Guild Wars

While Draco was undoubtedly enjoying himself, Shuro was far from it. Coming here, he had fully believed his father was dead, driven by a desire for righteous vengeance. However, discovering that his father was still alive, albeit having suffered unimaginable torture, was a different reality altogether.

And then, to witness the flicker of hope that had ignited in his heart for a brief moment in his heart, to rescue and restore his father, extinguished right before his eyes with no chance of recovery, was unbearable. To go from resigned to hopeful, only to plunge into the depths of despair, it was unimaginable what his mental state must have been.

Actually, one did not, as a matter of fact, need to imagine anything. The two men had been radiating their auras wantonly the entire time, Draco releasing his blackish aura full of malevolence and evil, while Shuro released a sharp and pristine aura of severance and sword light.

Shuro's aura spiked suddenly as he stared dully at the place where his father had been forever destroyed without a trace left, his hand slack on the hilt of his katana. His aura surged and billowed, even threatening to stifle Draco's and swept the whole world under the rug.

"F-Father…" Shuro spoke softly, akin to a wail from a crying boy who ran to his father's embrace for protection.

Without a single word, Shuro exploded.

He roared like a crazed animal as his aura surged throughout the Forest of Truth and annihilated everything within, only matched by Draco's own aura which he increased in response with a coy smile on his face.

Shuro unsheathed the katana he had held at bay, revealing a sleek blade that was silvery-black, with an edge zig-zagged by a blood-red glow.

"I'LL KILL YOU!!" He roared, fully losing his composure as his eyes became bloodshot to the point of saturation, his red pupils becoming pitch black instead, full of limitless hatred.

With a swing, Shuro was in front of Draco, bearing down on the young man with his sword. A huge wave of grayish-black power manifested on the edge of the blade and fanned out behind it from a few hundred meters, a sword aura of the greatest degree of power.

Draco easily unsheathed one of his dual Dragorugio swords and met the strike head-on, causing the overbearing sword aura to pour down on him, yet it got reflected off his body like water hitting an umbrella. Rather, the area behind him cratered and quaked, tearing the land for hundreds of meters and causing a small ravine to form.

Shuro bore down with all his strength, trying to cut the blade before him in twain so that he could rend Draco into half as his face contorted into an expression of bestial rage. Staring right back at him Draco easily maintained the stalemate of the clash with one hand while having the leisure time to smirk at him arrogantly.

"Is that all?" Draco taunted simply, clearly not taking his foe seriously.

Shuro responded with another crazed roar as he pulled back and struck down one more, mustering his strongest power right from the get-go.

Draco laughed and swung his other sword to meet the clash, releasing his own sword aura from his blades to counter Shuro's overbearing sword aura that was famous for being able to cut through anything, even the void between dimensions, just like his father.

CLANG!

CLANG!

BOOM!

With each strike, the ground beneath them became even more ruined, but the effects were actually the mildest at the epicenter, where they were. Rather, the shockwave and aftereffects were felt farther away, and even by the Realm as a whole.

Shuro's speed increased with every strike he released while the power output remained at its peak, seeming as if he had an inestimable source of power. Not to mention that based on his strength alone, he was far from a mere Rank 5.

Even a True God could not match the power Shuro was putting out, and there was no Divine Law nor Divine Energy involved!

Draco met each blow with one of his swords, one at a time, finally unleashing the full might of his tyrannical Semi-Eternal stats for the first time. To keep up with Shuro's overwhelming strength, he was forced to channel his full Control at Tier 7, a level of focus that wiped away the playful demeanor he'd maintained up until now. This time, he was taking things seriously.

The two of them were stationary but their hands moved like a blur as they swung crazily at each other, every blow releasing their clashing aura as well as raw shockwaves from the force of their clash.

The two men had power akin to megaton nuclear warheads, and each blow released a shockwave for hundreds of millions of miles that possessed the energy of a nuclear bomb landing. The very air trembled under the intensity, sending countless avian creatures plummeting from the sky, their innards crushed by the sheer pressure.

Land-based creatures fared even worse, with millions of beings dying per second.

The entire Elven territory was razed to the ground, the Elves fighting for their lives on various battlefields dumbfounded by the sudden sense of racial crisis they were abruptly bombarded with as they exploded into blood mist that was swept away, along with hundreds of squads from the War Maniac Pavilion meant to subjugate them.

Even across the vast oceans, countless marine lifeforms were crushed by the violent pressure that surged uncontrollably, reaching unbearable levels. Sea-faring vessels shattered from the force, sending their crew and cargo into the turbulent waters, where they met the same grim fate as the creatures of the deep.

The encampment that Draco came from was torn asunder as aides and logistics personnel flailed about with fear, the shield covering the encampment only lasting a few seconds under the shockwaves before shattering.

Like a wind blowing over a flame, all living beings within were stripped of their flesh, leaving their crushed skeletons to turn to bone powder that was scattered into the distance.

Powerhouses like Major Kril managed to resist for a brief moment longer, their faces contorted with fear and confusion as they struggled to comprehend the source of this overwhelming and terrifying assault. Had two Gods suddenly descended to battle each other? Had their continued attacks against the Elves resulted in the Realm's will exacting revenge on them?

