Chapter 169

Six blazing meteors fell from the night sky. Six strikes, each one as swift as lightning, stabbed and slashed in succession.

The light unleashed from the Holy Sword came crashing down to the earth, every blow a finishing move strong enough to overwhelm an equal warrior. And the result of Leon unleashing six of them in a row was nothing short of terrifying.

The instant the shockwaves burst forth dozens of meters above, an immense pressure formed around Anubis’s body. Already driven deep into the ground by his own weight, his feet sank further, leaving him no chance to evade.

The shockwaves themselves reached him before the strikes did, suppressing the space around him. Even Anubis could not simply endure this attack.

“————!”

With an inhuman roar, his crescent-shaped spear began to spin at an incredible speed. Sand whipped into the air by the wind pressure swirled into a vast vortex, howling like a maelstrom in the heart of the sea.

𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Undead caught within its radius were shredded into bloody mist. Even the swarms of beetles that had mindlessly hurled themselves at the living scattered in panic, burrowing into the desert floor.

It was truly a storm of death. Even the Bedouins, who had lived for centuries in the Great Desert, had never seen such a storm as the one Anubis summoned now. Hundreds of tons of sand—perhaps more—swirled at the command of his spear, rising into a cyclone that clashed with the six falling stars.

It was as if lightning and whirlwind collided. The meteors from the heavens and the whirlwind from the earth tore into each other, each trying to devour the other, each screaming its fury.

The first Three Stars in Heaven’s Jar slammed directly into the sandstorm, and in that instant, the world blazed with light. The swordlight of the secret technique carried not only power and radiance, but searing heat. The sand didn’t have time to melt—it evaporated or hardened into glass shards that scattered light in all directions.

The clash between sandstorm and meteor shower was fierce beyond words. The earth around Anubis collapsed into a vast crater, hundreds of tons of sand sucked upward, while the temperature in the air soared, twisting sight into waves of mirage.

One strike definitely wouldn’t have been enough.

From high above, Leon looked down on the battlefield. The price of unleashing six ultimate slashes left his breathing ragged, his blood boiling, and dizziness clouding his head.

Yet his eyes wavered not at all. With every breath, his ragged breathing calmed. The arms that had screamed in pain and trembled with exhaustion steadied. It was the result of embodying the sun within his heart.

Clenching and unclenching his fists, Leon readied himself again.

Ten more seconds, and I’ll be fully recovered.

Astonishingly, the Stigma of the Guardian drew strength even from the sun within him, restoring the source of power that Nephren-Ka had severed. If it continued like this, he could unleash the Grand Chariot several more times and still endure.

The problem, however, remained.

“————!”

Even two consecutive strikes of the Three Stars in Heaven’s Jar hadn’t been enough to finish Anubis. Having blocked two meteoric showers, the reaper of the dead swung his reddened spear with a roar. The sandstorm finally tore apart under the weight of the technique, but the effort of holding it back had blunted Leon’s power, stripping much of its force.

However, that didn’t mean Anubis had emerged unscathed.

“That would have killed most right then and there...” Leon muttered, looking at the still-standing Anubis.

Once, he had ruled as a god upon the divine throne. Now, he was nothing more than an undead, tainted by otherworldly power. Worse, Nephren-Ka’s curse of inversion gnawed at him still.

Either one of the Holy Sword or the Sun was lethal. Together, they inflicted devastation he could not shrug off.

Only his arms remained intact. His torso and one thigh were shredded, flapping like torn cloth. Bone jutted out, rotten innards spilled, and black venom poured instead of blood as if to prove his corruption.

Yet still he fought. His eyes, burning black with hatred, fixed on Leon. In that moment, others leaped into the fray.

“Wow. Magnificent,” Leon remarked, looking at not one, but two silhouettes that chattered as they charged.

“I won’t let myself fall behind my little brother so soon.”

“Still clinging to that ‘brother’ talk?”

“Mind your own business, wolf!”

Al Razzaz and Varg launched themselves at Anubis almost in unison. Their shared instinct, honed by their ability to read the flow of battle, told them there was no better time.

