Chapter 256: The Thrill of Battle

"Aragon, huh?" Max asked as he continued walking forward. "Slayer of dragons, you say? I wonder who you killed to earn that title."

Void magic twisted around Max’s right hand before stretching beyond his claws and taking the shape of a long blade. Darkness compressed along its edge until the weapon appeared capable of cutting through anything placed before it, and as more of Max’s overwhelming power flowed into it, the void blade released a piercing scream.

The unnatural sound spread across the ruined lands, cutting through the raging winds and causing the air between the two men to tremble. Aragon stopped bouncing from one foot to the other as the noise reached him. His blood had always burned with excitement whenever he faced a powerful opponent, yet something about the weapon sent a chill through his enormous body. The grin remained upon his face, but his eyes became far more serious as he examined the darkness gathered within Max’s hand.

"Only one." Aragon raised a single finger and pointed it directly at Max. "You. Past, present or future, it makes no difference. You are already dead by my hand, kid."

Crimson magic surged around Aragon as he lowered his finger. Two separate currents twisted around his arms before extending outward and solidifying within his hands, forming two enormous axes with broad crimson heads and handles thick enough to fit his grip. Aragon tightened his fingers around both weapons and spread his arms, allowing their immense weight to hang at his sides while crimson power continued dancing across their surfaces.

Max raised his screaming void blade as Aragon lifted both axes, and the pressure released by their weapons collided before either man moved, cracking the ground between them.

"So you’re simply delusional. Good to know."

Max spread his wings and drove them downward. The ground beneath his feet collapsed under the force, but he had already disappeared from where he stood. A gust brushed across Aragon’s unmoving face, and for the briefest moment, an image of Max remained standing in the same place before him.

A thin wound opened across Aragon’s throat in the next instant, spraying blood through the air. His eyes widened, but instead of anger or fear, a sick smile slowly spread across his lips as he touched the wound with one finger and examined the blood staining its tip.

"Good. You’re fast."

Aragon swung one of his crimson axes through the image lingering before him. At that moment, Max heard a strange ticking inside his ears. It resembled a clock counting the passing seconds, yet the rhythm sounded completely wrong, almost as though every tick was moving backward instead of forward.

Before Max could understand what he was hearing, the world shifted around him. He suddenly found himself standing in the exact place from which he had launched himself moments earlier, while a terrifying crimson attack was already rushing toward him, its edge less than a meter away from his chest.

Every scale across Max’s body tingled, screaming at him to dodge, but the two hearts beating within his chest refused to allow such a trick to make him cower. He raised his void blade and caught the attack against its edge, causing a powerful explosion of pressure to erupt between them. His claws tore through the ground as he was driven several meters backward, leaving deep marks across the ruined earth while the force pressing against his blade continued spreading through his arms.

Max immediately understood that he could push the attack aside and escape its path, but every instinct within him screamed against it. Avoiding the attack would mean admitting that Aragon’s strength had overpowered his own, and Max had no intention of yielding during their first true exchange.

All five beads within his Magic Soul released waves of magical energy at the same time. Black, multicolored, icy-purple, golden and translucent currents flowed through his body before gathering around the void blade, wrapping its darkness beneath layer after layer of mana as Max tightened both hands around the hilt.

"Fuck off!"

Max roared and pushed forward with all his strength. The magic surrounding his blade twisted around the crimson attack and forced it backward, tearing apart the ground as the combined powers changed direction and rushed toward Aragon.

However, Aragon was no longer there. The attack continued through the place where he had stood and crashed into the ground hundreds of meters away, shaking the surrounding lands as a powerful explosion devoured everything in its path and rose high into the sky.

The many colors of the explosion reflected within Max’s dark eyes, but he had no time to admire the power he now possessed. Danger suddenly emerged from his left, and the moment he turned his head, he found Aragon already beside him, swinging both enormous axes horizontally toward his body.

Purple ice flames roared to life before Max and expanded into a thick wall between them just as the two crimson axes struck. Cracks spread throughout the frozen barrier from both points of impact, and a moment later, the entire wall burst into countless thin particles that filled the air around them.

Max used the force of the impact to turn his body and launch an immediate counterattack. His void blade tore through the cloud of icy fragments and collided with both of Aragon’s crimson axes, releasing an impact that erupted like thunder and threw black, purple, and crimson magic across the battlefield as neither man allowed his weapons to move backward.

"Can you feel it as well? The thrill of battle? The romance of combat? The joy of robbing another man of his life or treasure?" Aragon roared as his grin widened. "Maximus, aren’t you the same?"

His axes suddenly vanished from his hands, and Aragon disappeared with them. He reappeared behind Max an instant later as the two weapons combined into a single colossal axe within his grasp, its massive crimson head already descending toward Max with enough force to take his life.