Ch.314Chapter 314: Breaking Free

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*thud*

Desire’s consciousness, lying on the cold floor, focused on the approaching footsteps.

Not just any footsteps, but ones coming to deliver her final judgment.

Normally, not only would her consciousness be alert, but her body would also move away from that sound.

“…”

But the current Desire, unable to utter a word, couldn’t distance herself from those sounds.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t tried.

She had exerted all her strength to move even the smallest part of her body.

“Nngh…!!”

But pain hundreds or thousands of times greater than the effort she put into moving those extremities overwhelmed her entire body in response.

The pain was so intense that it made her hesitate to move even in a situation where staying still meant certain death.

Because of this, Desire had no choice but to accept the helplessness of her immobile body.

As she listened to the approaching footsteps of the sword coming to pronounce her end, she felt a long-forgotten emotion awakening within her.

“…!!”

Though no groan escaped her lips, her body twitched involuntarily, unrelated to the pain.

*tremble tremble*

The twitching gradually worsened until it reached the level of convulsions.

Even from a distance, one could clearly see the single emotion Desire was experiencing now.

It was fear.

Since her birth as a dragon, she had always pursued greater power, making it her daily routine to devour beings weaker or stronger than herself to grow.

In a way, it wasn’t strange that she, who had always taken victory and devouring others for granted, would feel such fear when faced with the crisis of being on the receiving end.

Desire’s reaction, shrinking infinitely from fear, wasn’t much different from how ordinary beings react when afraid.

“Hng…!!”

She was clearly revealing her fear through faint groans, exposing her terror.

Before, or even until just moments ago, when she had been gleefully anticipating exercising the privileges of a victor, she might have found a way to escape this situation.

‘Power… divinity…’

Just earlier, when she had tried to forcibly take the divinity residing in Kal’s body, her body had a violent rejection reaction to the excessive influx of divine power, causing her immense pain.

From that moment, Desire’s chances of escaping this fearful moment had essentially vanished.

Nothing. There was nothing left. The robust divinity that had endlessly sustained her arrogance was, for some reason, completely gone.

And her mighty physical form, which had flawlessly supported that divinity, had weakened along with the loss of divine power, making even standing up again a struggle.

In the end, all Desire could do, having recognized the extreme danger of her situation…

*crunch*!!

Was to grind her teeth—the only movement that didn’t cause her pain—while sorting through the complex emotions nestled in her heart.

Needless to say, there was no need to explain that her teeth-grinding expression was far from beautiful.

It was impossible to imagine that this was the same being who, just moments ago, had displayed an attitude full of composure and dignity toward the vessel and key that would make her a more perfect existence in this confrontation.

Well, facing such a situation, it would be normal for any being, not just Desire, to be unable to maintain composure.

If there was one thing that made Desire better than those ordinary beings…

*thud* *thud*

It was her calmness in quickly regaining composure while her red-hot mind, raging at the reality that she couldn’t even struggle, heard those footsteps from beyond.

“It’s really nice not having to hurry since you can’t move.”

She heard Kal’s indifferent mutter as he approached to pronounce her end.

It was the result of her own judgment, knowing that losing her mind and struggling pathetically would only contribute to worsening the situation.

But even with her regained composure, it was clear that in her current state—with not a fragment of divinity left in her body and her physical form damaged—she was in no position to do anything proactive.

“Adorator!! Adorator!!! ADORATOR!!!”

Ah, at least she deserved credit for regaining the judgment to call for the one being most needed in this situation.

Desire’s desperate calls for Adorator looked quite unseemly considering her status.

*flinch*

But they were effective enough to momentarily halt Kal’s movements as he stepped forward to end her life.

Now, if only Adorator would respond to Desire’s desperate calls and protect her, everything could return to normal.

Even though most of the divinity that had resided in her body had disappeared like water leaking from a cracked vessel due to the sudden backflow of divine power…

If she could just survive, it would be possible to somehow regain the divinity she had once gathered.

It was only natural that Desire, recognizing the gravity of the situation and focusing solely on survival, would desperately call for Adorator.

But while the truth of life—that survival is what matters most, no matter how ridiculous one looks—would continue to be a driving force if one survives…

“…She’s not coming?”

Even Kal, who had been preparing for Adorator’s attack in response to the call, uttered these words, yet the one Desire was desperately seeking had still not appeared in this confrontation.

…Something was wrong.

Considering Adorator’s tendency to rush to her side immediately when called, no matter how far apart they were…

The fact that there was no response despite her desperate calls was undeniably strange.

“…”

Forgetting her pain and even the fear she had felt upon seeing the energy within the dragon sword…

Desire, without saying a word, focused on locating Adorator’s current position, extending her spiritual perception to its maximum despite her damaged body.

Perhaps she held some conviction that there must be a reason why Adorator wasn’t responding to her calls.