Or had they simply been unlucky enough to stumble into the beginning of some kind of apocalypse?

All he knew was that he wanted out!

However, when physical strength reached a certain threshold, magical and elemental power could not be expressed!

No matter how much effort or whichever items Major Kril or the various powerhouses across the Wizard Realm attempted to use to escape, especially spatial ones, none of them activated fast enough.

They were not rendered completely unusable but had turned sluggish and slow, meaning that by the time they actually activated, their users were already ruined by the continuous battering from the terrifying shockwaves.

In one part of the Realm, one could see a huge floating city made of copper gears and pipes, the famous Clockwork Floating City of the Wizards!

This prosperous city was located at the heart of the Realm, where the purest Worldly Energy - called Magical Energy by them - flourished. Normally, this place was the dream of all living beings, as wizardry was not limited to the human race, and the executive decisions concerning the entire Realm were meted out from here.

Moreover, after the war began, this was the only other place that the WMP had trouble breaching, allowing those within to live in peace though they knew it would not last forever. Negotiations were constantly held between the General of the WMP of this conquest war and the Wizard Realm's top Arch-Wizards, but no progress had been made.

However, today, whether it was the elite encampment for the War Maniac Pavilion or the magnificent Clockwork Floating City, both were about to crumble down to the ground as their habitants panicked and screamed.

Nothing they had thrown at each other during the various battles had ever yielded such destructive effects, enough that people were dying akin to weeds under the cutlass. It was a definite doomsday for everyone involved, and as the civilians died en masse, the powerhouses found that their means of escape were blocked off.

"NO!!!"

"HOW CAN THIS BE?!"

I DON'T WANT TO PERISH!"

"I AM ARCH-WIZARD MELVIN, HOW CAN I DIE HERE?!"

Various roars of defiance and unwillingness sounded out throughout the city as well as the encampment, but it was futile. No matter what attempt they made to preserve their lives nor what cry they released to beg for salvation or curse towards the source of this calamity, death came to all.

It wasn't just the various locations and living beings of the Wizard Realm that were perishing under the weight of this conflict, but the entire Realm itself.

After Draco and Shuro had been clashing for more than 3 minutes nonstop, all beings still alive in the Wizard Realm felt a wailing voice appear in their minds, and they couldn't help but feel their bodies lose control and involuntarily rush towards the battlefield.

They had been forcibly conscripted by the ailing World Will of this Realm to resolve the source of this crisis, for the Realm itself was losing its stability.

Most Realms feared losing their world barriers that prevented the corrosive Void from impacting its surface and ruining the lifeforms within, but the Wizard Realm was probably one of the few that had to worry about the possible destruction from within!

CLANG! BOOM! CLANG!

"DIE! DIE! DIE!" Shuro screamed with madness, exerting all the force he could to see his opponent die while not caring about anything.

CLANG! CLANG! BOOM!

"Hahaha! HAHAHAHAHA!" Meanwhile, Draco was roaring with laughter as he returned all the blows equally without seeming stressed, a look of pure enjoyment on his face.

He was happy!

Draco was truly happy!

It had been a long time since someone could push him like this to use his full power and skill without reserve! More than ten years of parenting and even four years of growth before that had seen him clear many foes without feeling much.

Either they were too weak or too far above his level at the time, making him resort to gimmicks to clear them. This was the first time he felt a situation akin to fighting Eva in the previous timeline, where he was somewhat outmatched and had to make up using his combat sense.

For Draco's bloodline, control, and various other sensory means were sounding alarms about Shuro. Despite the young man being furious, he was withholding something that could change the fate of this battle in his favor!

Clearly, this must be linked to his 'sponsors'. They had given him an item or a means that could unleash a power that even Draco would find threatening, 100% bloodline and all, but it must come at a cost so terrible that even the rage-filled Shuro feared to pay without trying everything else first.

So despite being able to match Shuro's full martial power using just his Semi-Eternal class and Control, not even using magic or bloodline, this persistent sense of crisis made Draco feel like he was teetering on the edge of disaster.

For the first time, he fully channeled his Ultima Sunt precognition ability he inherited from Roma, allowing him to see all battle maneuvers up to 2 minutes into the future. That way he could respond to Shuro's changes and not be surprised.

"MORE! UNLEASH YOUR POWER!" Draco roared back at the incoherent Shuro who was screaming for his death with every thunderous swing, hoping to provoke the fellow into risking it all.

It did seem like his words had some effect for Shuro began to stop swinging chaotically to vent his fury and began using his sword techniques to strike.

"Muramasa style: Sword Swallow!" Shuro roared, swinging his sword from an overhead position, but his single blade-light split into three at the same time.

One came from the top and two from each side, sealing Draco in. He only had two swords himself, meaning that he could definitely not block all of them before it was too late.

However, Draco was not at all fearful, rather grinning widely in satisfaction as he began using his own special techniques to counter.

"Paragon Sword Style! Sword Skill 34: Reversal!"