Ch 23

The hunters watched from afar. The drones secured the surroundings of the rift. Everyone prepared their equipment and their concentration reached the peak.

All of the sudden, the drones withdrew from the vicinity of the rift. The entrance ripped space apart and expanded. A powerful wave was released.

The shockwave destroyed the nearby buildings and broke windows. The trees were broken apart and small objects flew out.

"Ready yourself!"

The high ranked hunters, commanded by a military officer, went alert. The first phase of the monster tide was the rift signal. The signal could be detected by the drones which allows them to prepare in advance. The second phase would be the shockwave. Any civilians near the rift would not survive the shock. Ending with mere broken bones and ruptured organs was considered fortunate.

The third phase was about to occur. A mighty roar was heard, then a large head surfaced from within.

"Begin the attack now. Start with long distance barrage. Pay attention to the monsters capable of flight."

Spells rained down systematically. The rift was large enough, capable of fitting two trucks side by side. The monsters appeared continuously.

The first monster was slain, but there were countless of them waiting from the other side. They trampled over the corpse and successfully landed on Earth.

The vicinity of the rift was enclosed by experienced hunters. The monsters who survived from the initial barrage engaged in close combat with the front-liners, struggling to break free.

Explosion raged in the center, while the edge of the encirclement turned into a meat grinder. Severed limbs flew and blood splattered, from both monsters and hunters alike.

The military officer noticed something peculiar about the monsters. The monsters seem to be suffering from a common disease, black, fleshy tumors grew from their bodies. Some were missing their fleshes, exposing their organs.

They were radiating a strange energy. Somehow, the air felt heavy and negative emotions were easily stirred.

"Expand the boundary!" He ordered.

The fighters carefully retreated, creating more space for the monsters.

"This vile energy again." Areth muttered as he also noticed the problem.

He reached out with his palm, his signature golden mana transformed into numerous dots of lights. They flew towards the battlefield and cleansed the malevolent energy. Although this kind of energy would hardly affect the battle, long term exposure to it could lead to psychological disorders.

"Looks like my help is not needed."

The hunters appear to be capable of handling the situation. He could even see his father among the fighters, brandishing his sword in a dashing way.

Wisp of golden mana condensed to form a mini version of himself, similar to Leyfin's form. Mini-Areth descended and sat on top of his father's head unnoticed.

At the same time, the glow in his split soul dimmed slightly.

As he looked down, a sudden change in the battlefield transpired. A large reptile head emerged from the rift.

It hoisted up its head and from its gaping mouth came a terrible stench, accompanied by a pillar of flame. The fire decimated everything in the way. It did not discriminate between friends and foes.

The large monster leaped up from the rift after it cleared the path, its massive wings spread out and casted shadow upon the hunters.

"A wyvern huh. Though it is not a dragon, it still inherited some of its genes."

The wyvern launched itself into the air, ignoring the wounds on its body. The spells flying after it were blocked by its resistant scales.

The most powerful hunters stationed at edge of the encirclement launched themselves into the air. Their attacks were significantly more powerful, causing the wyvern to fall to the ground after a punch.

"Kill it now."

The S rank mages electrocuted the struggling wyvern, repeating the process until its roars subsided.

After the wyvern, many more monsters escaped the encirclement through flight, but they were all dealt by the S rank hunters.

After half an hour, the rift showed signs of stabilizing. Monster corpses have covered the area. They died in various ways, some were burnt, some were cleanly sliced, some were crushed, and others died without any signs of damage.

The hunters were now cleaning the battlefield, finishing the remaining monsters and helping the injured. Areth took this chance and swiftly entered the rift.

He was curious about Leyfin's world, Flauren.

However, he had entered because of the dangerous aura he had felt. It was nothing like the ones he had faced before.

The scene in the other side was that of a jungle. There were trees blocking his view, and numerous monsters were racing from all directions, squeezing themselves into the rift. It was utter chaos and they were all killing each other. The corpses on this side was more than those on Earth.

Areth simply waved his hand and flames consumed the remaining monsters. After a while, all the roars and wails stopped and silence ensued.

Areth took time to examine the place. It was indeed a forest, but the trees were showing signs of corruption. The trunks were black and twisted. The branches were covered in sharp thorns.

He flew to the sky and overlooked the vast forest. He stared into the distance. There were no signs of demons anywhere, but the massive amount of evil energy was permeating on every object.

Areth followed his senses and traced the source of the alarming power. On his way, he saw signs of civilizations, he saw human skeletons strewn on the ground and some corpses were still in the process of rotting.

