Vol 6. Chapter 159: The Meaning of Death

With a single command, tens of thousands of Void warriors surged toward the Silver Dragon side like a collapsing mountain.

Their objective was unmistakably clear. To break through the defense line, locate the successor of the God of Time, and smother the last flicker of resistance to the Void before it could awaken.

A brutal clash erupted instantly. Though they stood ready, the numbers were still overwhelmingly against them. Atos showed no urgency to join the front himself; instead, he remained at the rear, overseeing the battle.

Leon directed the Silver Dragon warriors in a firm counteroffensive. The two armies collided with a deafening din of slaughter and steel.

Atos was “considerate” enough to Leon and his daughter, dispatching several hundred elite fighters specifically to handle them.

Leon tried to disrupt the enemy’s assault with wide-range magic.

But the sheer number of enemies was outrageous, and their coordination and combat strength far exceeded the Void beasts they'd fought before.

So after the first round, aside from halting the vanguard, Leon’s spells didn’t inflict any major damage on the Void warriors.

When the magical exchanges ended, Leon immediately engaged several Void warriors in close combat.

At this range, Leon’s extrasensory perception gave him a distinct advantage.

Two Void warriors charged him head-on. Leon lowered into a slight crouch, waited for the right moment, then sidestepped with ease to evade one of their lunges. He seized the other by the torso, and with explosive force, drove his knee straight into the man’s gut. The brutal impact dropped the attacker on the spot.

Without pause, Leon grabbed the man’s collar and flung him into the reinforcements rushing from behind.

The two crashed together and tumbled violently.

But before Leon could catch his breath, three more figures leapt at him from behind.

Blades drawn, they slashed toward the back of Leon’s neck in unison.

“He reacted again—hah, this time we’ve got him!”

One of them grinned to himself. The so-called 'Strongest Man of Samael'? Leaving such a wide opening in the middle of a fight?

But in the very next second, without even turning around, Leon evaded the sneak attack with a ghostlike twist of his body.

“What?! How is that even—gah!!—”

Before the man could even finish his sentence, Leon stepped back, brought up his knee, and drove his elbow into the man’s chest with bone-crushing force. Seizing the moment, he snatched the blade from the man’s hand.

Leon spun, grasped the attacker’s wrist, and slashed the blade across his chest.

Blood sprayed out. The warrior stumbled back, clutching his wound.

“Damn it, this bastard’s reactions are insane!”

“He can move like that...?!”

“He looked straight through my attack like it was nothing...”

He hadn't seen it coming—yet somehow, Leon had dodged with perfect precision.

Leon turned from the wounded man and immediately faced the other two.

—Clang!

Their blades clashed, sparks flying.

Leon refused to be drawn into a raw power struggle. Instead, he lifted his other hand and summoned the Thunder Blade.

The arc of lightning forced one of them backward.

Taking advantage of the brief opening, before the enemy or his spear could regain balance, Leon hurled the stolen blade—

It spun through the air, then struck true, driving straight through the man’s shoulder and pinning him to a massive tree.

“You bastard! I’ll kill you!”

The first warrior Leon had downed recovered and now came charging, screaming.

But his movements were disordered, lacking form. With Leon’s extrasensory edge, even punches swift as lightning couldn’t find their mark.

As more Void warriors swarmed toward them, Leon had no intention of wasting more time on that one.

He saw his chance—the cold flash of Thundercloud Blade sliced the air, and the man was gone, lifeless before he hit the ground.

“Go! Everyone, all at once! Even if you have to bite, tear off a chunk of his flesh!”

“Kill him!”

...

Leon turned to meet the next wave.

Alternating between physical techniques and magic, the battlefield lit up with thunder and lightning, each flash followed by screams and blood.

Against these Void warriors, Leon still had the upper hand.

What he wasn’t sure of was whether he could hold the line long enough for Isha’s reinforcements to arrive.

He could guess: if the Void was launching a full-scale invasion of Samael, then the Silver Dragon Sanctuary wasn’t the only place under siege.

Aside from Isha, the other Dragon Kings—like Odin—were surely major targets as well.

Atos would’ve sent a strong force to strike them down.

It all came down to who could finish their fight first and rush to support the Silver Dragon Queen’s forces.

“Die, primitive scum of Samael!”

The snarl snapped Leon out of his thoughts.

He turned toward the voice—just another Void warrior rushing toward death.

Leon raised a hand, and a burst of lightning arced out like a whip, swallowing the attacker in a flash.

Sha-sha—

Footsteps rustled from the side.

Leon reacted instantly, spun around, and brought his blade down toward the source.

But just as the edge of the Thunder Blade was about to slice through the man’s throat—

Leon stopped.

The blade froze less than a centimeter from the man’s carotid artery.

Leon stared at the face before him—terror, pressure, defiance, and a twisted mix of countless other emotions.

But most of all, it was his eyes.

Leon had seen countless expressions in battle. He knew exactly what those eyes meant.

They were begging for death.

Leon lowered his gaze, judging their distance. At this range, the man could’ve attacked first—but hadn’t. Instead, he had stepped forward, exposed himself to melee.

Before Leon could make sense of the man’s actions—

Thud—

He fell to his knees, hands to the ground, trembling.

“Kill me... please... kill me!”

“I won’t keep serving that lunatic—I’d rather die at someone else’s hands!”

“Just kill me already... please, let it end!”

Leon understood now.

This man was one of the Void's Homeland Faction.

Safina had told him before—Atos used slaughter to threaten Homeland Faction members into obedience.

And now, on the day of the final battle, the moment of their awakening had finally come.

But with no one able to stand and lead them in rebellion...

The only choice left was to seek death on the battlefield.

Yet Leon understood... Death could never be a weapon to coerce others into sacrifice.

So then why—why would Atos dare to send Homeland Faction members into a battle this critical?

That answer... came swiftly.

Atos had just unlocked the shackles around Leon.

Before the Homeland Faction soldier in front of him could say another word, his body began to shrivel at a pace visible to the naked eye—withering, collapsing into a dense, dark mass of violet malevolent qi.

Amid his anguished scream, the evil mist drifted slowly toward Atos.

At last, the entire cloud was drawn into the demonic sword in Atos's hand, absorbed completely—becoming fuel for the blade.

Leon stared in stunned silence. No matter how much he wanted to deny it...

“Kaiser and the others were right... Atos is a fucking lunatic.”

In the distance, Atos plunged the demonic sword into the earth and bellowed across the battlefield:

“Did you see that? If you dare disobey my orders, you won’t even get to choose how you die! If you want to live—or at least die clean—then throw away your so-called morals and principles! And then, kill every single Samael bastard in front of you!”

...

...

Sherry was surrounded—caught between two Void warriors.

She put everything into slaying one of them, but in the process, she suffered severe wounds herself.

She staggered back a few steps and collapsed to the ground.

The remaining Void warrior advanced slowly, blade in hand.

Sherry bared her silver teeth, face smeared with blood, but the defiant fire in her dragon eyes refused to die.

She raised what remained of her inner magic, desperately ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) trying to summon dragonflame.

But at this point, she was completely spent—there wasn’t a drop of strength left for fire.

A flicker of flame danced across her hand, then fizzled. She gasped, choking for breath, her vision going black.

“Damn it...”

The Void warrior now stood directly in front of her.

Sherry looked up.

He gripped his blade in both hands, the edge pointed directly at her forehead.

“Come on! If I so much as blink, then I’m not the Silver Dragon Queen’s personal guard captain!”

Clink—

The long blade slipped from his grasp and clattered to the ground.

His eyes were vacant. He raised his hands, buried his fingers in his hair.

“How... how did it come to this...? I don’t want to kill... I don’t want to be part of this war... I just... I just want to go home. I don’t want to die... I don’t want to die—!”

His voice trembled into a whisper, his expression unraveling.

Sherry stared at him in blank confusion. She couldn’t understand what was happening.

“At least... yeah... at least I can choose how I die... Fuck you, Atos! I quit!!”

The young Void warrior’s eyes bulged in desperation, madness creeping in.

Hands shaking, he reached for the dagger at his waist—and with a shout, he thrust it toward his own throat.

Sherry’s instincts kicked in. She shut her eyes tightly.

But the gush of blood she expected... never came.

Slowly, she opened her eyes.

Standing before her was another man.

It was Kaiser.

His short violet hair fluttered gently. His tall, lean figure stood like a blade itself. He held the warrior’s wrist, halting the suicide.

The young man turned his head—and then froze.

“K... Kaiser... Kaiser?! It’s really you!”

Kaiser nodded slowly.

“Suicide is the dumbest form of escape.”

“But... but I—”

Kaiser took the dagger from his hand, then strode toward the heart of the battlefield.

The chaotic battle momentarily quieted as the two sides noticed the newcomer.

Void warriors paused, staring.

“Is that... is that Kaiser?”

“He’s not dead? But didn’t Atos say he was already—”

Gone? Back again?

“If Kaiser’s here, then where’s Safina?”

“Don’t tell me he’s fighting for Atos again?”

...

Paranoia and fear exploded through the ranks of the Void warriors.

Atos also saw him—his former strongest lieutenant.

