*Shing*
Lloyd's sword slashed, sliced, and cut everything in its way.
*Shing*
Everywhere the sword would move, blood would splatter on the forest floors.
*Shing*
The forest floor had become dyed red with the blood of wolves, and the perpetrator stood in the middle of this very forest, panting while struggling to swing their sword.
*Shing*
Yet despite that, their sword would slice through their opponent, a clean cut traveling through their necks and decapitating them in one fell swoop.
*Shing*
Their blade would reap their opponent's souls before they could even understand what hit them... That was the power behind the shadowless blade.
*Shing*
*Pant*
*Thud*
"That was the last of them..." Lloyd panted.
After fighting against the two large wolves and killing them, he had felt an unsurmountable amount of energy course through him. He was beyond excited, yet his excitement was cut short after several sky-shaking roars resounded from the surrounding forest.
Holding his blade tightly again, he found himself fighting against a wave of wolves that ranged from being as strong as the ones he had just fought against to being as weak as the first wolves he had ever fought.
3 hours quickly passed, and the forest had been dyed red as the blood of the wolves splattered all over the ground.
"These damn shadow wolves... Especially those with abilities. What a pain in the a$$!" Lloyd grunted while punching the air in front of him with an irritated sigh.
Forcing himself to get up, he dragged his feet to one of the shadows nearby, allowing his passive ability [Shadow Sustenance] to activate and let him regain his mana.
After 15 minutes of pain coursing through his body while it slowly healed, his body suddenly melted into his shadow.
*BOOM*
Leaving his shadow and appearing almost 50 meters away, Lloyd looked at the scene in front of him with cold sweat drenching his back.
'I almost died! Just like that!'
When Lloyd felt a tinge of danger, he already reacted by activating [Shadow Movement] before traveling 50 meters as quickly as possible. Before he knew what was about to hit him, an enormous explosion rang out from behind him, and as he left his shadow, his eyes finally landed on what was left of the area he lay on.
As the dust began to clear up, Lloyd narrowed his eyes, yet a few seconds later, a cold shudder went through his being and made him instinctually take a step back.
A crater at least 10 meters in radius and 2 meters in depth could be seen past the dust cloud. Everything in that area turned into ashes at the moment of impact, and so would have Lloyd if he didn't react fast enough.
His eyes darted for a while as he tried his best to find the creature that had caused the explosion, yet suddenly, an ominous feeling grew in his heart.
His eyes suddenly shot wide as he quickly turned around, his blade in hand, swinging at the incoming attack with a blade strike filled with killing intent and parts of his [Monarch's Aura].
However-
*BOOM*
Before Lloyd could understand what hit him, he was sent flying like a broken kite, smashing through several trees and leaving behind a trail of debris and dust that reached the skies.
A trail of destruction could be seen behind him, and at the end of it was Lloyd as he motionlessly lay in the middle of a crater with cracks all over his body.
'If this continues...' Pushing himself off the ground, a pained grunt left his mouth and caused him to clench his teeth tightly.
Every centimeter of his body ached, and despite not having muscles, it still felt like they had been ruptured, destroyed, and turned into ashes.
Plunging his katana to the ground, he pushed off it and stood up, his body visibly shaking as pain coursed through him.
However, before he could fully stand up, a gunshot-like sound raptured the air and reached his ears, and as if on instinct, he moved to the right in an attempt to dodge the incoming attack.
*Swoosh*
*BOOM*
Before Lloyd knew it, the 3-meter tall wolf appeared next to him. The next instant, he flew in the other direction before tumbling head over heels.
[4-Dimensional Thought]
Lloyd finally slammed into a tree as air forcefully left his mouth. He did not understand how it worked since he had no internal organs, but he knew that his body was acting the same way a normal human body would have.
Falling to the ground, Lloyd quickly looked up and opened his eyes. From his point of view, the world around him was beginning to lose color, and the only thing that regained even a tinge of its former vibrance was the creature with piercing eyes that gazed at him from over 100 meters away.
