In less than twenty minutes, the battle was over.
Only half of the Imperial capital remained.
The other half had become ruins.
On those ruins, Caelum sat atop a broken wall. After one thoroughly satisfying fight, the breath that had been trapped in his chest finally dispersed, and he returned to his usual unruffled manner.
Before long, a figure walked across the shattered ground and entered the ruins.
Cerys stopped in front of Caelum and looked around at the devastation.
"You really made a mess this time."
Among the Empire’s Calamities, she was the only one without a force or territory of her own. She had been wandering near the capital, and after receiving the summons, she had rushed over at once.
Obviously, she had not come to serve the Empire.
Caelum stood.
"There were some matters I needed to settle. It turning into this was purely an accident. After all, I did not come for the Empire or the Emperor."
"No matter what, the consequences will be severe. Without the Emperor and the Empire’s upper ranks, the entire Empire will fall into chaos before long."
The Empire’s rule was rotten and dark, but its government and top combat forces truly had been maintaining the country’s stability.
Caelum had killed them all in one stroke.
With nothing left to restrain the local nobles, the Empire would surely break apart into regional powers.
Caelum did not care.
"That has nothing to do with me. I have no interest in the future of this country or this world. Whatever it becomes, it has nothing to do with me."
Cerys laughed.
"Fair enough. Then that is enough small talk."
She looked at him.
"Do you remember what you told me when you left Hartstead? I have come to prove my qualification."
As she spoke, fighting intent rose from her like flame.
Caelum drew Cloudrend again.
With silent agreement, neither of them used Haki.
Only pure swordsmanship Cultivation.
"Let me say this first. If I win, Cloudrend is mine."
Caelum smiled.
"Same answer as back then, Cerys. This world is broader than you imagine. Your swordsmanship still needs tempering. I acknowledge your strength, but that does not mean you are already my opponent."
"How would I know without trying?"
Memories of being defeated by Caelum again and again flashed through Cerys’s eyes like fire.
She had waited more than ten years for this chance to cross blades.
Caelum’s acknowledgment had run through the first half of her life as a swordsman. It was what she had chased with everything she had.
But acknowledgment alone was not enough.
What she wanted more was to prove that her swordsmanship stood above Caelum’s.
To return all the unwillingness from those defeats back to him.
The instant her words ended, two extreme streaks of blade light crossed.
Their figures flashed past each other.
Victory and defeat had already been decided.
Caelum calmly sheathed his blade.
Cerys remained where she was.
Crack.
A clear tremor rang out.
The blade in her hand broke into several pieces.
Blood flowed.
A vicious wound appeared on her shoulder, barely missing her neck.
"That hurts."
After stepping into the Realm of Grand Sword Master, Cerys had not been cut by anyone in a long time.
The pain from this slash actually felt a little nostalgic.
She accepted her defeat without trouble.
It was not the first time anyway.
Her eyes, however, still burned brightly.
"What Realm is this?"
Steel Cutting?
No.
It had to be higher than Steel Cutting.
If it were any other swordsman, even one who had stepped into Steel Cutting Realm, they would never be able to cut through the blade in her hand.
Caelum had done it with ease.
Caelum asked her in return, "Do you need me to tell you?"
Cerys thought for a moment.
"Forget it. I will figure it out myself."
All this time, she had treated Caelum as the goal and opponent she had to surpass.
She knew that if she asked, Caelum would give her the answer.
But she was Cerys.
Her stubbornness and pride had never changed.
After saying that, she turned and left.
Caelum then came to Javier, who was barely alive, and lifted him up.
Javier tried to turn intangible, only to find that the Ring of Illusion and Reality on his hand had already been damaged.
Thinking back to that slash, it must have been broken then.
Azure Diamond had no ability to heal the body, and Javier had no inherited bloodline.
He could do nothing about his wounds.
Otherwise, how could he have obediently stayed lying on the ground?
There had simply been no other way.
No matter what, Javier could not have imagined he would lose this cleanly.
They had not even exchanged two moves before Caelum cut him down with one slash.
He could not understand it.
How could the gap in strength be this large?
With Azure Diamond, he should have possessed the body with the strongest defense in the world.
How had his defense been broken by a single strike?
It was beyond reason.
They were both players.
Yet Caelum was this powerful.
Javier could not make sense of it no matter how he thought.
And to him, Caelum’s strength was excessive.
If he had lost after a fierce battle, Javier would have accepted it.
But the result had been one slash.
A single slash had left him gravely wounded and dying.
The gap was so great he could hardly believe it.
Javier was unwilling, yet he had no choice but to admit that he had fallen into Caelum’s hands.
Seeing that Caelum did not kill him on the spot, he could not help asking, "You are not killing me?"
Caelum said, "To me, you are more valuable alive than dead."
Javier did not understand.
For the game system, as long as Caelum killed Javier and removed the hostile system’s only anchor, the hostile system’s anchoring of this world would fail.
Caelum and the players in the game system faction would complete the mission and obtain a Revival Gem usable in all game worlds.
But Caelum now had a better idea.
A mere Revival Gem held little value.
Compared with that, he wanted to take an entire system into his hands.
This world would be his greatest opportunity so far.
The game system and the hostile system had both gathered here.
Caelum was not sure how strong the game system’s countermeasures were.
To avoid being erased while tracing the game system’s source, he decided to practice on the hostile system first.
If he could control the hostile system, Caelum would instantly become one of the overlords of the infinite story worlds.
Devouring the game system would only be a matter of time.
From there, he could become the supreme ruler of the infinite story worlds.
As the hostile system’s anchor, Javier was like a network cable pulled over from the hostile system.
Caelum would try to climb along that cable.
If he succeeded, he would raid the enemy base directly.
And even if he failed, at worst he could rely on the game system to return to reality.
The value of such an opportunity was countless times greater than a mere Revival Gem.
However, to accomplish this, Caelum’s current strength was still not enough.
He needed more time to grow.
Before that, Javier could not die.