“So. You traitor still have the guts to show your face,” Atos muttered coldly.

Kaiser walked calmly to Leon’s side. The wind brushed through his hair. He looked as composed as ever.

“I’d planned to live out the rest of my life hidden in some forgotten corner of this land. But the man beside me reminded me of something... People inevitably run from things. But when you have the strength to change the world around you, you should give it everything you have. Only then, when you look back one day, will you have no regrets.”

Atos sneered.

“You disappear for all this time, and now you show up just to play the victim?”

Kaiser shook his head. “Not just that.”

He closed his eyes, took a long breath, then opened them slowly.

Turning to face the Homeland Faction soldiers, he spoke loudly:

“I know many of you remember a girl named Anita. She joined the Homeland Faction long ago and gave everything she had to restore our homeland. She was my and my sister Safina’s closest friend... and the pillar of the Homeland Faction. But not long ago, Atos unleashed a massacre against us—to force your obedience through slaughter. And Anita... she died in that massacre.”

No one had forgotten that day.

It was the deepest scar in the hearts of every Homeland Faction fighter.

And to Atos and his Descendant Faction, that massacre had been a brutally effective tool of control.

Kaiser continued.

“I know you don’t want to pick up weapons to fight people from another world, just like I don’t. I know you don’t want to invade someone else’s home just to survive. But for a thousand years, Atos has used violence to force us into doing things that go against everything we believe in. He won’t hesitate to slaughter us to get his way. We’ve tried resisting before—and we failed. All that awaited us was more cruelty, more blood. We hid our identities. We followed orders we didn’t believe in. But today—right now—we’re standing on foreign soil. In front of us are people, just like us, who want to protect their home. And behind us is a tyrant who forces us to kill, or be killed. If we still choose silence, still let him pull our strings, then there’s no turning back. But—”

Kaiser turned and pointed the dagger at Atos in the distance.

“If we resist now, maybe—just maybe—there’s still a sliver of hope. We may not get to choose how we die... But we can choose the meaning of our death. Homeland Faction warriors... your future is in your hands.”

He slowly lowered the dagger and stood silently, waiting for their response.

Leon looked over the suddenly silent battlefield, tension winding through his chest.

To turn enemy soldiers mid-battle was dangerous.

Not just for Kaiser—it was far riskier for those Homeland Faction members.

If they rebelled now, if they rose up—there would be no going back. No forgiveness. No redemption.

If they won, they’d be heroes.

But if they failed... Their fate would be worse than being devoured by Atos’s sword.

Even Kaiser didn’t know how many would follow him. Maybe none.

But that didn’t matter.

He had to speak his truth. He wanted the entire Descendant Faction to hear:

Even under tyranny and slaughter, some still chose to walk against the current.

Time ticked on. The battlefield stayed quiet.

Leon clenched his fist.

He knew. Kaiser had failed.

He raised his hand, gently rested it on Kaiser’s shoulder.

“You’ve done enough, Kaiser. We—”

But before he could finish, a furious roar cut him off.

“ATOS!! I’LL FUCKING RIP YOU APART!!”

The cry ignited the field like a spark on dry grass.

“Even if I turn to ash, I’ll never fight for you again, you maniac!”

“Homeland Faction! We’re the true future of the Void! We can rebuild our world with our own hands!”

“I heard what Kaiser said! We may not get to choose how we die, but we can damn well choose why we die—fuck it, let’s take that bastard down!!”

...

The Homeland Faction, oppressed for a thousand years, finally chose to fight back.

Kaiser’s expression, usually calm and unreadable, now carried a faint, gratified smile.

The battle reignited.

This time, the Descendant Faction faced the Silver Dragons—and the Homeland Faction.

The tide turned.

Leon let out a long breath.

“Not bad, Kaiser. Should’ve done this sooner.”

But Kaiser’s smile faded as quickly as it came. He stayed serious, voice steady but grave.

“There’s something else I have to tell you.”

Leon paused. “What is it?”

Kaiser summoned his longsword and looked toward Atos.

Then he said slowly,

“Atos has already fused with the Void Realm itself. As long as the Void exists, he will never die. In other words, we can’t kill him. The only way to defeat him... is to awaken the power of Time and restore the seal on the Void Gate.”

Leon bit his lip, thinking.

Then he drew Thundercloud Blade, assuming a battle stance facing Atos.

“But to awaken the God of Time’s power... we’d have to have Aurora take Chronoz’s place—”

“I know.”

Kaiser paused.

He lowered his eyes, as if recalling something distant.

And then, his steady voice suddenly cracked with emotion.

“My sister... already found a way.”