Now that 4-Dimensional Thought had activated, the flaring rage in his eyes vanished, and what replaced them were cold and merciless violet eyes that released enough killing intent to cause anyone with a weak will to drop to their knees or pass out.
Slowly, the shadows around Lloyd began to shift and move towards him, a single goal in mind.
To kill the creature before them.
Pushing off the ground, Lloyd's figure blurred and traveled several meters in a single second while shadows covered his body from head to toe.
[Shadow Enhancement]
However, the wolf did not stand idle either, as the moment Lloyd had gotten within a 50-meter radius of it, it had already disappeared from its previous spot.
*SWOOSH*
Despite the wolf suddenly appearing at Lloyd's side, he did not feel any signs of displeasure or fear. Instead, battle intent surged out, and with a pair of cold eyes, he locked gazes with the wolf for a split second.
To the wolf's dismay, while this amount of time might have seemed inconsequential, in fact, it was all Lloyd needed as his instincts kicked in and one of his void walker abilities activated on their own.
[Void Gaze]
For a split second, the wolf lost all sense of its surroundings as its mind was sent into a place that could only be described with three words.
An infinite abyss.
However, as the wolf saw something deep within the darkness of the abyss, it slightly squinted its eyes. In the distance, a pair of violet eyes gazed at it, and as it locked eyes with this being, it felt as if its soul was being peered into, and all its secrets had been laid bare in front of it.
Its entire body stiffened, yet before it could regain what little composure it had left, it was thrown back into the real world, pain coursing from a particular spot in its body.
A deep gash could be seen on its side, yet the party that had created that gash did not seem pleased at all, their cold eyes simply narrowing at the display of blood gushing out of the side.
'Void gaze won't work a second time... and even as it froze, I was only capable of creating that? I guess this should be expected, after all...'
Lloyd's thoughts paused as he narrowed his eyes further-
'That thing is clearly in the first commandment.'
It was a well-known fact that fighting between commandments was close to impossible. All records show that fighting a person of a higher commandment, no matter how talented the weaker party is, was impossible. Only a few people in history had done it, and even then, it was mainly because of their immense talent and the fact that they were half steps.
Due to half steps being people who were already half a step into the next commandment, it made their fights much easier. It should be pointed out that the gap between commandments was immense, to the point where not even 20 average people of a lower commandment could create a scratch on an enemy with a higher commandment.
However, throughout all of history, there has always been one exception to this rule... A race that broke every rule in the universe without batting an eye. A race that shattered all scales and had to be ranked on a scale of their own.
Those were Void Walkers.
As Lloyd's eyes lingered on the gash that gushed blood out from the wolf's side, his eyes apathetically scanned the rest of its body before sighing in disappointment after not finding any more openings.
From what he could see, the wolf was enraged beyond belief, and doing anything at that moment would sign his death warrant.
Using [Shadow Travel], Lloyd's body began to melt before it finally submerged into his shadow. Without a second thought, Lloyd used [Shadow Travel] to retreat several dozen meters away before reappearing on a branch in the distance.
His apathetic eyes nonchalantly gazed in the direction of the wolf, and from what he could see, the wolf's gaze was like a pair of sharp daggers pointed in his direction. The bloodlust emanating from the wolf alone was enough to indicate the level of anger that boiled within the wolf's heart.
'It's much stronger than me, and its speed is unrivaled. However, despite that, it lacks techniques, while all its attacks are telegraphed. I easily figured out its attack patterns, and it doesn't seem to have much variety in how it attacks.' Lloyd mused.
However, his thoughts paused there as he watched the wolf in the distance get enveloped in shadows before suddenly disappearing.
*Thud* *Thud* *Thud* *Thud*
Lloyd could audibly hear the wood get knocked as the wolf blurred between trees like a ping-pong ball, jumping from one tree to another in a zigzag pattern that would have confused anyone who saw it.
