The clash between them continued.

Adrian and the humanoid monster tore the sky apart, each blow splitting the land, each strike rattling the Abyss. At first, they seemed equals, but the truth soon bled through.

Adrian’s blade slowed. His Temporal Veil strained. Every cut grew shallower, every breath heavier.

His basic mana bled away in torrents, while the monster’s liquefied reserves, fueled by the Stone glowing in its chest, never faltered. The creature’s regeneration outpaced every wound Adrian carved into its flesh.

Then the creature halted. It tilted its head, bored, its gaze turning downward.

The battlefield below thrashed with fire, light, and steel. Thomas, Elara, and Ironwood held against the hulking A-ranks, their forms staggering beneath suppression.

Kael’s spatial blades carved reality itself, but even he faltered against the A-ranks under suppression. Blood streaked his face as a Stonehulk’s fist grazed his shoulder.

The monster watched the struggle with cold amusement. “How tedious.”

With a disdainful hum, it blinked, teleporting instantly. Adrian’s eyes widened in horror.

It reappeared behind Elara, who was locked in combat with the massive Stonehulk. Her golden light flared desperately against the titan’s crushing blows.

The monster’s arm lanced through her back, its hand bursting from her stomach in a spray of crimson. Elara’s scream ripped the battlefield apart as the creature lifted her high, skewered like a trophy.

“Mother!” Adrian’s voice shattered the battlefield. His mind went blank, the word ripping from his soul.

The monster’s lips curled into a cruel smile. “So fragile.”

It flung her aside like discarded refuse. Elara’s body tumbled across jagged stone, leaving a trail of blood.

Adrian blurred, catching her before she struck the ground. His hands shook as Breath of Life roared, emerald smoke pouring into her torn body.

Her wound knitted slowly, her breath steadied, but she was pale, trembling, on the edge of death. “Adrian… run…”

Before he could finish healing, space warped behind him. The monster blinked again, this time targeting Kael, who was pinned between two Stonehulks.

Adrian’s mist exploded outward. Rage tore through his veins.

He tore across the battlefield, caught the monster’s throat mid-strike and slammed it into the stone with all his fury. The land cracked, dust exploding outward in massive clouds.

But the creature broke free instantly, its strength overwhelming. It hurled him back like a ragdoll.

Adrian skidded across fractured stone, chest heaving. His reserves were nearly empty, his manifestation flickering.

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He looked around, the world a nightmare. His mother, pale, barely clinging to life in a pool of her own blood.

His father raging but pinned by the Stonehulks, their massive fists raining down. Kael straining against impossible odds, spatial tears failing to cut deep enough.

Ironwood barely holding his ground, steel armor cracked and bleeding. All of them dwarfed by this one being.

Helplessness choked him. That same helplessness he had sworn to erase from existence.

His teeth bared. His voice thundered across the battlefield, raw and broken.

“If I were stronger…” his roar cracked, wild, guttural. “You never would have touched her!”

The monster paused, intrigued by his fury. “Stronger? You are already beyond your kind.”

“If I were stronger, this would have ended long ago!” Adrian’s manifestation thrashed violently, the mist surging, devouring the ambient energy around him.

His reserves screamed, compressed beyond their limits. The pressure built like a dam about to burst.

And then, it broke.

Mana liquefied in an instant, dense and absolute, flooding through his body. The transformation sent shockwaves through the Abyss itself.

He moved toward the monster, his every step cracking stone. His strikes flared sharper, faster, heavier than before.

His blade carved through the creature’s defenses, each swing leaving deeper gouges.

But even that wasn’t enough. The monster’s strength never wavered, the Stone in its chest pulsing brighter, feeding it endlessly.

Adrian’s blade tore flesh and bone, but it did not kill. The creature regenerated faster than he could destroy.

This wasn’t enough! Even with his liquefied mana, he could not kill it. He needed more. He wanted more.

His fury reached for the depths of himself, the source inside him, which was in the form of a cosmic river, answered his call!

At that moment, everything collapsed.

His liquefied mana collapsed inward, unraveling, until all of it was consumed and remade into Source energy. The transformation began slowly, mercilessly.

First, his veins turned white-grey, then his blood, his flesh, his very organs. His entire body dissolved, stripped bare, and rebuilt.

Not as flesh. Not as blood. Not as human.

Adrian’s form changed completely. He was no longer flesh and bone, no longer blood and cells.

His features melted away, leaving only two eyes burning faintly in the blank silhouette of a man. His body was pure Source energy, white-grey, formless yet absolute.

The Abyss itself convulsed. The land cracked and split as reality warped around his transformation.

The air screamed, torn apart by energies that predated existence itself. Mountains in the distance trembled and collapsed.

He was no longer fighting. He was no longer even raging.

Every impurity, rage, fear, hesitation, wasted motion, was gone. What remained was blank, Empty, Terrifying.

He was not a god, nor a demon. He had become the Source itself, the origin of affinities, the origin of everything.

Kael staggered backward, his spatial affinity recoiling in terror. “What… what has he become?”

Elara gasped from where she lay bleeding. Her light affinity flickered, dimming before this absolute presence.

Thomas and Ironwood shivered, their newly liquefied mana trembling like frightened children. They felt it in their cores, as if every affinity, every drop of mana they held bowed before him.

The very fabric of the Abyss bent around Adrian. Stone rose from the ground, floating in reverence.

Reality itself acted as if it were bowing toward him, making way for him. The pale mist of the Abyss swirled in perfect spirals around his form.

He took a step forward. The land beneath his feet cracked like spider webs, fractures spreading for miles.

He turned slightly and looked at the three A-rank Stonehulks. His gaze fell upon them like the weight of eternity.

His mere look erased them. Not cut. Not killed. Simply gone.

They didn’t scream. They didn’t resist. They ceased, as if they had never existed at all.

For the first time, the humanoid monster faltered. Its body shook, instincts shrieking that it stood before something it could not fight.

“Impossible,” it whispered, its voice breaking. “You’re just human. Just… human.”

The Source Stone in its chest pulsed frantically. Its glow dimmed, then began singing.

Not to the monster. To Adrian.

It hummed in joy, calling to him like a child to its parent. The Stone’s resonance shifted completely, abandoning its host.

It no longer fed the creature, it yearned to return. It wanted to return to its origin.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep