CHAPTER 773: HE’S WEAKENING...

Kaelira’s eyes narrowed, sharp as a blade.

No hesitation. In a single, fluid motion, she shoved Ethan hard, sending him stumbling backward—away from the heart of the fight.

A heartbeat later, she vanished from his side and reappeared in front of the Butcher King.

A torrent of pink energy burst from her like a waterfall of light. She raised her fist—and brought it crashing down.

The impact roared through the cavern. The pink surge engulfed the Butcher King, a tidal wave of force that looked ready to erase him from existence.

But—

He didn’t flinch.

Instead, he threw his head back and laughed, the sound booming off the stone walls like a war drum.

"Ha ha ha ha—You? You think you can stop me?"

The Slayerfrost Sword gleamed in his grip, a flash of icy death. He swung it in a wide arc.

BOOM.

The air detonated.

Pink energy collided midair with the Butcher King’s killing aura, the two forces spiraling into a massive vortex of raw power.

The cavern walls tore like parchment. Cracks spiderwebbed through the air itself.

This world—this layer of it—was coming apart at the seams.

From deep within the swirling chaos, the Butcher King’s voice echoed, low and venomous:

"Kaelira. Queen of Sol’Rakka or not, you’re nothing but an insect to me."

"Take my advice: surrender to Lord Vaedoroth. Maybe then they’ll bother to leave your corpse intact."

"Otherwise—your flesh will be pulp before the hour’s out."

Each word rolled out like it had clawed its way up from the Inferno, soaked in the screams of the dead. The air itself reeked of blood and despair.

Kaelira didn’t back down. She smiled—cold, sharp.

"You’re just a pack of deformed freaks hiding underground," she said, voice like a blade drawn slow. "If you’ve got any real guts, crawl up to the surface and see what happens. I’ll tear every last one of you to pieces."

The Butcher King’s laughter cut off like a blade to the throat.

His killing intent surged, a storm front crashing outward.

Behind him, frost magic coalesced into a towering black specter—a cursed beast, its hollow eyes burning with dark blue fire.

Kaelira inhaled, steady and deep.

Pink energy gathered in her palm, tightening, hardening—

Into a short sword.

She shot forward, a streak of light.

The battle exploded.

They moved too fast for the eye to follow—blurs of pink and frost, clashing like twin dragons roaring through the cavern.

Steel rang against steel:

Ting—ting—ting—ting!

Like a thousand blades hammering stone, the sound echoed endlessly.

The space around them buckled and cracked.

Blue-violet magma churned beneath the surface. Stone walls split open. The ground heaved like it was being torn apart.

If Ethan had tried to jump in now, he’d have been flung away by the shockwaves—or worse, caught in the crossfire and obliterated.

BOOM.

RUMMMMMBLE.

RUMMMMMBLE.

RUMMMMMBLE—

Wave after wave of destruction rippled outward, like invisible giants pounding the world with their fists.

The cavern walls crumbled before their eyes.

Pink light and black frost twisted together, a storm of annihilation threatening to wipe this entire level from existence.

At this rate—

Everything here would be reduced to ash.

Ethan drew in a deep breath, trying to steady the fire burning in his chest.

He raised both hands, forcing every last scrap of energy he could muster into his palms. Slowly, a massive Energy Disc began to take shape—dense, volatile, humming with raw power.

But he didn’t throw it. Not yet.

His eyes stayed locked on the center of the battlefield, where Kaelira and the Butcher King clashed at speeds too fast to follow. Just blurs of pink and black, colliding again and again.

All he needed was a single opening.

One heartbeat of vulnerability—

And he’d strike.

But thirty seconds passed. Then a full minute.

Not a single gap.

The Butcher King’s power wasn’t just overwhelming—it was corrosive. His killing intent warped the very air around him, thick and suffocating. Even Kaelira, a queen who could go toe-to-toe with monsters, was starting to lose ground. Each blow pushed her back a little more.

Ethan’s gut twisted.

If this kept up... she’d lose.

Worse still, the Energy Disc in his hands was too pure, too wild. If he missed—if he misjudged even slightly—

He could hit Kaelira instead.

He couldn’t risk it.

Then—

A shockwave split the cavern.

BOOM!

Kaelira and the Butcher King were blasted apart, slammed into opposite walls with bone-rattling force. Chunks of rock rained from the ceiling, shrieking as they cracked and fell.

And for the first time—

There was space between them.

A gap.

Ethan’s heart kicked hard against his ribs.

"There!"

He launched forward, a streak of gold tearing through the air.

The Energy Disc in his hands swelled, spinning faster, shrieking like a blade dragged across steel.

Without hesitation, he hurled it.

The Butcher King hadn’t even regained his footing—

The golden disc was already screaming toward him.

His expression twisted.

He had no choice but to raise the Slayerfrost Sword and block.

SZZZZZZZZZZ—

Frost and golden light clashed, grinding against each other in a storm of sparks.

The two forces tore at each other, devouring, ripping, burning.

Even the Butcher King’s suffocating aura of slaughter—so heavy it felt like a physical weight—was beginning to fray.

But Ethan wasn’t done.

He leapt into the air.

"Let’s go—!"

Teeth clenched, he poured everything he had left into one final burst. Energy surged through him, compressed, condensed—

And exploded outward as a rain of miniature Energy Discs.

They fell like a golden downpour, each one humming with enough force to rend the fabric of space.

Kaelira, watching from across the battlefield, actually held her breath.

She’d never seen Ethan unleash power like this.

The Butcher King’s pupils shrank.

"You—"

In that instant, he finally understood.

Ethan wasn’t some weakling tagging along.

He was a threat. A real one. A warrior aiming to kill.

But the Butcher King only sneered, lips peeling back in a snarl.

"Mortal scum... get out of my sight!"

ROAR!

His bellow shattered stone, a wave of killing energy erupting from his body like a dam breaking.

A blast of icy blue surged outward—

And in a blink, every single Energy Disc in the air was obliterated.

Golden shards scattered like dying stars.

But—

The roar had come too fast.

Too hard.

When the surge faded, the Butcher King’s chest was heaving. The frost coating his skin began to crack and flake away.

He’d overexerted.

He was weakening.

"He’s weakening..."