Chapter 250: Final Climb (2)

"We didn’t come for a rematch," Nathan said, keeping his bow lowered but his body coiled like a spring. He jutted his chin toward the pulsing anomaly. "We’re here to put a stop to that."

Goliath let out a laugh that sounded more like a cough of blood. "Stop it? You think you have a say in this anymore? It’s at ninety-two percent. The die is cast."

"We can break the mold."

"You’ll just break yourselves."

"Maybe," Nathan said, smoothly nocking an arrow and drawing the string to his cheek. "But we’re going to try anyway."

The party fanned out instantly, their weapons catching the sickly green light.

Goliath just stood there, the tip of his bloody sword resting on the black floor. "You don’t understand the math of this," he murmured, his gaze drifting up to the sphere. "I’ve spent years feeding this birth. I sacrificed my people. I traded my world. I burned my own family down to ash for this single chance." He tightened his grip on his hilt, his knuckles turning white. "I cannot let you touch it."

"Then you’re going to die with it," Kaito said.

Goliath smiled—a small, broken thing. "Fine."

He vanished.

Goliath wasn’t just fast; he was untethered. He fought with the terrifying, fluid unpredictability of a man entirely devoid of self-preservation.

Kaito braced for a heavy frontal assault, but Goliath didn’t strike the shield. He slid past it like water, his blade sweeping in a brutal upward arc that Arthur barely managed to parry. The force of the blow still sent Arthur skidding backward, his boots carving trenches in the stone.

Garrett and Red flanked him from the left. Goliath didn’t even look. He pivoted on his heel, using the momentum of Garrett’s hammer swing to duck, sweeping Red’s legs out from under him with a vicious kick before parrying Elise’s Glacial Lance with the flat of his blade.

Dillon dropped from above, Thunder Edge humming with lethal intent, but Goliath simply stepped out of the trajectory. He absorbed a glancing blow to his shoulder, not even flinching as the lightning scorched his flesh, and drove the pommel of his sword backward into Dillon’s ribs, sending the speedster tumbling across the floor.

Nathan fired a relentless stream of arrows, trying to pin the man down. Goliath took two hits—one to the thigh, one grazing his ribcage—but his momentum never stuttered. He was a force of nature, bleeding but unbothered.

"We can’t lock him down!" Dillon spat, spitting blood as he scrambled to his feet.

"Then we break his rhythm!" Garrett roared, charging again.

But it was Smithy who saw the opening.

He had stayed in the rearguard, his eyes darting frantically, analyzing the kinetic flow of the fight. His Void Eel writhed nervously around his forearm. Smithy wasn’t watching Goliath; he was watching the blade. The way it moved, the way Goliath channeled his mana into the edge a fraction of a second before impact.

There was a rhythm to the madness. A split-second where Goliath’s guard completely evaporated to fuel his offense.

Smithy broke from the backline.

"Smithy, get back!" Nathan screamed, realizing the artificer’s trajectory.

Smithy ignored him, sprinting headlong into the meat grinder. As Goliath spun to deliver a decapitating strike to Kaito, Smithy threw his arm out. The Void Eel shot forward like a shadowy harpoon, phasing directly through physical space to coil aggressively around Goliath’s sword arm, anchoring his mana flow to the physical plane.

Goliath’s eyes widened in sheer panic. His blade froze mid-swing, snagged by the dimensional weight of the Eel. He wrenched his arm violently, trying to shatter the hold. Smithy dug his heels in, his face contorting in agony as the sheer kinetic feedback threatened to tear his arm from its socket.

"NOW!" Smithy shrieked, blood bursting from his nose.

Kaito lunged, thrusting his blade toward Goliath’s exposed chest.

But a cornered animal is always the most dangerous. With a roar of pure, unadulterated fury, Goliath abandoned his finesse. He ripped his arm forward, dragging Smithy bodily through the air. The blade tore free, leaving a trail of spatial distortion, and carved a devastating, deep arc directly across Smithy’s chest.

Smithy hit the black stone floor with a sickening thud. He gasped, his hands immediately clutching the fatal, ruinous wound. He looked up at Nathan, blood bubbling past his lips, and managed a weak, bloody grin.

"Worth... it..." he gurgled.

Something inside Nathan shattered.

He didn’t scream a word. It was a guttural, primal sound of absolute rage. He planted his feet, drawing his bowstring back so far it threatened to snap. Focus Shot. The system timer began to tick. Sixty seconds to full charge. The arrow ignited like a miniature sun.

Seeing their opening, the party descended on Goliath with ruthless synchronization.

Kaito and Arthur pressed him hard, giving him no room to breathe. Arthur took a brutal slash to his shoulder but stepped into the blow, locking his shield against Goliath’s arm.

Garrett and Red capitalized. The minotaur slammed his bulk into Goliath’s blind spot, dropping the massive warrior to one knee. Garrett leaped, Volcan roaring with maximum output. The hammer detonated against Goliath’s pauldron, the thermal wave liquifying the armor and pulverizing the bone beneath.

Goliath screamed, his grip loosening on his sword.

Elise finished the sequence. Aurora’s Heart pulsed blindly. A massive Glacial Lance materialized in the air and fired with the force of a ballista, punching clean through Goliath’s chest.

He was thrown backward, crashing against the base of the throne. His bloody blade clattered uselessly across the stone. He didn’t try to stand. He slumped against the black iron, blood pooling rapidly beneath him.

His broken eyes drifted to the raid party, then up to the pulsing sphere.

"Go," Goliath whispered, his voice bubbling. "Stop it... or don’t. I don’t care... anymore."

His head rolled to the side.

Nathan didn’t waste a second mourning the victory. He pivoted sharply toward the dais.

[Lord Creation Progress: 98%]

[Time Remaining: 4 Minutes]

"We need to destroy the sphere!" Smithy wheezed from the floor. Amara was already by his side, her healing spirits frantically trying to knit the devastating wound together, though her face was pale with panic.

Nathan’s eyes darted between the floating anomaly and the throne it hovered over. "No. The sphere is just the byproduct. Look at the veins—it’s anchored to the throne. That’s the incubator. We break the throne..."

"...The Lord has nowhere to birth into," Elise realized, horror and hope warring in her voice.

Nathan drew the burning arrow tighter. The pressure radiating from his bow was scorching the air.

The sphere pulsed violently. The green veins on the throne writhed like dying snakes.

[Lord Creation Progress: 99%]

[Time Remaining: 2 Minutes]

"Everyone! Form a wall! Do not let the backlash hit Smithy!" Nathan roared.

The party scrambled into position, Arthur and Kaito raising their battered shields.

Nathan aimed dead center at the obsidian throne.

Forty seconds left on the charge.

Then, a sharp, echoing CRACK rang out through the throne room.

Nathan’s breath hitched. He froze.

High above the throne, a jagged fissure ripped across the surface of the silver-green sphere. But the light bleeding from the crack wasn’t silver. It wasn’t green.

It was a suffocating, abyssal black.

The crack widened, shattering the sphere entirely. The system timer abruptly vanished.

And from the void, a feet stepped out onto the air.