Chapter 606: Why did I become so weak?
The ground was drenched in blood. Goblins twisted in agony, their screams muffled by the smoke, and the smell of burning flesh permeated the air. Strax stood still, Zani clutched tightly in his hand, her eyes flickering like dying embers.
Cristine kicked at the remains of two enemies, panting, while Yennifer cleaned the energy blade that wavered in her fingers. Bellatrix stood close to Beatrice, shielding her from the thinning hail of arrows.
But for Strax, all that dissolved into noise.
He stared at his own feet, covered in blood, and the only thing he could think was:
“Goblins?”
The fist around Zani trembled. The scene before him seemed too absurd.
His mind raced through memories.
The burning field where he had faced the Avatar of Ares. The suffocating heat of divine flames, the titanic battle that had crushed entire cities… and he, emerging victorious.
The heavens shattered as he devoured dragons, absorbing their essence, taking for himself a power he had never thought possible.
The wars against armies of monsters, titans, legendary warriors—battles that forged legends, battles that would make any mortal give up just watching.
And now…
Goblins.
Creatures he would once have crushed with a finger. Creatures that were nothing more than disposable meat on any battlefield.
He felt his chest tighten, the air thin.
“Since when…” he murmured, barely audible. “…since when have I become so weak?”
The weight of those words sank into his soul like an icy blade.
Zani, in her spirit form, appeared beside him. The warrior with the sharp eyes and white hair stared at him blankly.
“You’re letting these thoughts consume you,” she said in a cold but firm tone.
“Shut up,” Strax replied, his voice thick with suppressed fury. “Don’t give me any philosophy now.”
She didn’t answer right away. She just watched.
Strax looked up at the horizon. The catapults still spewing fire, the screams of the goblins echoing in the forest, the sound of arrows cutting through the wind. Every detail was a reminder of his own humiliation.
He took a deep breath. The hot air entered his lungs like fire, but what burned was the rage within him.
His eyes closed.
Memories pierced him like spears.
He saw himself again at the moment he devoured the flesh of an ancient dragon, absorbing power until his skin burned with pain.
He saw himself laughing in Ares’s face, even as blood flowed from dozens of mortal wounds. He saw himself crushing armies with his bare hands, as if they were ants.
And now… staggering before goblins.
A bitter laugh escaped his throat.
“Pathetic,” he whispered to himself. “Pathetic.”
Zani’s eyes gleamed as she finally spoke.
“Then prove me wrong.”
He opened his eyes.
The sword in his hand seemed to pulse, as if it had a life of its own. The black blade, alive with red runes, shimmered in anticipation. The air around it distorted slightly, as if reality itself feared what was about to happen.
Strax rolled his shoulders, raising his sword.
The sound of metal ripping through the air echoed like thunder.
And then, he swung.
A horizontal cut, clean, swift, as simple as breathing.
But the effect was not simple.
A black wave exploded from the blade, piercing the air like a crack in existence itself. The power expanded in a straight line, cutting through everything it touched.
The sea roared as the waters parted in a perfect gash.
The trees of the forest were mown down as if made of paper.
The catapults were shattered into pieces, swallowed by the energy that burned everything silently.
The goblins, thousands of them, didn’t even have time to scream. They were disintegrated, reduced to shadows and dust in a matter of seconds.
The slash cut across the entire island.
And when it ended, only silence remained.
The wind carried the ash, the smell of destruction permeated every particle of the air. The horizon, once marked by life and chaos, was now empty.
The island, once teeming with enemies, had been cleansed.
Cristine, Yennifer, and Bellatrix stood in the middle of the field, their mouths open, staring at the perfect line of destruction that divided the world before them.
Beatrice, even injured, raised her head to witness it, her eyes wide.
No one said a word.
Strax stood still for a long moment, his sword still raised. His arm trembled slightly, not from exertion, but from rage.
Finally, he lowered Zani, staring at the blade. The reflection of his face was distorted, shrouded in shadow.
He took a deep breath and muttered, low but loud enough for everyone to hear:
“Pathetic.”
The echo of the word seemed to weigh in the air more than the destruction he had caused.
Cristine took a step forward.
“Strax… you… wiped out the entire island in a single blow. How can you call that—”
“Pathetic,” he interrupted her, his eyes still fixed on the sword.
Bellatrix frowned.
“You just destroyed an entire army of goblins in seconds.”
“GOBLINS!” Strax shouted, spinning to face them all. His voice echoed like thunder. “I’ve killed many strong things! I’ve devoured dragons! I’ve faced monsters that would make this island look like a toy! And now…” he pointed to the void before them, the goblin remains disappearing in the wind. “…now, I have to sweat for this?”
Silence. Only the sound of the waves against the shore.
Strax closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. The weight of his own voice seemed to crush him more than any enemy ever had.
He opened his eyes again, staring at the sword.
“You’re nothing but a shadow of what I once was,” he said, barely above a whisper. “No… what the hell are they doing to me?” he muttered.
Zani shimmered in his hand, her spirit form emerging faintly, but before she could speak, Strax raised his sword.
The roar that escaped him was neither human nor draconian—it was something in between, a sound that shook the very earth.
And he struck.
An upward slash. Simple. Crude. But charged with a rage and power he couldn’t remember ever wielding with such fury.
The air ripped like paper.
The sky exploded into silence.
The clouds, thick and heavy, parted in a perfect line, as if an invisible hand had split the sky. Sunlight flooded the rift, creating a golden path that rose out of sight.
But it didn’t stop there.
The rift didn’t close. The cut rose, rose, and rose even higher.
Cristine, Yennifer, Beatrice, and Bellatrix looked up, eyes wide.
“This is…” Yennifer whispered, unable to finish the sentence.
Up above, above the clouds, something flashed.
It wasn’t the blue sky. It wasn’t stars.
It was a mark.
A colossal, incandescent rune that filled the entire horizon. Black and red lines crisscrossed the sky in intricate patterns, pulsing like veins. The rune seemed alive, breathing, vibrating.
Strax’s cut slammed into it.
And for the first time since arriving on these islands, the air vibrated with an energy that didn’t belong there.
The rune glowed, repelling the attack. The impact echoed like thunder, shaking the sea and the nearby mountains. Giant waves rose, birds plummeted from the sky, and even the earth shook as if it were about to crack.
Strax took a half-step back, his arm tingling from the shock of the collision.
His eyes widened.
“No…” he murmured, breathing heavily. “…the sky is marked.”
The women behind him exchanged glances, tension mounting.
Beatrice, still pale from her previous fall, forced herself to her feet.
“A… huge… rune,” she whispered. “How… how did we not see this before?”