Chapter 683: The council
Kayden did not pause for even a blink of an eye, nor did his opponent. Neither of them had the slightest hesitation in their movements. Each of Kayden’s rays was capable of creating immense holes in reality, holes that took a long time to regenerate.
The green color of his rays posed a problem—the emperor could not exactly identify what it was, but it was terrifying. It was something that should not be touched by mortals. In truth, not even gods should be able to touch such a thing. For Kayden to wield this power seemed like blasphemy.
"Succumb," the emperor began his final movements. All the runes on his body turned black and disappeared completely. His strength doubled in the blink of an eye. This time it was Kayden who was on the defensive, the problem was that...
The emperor’s attacks were being converted into even more rays by Kayden. As much as he was on the defensive, with each passing second the difference shrank again. Kayden was able to convert the emperor’s attacks into energy.
His rays broke a good portion of the force of those attacks, but the small remainder that lingered did not have enough power to overcome Kayden’s will. He simply subdued it completely, turning it into energy in a practically infinite cycle. There was no way to avoid it.
The way Kayden fought was strange—it should not be possible for a mage to simply convert the strength of others into his own. Kayden did not understand the laws or paths that the emperor carried, yet even so he was capable of utterly subjugating them.
Little by little, the battle moved toward its end. As much as Kayden’s attacks had not lost potency, he felt he was reaching a certain limit. His mortality was not capable of handling such power. He was simply being defeated by time.
"I believe this battle is over," the emperor ceased his attacks along with Kayden. Neither of them made any movement. There was no victor.
Neither of them felt the will to continue. This battle would only prolong itself without a clear winner. Kayden did not know if he would be able to defeat this opponent—his instincts told him he could, but at a cost... one that simply made no sense.
"Truly, you are far stronger than I expected," Kayden replied humbly. He really had not expected this mage to be so powerful.
"In truth, no," the emperor smiled. "I have been here a long time. When I was outside, there still existed a divine king, for example." The emperor’s eyes grew distant, lost in thought. "The point is not that I am strong, for my strength was already expected to be at this level here inside. But yours? No."
Kayden understood the emperor’s reasoning before him.
"What will your strength be when you leave this place?" The emperor looked at Kayden with doubt. "What is the limit of a mage who has already reached practically the boundary here inside?" The emperor’s voice trembled as he looked at Kayden, frightened.
"I don’t know," Kayden had no answer. He had simply never stopped to think about what his true limit might be, how far he could really go.
"Probably the same as a divine king. The problem is that first you must be able to leave this place alive." Kayden raised an eyebrow. "There is a group that has lived too long here. The mages did not leave because they were killed by them."
Kayden understood more or less what was happening—a certain group of mages simply was not able to leave this place, or perhaps they were, but preferred to be kings in hell rather than ordinary people in paradise.
It was a mediocre thought, but one that would probably occur with most who remained trapped here: a kind of reign over a world with no future at all, rulers of the failed.
"How long has this lasted?" Kayden asked curiously.
"Since the last god ascended from this place. Since then, the council has dominated everything and rules every tiny inch of this world," the mage looked toward the horizon strangely.
"Thank you for the information, but I believe we part ways now," Kayden remarked and vanished magically.
The emperor did not try to stop him, nor did he even understand what Kayden had done to accomplish it. It was something he had learned from Jarvis after a long time. At the very moment Kayden left, a gathering of mages appeared.
The gathering that emerged were the mages of the council, ancient figures in tattered robes with eyes that glowed like embers, each marked by centuries of seclusion. Their presences distorted the air as if they carried the very essence of this imprisoned world. Among them there was no youth, only accumulated power and a suffocating aura of decay. They were kings in ruins, rulers of an empire with no future.
Kayden was already practically on the other side of the world at that moment. In a simple blink of an eye, he crossed insane distances using a fourth-level divine technique, something very few gods had access to throughout existence. Space was linear, it did not exist merely for existence’s sake.
Space-time had rivers and flows, and a trained person was able to see those flows and throw themselves into them. A mere movement could hurl you dozens of universes away, for example. It was only a matter of training. Since Kayden knew he would not leave this region, he simply dove into them.
Kayden still did not have true mastery. At most he could observe the flows; he was not capable of understanding them, much less manipulating them. But he could throw himself into them with Jarvis’s guidance, and this allowed him to escape the ambush that his sixth sense had warned him about with all its strength.
"This is going to be complicated," Jarvis remarked to Kayden.
"Yes." Kayden was not nervous. He had not expected this situation, but he was fully ready to deal with it. Being hunted in an enclosed space was nothing new for him—it was something Kayden had faced throughout his entire life.
His next steps were very simple. He only needed to understand karmic law to the point where he could surpass everyone inside, to a point where he could crush every living being in this world at his pleasure. It would be a race against time.
If he were found? Kayden would simply face them all to the death. He could no longer run, he could no longer flee. His path did not allow it. If Kayden was challenged, he had to fight.