The battlefield was silent.
The crimson flames that had once wreathed the Phoenix were gone—swallowed into a void of nothingness.
In their place rose a giant.
She was no longer the blazing avatar of life and rebirth. This was something else entirely.
Her wings stretched wider than mountains, each feather black as the abyss yet veined with rivers of molten gold. Veins of crimson fire pulsed beneath her obsidian form like the heartbeat of a dying star. Her eyes—once filled with arrogant divinity—were now wide, trembling, and human enough to show one thing clearly.
Fear.
Ritsuka stepped forward, his voice steady.
"Excalibur… the Promised Sword of Final Hope. Let me borrow your strength."
A sudden flare of radiance engulfed him.
Pure, angelic light spilled outward, gilding the air in gold. Magic sparks danced around his body, each one a star born in miniature. His hair fluttered in the light as if the very wind bowed before him.
He extended a hand into the air.
A weapon began to form—light condensing into a shape so pure it made the surrounding shadows recoil. When the brilliance dimmed, a sword of gold remained—majestic, unyielding. This sword is more powerful than Excalibur and only he could use it. (It was grand Excalibur sword)
The Phoenix's talons curled.
That aura—his aura—was not merely strong. It was final. The act of a hunter drawing the weapon meant to end the hunt. And she understood, in that moment, what she was.
Prey.
Her eyes widened, frozen in the same realization she had once tried to deny.
BOOM!
A massive burst of brown aura erupted around Ritsuka, the air distorting under the pressure.
"Liar… I know you'll kill me," she spat, voice trembling.
Her throat, shivering. Her lungs, shivering. Her heart, shivering. Her soul, shivering.
Bang! Crack! The earth beneath her talons split from the tension.
"Phoenix, you've lost the ability to think rationally. Please—stop everything. I won't hurt you. Just stay in your dimension instead," Ritsuka urged.
"Lies! I don't believe you, monster!" she screamed back, flames trembling around her like a frightened animal's fur.
"…I see," Ritsuka muttered, his tone lowering to steel. "It's a waste to talk to you."
He raised his sword, eyes locking onto hers. "Fine… then let's fight to the death—"
"No! I don't—"
With a violent beat of her wings, she shot upward, the sky warping from the heat of her passage.
"Why are you Running?" Ritsuka called after her.
"I don't believe you! You'll kill me!"
"Of course I will. Come and fight me—this is my first solo real fight."
"NO! Get away!"
Ritsuka's gaze sharpened into a deathly stare.
"…I guess I have no choice."
Swoosh!
A black shadow tore free from his body, spilling outward like liquid night.
In seconds, a three-kilometer radius of ground was drowned in darkness.
GRRRR!!
WRAAAA!!
KREEE!!
From the shadow rose thousands of towering, inhuman silhouettes—shapes half-formed, half-forgotten by the living world. Their forms shifted between monstrous beasts and ghostly warriors, faces obscured by endless void.
They were not flesh and blood. They were the shadow legions of the Hassans—phantoms of assassins past, summoned as extensions of his will. Not the real Hassans, but shadows given form by his command.
And in that moment… the battlefield became shadow hell itself.
Ritsuka's pupils narrowed, and in an instant, his gaze shifted.
His eyes—now aglow with a cold, unnatural light—had become the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception. Lines of mortality laced themselves across the Phoenix's form like cracks in fragile glass.
He didn't hesitate. His vision locked on a single glowing thread—one feather among thousands.
Slice.
BOOM!!!
The feather detonated mid-flight, its destruction tearing through the Phoenix's balance. Her massive frame convulsed, wings faltering before gravity claimed her.
The goddess fell.
A shockwave rippled across the battlefield as she crashed into the ground, a thunderous quake shaking loose stone and shadow alike. She turned her head—rage and terror warring in her expression—and looked at Ritsuka and the army arrayed behind him.
She tried to regrow what was lost. Nothing happened.
Her breath hitched.
"Charge," Ritsuka commanded, his voice steady despite the agony burning behind his eyes. Blood welled faintly in the corners—proof of the toll these cursed eyes demanded. He never used this skill unless the situation was beyond negotiation.
ROARRR!!
The shadow Hassans responded instantly. A thousand faceless wraiths surged forward, blades, claws, and spectral chains raised high.
"Mission—" Ritsuka's voice cut through the chaos,
"—attack the Dark Phoenix."
The army moved like a tidal wave of night. Against the towering, obsidian form of the Phoenix, they were ants before a mountain—but each was an assassin, and death was their only purpose.
BOOM!! CRACK!! SHATTER!!
The Phoenix unleashed her counterattack—a vortex of black flame and golden lightning that vaporized anything caught within. The ground ruptured in two-hundred-meter stretches, shockwaves tearing fissures deep into the battlefield.
Splat!
Hundreds of shadows were obliterated instantly, torn apart by raw destructive force. Dozens more vanished into the crevices splitting the ground.
But one shadow moved differently. It slipped past her right side in silence, hugging the curve of her massive frame.
Swoosh!!
On her left flank, the truth revealed itself—Ritsuka himself.
He landed upon her massive shoulder, the breadth of it alone spanning over a hundred meters. She had been so fixated on escape, on survival, that she never noticed the trap being set.
Ritsuka's grip on Excalibur tightened. Pure light began to gather along the blade, the hum of divine energy resonating in the air. Crackling arcs of power traced across the greatsword, the scent of ozone sharp in the wind.
A radiant aura enveloped him.
This was not a mere strike. This was a verdict.
"—Mana Burst: Strike!"
BOOM!!
The blade carved downward, splitting the air itself. The impact was cataclysmic—light erupted in a shockwave so blinding the shadows themselves recoiled. The Phoenix's head jerked from the force, and a gash ten meters long tore across her crown. Lava blood hissed against the scorched ground.