Within the massive crater Anubis now occupied, the two Masters launched their first-ever joint assault. Against Anubis, such a thing was no shame.

Varg darted in first, slipping past the descending spear.

“Sirius, Swiftwind Step: Wind March, Frostbite.”

Before Anubis could recover his weapon, the giant appeared at his back, Al Razzaz’s blade carving into his thigh.

“Djinn of Al Razzaz: Storm-Culling Slash.”

Even with an Aura Blade targeting the wound, the sword barely bit in. Still, it wasn’t without effect. Anubis faltered for an instant, forced to abandon his counter.

That brief pause was all the Master of Sirius, the pinnacle of speed, needed.

“Sirius, Swiftwind Kick, Ultimate Secret Technique: Lightning Soul Strike.”

Unlike before, the storm condensed into a single point, his toes driving forward like a spear. The vortex spiraled tight, piercing into Anubis’s abdomen.

The blow ruptured the entrails already spilling out, a foul stench of miasma bursting forth. Against a living body, it would have been fatal.

“———!”

However, Anubis, knowing neither pain nor fear, swung his spear around to strike at them both. Then, the crescent-shaped blade blurred and wavered.

A shriek of steel split the air. In an instant, Anubis’s arms blurred, stabbing so fast they vanished, raining thrusts down on Varg and Al Razzaz.

Even Leon, with dynamic vision ten times sharper than usual, couldn’t follow half of them. It was an endless barrage, undead resilience letting Anubis ignore his ruined body as he unleashed the storm. The off-beat sonic booms from his strikes blasted the entire area to rubble.

El-Cid chimed in, —Sixty-four.

“What...?”

—That’s how many thrusts Anubis just unleashed. If there’d been only one of Varg or Al Razzaz, that would’ve killed him.

It was absurdly fast.

If Leon had faced it himself, he would have raised a shield of amplified Aura instead of trying to parry. Even then, survival would have been uncertain.

By some miracle, the two Masters survived. Thrown aside by the shockwaves, Varg and Al Razzaz rose from the sand, bodies soaked in blood, staining the desert red.

“

Cough

! It’s been a while since I’ve come so close to death,” Varg spat, blood flecking his lips.

Al Razzaz clenched his teeth and growled, grabbing Varg by the shoulder.

“You son of a goddamn bitch...!

I

took all the hits you dodged!”

Unlike Varg, who had focused on evasion, Al Razzaz had thrown his mind-body forward to take the brunt of the thrusts. As a result, his condition was worse. Had the strikes dug in even a little deeper, and he would’ve passed out.

Varg barked a laugh and grabbed his staggering arm, saying, “When did I ask you to take the hit for me?”

“You bastard...!”

Their words were harsh, but there was no true malice between them. Dragging their battered bodies, the champions of desert and steppe charged Anubis once more. This time, Leon and Elahan—fully recovered—joined them.

Nephren-Ka is still focused on recovery. If we don’t break through Anubis and strike him down now...!

The cost of summoning Anubis must have been enormous. Since then, Nephren-Ka hadn’t moved, only chanting his profane incantations to gather strength.

This was the chance. Varg and Al Razzaz knew it too.

“Heir!”

Leon caught the intent in Varg’s eyes and voice, and instead of replying, simply nodded.

The clash came an instant later. At the vanguard, Leon opened with a downward slash.

“Heavenly Core, First Form: Dubhe.”

The Grand Chariot strike carried subsonic force, and even Anubis dared not ignore it, thrusting his spear to meet the blow. Star and crescent clashed, exploding in a blinding flash.

Seizing the moment, the two Masters advanced. But something about their movements was strange. As Varg pressed forward, Al Razzaz slipped behind, blade raised.

“Keep up, wolf!”

“Don’t you dare drag me down, sand geezer.”

Anubis, stripped of reason, couldn’t guess their intent. He simply sought to obliterate the foes before him.

As his spear came down to shred Varg, his body split into eight, scattering in all directions.

“Sirius, Swiftwind Step: Chasing Wind, Catching Shadow.”

