Zenith Online: Rebirth of the Strongest Player

Practically broken by Adeia's unrelenting onslaught of unbearably heavy slashes, all fueled by her unspoken and burning dudgeon, Kieran staggered, warm streams of blood clouding his listless and unfocused vision while an implacable pain assailed his body.

And yet, despite his condition, Kieran didn't fall or stop swinging his blade.

He was currently driven by a kind of intangible and uniquely mystifying perseverance that wouldn't let him fall. With the bits of clarity he desperately clung on to, Kieran focused on two things in his vision.

Death Avoidance and Vim Restoration.

Their icons were vague and grayed out, indicating that they were both on cooldown. This much was understandable, considering they played a vital role in allowing Kieran to endure Adeia's retaliation for the several tens of seconds he lasted.

Tens of seconds without succumbing to death against Adeia. That was quite a feat.

Without these two skills, Kieran couldn't see the light in this dimming tunnel known as fate.

Could he prevail against such an opponent?

An opponent that outclassed him in every way. Was superior to him in every aspect. And even seemed to possess a vengeance that burned hotter than his own.

Soon, his body defied him, falling to one knee in indescribable pain. The agony radiating throughout his body was, ironically, the only beacon of clarity he could grasp onto.

On the other hand, Adeia, with eyes as cold and callous as the frigid flames of the Netherworld, placed Deidamia against Kieran's neck.

The look in her eyes suggested she was contemplating if she should end this young boy's life here and now. After all, foreign presences, alien to the War Phantasmagoria, could not experience a True Death.

Nevertheless, dying here left a mark that kept them from ever returning.

Not that anyone would want to return to this hellish place once the restrictive limitations are activated.

"I must commend you. You have fought valiantly. Not many have reached this place and succeeded in forcing me or, rather… inspiring me to call upon Deidamia's undying desire to destroy. But because of that… you were doomed to lose. I know, it's perplexing and infuriating—that's exactly the nature of fate."

Adeia's expression might have remained unperturbed, but her voice was raw with emotion. It was as if she was a teacher imparting vital and invaluable life lessons unto their most cherished pupil.

From the clashes of their blade, Adeia could tell that Kieran was a young boy tenaciously battling against fate, clawing to obtain his place in its mystifying and frequently overwhelming tapestry.

But… sometimes, this merciless grind and inexorable conviction wasn't enough.

There was always a greater sky above—a more colossal mountain peak beyond it. Against the grand motif known as karmic fate, Kieran's existence could be likened to a grain of sand.

A particularly aimless existence, capable of being blown away by even the slightest of winds.

In this case… Adeia was that wind.

Far from the most powerful being known to anyone, yet she remained a problem. Almost as if she were destined to be Kieran's vanquisher.

Was she?

Kieran didn't know. Then again, he also didn't care. Why should he let something that was not his own unique cognizance dictate his actions, his story… or his ending?

He shouldn't. And Kieran deeply understood this fact.

This understanding was seared into his soul and flowed through his damaged veins.

Had he not already overcome the fate he was resigned to once before? Kieran asked himself this question many times.

If the answer was yes, could he do it again? However, if the answer was no, then in Kieran's eyes, that was not the end.

It was an opportunity.

[Ah, yes. The young man is growing. Emotional and spiritual growth that steps closer towards the ever-elusive Grand Truths. If they are what you seek, even if it is not your conscious action… rip the chains that bound. Sever the links one by one as you grow strong enough. In setback… find advance.]

Nameless' archaic voice rang out in Kieran's mind, leaving him a cryptic and sage-like message. Though indecipherable to Kieran, his soul reacted to the ambiguous missive Nameless gave him.

Defiantly, Kieran switched hands, holding Crimson Ashrune in his right before grasping the blade of Deidamia with grim unwillingness.

As he lifted his head that had previously fallen, nearly giving in to the unimaginable pain he was in, with his body riddled with wounds and mind battered by the true foe hidden inside War Phantasmagoria, Kieran's eyes burned with the unwillingness and madness of a condemned demon.

Momentarily alarmed, Adeia stared into the morbid reflection inside Kieran's eyes and saw herself, saw what she could not break away from.

'After all these years… I remain a slave to order. Unable to defy or enact the one thing that made me an individual—my free will. I have been lost… but you haven't, young man. I hope that you find the power within yourself needed to defeat me. To help… me.'

"I wish… to rest," Adeia muttered.

Her voice was powerless and filled with longing and yearning. Unlike most, she didn't attach her longing desires to a person. She wished for something intangible. Yet, oddly enough, everyone felt that at different times in their life, it could be grasped.

Adeia sought liberation.

