Rivers of the Night

Chapter 731: Absolute Power

Theron exhaled, the momentum of a Ninth Resonance Gold Mancer causing streams of Dark and Water Mana to endlessly funnel toward him.

His skin glowed even as it healed in real time, his blood flaking off and falling to the ground in a rain of ash.

By the time he had stood to his full height, he was already back to 100%, his momentum so fierce that Venicin took a subconscious step back. Despite sensing his support coming from a distance, Venicin couldn’t even hope to relax, his nerves stretched taut.

He had never felt this amount of pressure from a Gold Mancer in his lifetime.

Theron, though, hardly seemed to be paying any attention to him at all, slowly taking out a spear that swallowed all the light that touched its surface. Staring at it, even in broad daylight, somehow made one feel like they were looking at an object that was more two-dimensional than three, the twisting changes to one’s senses confusing the mind.

The Nightingale Ancestor Bird only seemed to be growing stronger and stronger these days. Even without having completed its first refinement just yet, the difference between it now and the past was practically night and day.

BOOM.

A man with a face as pale as snow and eyes as crimson as the blood that ran through his veins landed on the ground, the already rupturing earth shattering on impact. Large swaths of dirt and soil were kicked up into the surroundings, but not a single hint of it touched him.

Beyond him, though, Theron found someone he didn’t expect to.

Lyrah. Lyra’s mother and the recently promoted Quasi Dome of Heaven expert of the Hall of Ice and Heart.

Except she was no longer a Quasi Dome of Heaven expert. In fact, she was already a Third Resonance Dome of Heaven expert.

Now this was quite interesting. All things considered, her cultivation was even faster than Theron’s.

But if Theron had benefitted from a suppressed cultivation, Lyrah benefitted a hundred times over. Theron had ultimately spent a little more than a year cultivating. Although his cultivation had technically been suppressed at the peak of Silver Mancy, his situation was different.

Lyrah, though, had spent decades slowly crawling forward despite her cultivation talent being far beyond what she had shown.

From what Theron could see, her cultivation wouldn’t show any signs of slowing until she reached the Middle Resonances of the Dome of Heaven Realm.

It seemed that she had gotten tied back in with the Umbra Clan, probably due to Ilzan.

Whatever the reason was, it didn’t matter much to Theron. Even when he saw the surprise on Lyrah’s expression turn to something that seemed close to pleading.

It seemed that her time in the Umbra Clan, as short as it had been, hadn’t been all that peaceful.

Then a third figure landed, yet another that Theron recognized.

Ilzan.

Last time, Theron had to run from this man. But whether that would have to happen again today... well, only time would tell.

"Come here, Venicin," the pale-faced man said coldly. "Where is Rikon?"

The words had barely left his lips when he saw the decapitated head buried in the rubble.

Venicin didn’t reply to the pale-faced man. In fact, he never took his eyes off of Theron.

He might have seemed like the typical arrogant young master, but to his credit, he hadn’t lowered his guard a single time, not even after the other members of his family arrived.

"It’s you," Ilzan said coldly.

"You know this boy, Ilzan?" the pale-faced man asked.

"He is the one who carried the mistress’ soul sliver. I was forced to let him go. We’ve been looking for his whereabouts since."

"Is that so? In that case, we can kill two birds with a single stone today."

The pale-faced man’s gaze landed on Theron once again. He didn’t try to ask Venicin to move again.

Seyxan wasn’t a man who spoke very much. His aura was already flaring up.

Suddenly the ground beneath Theron collapsed, but instead of falling like he should have, Theron continued to stand there as though nothing at all had happened. He didn’t even look down, almost like the Spell had no effect on him in the slightest.

Seyxan’s pupils constricted.

Theron looked down.

’Seventh Resonance Dome of Heaven. Higher Celestial Resonance. Not strong enough.’

Theron’s Void Cores surged. The Dark Mana Seyxan used was ripped apart, his Third Eye forcefully taking control over it.

There was a glow in Theron’s [Entangling Blood Vein Pupils], and a Mana that should have been beyond his means to control was forced to yield.

Alone, his [Entangling Blood Vein Pupils] could wield Cloud Mana.

With the evolution of his Third Eye, and in conjunction with his Void Cores—and given how close he now was to the Cloud Realm...

He could force Heaven Mana to yield for a short moment.

BANG.

[Phase Slip].

The ground beneath Theron shattered to pieces just before his body became entirely incorporeal. He slipped through the wind as though he wasn’t even there. In Phase Slip, it was as though he could ignore all the rules of physics, his speed alone reaching a height that was untouchable.

He moved so fast his spear tip was already at Seyxan’s throat before the latter’s lips could even part in shock.

PUCHI.

A distance of half a kilometer crossed in the blink of an eye, the blood of a Seventh Resonance Dome of Heaven expert falling like a delicate rain.

There was no great battle, no shocking change—just abrupt and utter domination.

Theron’s wrist twisted and a head flew into the air.

He stood there beneath the rain of blood, his piercing blue eyes practically devouring Ilzan whole. The latter didn’t dare to move a single inch, a cold chill drilling into his very bones themselves.

The Theron he knew was a First Resonance Gold Mancer, and yet he had killed a Dome of Heaven expert within minutes of his breakthrough.

The Theron of now was a Ninth Resonance Gold Mancer. And it showed.