SSS Frost Sovereign: Rewinding The Apocalypse!-Chapter 53: You have survived...

Teleth remained mostly unbothered. Actually, he had expected this outcome.

"You may have won this time, but hear me, Erient’s incarnation," he said, his voice already beginning to fade.

Icard’s eyes widened at the mention of Erient’s name.

"I will find you eventually, and I will consume you completely. Mark my words"

His presence thinned, slowly drawn upward along the cylinder, and then vanished.

The violent surge of energy did not stop at once. It took a few moments before the turbulence finally calmed.

The black ring cracked with a sound like shattering glass, fractures spiderwebbing across its surface.

Then it disintegrated, breaking apart into nothingness.

And in the following seconds, it was gone.

Both presences, the Keeper and the herald, had vanished completely.

In their place, where the black ring had sealed the space, a hollow remained. A black pit yawned open in the ground, stretching down into the earth with no visible bottom.

As the oppressive presence lifted, the weight crushing everyone vanished at once.

Air rushed back into lungs. Incarnations gasped, some collapsing forward as their bodies finally remembered how to breathe.

The Erwalds stirred, their forms trembling as they regained movement. Even the ruins seemed to exhale.

Especially Icard and the Erwalds there, who had remained conscious through it all, felt the release sharply.

The pressure that had pinned their thoughts and bodies in place was simply gone.

Katar shook himself, his snow cat form bristling as he shrugged off the lingering numbness.

That was when he noticed Seban was no longer there.

"Tch. He must have escaped the moment the pressure lifted," Katar thought, a low grumble in his chest.

Reya and the others coughed and groaned, some bracing themselves on the ground as the last traces of the crushing force faded from their bodies.

Icard let out a slow breath, relief loosening his chest.

’I completely forgot about the black herald in that moment,’ he thought. ’I was too focused on what Teleth could do, even by just sneezing.’

He exhaled again, steadier this time.

’There’s no way you’re getting to me this time, Teleth’ Icard continued in his thoughts.

’No way’.

"Redd!" Rybie gasped suddenly, scrambling off in a hurry toward where his incarnations were fighting in the main battlefield.

Once Wester’s goons had begun to fall, he had rushed here to see what had caused such a disturbance.

But a Keeper’s presence bearing down on the field; he needed to be with them.

"I will deal with you later!" Rybie snapped, pausing only to glare at Katar before scurrying off.

Katar huffed softly, ears flicking as the last traces of that pressure faded from the air.

Then, he glanced back at Icard, who was still on one knee, drawing slow, steady breaths.

He frowned faintly.

Icard was still conscious. Still coherent.

That amongst other things unsettled him.

’How the hell did he endure a celestial?’

Katar turned fully toward them.

"Are you alright?" he asked, his gaze lingering on Icard.

"Yeah... I guess," Icard replied.

He was mostly fine, physically at least. But what had just happened was far beyond anything he had expected.

Teleth’s presence had manifested fully, burning through the remnants of Wester’s entire essence like dry leaves in a furnace.

It had been overwhelming. Dire.

’Celestial Reach... the Frost Sovereign...’ Icard thought, his jaw tightening.

’Not in my wildest dreams did I expect to rely on those this early.’

From the fifth floor upward, titles were bound to each floor, each carrying their own attributes.

Just like his god-tier attributes, the Frost Tower titles granted him passive and conditional abilities, though only up to the rank of Herald-tier power.

One of them was Celestial Reach, an attribute tied to the ninth floor title of the Frost Sovereign.

An attribute meant for beings at the peak of incarnation, or slightly beyond, allowing them to gaze at full celestial forms.

Because it was an attribute bound to a title, it did not require mana. Most attributes didn’t, except for some like Regelation.

Nevertheless, the moment the system registered Teleth’s manifestation, the attribute had activated on its own.

"Ugh..." Alia groaned, clutching her head as if it might split apart.

Blood streaked down the side of her face, and the others were in no better shape. Reya forced herself upright, swaying as she did.

Matt was still unconscious. And so was Eric.

"What... happened?" Reya asked hoarsely, coughing as she spoke.

Katar stood before them, his snow-white form planted firmly in the ground.

The great snow cat looked almost statuesque, chest lifted, head high.

There was a strange pride in the way he held himself.

"You have just survived being in the presence of a Keeper," Katar said calmly. "Take your time. Recover yourselves."

Their breathing was ragged and uneven. Some of them sat slumped against the cracked earth.

Katar could sense the lingering disarray in their bodies and minds.

Reya was still struggling to steady herself, and the others were no better.

Fear had not left them yet. Not after something like that. And not while they were still deep in spawn territory.

"Do not worry," Katar added. "No spawns will come near this place for a while. You are safe here, for now."

The reason lay not far from them.

The hollow black pit that scarred the ground, its edges still faintly shimmering, as though reality itself had been burned away.

A lingering imprint of Teleth’s presence.

Such power would drive even high grade spawns into blind retreat.

Just as the presence of the Maire did, the Keeper’s manifestation had purged the area of anything that could sense it.

Reya exhaled slowly, some of the tension draining from her shoulders.

Alia sank back against the ground, eyes half-lidded, while Icard lowered himself fully into a seated position, his breathing finally evening out.

Even those still conscious looked hollowed out, as if a part of them had been scraped raw by what they had endured.

And while they struggled to recover, far off in the distance, deeper into the ruined expanse, a flare of blue and yellow light had just been shot into the sky.