Titan King: Ascension of the Giant

Chapter 1443: The Abyss is staring back at you

Orion sighed, abandoning the idea of a slugfest.

"You don’t understand," Belthar sneered. "A lower-tier existence like you can’t comprehend the mysteries of the Divine Soul."

"Just be a good little mortal and become my food!"

"Hahaha..."

The specter vanished again. This time, he materialized directly in front of the Stoneheart Titan’s primary face, jaws gaping to tear Orion’s throat out.

He was inches away from victory.

Then, Belthar froze. He couldn’t bite down. He couldn’t move.

An invisible force had locked him in place, freezing space itself.

Orion stared directly into the specter’s eyes. His voice was calm, heavy, and final.

"The Abyss is staring back at you."

The spectral avatar was paralyzed, unable to see beyond its own nose. But in the mirror above, Belthar’s main consciousness saw everything clearly. And he was terrified.

A heartbeat ago, the void had shuddered. The rules of this world were being rewritten by an intrusion from outside.

Beneath Orion’s feet, a phantom world materialized. A colossal abyssal vortex opened up, spinning with slow, terrifying majesty. Ripples of distorted gravity pulsed outward, threatening to swallow the entire Ashenheart Domain.

Above, the Mirror of Theras. Below, the Abyssal Vortex. Heaven and Hell, locked in a tug-of-war.

"This is..."

Leonidas gasped. As someone who had successfully hatched a World Dragon, he recognized the signature of a world descending.

"A Divine Kingdom!" Edward whispered, his voice trembling. "Hulk... he actually hatched his World Dragon and converted it into a Divine Kingdom."

"Is he... is he a Fourth-Stage Demigod?"

Edward was shaken to his core. Only now did he truly understand the Commander’s words. Hulk is stronger than all of us. It wasn’t hyperbole.

"This is hell," Orion said to the frozen specter, "but I bet you’ve never seen the Abyss."

"It has a bad temper."

CRACK-CRACK-CRACK!

ZZZ-ZZT!

It was a sickening harmony of sounds.

The cracking was the sound of a Divine Soul being ground into dust by a superior force. The sizzling was the sound of the specter’s energy screaming as it tried to resist.

Combined, they sounded like a scream being strangled.

POP!

In an instant, Belthar’s spectral avatar imploded. It didn’t just die; it was erased. Every ounce of its power, faith, and consciousness was sucked down into the vortex beneath Orion’s feet.

Having devoured the avatar, Orion looked up at the mirror in the sky.

"You didn’t think it ended there, did you?"

"The Abyss is still hungry."

Orion raised his remaining seven arms and roared.

ROAAAR!

The vortex spun faster. The gravitational pull intensified a thousandfold. The power of an entire world latched onto the Mirror of Theras, dragging it down from the heavens.

This wasn’t a phantom. This wasn’t a trick. Orion had summoned his actual Divine Kingdom.

Though the kingdom hadn’t fully descended into the Minor Hell, the dimensional walls were crashing against each other in the void, bleeding power through the cracks.

"No!"

"That... that is the aura of a Divine Kingdom!"

"How is this possible?!"

Inside the mirror, Belthar panicked. As a Third-Stage Demigod, he knew exactly what that vortex was. And he knew he couldn’t fight a world.

Run.

The thought screamed in his mind.

Without hesitation, Belthar abandoned ship. His main consciousness ejected from the back of the mirror, severing his connection to the artifact. He tore a hole in the void and fled, escaping the gravitational singularity of the Abyss.

"That belongs to the Demon King!" Belthar’s voice trailed behind him as he vanished into the warp. "He will come for it personally!"

It was a parting threat, one that would haunt Orion for a long time. But for now, the enemy was gone.

Left pilotless, the Mirror of Theras began to shake. Without Belthar’s will to anchor it, the artifact succumbed to the pull of the vortex.

Slowly, inexorably, the massive black mirror descended. It took hours, but eventually, the abyssal vortex swallowed the Demigod Artifact whole, dragging it into Orion’s Divine Kingdom.

The deed done, Orion dropped from the sky, landing heavily beside Edward and Arthas.

He looked exhausted. His avatar flickered and vanished.

"Brothers... I’m spent," he mumbled.

Then he collapsed, his consciousness retreating into the cavern to enter a deep restorative slumber.

Edward, Arthas, Alexander, and Leonidas stood in silence, staring at the cave entrance.

"Is the kid... impotent?" Leonidas finally cracked, breaking the tension.

Arthas and Alexander turned in unison, shooting him a look of profound disgust.

"He over-drafted his Divine Power," Edward corrected. "He needs sleep to recover."

High above, in the chaotic void, the presence of Orion’s Divine Kingdom began to recede, drifting away from the Ashenheart Domain.

In truth, Belthar had been bluffed.

He had been scared off by the concept of the Divine Kingdom. If he had stayed and fought using the mirror, he might have won. Orion’s "Fourth Stage" was hollow—he had skipped the steps of igniting Divine Fire (Second Stage) and forming a Divine Soul (Third Stage). He was a glass cannon with a nuclear warhead.

But then again, Belthar would have had to fight Orion and the four Demigods on the ground. Fleeing was probably the only reason he was still alive.

"My god... the kid is a monster," Leonidas muttered, shaking his head. "We used to be his heavy hitters. Now he’s carrying us."

He threw an arm around Arthas’s shoulders, grinning shamelessly. "Arthas, teach me. How do I find a disciple that freaky?"

Arthas glanced at the hand on his shoulder, said nothing, and walked into the cave.

"Keep dreaming," Alexander dropped the comment as he followed Edward inside.

Leonidas stood alone for a moment, looking at their retreating backs. He sighed deeply.

"Damn it. Now I know how Squiddy felt when we left him in the dust."

"It sucks. It really sucks."

Inside the cavern, the air was still.

In the center of their sleeping circle sat a small statue of a Stoneheart Titan. This was the vessel for Orion’s projection. Beside it sat a dragon statue (Leonidas) and a mage statue (Edward).

Arthas and Alexander needed no vessels. Arthas was here in his true body, having staked everything to defend the volcano. Alexander used his Asura Avatar, which required no anchor.

Arthas walked up to the Titan statue. He pulled a pitch-black skull from his robes—a relic of immense necromantic power—and placed it gently into one of the Titan’s stone hands.

Seeing this, the others moved.

Edward produced a sphere of holy light, placing it in another hand.

Alexander drew a translucent, ethereal sword and laid it across a third palm.

Leonidas, ever the showman, didn’t use an item. He reached out, and his own arm dissolved into golden light, transforming into a miniature dragon that coiled itself lovingly around the Titan’s fourth arm.

They were investing in their future. And their future was sleeping right in front of them.