Chapter : 1327

Lloyd, the Winter King, watched this happen with the calm, removed interest of a scientist. He was like someone watching a chemical reaction that was interesting but expected. He did not look triumphant or happy. He felt no pleasure. He only looked cold and certain. The first part of the killing was done. The enemy’s main weapon, his power, was now gone. It was time for the second part: to slowly and carefully take apart the enemy’s will to fight, which would be very painful.

He took a slow, careful step toward the broken man. With every tiny movement, his wings, which were like crystal, dropped a light, sparkling dust of pure frost. Jager, whose sight was blurry from blood and tears, looked up. The sight of the amazing, terrifying god of winter walking toward him was the final thing that broke his mind. But his training was very strong and deep inside him. The rules that had been forced into him in the dark, harsh schools of the Seventh Circle were powerful. His will to live, the basic, animal need that was hidden under his pride, made one last, desperate attempt to take control.

With a deep roar that sounded more like an animal than a person, he jumped. He did not jump at Lloyd, but away from him. It was a wild, messy scramble to get away. He was trying to make some space, to find a moment to get his thoughts together, and to find a new weapon in a collection that he now knew was empty.

It was a useless, sad, and almost sweet attempt.

The Winter King did not need to be faster. He did not need to chase him. He simply existed. With a single, quiet thought, he changed the area around Jager. The plain white floor under the killer’s running feet changed. In a silent, sudden moment, it turned into a perfect, smooth sheet of polished black ice that had no friction at all.

Jager’s desperate, frantic run became a clumsy, silly slide. His speed, which was the only thing he had left, was now his worst enemy. It carried him away from the safety he wanted so badly and toward a new, much cleverer trap.

At the same time, a wall of shining, unbreakable ice grew out of the ground in Jager’s path. It was a hundred feet high and twenty feet thick. It did not rise with a loud noise. It just appeared. It was a silent, beautiful, and total dead end.

Jager slid, out of control. His arms spun around, and his face showed pure, funny-looking terror. And then he slammed into the clear, solid wall. It made a sick, final thud that was the only sound in the silent world. He fell in a heap at the bottom of the wall. His speed, his hope, and the last sparks of his will to fight were all put out in one smart and completely cruel move.

The whole fight had been a perfect example of controlling the battlefield. Lloyd was not just fighting an opponent. He was creating a song, a beautiful and terrible piece of music. Every note was an act of smart and mental control. The song was about pure cold, and its parts were a slow, beautiful, and totally cruel way of choking the life out of his enemy.

He walked slowly toward the trapped killer. The sound of his steps was like the sharp, clear crack of a giant piece of ice. It was the only noise in the silent, frozen world. He was not in a rush. The cage was perfect. The animal was broken. The only thing left was the final, quiet, and very personal part of taking him apart.

Jager, with his back against the cold, hard wall of ice, tried one last, desperate, and very predictable move. He was a creature of the Seventh Circle. He was a servant of the dark Abyss. He still had one last, terrible weapon.

He began to chant. His voice was a low, rough, and bloody whisper. The words were from a nasty, old, and evil language. It was the language of devils, a sound that seemed to poison the clean air of the space. A small flow of black, thick, and oily shadow began to leak from his eyes, his mouth, and even his skin. He was calling to his master. He was trying to do a forbidden ritual where he would sacrifice himself. He wanted to turn his own broken body into a doorway for a piece of Beelzebub’s own terrible, world-ending power.

Chapter : 1328

Lloyd watched. His golden, dragon-like eyes showed something that looked like scientific interest. He let the chant go on for a few long and tense seconds. He let the dark, evil energy gather around Jager, forming a messy, spinning cloud of shadow and sadness. He let his enemy have one last, quick, and completely false bit of hope.

And then, with the casual, almost bored motion of a man swatting a fly, he put it out.

He raised a hand with long, graceful fingers, like Beelzebub’s own. From the ice wall right behind Jager, a single, perfect, and incredibly sharp piece of black ice pushed itself out. It was a foot long and as thin as a doctor’s needle.

It did not move with speed, but with a silent, unstoppable, and beautiful purpose.

And it slid, with a quiet, almost gentle, and very exact motion, through the back of Jager’s throat. It cut his vocal cords and ended his evil prayer with a wet, gurgling, and final choke.

The dark energy’s path was now broken. The ritual was not finished. The energy disappeared with a frustrated, mental hiss, like a ghost sighing with disappointment. Jager fell forward. His hands grabbed his throat and his eyes were wide with a new, deeper, and total terror. He had been silenced. His power was taken. He was stripped of his voice, his magic, and his connection to his dark god. He was no longer a prince of the Abyss. He was just a man, bleeding and broken, in a very cold and lonely room.

The Winter King knelt in front of him. He was a beautiful, terrible god of winter looking down at a broken, silent, and unimportant human. “I believe,” the Winter King whispered, his two voices mixing into a soft, musical, and unforgiving final word, “that we were talking about math.”

The white empty space was no longer a place for a duel; it had become a classroom. It was a cold, clean, and very personal classroom. Jager was the only student, and he was the subject of a harsh but helpful lesson about the nature of sadness. He knelt on the polished black ice. His hands held his throat, and a silent, gurgling sound was the only proof of his useless attempt to breathe. The piece of black ice that cut his vocal cords was a work of cruel, perfect skill. It was not an act of anger. It was an act of editing. Lloyd had not killed him. He had simply changed him, removing the one problem sentence of his last, evil prayer.

Lloyd, the Winter King, watched him with the calm patience of a master artist checking his work. The exciting feeling of combat, the wild anger of the battle—it was all gone. Now there was only a cold, quiet, and total focus. This was no longer a fight. This was a close examination. It was an operation to gather information. And Jager was no longer an enemy. He was a source of information, a living, breathing, and very useful book about the methods of the Seventh Circle.

Jager’s eyes were wild with a mix of pain and a complete, deep terror. They met Lloyd’s eyes. In them, Lloyd saw not just the normal fear of death. He also saw the slow-growing, deep horror of a man who had built his whole life and his view of the world on power and control. And he had just seen that foundation, and the ground itself, get erased.

“You fought with evil power,” the Winter King’s dual voice echoed in the silent, empty space. He was not making fun of him. It was a calm, educational, and terribly correct lecture. “It is a power that feeds on others, a way of thinking based on decay. It is a very flawed design, Jager. It needs a host to live in. It needs a source of warmth, of messiness, of life to eat. It is a fire that cannot burn without fuel. And in a world of pure cold,” he said, spreading his hands in a slow, graceful move that included the whole frozen, empty space, “there is no fuel. There is no messiness. There is no life. There is only the end of all things. The perfect, beautiful, and total stillness of a universe at peace.”

He was not just beating his enemy. He was taking him apart and explaining the perfect, unavoidable, and painfully cruel reasons for his own destruction. It was the highest form of mental and belief-based control. He was not just killing a man; he was killing his god.