"You stopped my attack."
Even after saying it, the words didn't feel real.
So he asked, "How did you do that?"
Naless Death coughed.
A trickle of blood ran from the corner of his mouth as he replied, "I learned… after… watching you… Cough! Cough!"
The dust fully cleared, revealing what remained of his broken fra.
Barbatos' Death elentals still clung to him, eating away at both body and soul.
Naless Death had tried to regenerate, reconstruct, and even resurrect himself.
None of it worked. Barbatos' Death wouldn't leave him alone. It was like rot that ignored ti and space, eating through every defense he summoned.
He couldn't heal.
"You learned it?" Barbatos asked, eyes narrowing. "But you—"
He stopped himself.
He'd seen countless geniuses in his lifeti, but this… this didn't fit any mold.
The first ti he used that technique, Naless Death died instantly.
He hadn't even seen the attack. There had been no defense, no reaction, just a corpse left standing.
That ant…
'He only saw it the second ti I used it,' Barbatos thought. 'And in that instant… he learned and blocked it?'
No. That couldn't be.
Was this person really Neo?
The original Neo, the one from the royal family, never possessed such monstrous adaptability.
He had unbreakable will, yes, but talent? Not even average.
'Naless Death has a Darkness that devours everything. If that includes talent… it makes sense. He's absorbing more than just power.'
Barbatos let out a slow breath and stepped forward.
"It was a splendid performance," he said at last. "What you did… I'm still not sure how it was possible. Which is why I'll give you another chance. Co back to the Prince, and I won't kill you."
Naless Death grimaced.
Barbatos' tone was firm, and final. "You're injured badly, and you can't heal. Even if you blocked my attack once, that was only a single attack. You can't defeat in a battle. You can't escape either. Surrender is your only option."
He wasn't wrong.
Naless Death could barely keep his back straight.
His knees shook. His vision kept slipping. His soul pulsed erratically alongside his damaged Cores, and the death aura clawing at him made it hard to breathe.
He looked at his sword.
'Thirty seconds are still not up?'
Berserker was busy doing his part. He just needed more ti.
Naless Death coughed again, then tightened his grip on his sword.
He faced Barbatos.
"I take it you're not willing to surrender?" Barbatos asked.
"I'd rather die than surrender."
"So you're prepared to lose."
"Lose? No. I'm going to win."
Naless Death could never win if he was badly injured after blocking one attack.
But Barbatos' instincts scread.
His Death warned him.
Sothing dangerous was about to happen.
He raised his scythe, no longer calm.
His eyes locked on Naless Death, waiting for so strange move. But Naless Death didn't attack.
Instead, he spoke.
"Barbatos, there's sothing I wanted to ask you," he said.
Barbatos hesitated, then replied, "Go on."
"Do you rember the Sacred Gate?"
"...I do."
"And the shadowy being who guarded it?"
"Yes."
"He was the Shadow Supre. His na was Barbatos—"
The words barely left his mouth.
And then his voice vanished.
Naless Death staggered.
Blood exploded from the cracks forming on his skin.
His mouth opened but no sound ca out.
The air distorted around him. His Cores shuddered. His soul splintered.
His Seed of Existence cracked like porcelain.
Then it shattered.
It was the punishnt for uttering the na of soone far beyond himself.
Barbatos wasn't spared either.
The mont he heard the na, his body froze.
He felt as if a hand larger than reality itself had wrapped around him and refused to let go.
'Barbatos… is the na of the Shadow Supre?'
A flash of white-hot pain tore through his head.
It was unbearable.
The rules of the world didn't allow people at his level to hear such nas.
The only reason he had heard it now was because Naless Death was a Heavenbreaker, and the Heavenly Principles that should've stopped Naless Death had almost no authority over Heavenbreakers.
And because of that, Barbatos had heard everything before the Heavenly Principals reacted.
'The Shadow Supre… with my na?'
He fell to his knees. His scythe clattered against the ground.
'That's impossible…. I t the Shadow Supre when I finished the Shadow Trials…. We both existed at the sa ti. That couldn't have been .'
'Ti wouldn't allow two people two exist at sa point of ti.'
But what about the shadowy being protecting the Sacred Gate?
'Is he… a second Shadow Supre….'
It only raised more questions.
The more he questioned, the more pain surged through his head.
White blood spilled from his hood, and from the cracks forming along his bony arms.
His Death and Shadow power lashed out uncontrollably, destroying everything within reach.
The world shook. Even the sky seed to dim.
That was when a new presence surged into the battlefield.
The Universal Will.
It looked down at Naless Death's fragnted body. He was slowly—desperately—reforming.
Again.
