Their eyes held nothing but madness and the hunger to kill.

Gold and red painted a nightmare across the sky—a vision of Judgment Day reborn in myth and fire.

No one could say how long the battle raged.

A moment. An eternity.

When the smoke began to clear, the ground beneath the fortress was carpeted in corpses.

There were no sides anymore. Only blood.

Above, Ethan and the Bloodfiend Lord were still locked in combat.

Their forms flickered, too fast, too powerful for space itself to contain. Every clash cracked the sky. Every breath shook the earth.

BOOM—

Another impact. The two were blasted apart, flung to opposite ends of the sky.

They hovered there, staring each other down.

Lightning arced between them, sketching their silhouettes in stark relief—two gods carved from fury and will.

Both were breathing hard, their chests rising like storm-swollen seas.

Ethan's arms trembled. Blood and light flowed across his skin, indistinguishable now. He couldn't tell which side of him belonged to which force.

And the Bloodfiend Lord—

For the first time, his cold, calculating eyes flickered with something else.

A flicker of disbelief.

"He actually… blocked it."

Ethan wiped the blood from his mouth.

He hadn't expected this.

The Bloodfiend Lord was stronger than he'd imagined.

Far stronger.

And this wasn't going to end quickly.

...