MIGHT AS WELL BE OP-Chapter 984: Backlash
Lucian Darkheart could be seen floating within the void of the Acarnis Galaxy as he basked in his glory. He floated with his eyes closed, immersed in the overwhelming magnificence of his own triumph, savoring the stillness that followed the astra shattering clash. Three years... he had waited three long, relentless years for this singular moment, and it had finally paid off... all his training, every calculated risk, every brutal confrontation, every sleepless night spent refining his power and sharpening his mind.
Although he did not say it out loud, Lucian could not help but respect Aaaninja; even with all his own overpowered abilities that he had meticulously copied over the course of a century, Aaaninja had still managed to keep up with nothing but sheer talent and brilliance. With just his time manipulation talent alone, he had managed to contend against Lucian even when faced with various reality-warping skills that should have decisively overwhelmed him, standing firm against impossibility itself with nothing but ingenuity and terrifying instinct.
Indeed, Aaaninja Chronisynth Eternos was not a man that could be scoffed at. His battle IQ and resourcefulness were truly immense, switching to soul abilities and obscure techniques the very moment his time manipulation ability was taken away, adapting seamlessly as though every setback was merely another variable in an equation he had already solved.
Such a genius.
Lucian smiled faintly, for he had no problem admitting that Aaaninja was a genius who stood on an equal level with him; after all, he saw Aaaninja as his ultimate rival, the one existence that forced him to push beyond complacency and transcend averageness. As for Aura Nova, she would have to earn that title when she achieved her perfect self, when her potential crystallized into something undeniable rather than something merely promising and raw power.
But then, another thought occurred to Lucian: he and Aaaninja had been on equal footing almost throughout the entirety of the battle, their powers colliding like cosmic forces, and the deciding factor had ultimately been the Personification ability that they had both used in that climactic exchange.
Neither Aaaninja Chronisynth Eternos nor Lucian Darkheart had known they possessed such dangerously transcendent skills. When ??? had bestowed the skill upon him, it had been granted under a peculiar condition, as something that they would only gain awareness of when they truly went to use it, as though the knowledge itself was sealed until necessity forced its revelation. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎
Meaning, Aaaninja had not known of the skill until the precise moment he used it, and it had been the same for Lucian, both of them unlocking an ultimate card neither consciously prepared for nor fully comprehended until it manifested.
None of them could have imagined that their ultimate cards would be this... broken, extraordinary, and overpowered. Even those three words seemed to undercut the sheer magnitude of what they had unleashed, as though language itself was too primitive to properly define such transcendence.
A thought occurred to Lucian: he had only won because he was the sole one with knowledge of the fourth wall. But did he care? Absolutely not. It was one of his own abilities, just as Aaaninja had the backing of the River Of Time and Kingsley had the backing of the Universe; advantages were meaningless if they were not utilized, and he had simply used what was his.
Lucian’s foot made contact with the lunar surface where Aaaninja’s dead body lay. The dust shifted faintly beneath his weightless descent. He stared at it in silence, then sighed as he shook his head, wondering why Aaaninja had not resurrected yet; after all, he had not ’truly’ killed Aaaninja, so this was not True Death in the absolute sense.
As Lucian was about to shout out Aaaninja’s name, certain that the River Of Time was definitely watching and listening from beyond causality, he felt something hit him. It did not arrive slowly like a gentle wave; no, it crashed into him with ridiculous, unfathomable force and power, like an ocean collapsing inward upon a single point.
Lucian immediately dropped to his knees, the impact stealing his breath. The next moment, he vomited a huge amount of blood as though he were about to expel his own heart. Lucian felt his internal organs twist and rupture one after the other as he vomited liters upon liters of blood onto the pale lunar surface.
He felt pain bloom across his entire body, a violent, invasive agony; he, who possessed a Pain Nullification ability and should have been immune to pain and suffering, now felt it to a degree he had never experienced in either of his lives.
’A backlash?’ Lucian thought to himself, but before he could dwell on it for long, he vomited again, and this time he did not merely expel blood; he vomited bile, thick and bitter. Normally, his innate, ridiculous regenerative abilities should have already activated and begun restoring him, knitting flesh and stabilizing organs within seconds, but they had not. It was as though the backlash had forcefully suppressed every hope of regeneration, every mechanism of survival brutally silenced.
The next moment, he felt his skin pale slightly, then pale again; it was paling with every passing moment, draining of color and vitality. His perfectly arranged abs and athletic body, a physique sculpted through battle and reinforced through countless enhancements, started to wither as though he were losing mass and substance itself. Next came his hair; the black strands that once screamed with vitality began to show streaks of white, and then, almost mercilessly, they turned fully white.
Lucian did not need anyone to tell him what was happening; he was losing his lifespan, and he could feel his vitality dropping in real time, slipping away like sand between his fingers. He immediately attempted to act, for there was no conceivable way that a man like him, who had toured the galaxy since the age of twenty and was now over a century old, did not possess at least one ability capable of bypassing backlashes of any conceivable kind.
But before he could activate his skill, Lucian felt it again, a restriction; the same oppressive force that had suppressed his regenerative ability was now sealing every ability he possessed at that moment. Yet it was not just that. His mana rank was also dropping permanently in real time, an irreversible regression.
Lucian, who had been at the Ascendant Mana Rank, felt his Mana Rank collapse to the Exarch Mana Rank within the span of seconds. It dropped again to the Hyperion Mana Rank moments later, the mana within his mana core evaporating into nothing but thin air, as though siphoned by an invisible, merciless entity.
He was losing both vitality and mana rank simultaneously, his very foundation eroding without resistance.
Even all access to his skills had been restricted, sealed behind an impenetrable lock, but Lucian did not give up. His thoughts shifted toward the system inventory as he desperately searched through the countless artifacts he had acquired over his long and perilous escapades across worlds and planes, relics of ancient civilizations and historic remains, but he could not find a single thing capable of helping him in this predicament.
Lucian knew what was happening. He was dying, and no, this was not the type of death where he would simply resurrect afterward. No, even his Reality Anchor ability would not function here, as every ability had been comprehensively blocked, suppressed beyond activation.
’I’m dying, huh?’ Lucian thought with a blood-stained mouth as crimson liquid trickled down his lips, jaw, clothes, and body, staining him in the color of mortality. But Lucian felt no fear. It was merely death. He had died once in his previous life; there was no fundamental difference between that first death and this incoming one, aside from the scale of what he had achieved in between.
’Hopefully, the author has started a second book; maybe I will reincarnate there,’ he mused inwardly, a faint trace of humor surfacing even as pain relentlessly assaulted him from every direction.
At this moment, he felt perfect clarity, not because he was at the edge of death, not because of some mystical enlightenment triggered by mortality, but simply because he genuinely had no problem dying, and in that acceptance, there was an undeniable, almost serene lucidity.
