Rebirth: Necromancer's Ascenscion-Chapter 182: Prophet Vs Plauge III

Thunder cracked again. This time closer. But still no rain. They stood in that silence.

And for the first time since the fight began, they both knew one truth. The next clash might end something.

They just didn’t know what.

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By the time the clouds gave way to rain, the clearing was gone.

Nothing remained but craters and ruin.

Charred earth steamed beneath the falling water, smoke curling from wounds in the land that would never heal right. Trees were uprooted. Rocks split.

Blood painted the edges of fractured stone, mingled with the wet black of void-burn and the bright silver of soul flame.

And in the center of it all—they danced.

No longer precise. No longer patient.

Now it was desperation, fury made elegant, power refined into violence. Each strike could kill. Each miss was deliberate misdirection.

They were past the point of holding back.

They were trying to break each other.

Eli moved like a hurricane—fast, wide, unpredictable, carving wide arcs through the air with his sword, using the terrain as weapon and shield alike.

At one point he vanished into the smoke—only to erupt from the other side, slashing a flaming crescent that cleaved through stone and aimed for Ian’s throat.

Ian didn’t stop.

He simply glided.

A wisp of dread.

And reappeared behind Eli before the blade had finished its arc.

Sovereign’s Step made no sound. No flash. Just absence, and then presence.

Judgement hummed as it came down like a guillotine—

But Eli twisted, dropped to one knee, and caught the voidblade between crossed arms wrapped in golden spiritlight. It wasn’t a parry.

It was will against will.

And Ian was still stronger.

The impact flung Eli backward like a comet, smashing him through a half-standing boulder. The stone exploded. Debris rained down. For a moment, nothing stirred.

Ian stood still, sword low, rain hissing against his skin.

The runes across his chest and arms pulsed brighter now, no longer just breathing—but chanting, a silent invocation in a language older than death.

His scars had vanished beneath the web of ancient symbols. His eyes no longer just glowed—they burned, deep gray edged with creeping black, voidlight threading into his pupils like cracks in the world.

Each time he stepped, the air warped.

Each breath sent spirits fleeing into the wind.

The Prophet of Death was still standing.

But then, Eli rose again.

Half-covered in dust, one arm hanging limply, ribs shattered beneath soaked leather.

But he smiled anyway.

"Is that it?" he asked, coughing blood. "You just... teleport better now?"

Ian tilted his head.

Then stepped.

And the world shattered.

He didn’t teleport. He moved—reality folding inward for half a heartbeat, reappearing mid-strike behind Eli, Judgement already in motion.

The blade sang. The rain around it vanished, vaporized by the sheer dread of its passage.

Eli ducked—barely.

A strand of hair was sheared from his head.

But even as he ducked, he thrust—his own blade reversing upward in a brutal undercut. Ian caught it again, palm-first—but this time the blade cut.

Just an inch.

Just enough to bleed.

Eli’s eyes widened.

Ian looked at his palm.

The skin had torn—not much. But torn. The Flesh of Suffering had yielded.

Then Eli said something quiet.

A single word.

"I remember."

He surged forward, fast enough to make the rain part. Not even his sword led the strike—he did. His body, his shoulder, his rage.

They clashed again.

And again.

And again.

Now it wasn’t beauty.

Now it was destruction.

Rocks lifted from the ground from the sheer force of their movement. Lightning struck nearby and arched toward Ian’s body, drawn to the divine wound in him.

Thunder came a second later—louder than it should have been, like the sky itself was trying to witness the fight.

Ian swung, and the void screamed.

Eli blocked, and the world held its breath.

Ian cast Sovereign’s Step into the sky, and reappeared above—bringing down Judgement like an executioner’s axe—

And Eli caught it with both hands, blade and all, even as his legs buckled beneath the weight.

The sword howled.

The ground cracked in a ring around them. Rain turned to steam.

Eli’s mouth was bloody, his body trembling. But he grinned through it.

"Good," he breathed. "Now try that again."

Ian’s reply was not words.

It was Prophecy.

He spoke.

And what he said was truth.

It had to be.

"Fall."

And Eli staggered.

His left leg buckled, his blade drooped, his breath hitched. It was a spell with no casting. A curse written in the bones of fate.

Eli’s knees nearly gave out—but he roared through it, pushing forward, slamming his shoulder into Ian’s ribs, driving him backward through a stone pillar that had once been a tree.

Prophecy’s words forced reality, yes.

But Eli had endured worse.

They stood again—opposite sides now. Bleeding. Scorched. Runes flashing against golden veins.

Breathing heavy.

Staring.

Then they charged.

No more feints. No more tricks.

Just the final swing.

Blade to blade.

Judgement and spiritsteel.

The sound was thunder.

The impact, apocalyptic.

The shockwave ripped the sky. Trees bowed a mile away. The ground split open, veins of magic and darkness and spiritlight surging up like exposed nerves.

And then—

Time stopped.

Literally.

Their blades froze in place, locked mid-collision.

Their eyes wide.

Because something was holding them there.

Fingers.

Slender. Pale. Wrapped in dark leather.

One hand gripped Judgement as if it were a toy.

The other held Eli’s blade like it was a child’s mistake.

And between them stood a man neither had seen arrive.

He wore no armor. No cloak.

Only the holy adornments, and a grin carved in shadow.

Eyes like gold coins dipped in bloodlight.

Hair blonde, and falling loose around a face too perfect to be mortal—but too cruel to be divine.

He looked between them.

Then spoke.

"Oh," he said, voice velvet and razors.

"So this is where the fun’s been happening."

The rain fell harder.

But neither Ian nor Eli could move.

The blades still held.

The fight—not over.

Just... interrupted.