Chapter 371: Absolute Erasure

Chapter 371: Chapter 371: Absolute Erasure

The arena held its breath.

Every eye in the Great Solaris Arena was fixed on the trench that cut across the stone floor, on the smooth, impossible wound where Kai had been standing moments ago.

Damon stood at the center of the arena, his wooden sword raised, the darkness pooling around the blade like liquid shadow.

He looked at Kai.

Kai was on his knees, his demonic form shattered, three of his six arms gone, his necrotic fire extinguished.

The fear in Kai’s eyes was absolute.

Damon lowered his sword slightly.

"You wanted to fight me," he said. "You wanted to humiliate me. You wanted to take everything from me."

He took a step forward.

"So fight."

Kai’s remaining three arms twitched.

His body trembled as he tried to summon the demonic power that had always been there, the power that had made him invincible, the power that had allowed him to slaughter without consequence.

Nothing happened.

The necrotic fire would not ignite.

The bone grafts would not respond.

The demonic core inside his chest was cracked, leaking energy into his bloodstream, poisoning him from within.

He was dying.

And he knew it.

Damon stopped walking.

He stood ten feet from Kai, his wooden sword resting at his side, his golden eyes calm and unreadable.

"You’re done," he said. "I can see it in your eyes. You know you’ve lost."

Kai’s lips moved, but no sound came out.

Damon raised his sword one final time.

"Then let me end this properly."

He activated the Chaos Devourer.

The darkness that pooled around his blade was different now, deeper, more absolute, more hungry.

It was the darkness of the void between stars.

The darkness of the space before creation.

The darkness of the end of all things.

And Damon Arcknight swung his sword.

The Chaos Slash erupted from the blade.

But this time, it was not a line of nothingness that cut across the arena.

This time, it was a rift.

A vertical tear in reality itself, opening in front of Damon’s sword and expanding outward, growing wider, taller, hungrier, until it was large enough to swallow a man whole.

The rift moved forward.

It consumed everything in its path.

The rift touched his demonic form, and he was simply gone.

And where Kai had been standing, there was nothing.

No trace that he had ever existed at all.

The only evidence that he had been there was the smooth, impossibly clean wound in the arena floor, a scar on reality itself that would never heal.

The arena was silent.

Completely, utterly silent.

Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.

In the VIP box, Alistair stared at the empty space where his nephew had been standing.

His mind was screaming at him to move, to run, to get away from this place, to get away from the boy with the golden eyes and the sword that could erase existence.

He had seen many things in his long life.

He had seen cultivators rise and fall.

He had seen empires crumble and sects burn.

He had seen the Eclipse Cult’s most powerful rituals, the demonic transformations, the forbidden arts that twisted reality itself.

But he had never seen anything like this.

He had never seen a power that could erase a person from existence.

He had never seen a weapon that left no trace, no evidence, no soul to reincarnate.

He had never seen a boy who looked at the heir of the Reventon family like he was nothing more than an insect to be crushed.

Alistair turned.

He slipped out of the VIP box, moving through the shadows, his robes billowing behind him, his heart pounding in his chest.

He disappeared into the maintenance tunnels beneath the arena, fleeing the Great Solaris Arena, fleeing the boy who had just destroyed everything he had built.

On the arena floor, Damon lowered his wooden sword.

He stood in the center of the scarred arena, the smooth wound in the stone floor stretching out in front of him, the silence of the crowd pressing down on him like a physical weight.

He looked up at the royal box.

King Aurelius Solaris was standing, his face pale, his hands gripping the armrests of his throne.

Grand Marshal Vane stood beside him, his expression unreadable, his eyes fixed on Damon.

Damon met Vane’s gaze.

Grand Marshal Vane’s voice broke the silence.

"The semifinal match is over."

His voice carried across the arena, amplified by his spiritual energy, reaching every corner of the stadium.

"The Azure Dragon Sect has defeated the Crimson Eclipse Sect."

A beat of silence.

Then the crowd erupted.

A primal, thunderous roar of shock and awe and disbelief and excitement all mixed together.

The spectators rose to their feet.

They chanted Damon’s name, the name of the boy who had just erased a demonic cultivator from existence with a single swing of his sword.

Damon Arcknight did not acknowledge the crowd.

He turned and walked toward the Azure Dragon dugout, his wooden sword still in his hand, his golden eyes calm and steady.

He stepped through the barrier and into the dugout, where Mio, Mia, Seraphina, Flare, Alena, and Selene were waiting.

Selene stepped forward.

She did not say anything.

She simply wrapped her arms around him and held him tight.

Damon returned the embrace, his hand resting on her back.

"It’s over," he said. "The semifinals are over."

Selene pulled back, her eyes searching his face.

"And the final?"

Damon looked past her, toward the other side of the arena, where the Vermilion Bird Sect was preparing for their match against the Nameless Sect.

"We’ll deal with that when the time comes."

He turned to face the crowd, the roar of the arena washing over him.

Grand Marshal Vane raised his hand, and the crowd fell silent.

"The final match of the semifinals will begin in one hour," he announced.

"Vermilion Bird Sect versus Nameless Sect. The winner will face the Azure Dragon Sect in the grand championship final."