CHAPTER 145: THE MAN KNOWN AS...

The mountain fortress of Ourouboros was buried deep within the granite cliffs, its jagged towers hidden beneath layers of illusion spells. The entire lair was a maze of corridors reinforced by magic and steel, crawling with demonized soldiers and warped mages who had traded their humanity for monstrous strength. To most intruders, this place was a tomb from which there was no escape.

Tonight, it was the reverse.

Because Azariah Raizen had arrived.

He stood at the foot of the mountain, his tall frame draped in black and gold. His cloak whispered against the stone as the cold night wind howled. In the sky above, thunderclouds began to churn unnaturally, dark veins of electricity flickering inside them as though the heavens themselves feared what was about to walk forward.

Azariah’s eyes were unreadable, sharp as polished obsidian, reflecting nothing but void even though they’re pure golden in color. His expression carried no anger, no joy — merely a stillness that was more terrifying than rage itself.

The ambient prana seemed almost docile around him. This showed how much skilled he was. Black lightning hissed faintly around his hands, crawling up his forearms in thin strands like serpents awakening. He didn’t even raise his weapon — he had no need to. His mere presence cracked the atmosphere.

Inside the mountain fortress, alarms began to sound.

"An intruder!"

"Defensive formations, now!"

The first wave rushed from the fortress’ gate: dozens of demonized humans, their eyes glowing scarlet, their bodies twisted with scales, claws, or stone-like armor. They charged with monstrous roars, weapons coated in corrupt prana.

Azariah walked forward slowly, each step echoing against the cliff.

The soldiers roared. Azariah raised his hand.

The world turned black.

It wasn’t shadow, nor nightfall — it was light itself being devoured. A single crack of black lightning arced across the ground, splitting stone, melting steel, and in an instant, thirty soldiers disintegrated into nothing but drifting ash. Their cries were cut short, erased before they even realized they had died.

Azariah didn’t pause. His cloak billowed, untouched by the wind, as if reality bent around him.

From behind him, the mountain gate split open wider, unleashing a horde of nearly a hundred. They charged like a tidal wave of flesh and steel. Their claws dug into stone, their fangs gleamed, their weapons carried the distortion of the Ourouboros’ corruption, their madness.

"Hold the line!" their captain screamed, his voice shaking. "He bleeds like any other man—"

The sentence never finished.

Azariah’s gaze shifted toward them. Just his gaze.

The air split. A storm of black lightning fell from above like the judgment of a wrathful god. Bolts so fast they could not be seen — only the aftermath remained: smoking craters, severed limbs, the stench of ozone and burning flesh. The ground itself cracked and peeled as though reality rejected their existence.

Half the horde vanished in an instant. The survivors stumbled, horrified.

"What... what is this...?" one muttered, his weapon trembling in his hand.

Another shrieked, "He isn’t human! Retreat, retreat—"

Azariah lifted his palm, fingers closing slowly. Black lightning wrapped around the remaining soldiers, constricting like serpents. The corrupted humans convulsed, their screams filling the night. Then — silence. Their bodies shattered into fragments of obsidian glass that scattered to dust.

The battlefield was empty. Not a single soldier had survived.

Azariah walked on.

Inside the fortress walls, commanders watched through scrying mirrors, their faces pale.

"This... this can’t be right. A single man?" one stammered.

"Deploy the Knight-class units," another barked, though his voice cracked. "He must not reach the inner sanctum!"

Orders flew. From the deeper corridors, more powerful figures emerged: demonized knights clad in spiked armor, wielding weapons infused with the Laws of corrupted flame, steel, and stone. Behind them came ominous looking mages, their staffs dripping with black ichor, their mouths chanting incomprehensible curses.

They assembled on the great platform just beyond the first gate — nearly fifty Knight-class and Mage-class demonized soldiers, each powerful enough to slaughter a battalion of men. Together, they formed a wall of corruption, a perfect death formation.

The ground rumbled with their unified roar.

And Azariah stepped through the gate.

The fortress’ illusions shattered in his presence — the runes etched into the walls flickered and died, like candles suffocated by the storm. The twisted mages screamed their chants, summoning waves of black fire and corrupted ice, runes tearing across the sky.

Azariah stopped. He raised his hand.

The black lightning surged.

It didn’t explode outward like before. No. This time it pulsed like a heartbeat, and the air itself fractured. Cracks spider-webbed across space, black lightning crawling through them. The world seemed to splinter apart, reality rejecting the force he wielded.

And then—

BOOM.

Every spell cast by the mages evaporated instantly, their black fire undone, their ice shattered into vapor. The knights braced their weapons, forming a wall, shouting war cries.

Azariah walked toward them, step by step.

Every step released another pulse of black lightning, and with each pulse, a knight fell apart, armor melting into liquid shadow, flesh vanishing as though eaten by the void. The survivors screamed and pushed forward, charging, desperate.

For the first time, Azariah’s lips moved. His voice was low, cold, resonant.

"Pathetic."

With a flick of his wrist, the sky collapsed in a single arc of lightning.

The entire formation disintegrated in seconds.

Where once stood fifty of Ourouboros’ soldiers, powerful than your regular soldiers, there was only a blackened crater, the stone still sizzling, the air reeking of ozone and blood.

Azariah didn’t even slow his pace.

The fortress trembled, deeper alarms blaring. Commanders screamed orders, desperate to stall the inevitable.

But the inevitable had already arrived.

The fortress quaked as if the mountain itself wanted to flee. Azariah’s slow advance sent vibrations through every corridor, every chamber of the lair. Black lightning crawled across the walls, searing runes into the stone.

Inside the command chamber, five figures stood around a war table. They were the fortress commanders — veterans twisted by Ourouboros’ experiments until their very presence radiated malice.

One, his skin plated with molten steel, snarled. "He hasn’t even drawn his blade. You expect us to believe a man like that can’t be killed?"

Another, her eyes dripping with black ichor, hissed, "You saw it. Fifty Almost Purple Knight-class erased without a swing. This is no ordinary intruder... This is a calamity wearing human flesh