Each impact left its mark.
Fine cracks spread across the surface of the celestial spheres, thin fractures of light branching outward like spiderwebs.
Their glow dimd for the briefest breath before flaring again. They cracked and healed at the sa ti, forced into constant regeneration under relentless pressure, their instability mirroring the growing strain inside Reynold himself.
Then ca the ntal assault.
A sharp, vicious wave of willpower slamd into his mind. Alien voices scread together, trying to crush his resolve, to drag his awareness into chaos and madness.
Reynold did not even blink.
He pushed through it as if wading through shallow water. His focus never wavered.
At last, the spatial head moved. As Reynold drew close, it cast him a cold, disdainful glance. Its massive form began to dissolve into ripples as a spatial wormhole opened beneath its body.
Unhurried and confident, it slid backward into the folded void, certain of its escape.
Space was its domain. Retreat required no effort. No mortal could follow it there, let alone harm it.
Or so it believed.
Halfway through its withdrawal, sothing seized it.
A sudden, violent pull wrenched at its enormous body, dragging it outward instead of letting it slip away.
The head thrashed on instinct, spatial currents surging in defiance, but the force only grew stronger, crushing its control.
Its eyes widened.
Reflected within its vast crimson gaze was Reynold, already closing in. Above him, the dark sphere within his divine halo pulsed with ominous power, the space around it collapsing inward.
IT was the sa authority as his.
"That mirror…" the head snarled within its mind, fury and disbelief crashing together. To have its own law reflected back at it was an insult beyond asure.
The pull beca absolute.
In the next instant, Reynold was upon it.
He reached forward and pressed his hand against the massive serpent body.
Void fla erupted from his palm. Black fire spread instantly, devouring scale and flesh alike, sealing everything it touched beneath a creeping obsidian shell.
The head thrashed once, violently.
Then its movents slowed.
Its authority snapped, cut off and locked away beneath the consuming black layer. The obsidian continued to spread, encasing the serpent completely, freezing it mid-transition, half within reality, half torn from it.
Trapped forever between worlds.
Reynold withdrew his hand and drifted back, flas curling around his arm as the sealed head hung motionless in the void.
The eruption of void fla monts earlier had left a cost Reynold could no longer ignore.
The cracks beneath his skin had spread wide. They were no longer thin lines of light, but jagged fault lines that pulsed with unstable radiance.
His presence flickered, strength leaking away in uneven surges, as if reality itself struggled to hold him together. Yet there was no ti to recover.
The remaining heads of Azeroth descended without rcy.
They attacked as one, their assault forming a relentless storm that allowed no space to breathe.
Beams of pure annihilation tore through the void. Tides of corrupted authority pressed down like a crushing sea. Elental power followed in roaring waves, striking him again and again.
Above him, the twin divine stars spun in desperation.
They intercepted what they could, radiant barriers flaring into existence only to shatter monts later. Their light brightened, then dimd, erratic and unstable, as fractures spread across their surfaces. Even so, many attacks slipped past them and struck Reynold directly.
His body was torn apart.
Flesh disintegrated. Bones shattered. Half of his form vanished under overlapping laws ant to erase him completely.
And yet, each ti he was destroyed, he reford almost at once. Light surged, knitting flesh back together, forcing reality to acknowledge his existence again.
Again and again, the cycle repeated.
Destruction. Rebirth. But every reconstruction ca at a price.
The cracks across his body multiplied, spreading deeper, glowing brighter. His form grew more unstable with each recovery, flickering more often, as though one misstep would cause him to collapse entirely.
Reynold understood their intent.
They were wearing him down, forcing his body to regenerate over and over until it could no longer contain the false divinity raging inside him. Every heartbeat pushed him closer to collapse, and they knew it.
His jaw tightened as another wave tore through him. He reford monts later. His gaze darkened, resolve hardening into sothing dangerous.
This was the endga.
If the battle continued like this, his body would fail long before theirs ever did. There was only one path left, an all-out release. His final trump card. Even if it ant shattering himself beyond recovery.
But then, the attacks stopped.
The sudden absence of pressure was almost shocking. The crushing force vanished, replaced by stillness.
One by one, the remaining heads withdrew, slipping backward into distorted folds of space, retreating into so unseen depth.
From all directions, Azeroth's voice echoed.
"For destroying my body," it said slowly, each word reverberating through Reynold's consciousness, "do not expect an easy death."
The spatial distortions sealed shut.
For a single breath, nothing moved.
Then the endless white began to tremble.
The void shuddered as if a sleeping presence had finally opened its eyes. Waves rippled outward, and space itself let out a low, strained under a pressure far greater than anything before.
Reynold's eyes narrowed, as a massive rupture tore open in front of him.
From within that opening, sothing stepped out.
It was humanoid in shape, towering over Reynold at twice his height. Its body was covered in dark, ancient scales that caught the light with a dull, ominous sheen.
From the shoulders down, it looked like a monstrous giant carved in the image of a man, every muscle coiled with overwhelming strength.
But above the neck, six serpentine heads rose together, fierce and regal, their crimson eyes burning with a single, unified will.
The fusion of remaining heads. This was Azeroth's true form, the convergence of all the remaining heads.
"You've made this easier for ," Reynold said, lifting his gaze as void fla surged around his body once more. "Now I only have to seal you once."
Black fire exploded outward, swallowing his figure as he vanished in a blink.
In the next instant, he stood directly before Azeroth, arm already extended.
Void fla poured from his palm in an all-devouring tide, roaring forward with the intent to erase everything in its path. The fire crashed into the fused body, spreading across scales and flesh, howling with annihilation.
Azeroth did not move. It did not dodge. It did not resist.
The six heads simply watched, their expressions cold and unreadable, as the flas raged around them. Monts passed. Then more.
Nothing happened.
The void fla, once capable of sealing divine beings, slid harmlessly across Azeroth's body. It dispersed as if it had struck an unbreakable truth.
Reynold's frowned.
In that instant, he understood.
Before the fusion, each head had held a level of divinity no greater than his own false state, and vulnerable to his fla.
But now, united into a single existence, Azeroth had crossed a threshold Reynold himself had failed to reach.
True celestial state.
Its divinity had fully solidified. Its authority over the laws of existence had leapt beyond comparison. What stood before him now was no longer sothing his false divine star could threaten.
The flas receded.
Reynold stood there as cracks blazed across his body, his form flickering violently under the strain.
Unless he stepped into true celestial state himself…there was nothing he could do to harm the being before him.
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