Such disheartening sight caused him to frown. A dying emotion in his heart was rekindled.

'Was it anger?'

He had seen a world infested by demons, but this was the first time he had seen actual corpses from the natives. Even animals were not spared from the corruption.

As he got deeper and nearer, Areth had to stop because of the unbearable stench. A black substance was crawling on his soul form, spreading like an ink. This kind of unavoidable curse was what annoyed him the most. It could not harm him but it made him look really pathetic and ugly.

'Am I such a pushover to you?' He thought. This was the third time such a thing happened to him.

"Fine."

Areth's eyes which were originally blue in color turned golden. His golden mana was provoked and instantly eradicated the malevolent energy. The mana leaked out and went past the atmosphere before stopping. It looked like a massive flame seen from afar. It's tongue reaching the heavens.

Immense power was radiating out of his soul form. An indistinct noise was heard, the sound was akin to multitudes of people screaming all at once. It caused the land to tremble and drowned all noise.

No, it was not the sound of his bgm, but the strings of Absolute Rule humming.

"Let's see who corrupts who."

The radiant mana collapsed back towards Areth, the shockwave from the implosion left a huge crack on the ground beneath. For a moment, everything seem to have stopped moving, not the slightest sound was heard. The surroundings lost color as everything turned gray.

It was the calm before the storm.

Areth's mind was running fast, trying to remember the name of this particular move. It just so happen that he had a brain fart. Until then, he had to hold the momentum.

'What was it again? Damn, why can't I remember? Grand Release? Grand Blue? Grand Chase...'

'I think it was... right, I remember now. I wonder why did I even made such long name.'

He threw all his dignity to the trashcan and spoke without stuttering.

"Advent of Extinction series, Radiance of a Thousand Stars!"

Areth transformed his tremendous mana into fire element.

Normally, he would follow up with a paragraph or two, explaining the mechanisms of this move to his opponent, telling them their outcomes, laughing manically and causing them to hallucinate their pasts with his magic. There would usually be an orchestra composed of the most powerful mages, who would perform a somber piece in the background to intensify the suspense.

But today, there was no one nearby to listen, hence, he simply fired his move.

His figure was distorted by the tremendous heat wave and a glowing orb appeared on his place. Wherever its radiance shone, everything would burn. The blaze reached as far as 5 kilometers, turning everything into a sea of fire.

A terrible roar came from afar and it shook the ground like thunder. The master of this place seem to have suffered some pain.

However, things were just starting. Immediately after the blaze was a powerful shockwave. The ball of light expanded rapidly, reaching 1 kilometer in an instant. The land simply melted like it was water. The molten materials splashed high up into the air and caused a rain of destruction.

The shockwave blasted in all directions, causing earthquakes and leveling everything to the ground. Massive crevices have even formed across mountains.

Areth's mana swept the dark mana like a powerful tide, burning them and killing all the creatures that were corrupted by it.

Far in the distance was a massive tumor the size of two cities. It was usually hidden by black clouds, but now it was clear to see. The blaze have unfortunately reached it and burnt a part of it to ashes.

The powerful shockwave soon arrived and crushed the humongous being into a large mess. A literal river of blood flowed as its insides were spilled into the land, quickly being vaporized by Areth's fiery mana.

The luminous ball of light was gradually receding, however, the shockwave was still running a lap across the planet, like it was making sure that the job was done properly.

Also, the earthquake has yet to stop. Far in the coast, giant tsunamis smashed to the ground with such momentum that it was able to sweep forests and mountains deep in the mainland.

Meanwhile, Areth's signature mana has saturated the entire world, if a Mage would attempt to sense mana here, they would be shock to find the entire world filled with the unique mana.

Finally, everything calmed down. Fires were still raging on, the ground was red and unknown objects were still raining down for several miles.

More importantly, the annoying evil mana was nowhere to be found. Areth was satisfied at his work.

"I came, I saw, I conquered." Areth felt like his soul was liberated from uttering those cool words.

"I have marked this territory." He said. Though he felt like something was wrong with his wording.

He then remembered something.

"I may have to apologize to Leyfin... Let's just say I did some small makeover."

The sky was originally dark, but it was darker now, clouds of dust have filled up the air. Some mountains were formed, some were gone. As for the rest of the planet, he did not know what sort of changes occurred. He just hope that there were no humans around...that sounds wrong too.

Areth suddenly turned toward the direction of the large tumor, as he had noticed a strange occurrence.

"Oh, interesting. So you still have a final form."