If it had been another flurry of thrusts, perhaps, but with an ordinary strike, he couldn’t track eight illusions at once. For a moment, Anubis faltered, recalculating where to strike.

That fleeting moment was exactly what they wanted.

“Sirius, Swiftwind Kick, Ultimate Secret Technique: Fivefold Tempest Strike.”

Normally, the technique required seven thrusts, but his body wasn’t at its peak. Even the ten clones had been reduced to eight. Still, he barely managed five whirlwinds, which coiled around both his legs, each one powerful enough to flatten a hill.

Not stopping there, Varg wrapped them over the blade of the giant that rose over Al Razzaz like a wide-brimmed hat.

“Give it your best swing, idiot!” the Beast King shouted.

Even Leon and Elahan were awestruck. They were both Masters of the same attribute, but to improvise a combination technique like this? If their timing was even slightly off, both would have been mortally wounded. Yet neither hesitated.

“Djinn of Al Razzaz, Sirius, Joint Technique: Storm-Culling Blade!”

The scale alone dwarfed Leon’s Three Stars in Heaven’s Jar several times over. Even Anubis was forced onto the defensive before the power that was enough to crush him, regardless of affinity.

Eyes blazing at Varg’s taunt, Al Razzaz brought his storm-wrapped blade down, shouting, “Who are you calling an idiooooot!”

The tempest crashed upon Anubis from above, but even so, they couldn’t finish him. The strength of the two Masters was immense, but against a being corrupted by exolaw, even an Aura Blade couldn’t deliver a killing blow.

That was why Varg had already passed his intent to Leon.

“Hurry, Heir!”

Though it was only a few seconds, the joint technique of Varg and Al Razzaz, the Sirius Storm-Culling Blade, managed to bind Anubis perfectly.

Leon and Elahan didn’t waste the opening. Icarus Wing, overstrained for hours, flared once more. With wings spread wide, kicking up a towering sandstorm behind him, Leon fixed his gaze past Anubis’s prison of whirlwinds—on Nephren-Ka.

Now!

If he poured everything into one last burst, the Icarus Wing could hurl him across the distance in the blink of an eye. He crouched to launch, when—

“————!”

Anubis, not paying any mind to his own arms being torn apart, thrust his upper body through the storm and hurled his spear.

Leon, already preparing to accelerate, couldn’t dodge in time. So, Elahan filled the gap.

“Go, Hero Leon!”

Turning her body to shield Leon’s back, Elahan brought down her Holy Iron Breaker against the incoming spear. The spear veered off course, missing Leon, but the recoil slammed Elahan into the ground.

The aid and sacrifice of his comrades. Everyone bled so Leon could take one more step. He could repay them with nothing but victory.

“Here I come.”

Leon’s Icarus Wing ignited diagonally forward. Turning the explosion into pure thrust, Leon shot through the sky like an arrow loosed, charging straight at Nephren-Ka.

The sound barrier shattered again and again. His body ached from the recoil, numbed beyond sensation. The only thing he could still feel was the weight of the Holy Sword in his hands. There was no space for hesitation, no chance to slow down. Only acceleration.

With a crack, several fingers broke. Blood pressure spiked from the strain, and his vision turned scarlet, but through all that, his eyes never left his enemy.

The glowing eyes of Nephren-Ka, the king of death, wrapped in filthy bandages, body warped into a grotesque mockery, became fixed on Leon’s approach.

In the blink of an eye stretched into eternity, Nephren-Ka’s voice echoed slowly.

“I knew it would come to this,” he muttered. “I knew it would be the sun that would try to end me. I knew only

you

could threaten me. Anubis failed to kill you, so I will claim your life myself.”

Darkness surged. No—it poured.

Even the shadows devouring the world were drawn back, condensed solely to kill Leon. Already locked on his path, he had no way to change course. It was a curtain of abyss, blinding even a step ahead, a depth that stole reason at a glance.

“However radiant a sun may be, it is but a firefly drifting through the empty void of space,” Nephren-Ka pronounced judgment, and the maw of the abyss swallowed Leon whole. “Behold. The sun has fallen.”