However, Lloyd had a neutral expression on his face as his cold eyes darted around, clearly following the moves of the wolf.
*Swoosh*
Shifting his shoulder slightly, Lloyd attempted to avoid the incoming attack that would cut his arm off, yet despite knowing that the attack was coming, he could not completely dodge it in time.
However, that's when something clicked in his mind.
In an instant, everything turned a different shade of their normal color before darkness enveloped Lloyd's vision. He didn't know what was happening, but when his eyes opened one again, he was in a different location, having completely dodged the attack in a way that he could not explain nor comprehend.
Taking several steps back, his wariness only increased while the grip on his katana tightened. Three gash marks could be seen on his shoulder, yet not a drop of blood came out of that wound. These gashes came from the previous attack, and he was sure that the wound would have been much worse if he had not mysteriously dodged it in the nick of time.
Lloyd did not even let out a grunt, his eyes still darting about, trying his best to find the wolf's next move.
While at first, it might seem like its movements were random due to its dominant speed, in fact, with a bit of time, Lloyd could easily begin to read its pattern. However, time was one thing Lloyd did not have.
*Swoosh*
The wolf tried to attack again, but this time Lloyd had readied his blade and swung in the direction of where he expected the attack.
*CLANG*
A loud metallic clash almost raptured both of their eardrums, and despite Lloyd not having any eardrums, he, for some reason, still felt the pain that associated itself with loud sounds, ear-piercing sounds.
However, despite blocking the attack, Lloyd was still flung back like a broken kite, smashing into every tree and breaking it in the process.
Regaining his balance mid-air, Lloyd's foot slammed into the ground and pushed him upwards, canceling out his momentum and allowing him to safely land on a branch mostly unharmed.
While several cracks continued to run throughout his skin, he continued to not feel an ounce of pain. Every fiber of his being was demanding one thing and one thing only, and it was to kill the wolf, no matter the consequences.
*Boom*
Suddenly, a wave of pressure shot out of the wolf, and from what Lloyd could see, it was the wolf's ultimate attack.
The shadows around the wolf began to shift, and in an instant, they all shot towards it at an unfathomable speed before beginning to spin around it like a vortex.
At the same time, Lloyd felt a weird feeling inside his chest, and as if on instinct, he held his blade horizontally in front of him before his left hand moved towards it, and two of his fingers rested on the base of the katana.
At the same time, the wolf disappeared from where it stood while shooting off like a bullet in Lloyd's direction. It was no longer moving left or right, and instead was now shooting off in a straight line, a technique optimal for gaining as much speed as possible in a short amount of time.
Dust was thrown into the air as a shockwave shot out from the wolf's figure, indicating that it broke a sound wave.
On the other hand, Lloyd let out a breath with white steam leaving his mouth.
*VHOOOOM*
Killing intent in the form of purple and black threads explode from his body before engulfing the surroundings and continuing to expand without stop. The wind was thrown in every direction, yet Lloyd did not face one bit as his eyes continued to stare at the incoming figure that made his instincts scream, "Instant Death!"
With his index and middle finger on the base of the katana, he slowly began to move them towards the tip as they traced over the cold pitch black metal that the blade was made of.
As Lloyd's fingers moved, bright violet runes would engulf the blade and shine brightly, and when his fingers finally reached the tip, the runes expanded and made everything but the handle of the katana, a bright violet that shone brightly in the darkness of the forest.
Before long, Lloyd had his katana over his head, ready to slice down at any moment and instantly kill anything that got in his way.
However, he did not have to wait long as not even a second later, the figure clad in shadows appeared before him.
His sword cleaved that air before it and moved down towards its enemy. Time and space fluctuated around the violet blade, yet that seemed to be the least of Lloyd's concerns.
Suddenly, 3 words left Lloyds mouth, and despite their simplicity, when muttered, nothing but chaos would descend on the landscape they happened to be summoned in.
"Aspect of Void"