'Crazy bastard,' the Universal Will thought. 'Not even a hundred years have passed since the last ti he pulled a stunt, and he did it again.'
It was furious.
What was this lunatic thinking, revealing the na of a previous Eon's Shadow Supre? Did he want to die that badly?
The Universal Will understood what had happened.
Since Naless Death couldn't defeat Barbatos by himself, he decided to do a double suicide by revealing previous Eon's Shadow Supre's na.
In doing so, he had broken a rule.
This ti he could be punished—
'Dammit, I can't punish him this ti either!'
Previous Eon's Shadow Supre shouldn't exist in this Eon.
If Universal Will punished Naless Death for revealing his na, there was a high chance that Eternals would find about why Naless Death was punished.
'Ugh, I will be implicated if they find out I didn't report the existence of previous Eon's Shadow Supre.'
So once again, Naless Death would walk free. Not because he was innocent. Not because he deserved rcy.
But because punishing him would lead to worse consequences.
The Universal Will couldn't afford that risk.
Its trembled with frustration.
Even now, it couldn't understand how Naless Death had gambled so confidently.
He shouldn't have known he'd survive sothing like that. He shouldn't have had any reason to believe he wouldn't be erased.
And yet, that madman had still spoken the na.
'Crazy bastard,' it muttered again, before turning its focus to the more manageable issue.
Barbatos.
Unlike Naless Death, Barbatos was firmly within the scope of the Heavenly Principles.
His existence was registered and monitored, and he had no protection from repercussions.
His mind had been force-fed knowledge it shouldn't have. That alone was enough to kill him, slowly but surely.
The Universal Will reached out, sighing deeply.
'Forget,' it commanded.
Its invisible hand brushed over Barbatos, and just like that, the mories slipped away.
Everything from the mont Naless Death had started to speak the na was erased.
Barbatos' body went limp, and he crumpled to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.
Silence returned.
Across the broken battlefield, Naless Death's body began to reform.
His flesh was slow to recover.
Barbatos' Death was insidious, still clinging to his soul.
But inch by inch, he healed.
"Hey!" a voice rang out cheerfully. A hand slapped him hard on the back. "That was aweso!"
Berserker's laughter echoed around them.
"I'm still healing." Naless Death groaned.
"Yeah, yeah," Berserker said, grinning wide. "But co on! That was insane. How the hell did you even think of doing sothing so crazy?"
Naless Death didn't answer right away.
He wiped a sar of blood off his chin and stared at the cracks in his skin.
They were closing, but it was happening slowly.
It would take ti before he was fully healed and stable.
"You know—"
"Shut the fuck up. I'm tired."
Berserker laughed harder, clearly unbothered.
Naless Death let Berserker take his arm over his shoulder for support.
"Let's get out of here before sothing else goes wrong."
"Roger that."
And just like that, the two of them vanished. The air shimred once where they stood, then turned still.
Soti later, Barbatos woke up.
A sharp breath escaped his lips as he blinked, disoriented.
"What... happened here?"
He tried to stand but stumbled. His legs felt weak. His head pounded with a deep, stabbing pain every ti he tried to focus.
Fragnts of mory floated around in his mind.
He rembered fighting. Naless Death. Berserker. The scythe. But after that, things beca hazy.
He placed a hand on the side of his head.
A sharp spike of pain tore through his skull.
"Argh."
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't rember what had caused him to pass out.
His instincts told him sothing important had happened, sothing he wasn't supposed to forget.
But every ti he got close to the thought, it vanished like smoke.
He looked around.
"They escaped."
There were no signs of Naless Death or Berserker. He couldn't even sense the direction they had gone in.
Ti had clearly passed while he was unconscious, and that ant they could be anywhere.
Barbatos cursed softly under his breath.
He wanted to chase them, but the Site was riddled with Space-Ti prisons, many of which he didn't even know existence of.
If Berserker had escaped into one of those recently, Barbatos could've located him, but too much ti had passed now.
"The Prince is going to be upset."
His words ca out quieter than he expected.
There was no point in lingering here.
With one last look at the empty battlefield, Barbatos sighed and turned away. He stepped back into the Site's core, already preparing the report he would have to deliver.
…
Sowhere deep within the labyrinthine space of a hidden prison site, Naless Death sat quietly, eyes half-shut.
Berserker leaned against the wall beside him, arms crossed and still grinning like a child who had watched the world's best prank unfold.
"I still can't believe you did that," he said after a while. "You actually tried to na the Shadow Supre in front of Barbatos."
Naless Death didn't respond imdiately.
After a while, he opened his eyes and looked at Berserker.
"Let's talk about the more important things. Since we are working together, I expect you to show so sincerity."
"….?"
"Where is the ant?"
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