[I need to find its weakness…] The thought cut through Ritsuka's focus, cold and precise.
The Phoenix's gaze found him at last.
Her throat… shivering.
Her lungs… shivering.
Her heart… shivering.
Her soul… shivering.
"I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live, I want to live—!"
The words spilled from her like madness, an unbroken chain of desperation.
Ritsuka didn't hesitate.
Bang!!
Excalibur flared to life once more, its golden brilliance cutting a swath through the darkness. He brought it down in a full-powered strike aimed squarely at the Phoenix's chest.
BOOM!
The impact was cataclysmic. The air itself split from the force, shockwaves racing outward in concentric rings. The titanic bird—wreathed in black flame—was slammed, her colossal frame crashing into the ground like a meteor.
CRACK!!
The ground shattered under her weight, fissures Flames across the battlefield.
But the strike… carried no killing intent.
Ritsuka knew exactly who—what—he was fighting. A goddess of rebirth could not be slain by mere attrition. To end her, he would need to sever the cycle in one perfect blow… or risk her escaping.
The Phoenix twitched, molten feathers scattering embers into the air as she tried to gather herself.
SHRILL!!
Ritsuka's hand flicked forward. Gandr.
A crimson curse shot forth like a bullet, striking her squarely between the eyes. She froze mid-motion, her wings locking stiff.
In the next heartbeat, Ritsuka was gone from sight.
He reappeared—emerging from the very shadow cast by her prone form—his leap carrying him high into the blackened sky.
Excalibur burned in his grasp, its edge now coated with an ethereal, pure light that seemed to slice through reality itself.
"...Let's end this."
Slash!!
He swung.
No flare. No sound. Just inevitability.
An invisible blade, sharper than existence itself, traced through the Phoenix's neck—over a hundred meters in circumference—before she even realized what had happened.
Thud!!
Her head struck the ground with the weight of a falling star, gouging a crater before rolling limply to the side.
Ritsuka exhaled, lowering his sword.
"Phew… She's too fearful. If I summon Douman… I should have Professor or Emma make Douman read my memories—just so I can watch him suffer for once."
The shadows obeyed their master's unspoken command. One by one, the Hassan shades dissolved into black mist, fading from the battlefield.
Lava-thick blood—glowing an ominous crimson-gold—spilled from the neck like a river, hissing as it ate through stone. The goddess of rebirth lay still.
Ritsuka's gaze fell on the severed head.
"…You didn't die at all."
ROWRAAAA!!
The sound was not from the head—it was from the body.
[This is my mistake!] Ritsuka cursed inwardly, a flash of irritation tightening his grip. The head wasn't its weakness.
The truth hit like ice. The Phoenix's head… was nothing but an extension. A mask. The true brain, the true core, still burned elsewhere inside that monstrous form.
A roar split the battlefield—deep, primal, fearful.
It came from the headless Phoenix.
Her cry shook the white dimension to its foundations, a voice of fear and desperation that threatened to ignite the air itself.
But Ritsuka didn't flinch.
He didn't dare give her a chance.
SWOOMM!!
"Judgement Domain!"
For the first time in this fight, he unleashed the skill. A tidal pull of space-force burst outward from him, warping the battlefield. Darkness fell—not the absence of light, but the crushing weight of a god's verdict.
Two hundred meters around the Phoenix's torso, the air solidified into a suffocating black sphere. Inside, reality seemed to bend toward Ritsuka's will.
The goddess's wings faltered. Her colossal frame shuddered. Her fire dimmed.
Sixty percent of her strength—gone in an instant.
Her defenses, her speed, her destructive aura… all choked beneath the oppressive law of this domain.
And Ritsuka wasn't done.
"Avenger…" His voice was low, steady, each syllable heavy with intent. "Let's bypass the rest."
His avenger skill activated itself as huge negative power he received from Dark Phoenix. His avenger side getting strong as time passed in this flight. And he knows it.
He released Excalibur into the air.
The sword—already magnificent—exploded with light, the air rippling as its form expanded.
From three feet to thirty. From thirty to three hundred.
In seconds, the Promised Sword of Final Hope towered two hundred and fifty meters tall, a radiant colossus in the void.
Its golden edge blazed like a second sun.
"Strike."
BOOOOM!!
The greatsword fell like the judgment of the heavens.
The impact swallowed the battlefield in fire and fury, a mushroom-shaped cloud blooming high above the dimension's fractured sky.
The Phoenix's torso collapsed under the blow—its core obliterated in a burst of divine light.
Thud!
Her body hit the ground one last time.
The black flames guttered and died.
No scream followed. No rebirth.
She was… gone.
But Ritsuka's strike had done more than slay the goddess. The very dimension they fought in groaned under the force.
The white expanse split like glass, black cracks spreading in every direction.
Chunks of the world fell away into nothingness.
Ritsuka caught Excalibur as it shrank back to its normal size, resting the blade against his shoulder.
He exhaled, eyes narrowing at the collapsing horizon.
"…I should really learn how to use a sword more perfectly in the future."
A wry smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth—half battle fatigue, half honest critique—before the void swallowed the last remnants of the Phoenix's prison.
---
Note: Phoenix is dead. Yes and no, This arrogant phoenix is dead. But you will find her again in future. I will explain it in next chapter.
I know I said I will write phoenix x karna ship but The story doesn't demand this ship right now. I will write this ship but in future when the story demands it. When I read og story, I thought, it wasn't necessary for the story. I do have plans for karna and phoenix but it's not needed now. We are still very starting stage of story. I want to focus on important characters and arcs.
Also how is the fight? It took sometime to make and I did my best to make Ritsuka inexperienced in fight as solo.