Perhaps Adorator had encountered an emergency situation that she hadn’t noticed while being preoccupied with stealing Kal’s divinity, and couldn’t leave her post.

Fortunately… though whether this could be called fortunate was questionable…

Even with her damaged state, since she was observing a place as familiar to her as her own home…

Desire’s spiritual perception quickly located Adorator’s whereabouts.

“…Ah.”

A sigh, completely separate from the pain she felt in her body, escaped Desire’s lips as she realized the urgent situation Adorator was in.

Adorator was fighting right now.

At the entrance point of the massive mountain range that separated this obsidian palace from human territory.

She was struggling against the onslaught of humans who, though few in number, were individually exceptional in skill.

Unlike herself, who had fallen asleep to conserve energy…

Adorator, who had always been on the battlefield to build her strength…

Shouldn’t have been pushed back by ordinary attacks in this demonic realm, the source of her power.

She should have easily repelled such attacks, ended the situation as soon as she faced it, and rushed to her side in one breath.

But even with Desire’s damaged spiritual perception, she could tell that the momentum of the humans Adorator was facing was not ordinary.

Adorator was facing five or six humans.

Desire didn’t remember each one individually.

But among them, she clearly remembered three whom she had encountered not long ago, even in her fragmented state.

One was of the same bloodline as Kal, who was now approaching to deliver her end—a descendant of Ranos.

Another was a being descended from the hero who, along with Ranos, had inflicted massive damage on Desire and her companions when they first began their activities in this land.

And lastly, another descendant of the same hero… one who had once captured and used a being identical to herself.

“…”

It was no wonder Desire’s eyes squeezed shut as she recognized their identities.

She instinctively knew that even Adorator, whom she had desperately called with a thread of hope, would find it extremely difficult to defeat those three at once.

If she could face them one by one in a divide-and-conquer strategy, it might be different.

But against those three moving almost as one body, even Adorator, acknowledged by Desire herself as a powerful being, couldn’t guarantee absolute superiority.

Moreover, when it was confirmed that the energy of the other three, whom Desire didn’t know well, was also formidable in addition to those three who would already be challenging enough…

‘She can’t come.’

With her eyes still tightly shut, Desire had to accept that no matter how much she called for Adorator in this situation, she wouldn’t come.

And as if to confirm that her intuition wasn’t wrong…

*RUMBLE*!!

A terrifying roar that penetrated the soundproofing of the obsidian palace, built by layering thick obsidian, pierced her ears.

It was the sound of humans—so small and weak by her standards that even calling them “a handful” would seem laughable—wielding divine weapons capable of leaving clear wounds on the divine body of a great being whose immortality couldn’t be fully captured in words.

Judging by the intensity of the sound that was clearly felt even from a distance…

It was evident that Adorator would be struggling against opponents who were using divine weapons so actively.

Thanks to the lethal weapon that could have led to her death disappearing like smoke due to unforeseen circumstances…

Adorator wouldn’t meet her death as a result of that battle.

But in any case, it was clear that she wouldn’t be able to come to save her in time.

“Ha….”

It wasn’t unreasonable for a sigh filled with indescribable despair to escape from Desire’s lips as she felt the resignation that all was lost.

On the other hand, unlike Desire, there was someone who showed a different reaction upon detecting the nature of the energy emanating from afar.

“Everyone came incredibly fast…”

It was also natural for Kal’s voice, tinged with both joy and relief, to emerge as he noticed the energy of the divine weapons a little later than Desire.

In Desire’s mind, which had never contemplated anything other than desire and the means to fulfill it, the despair she felt upon intuitively sensing that the situation she wanted wouldn’t materialize grew in magnitude.

“Dead… no, unconscious.”

Kal momentarily suspected she might be dead, seeing her show no vital response while her eyes remained open, so deeply was she immersed in despair.

Fortunately for Kal, Desire, with her eyes still tightly shut, was not yet dead.

“…”

And she was certainly not unconscious.

She kept her eyes closed because if she were to open them and meet the gaze of the one who had reduced her to this state, she felt she might die from rage even without being stabbed by the dragon sword.

And while preventing her rage from erupting was the main reason…

‘In that case…’

Now that it was a foregone conclusion that another ascension to become a higher being was essentially out of reach…

She also aimed to suppress the self-loathing for having to resort to a final measure she had wanted to avoid if possible, as she now had to prioritize survival, no matter how unsightly.

She was tormented by psychological resistance and self-loathing at the thought of returning to her original form from birth, something she had never reverted to since stepping into the realm of great transcendence.

‘As long as I survive…’

As Desire steeled her resolve…

“Haaah…”

A deep sigh escaped her lips.

*thrust*!!

Simultaneously, a crude sound echoed softly throughout the obsidian palace’s hall as the dragon sword in Kal’s warm, reddish hand pierced her heart.

*crack*!!

Around the same time, a sound like something violently shedding its shell was heard.