To be unbound and pulled away from these shackles that robbed her of her ancient individuality.

This draconian War Phantasmagoria was her personalized waking hell. A cycle she could not break alone. The constraints of a Relic were far too powerful for a lamented revenant like herself to escape from.

The weakness in Adeia's voice called out to Kieran. As he stared at her sorrowful, disconsolate and forlorn eyes, Kieran dragged his riven body back to its feet, grabbing Deidamia's blade still.

Kieran's hoarse yet strangely electric voice gripped Adeia's attention. "The irony is almost too palpable."

Adeia's expression grew curious, not just of Kieran's words, but his actions. It was painfully slow, but it was happening before her very eyes.

Despite continuing to increase the force behind her blade, Kieran wrenched the odachi upward.

Warm blood streamed down Kieran's hand, conjoining the blood that flowed from his wounded shoulder. If not for the Refined Blood passive and his vastly increased Health, Kieran was certain that the blood loss would have already killed him.

Under the pained and strained grunts of exertion and struggle, Adeia's question hung. "How so?"

"It's simple… really. You're the irony. Doomed to begrudgingly act as the warden of this hellish place. Perhaps you have done so for so long that there's nothing left of you. The goal of place is to teach one to be merciless, yet all you seek is mercy. You plead for it, and the remnant of your former self agonizes for it."

A silence looming with palpable tension ensued after Kieran voiced his outlook on Adeia's situation. His precise words impacted her mind like a tempered hammer, unbreakable and housing excessive force.

Then, Adeia froze, the grievance in her eyes receding to the point a fragment of her original clarity peered through. "I am not without my own emotions. At some point… I'm allowed to grow tired of it all. I'm allowed to hope for something else. Something more peaceful and pleasant. A halcyon aspiration amidst the chaos."

"You're right. Everyone deserves that. But… what purpose does hope serve on the battlefield?"

"The heart is a battlefield in and of itself. Your views are a war constantly being fought on many fronts until something emerges triumphant and drives you. Those thoughts that you then realize are the spoils of a subconscious war. Your moods… the conflagrations of it all. In the end, we're organic machines of the finest quality. Yet even that, at some point… it all grows too exhausting."

In his silence, while listening to Adeia's saddened tirade, Kieran noticed something he had seen too many times not to realize it at a moment's notice. Those empty eyes that lacked the faintest embers of life, the eyes of one who had resigned themselves to and welcomed the end.

In the truest sense, Adeia wanted… to die.

Kieran couldn't sympathize with that emotion, however. Because even at his end, death was not something Kieran wanted. He abhorred it, he fought against it and he challenged it.

"Why are you giving up?"

Suddenly, Kieran's hand clenched tighter around Deidamia; pieces of his Maddened Claw cracked and shattered under the pressure of his grip.

Amusement flashed in Adeia's eyes. "Giving up? I have fought for too many millennia to count. I just ask that someone be strong enough to give me solace."

"If that happens, what will be of this place?"

"Ideally, the end. But that likely won't be true. The Relic will find a new seamless prisoner of this hell. Or maybe… it'll inevitably pull me back. I was the beginning and the end... after all."

To this statement, Kieran blinked, his brows furrowing tightly. "What do you mean? You're the end?"

"Exactly that. What you're fighting now is a remnant of what I am to be once the rivers of blood flow back to me. I am… the War Phantasmagoria. The embodiment of all that I have caused and resented."

Met with realization, Kieran's expression darkened. "You mean to say you'll continually get stronger."

Adeia nodded solemnly. "Yes. At some point, you will be defeated; that much is certain."

Falling silent, Kieran recalled what Hekaina had told him.

He… was a Harbinger.

Someone that could bring about change, whether that be new beginnings or fateful demises. In that case, was his purpose for coming to the War Phantasmagoria not solely to get stronger, but to provide Adeia with this solace?

If so, was he even strong enough to liberate Adeia?

Amidst Kieran's perplexed self-assessment, Adeia's voice sounded.

"Also, you were wrong about mercy, mercilessness, and the irony of this place. Compassion is sometimes a greater weapon than mercilessness, provided you understand how to use it. Death is sometimes the least torturous of condemnations."

"If you're the end, then so be it. I will march towards it."

At that moment, an imperious light suddenly began to shine within Kieran's eyes. Their glint clearly conveyed his intolerance toward defiance. Soon, the ground beside him ruptured and trembled, giving way to the climbing aura Kieran exuded.

Another release-type skill had graced the battlefield.

"Ah. As it so happens, it would appear that you have shattered some restraint on your power. Is this the beginning of our end?"

Deidamia, as well, began to worsen, Adeia's aura similarly becoming almost unfathomable.