Only silence answered.
The countless Hellish Centaurs that had moments ago charged without the slightest hesitation now stood completely motionless, their monstrous crimson eyes fixed upon the blood-covered Devil standing alone amidst the corpses of the Twelve Death Generals, the gigantic carcasses of their commanders still falling from the heavens one after another before smashing into the already fractured battlefield, where the lingering Anti-Life aura slowly devoured even their remains until nothing but rivers of black blood and scattered fragments of armor remained behind.
For the first time since White had descended upon this wandering world, the endless march had come to a complete halt, not because there was no one left to fight nor because they had accepted defeat, but because every warrior present had just witnessed something that should never have been possible.
Their twelve greatest commanders, the strongest warriors ever created beneath the authority of Mundus, had all fallen before a single Devil who had not even fought at the peak of his strength, but had instead slaughtered them after being reduced to nothing more than two powerful legs supporting a body that should have collapsed long ago, every one of his shoulders ending in mangled stumps where black blood streamed endlessly into the air while the lingering Anti-Life aura relentlessly erased every strand of flesh his regeneration desperately struggled to restore.
Every wound remained open, every injury continued worsening beneath the authority lingering within them, yet despite everything his breathing never once became uneven, his expression never changed, and he simply continued standing where countless others would have long since fallen.
Not once throughout the battle had he taken a single step backward, and that quiet truth spread across the endless ranks of Hellish Centaurs faster than any spoken command ever could, settling deep within instincts that until this very moment had never known uncertainty.
The Hellish Centaurs neither feared pain nor death, for neither concept had ever existed within the instincts engraved into their race, yet what quietly spread throughout the battlefield now was something far older than fear itself, an instinctive warning carried within the foundation of every living existence, the realization that the being standing before them had surpassed every measure through which survival could still be achieved, leaving behind only the overwhelming certainty that no matter how many warriors charged forward, the Devil would simply continue walking over their corpses.
Even White noticed it.
He had seen fear countless times before: the terror of Humans cornered by monsters and the desperation of Supernaturals moments before death.
But this was different.
It wasn’t panic or hesitation. It was the silent understanding shared by an entire race that ordinary battle could no longer secure victory. Somewhere within those countless crimson eyes, a single conclusion had already been reached, and every one of them accepted it without resistance.
His ringed eyes slowly swept across the endless army before him, watching thousands of towering Centaurs instinctively tighten their grips around their weapons while countless others stood rooted where they were, their gazes refusing to leave the blood-covered Devil whose ruined body continued standing in open defiance of wounds that should have ended his life many times over.
Then, the silence finally broke.
ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAR!
A deafening roar exploded across the battlefield as one Hellish Centaur suddenly lowered the gigantic spear clutched within its grasp before launching itself forward with absolute abandon, every one of its four powerful legs crushing the shattered earth beneath its hooves while its enormous body accelerated toward White with enough force to tear apart the atmosphere itself.
White watched the approaching warrior in silence, his expression never changing as the distance separating them vanished almost instantly, yet something about the creature’s charge immediately caused the rings within his eyes to tighten, for it wasn’t preparing to attack, its spear never shifting from the position in which it had begun its charge, neither did the muscles throughout its gigantic body tense into the posture of a warrior preparing to strike.
Instead, every crimson rune carved across its flesh, armor, and weapon suddenly ignited with blinding radiance that raced throughout its entire body in less than a heartbeat.
White’s pupils contracted.
The charging Centaur smiled.
Then...
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
Its entire existence collapsed inward, not merely its flesh nor simply its blood, but everything that defined its very existence compressing into a single infinitesimal point before erupting outward in an unimaginably violent sphere of destruction that swallowed White completely, expanding across thousands of kilometers in a single instant as mountains vanished, continents fractured, and the surrounding atmosphere simply ceased to exist beneath the overwhelming force released by the detonation.
For the first time since the battle had begun, genuine surprise quietly crossed White’s eyes, not because of the explosion itself, but because within that single instant he understood exactly what had happened.
The Hellish Centaurs had abandoned the battle altogether.
They had abandoned the very instinct to survive.
No commander had issued the order, and no voice called them forward, yet the realization spread throughout the army faster than speech ever could.
If blades failed, if strength failed, and if even the Twelve Death Generals had fallen, then the only weapon remaining was their own existence.
Every warrior understood it, and every warrior accepted it.
They had chosen sacrifice.
The crimson inferno had scarcely begun swallowing the battlefield before another deafening roar erupted from somewhere beyond the expanding sea of destruction, quickly followed by another, then another, until within moments the entire wandering world seemed to roar together.
ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAR!
The disciplined formations that had marched so perfectly until now instantly dissolved into complete chaos as every remaining Hellish Centaur abandoned rank, formation, and even the instinct for self-preservation itself, charging toward the expanding inferno with reckless desperation, their colossal bodies colliding violently against one another in their determination to become the next warrior to reach the Devil until discipline ceased to matter, survival lost all meaning, and every remaining thought became consumed by a single purpose.
Kill the Devil.
The first wave reached the expanding inferno without a single warrior attempting to strike or even raising a weapon, their colossal bodies instead erupting into crimson radiance the very instant they entered the sea of destruction.
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!
The countless detonations merged together almost instantly, each explosion amplifying the next until innumerable crimson spheres fused into one apocalyptic inferno that swallowed the entire battlefield, transforming the wandering world into nothing more than an endless ocean of destruction where even space itself seemed to tremble beneath the relentless succession of sacrificial blasts.
Within that immeasurable sea of crimson, hidden beneath light so overwhelming that no ordinary eye could ever hope to perceive what lay inside it, a faint blue halo quietly shimmered around White’s motionless body for the briefest fraction of a second before disappearing once more beneath the endless brilliance of the explosions.
No one noticed.
Another wave had already arrived.
Millions more hurled themselves into the inferno without the slightest hesitation, allowing their bodies to collapse into existence-erasing explosions before the previous detonations had even begun to fade, creating an uninterrupted chain reaction that consumed everything in every direction until the battlefield itself disappeared beneath the relentless succession of sacrificial blasts.
There was no longer a battlefield, no armies, no formations, nor any trace of strategy remaining, only an endless bombardment of lives willingly offered in exchange for a single impossible hope as mountains vanished, the atmosphere was stripped away, and entire layers of the planet’s crust continuously vaporized beneath the ceaseless chain of detonations, each explosion flowing seamlessly into the next without allowing even a single heartbeat of silence to exist between them.
One wave sacrificed itself only for another to instantly replace it, followed immediately by another and then another again, the endless bombardment never weakening for even a moment but instead growing increasingly violent as more and more Hellish Centaurs willingly erased themselves from existence, as though every remaining warrior had reached the exact same conclusion without exchanging a single word:
If twelve Death Generals could not kill the Devil, then perhaps, nine million hellish centaurs lives could.
There was no grief amongst them.
No hesitation before death.
Those who remained alive never even glanced toward the comrades who had just erased themselves from existence.
They simply continued running.
Every explosion became the signal for the next warrior to offer their own life, until sacrifice itself transformed into an endless rhythm that engulfed the entire wandering world.
The inferno only continued to grow, fed not by fuel or flame, but by an army that had willingly become its own final weapon.