At the very moment Valyr heard those words from Dawan, it was as if a massive weight had been lifted off his shoulders.
Without hesitation, the young man returned his arquebus back into his spatial bracelet as he allowed his imposing aura to billow out for a bit longer.
Not long after, almost all of the empowerment skills in his arsenal had dispelled themselves, returning his aura back to normal.
Though, rather than stay here, it continued growing weaker thanks to the downsides of using [Descent of the True Wyvern].
Aside from that, it seemed that utilizing the ethereal state the Shard of Defiance gave him access to also had its own drawbacks.
'I hope it doesn't take too long for me to recover,' thought the young man to himself as he sat on the ground with great relief.
While doing so, he looked at the twins, their expressions still that of slight panic as the two wondered to themselves whether Valyr had lost it or not.
Seeing that his aura had regressed to a weaker state and that he had no intent on making a move on them anymore, it was only then did Dawan and Daon finally relax, both of them letting wide sighs of relief as Daon began to heal himself from the injury.
Watching the man gradually heal his injury through the use of his mana and Intent Energy from a fair distance, Valyr began to think about his ethereal state from earlier.
He already felt like he had reached the current limits of his strength after [Primeval Immolation] and [Descent of the True Wyvern], making him feel like he was close to reaching the boundary that separated his strength from the Myths.
However, out of nowhere, the Shard of Defiance had allowed him to enter an unworldly state that made him feel like he had gone past that boundary.
Even though making use of the state seemed to have its own consequences, Valyr was more than eager to make use of the state in his future fights as a last resort.
After all, during that state, he was able to grievously injure someone in the middle of Rank 6, and scare someone at the peak of Rank 6 out of their wits to the point they admitted defeat.
'Then again, I did catch them off guard,' muttered Valyr to himself, inwardly letting out a wry chuckle as Daon seemed to have healed up from the injury he inflicted.
'But seriously though… how the hell did I access that state in the first place?' asked the young man to himself as he scratched the back of his head.
'Why did the Shard of Defiance awaken during that moment?'
As the questions came to mind, Valyr thought back to the very moment the shard in his mind began to awaken.
Before being thrown into a myriad of visions relating to the ancient aura the Shard of Defiance emitted, the young man recalled that he had thrown caution to the wind, going all out as he activated all of the empowerment skills in his arsenal.
With that in mind, he wondered whether the condition to enter the ethereal state was to push one's body to their very limits.
At the same time, he thought that if it didn't have anything to do with pushing one's self to the very limits of what they could withstand, then it probably had to do with the mindset he was in at the time.
In the end, the young man let out a low sigh, reminding himself that randomly throwing out a dart wouldn't get him closer to obtaining his answer.
Then again, if there was one thing he was happy about at the moment…
It was the fact that he had finally finished the Gates of Awakening's final trial.
"You really did a number on us," said Daon, slightly wincing as he began to move his right shoulder a bit.
After getting himself used to the pain, he and Dawan began to move closer towards Valyr, looking at him with a slight knowing smile. "Then again, all of us here know that you cheated."
At those words, Valyr flashed a wry smile at the twins. "Either I die or I go all out to make sure I don't die. I didn't really have much of a choice."
"Well, you could've surrendered at any time." Dawan faintly chuckled. "Then again, in a life and death situation like that, we would have definitely done the same thing."
Hearing Dawan's words, the young man let out a sigh of relief. "So… that means I won, right?"
"It would be crummy of us if we were to renege on our earlier words, even if we said it during the heat of the moment," replied Dawan as he slightly nodded.
"So, yes. You've cleared the Trial of Nine Stars."
With Dawan's words confirming it, Valyr felt as if all of the hardships he had gone through during the Trial of Nine Stars had become more than worth it.
It was to the point he began to jump for joy after the man's announcement, forgetting the fact that the debuff [Descent of the True Wyvern] had inflicted on him was still active.
Nevertheless, that did not stop the young man from grinning ear to ear, prompting the twins to look at each other with smiles on their faces as they allowed the young man to bask in the glory.
…
After the three had gotten enough rest from their final skirmish, the three of them took the time to update one another on what was going on in Veldanyr, just like the young man had promised before their fight even began.
At the end of the young man's explanation, Dawan and Daon looked at each other with solemn expressions on their faces before shifting their attentions back to Valyr with a defeated sigh.
"I wish we could help out," said Daon. "However, we're currently on a planet far away from Veldanyr."
"By the time we return to the planet, the war between the orcs and the humans might have been long over," added Dawan.
"Even if that's the case, the sentiment is still appreciated." Valyr looked at them with a comforting smile, even though he would have truly preferred people like the twins to appear on the humans' side during the war.
"In any case, how did the two of you go off-planet?" Deciding not to talk about the war outside any further, the young man shifted the topic towards something he had become incredibly curious about after Nila's appearance.
Though he did not express interest towards this topic back when Nila was his opponent, seeing that the two before him were also currently off-planet, the interest to know had been reignited.
"Did you guys get your hands on a spaceship?" asked Valyr.
"Not at all." Daon shook his head as he looked at the young man with a slightly amused smile. "If we did, then Veldanyr wouldn't still be stuck with medieval technology, no?"
"Then how…?" At this point, the young man only knew one other reason why the two had gone off-planet.
Now, the only thing was whether or not his thoughts lined up with what the twins had to say.
"Well…" Dawan looked at the young man with a wry smile. "To cut a long story short, we were forced to go off-planet."
Daon nodded in agreement, a wry smile also adorning his face. "Yeah. After the two of us had progressed to a certain level of strength, the planet itself decided to eject us out of the planet, telling us that it could not sustain our existence."
"It was either we sacrifice part of our strength to continue staying on Veldanyr, or we head to other planets to increase our strengths."
"As you can see, we chose the latter."
'As expected,' thought the young man to himself.
Though Nila could probably get her hands on a spaceship thanks to her profession, as well as the level of technology she had access to, the same could not be said for Dawan and Daon.
Hence, the only reason the two of them had gone off-planet, aside from getting their hands on a spaceship, was being naturally kicked out of the planet itself.
Depending on the size and energy that the planet had, the limit differed.
However, for starter planets like Veldanyr, the limit was more or less known to the players.
Once you had ascended to Rank 8 or higher, you had no choice but to explore the vast expanse of space.
Talking about a few more topics whilst they rested, Valyr and the twins eventually parted ways after the young man promised them that he would meet up with them once he was off-planet.
Watching the two disappear into thin air in front of his vision, the young man eventually let out yet another sigh of relief as he recalled the madness he had just gone through.
Then, not long after, the monotonous voice of the trial grounds resounded once more.
'You have defeated the two final opponents of the Trial of Nine Stars. No opponents remain.'
'You have successfully cleared the Trial of Nine Stars.'
