CHAPTER 10 — JUDGMENT OF WARRIOR (part 1 )
The scent of scorched earth and iron spread across the valley floor.
The air was completely still, as if the surrounding sky itself was awaiting the outcome of this horrific battle.
Right in front of them stood Abu Al-Salasil.
The black chains wrapped around his body rotated slowly.
In that absolute silence, the sound of those chains grinding against each other felt like the arrival of the angel of death.
Aslam's breaths were rapid. His right arm was no longer there. In the previous battle, the Abyss Entity that had brutally crushed and ripped off his arm was none other than this very devil, Abu Al-Salasil.
Blood still dripped from Aslam's severed stump, wetting the dirt below.
Holding onto his heavy Thunder Spear with the support of just one arm was becoming continuously difficult, but he tightened his fingers on his left hand and solidified his grip on the dirt.
"Shut up, you demonic scum!"
Aslam roared, grinding his teeth.
There was exhaustion in his voice, but not a single trace of defeat.
"You took one of my arms... today, this single arm will be your death."
Maazin stood right beside him.
His royal red armor, though stained with the dust and dirt from the previous clashes, remained proudly intact.
He gripped his Scimitar sword with both hands.
"Save your energy, Aslam.
To break his chains, we need one final, direct hit."
The two warriors looked at each other. Words were no longer necessary.
Without wasting a second, they initiated their tag-team attack.
Abu Al-Salasil slightly extended his right hand and, without any warning, fired his 'Chain Lash Strike'.
Two black chains tore through the air, aiming straight for Aslam's neck.
Aslam dashed forward. Due to the loss of one arm, his body's balance was slightly off, but he drove the back end of his spear into the ground, executed an acrobatic vault, and propelled himself completely over the incoming chains.
While mid-air, he unleashed his 'Spark Step Thrust'.
Blue lightning erupted from the tip of his spear and struck Abu squarely in the chest, but Abu's massive body didn't retreat a single inch.
Abu spun his chains to ensnare Aslam mid-air, but just then, Maazin arrived.
Kicking up dirt, Maazin used his 'Flicker Dash' and, with a zig-zag explosive movement, reached Abu's left blind spot.
He made his Blue Ring glow and fired a 'Blue Freeze Burst'.
The freezing, explosive energy unleashed from his sword slash froze Abu's chains mid-air for a split second.
"Now, Aslam!" Maazin shouted.
The moment Aslam landed, he spun his Thunder Spear and executed a 'Thunder Arc Sweep'.
A wide horizontal lightning slash erupted from the spear, completely severing those frozen chains.
A hint of rage flashed in Abu's blind eyes. He slammed both his hands onto the ground and unleashed a 'Multi Chain Assault'.
Dozens of chains erupted from beneath the earth like vipers, launching themselves at both warriors.
Maazin channeled explosive energy into his legs, used his 'Burst Step', and instantly jumped backward.
While airborne, he swung his sword and fired a 'Firework Slash Barrage', triggering a continuous series of small explosions against the incoming chains.
Aslam, using only one hand, began to rapidly spin his spear around himself, activating his 'Lightning Guard Spin'.
The chains collided with his electric defense, showering the area in sparks.
Under the relentless pressure of their combined effort—Aslam's heavy thrusts and Maazin's explosive slashes—an opportunity to break Abu's defense was finally forming.
"We need to lock him in one place!" Aslam roared.
He leaped into the air.
Pushing his body past its absolute physical limits, he overcharged his Thunder Spear with blue lightning.
His spear looked like a blazing pillar of blue light.
This was his 'Thunder Super Power Attack'.
At that exact moment, Maazin, standing on the ground, placed a hand on his blade.
To confuse Abu, he used his 'Flash Clone Burst'.
An explosive after-image of Maazin dashed to Abu's left, which Abu instantly crushed with a chain, but the real Maazin was mid-air directly in front of him.
Maazin made his Red Ring glow with all his might and unleashed his 'Firework Lion Attack'.
A massive lion of pure fire roared from his sword.
Mid-air, Aslam's blue lightning and Maazin's lion of fire merged.
Those two energies combined into a massive, unstable plasma blast and struck directly against Abu Al-Salasil's broad chest.
A heavy, ear-shattering explosion occurred.
The valley floor trembled, and the surrounding broken cliffs began to crumble.
The smoke rising from the impact looked like a dust storm.
When the smoke cleared, the sight before them stopped the breaths of both warriors for a moment.
The sheer force of that combined attack had cleanly severed half of Abu Al-Salasil's massive body.
His body was split into two pieces at the waist, and his upper torso was blown backward through the air.
Aslam dropped to his knees on the dirt.
He was panting heavily, and the veins in his left arm throbbed with agonizing pain.
Gasping from pure exhaustion, he drove his spear into the dirt to support himself and looked ahead with a faint, pained smile.
But their joy could not last even a microsecond.
Abu's severed upper half never hit the dirt.
While still in mid-air, oozing black chains slithered out rapidly from his severed waist like snakes.
Those chains tightly grabbed both of his halves mid-air and pulled them toward each other like a spider's web.
A sickening, grotesque 'squelch' echoed, as if raw meat and iron were being forced back together.
And right before their eyes, those chains fused and completely regenerated him.
Abu Al-Salasil stood there exactly as he had been, as if he hadn't been attacked at all.
Abu tilted his neck. Black smoke drifted from his blind eyes.
He spoke in an emotionless voice,
"Your attempt was commendable.
But mere attempts do not change destiny."
Miles away, Jabar silently watched this terrifying, exhausting, and continuous battle from a high cliff.
Jabar no longer looked like the powerful dark-god whose terror spanned the world.
In Chapter 4, during his fight with Aslam, the heavy pressure of an attack had shattered the mystic purple locket around Jabar's neck—the very locket that had held back his aging for centuries.
Because the locket broke, centuries of delayed death and age had crashed down onto his body all at once.
He was now a frail, wrinkled 80-year-old man.
His hair was completely white, his skin clung tightly to his bones, and his hands trembled slightly in the air.
Yet, despite all these physical frailties, the same old demonic pride, the intoxication of death, and the temperament to watch battles remained in his eyes.
Just then, from directly behind him, a torn and scorched demonic skull came flying through the air, wailing and crying.
"My Lord!
My Master!
Save me from these human bastards!
Look what those tyrants have done to me!"
It was the Devil Head Huba Huba.
After being brutally beaten and slashed by Haibat's warhammer and Raziq's super-sonic blades on the other side of the valley below, his torn soul had fled here with whatever life he had left.
Jabar was already irritated by his newly weakened body and the dragging battle below.
Without even turning around, he reached out in anger, tightly grabbed Huba Huba's torn head right out of the air, and roared:
"Shut your demonic tongue and get out of my way!
Can't you see I am watching the sight of two fools dying?!
Do you want to die by my hands too?!"
Huba Huba was terrified by Jabar's roar.
But when his gaze fell upon his 'Master' Jabar's wrinkled, aged face, the psycho-comedy bug inside him awakened.
Huba Huba knew nothing about Jabar's broken locket or his sudden transformation into an 80-year-old man.
Even in that serious, death-filled atmosphere, he let out a sarcastic, mocking laugh and said:
"My Lord... who did this to you?
Where did your hair go?
You've become a complete old man! HAHAHAHA!"
Seeing himself being mocked, Jabar's fury spiraled completely out of control.
He squeezed Huba Huba's head even tighter with his trembling hand, causing the skull to creak.
"If you do not bite your tongue behind your teeth,
I will tie you to the trees of that jungle, you bastard!
You mock me?!
You demonic skull!"
In a fit of rage, Jabar raised his dark wand with his other hand and delivered a heavy, brutal blow right to the dead center of the skull.
Huba Huba whimpered in pain,
"Aah! My Lord! Forgive me, please!
Forgiveness,
forgiveness!
I won't mock you again!"
But despite begging on the outside, Huba Huba was laughing uncontrollably on the inside after seeing Jabar's withered form.
Down in the valley, the battle had reached an extreme, relentless, and brutal level.
Abu Al-Salasil had completely shifted into an offensive mode.
Abu raised his hand in the air and used his 'Drag Pull' attack.
One of his chains surged forward and wrapped tightly around the shaft of Aslam's Thunder Spear.
Abu gave a violent yank, intending to rip the spear from Aslam's single hand.
But instead of letting go, Aslam used the momentum of that pull.
Allowing himself to be dragged through the air toward Abu,
Aslam closed the distance, let go of his spear at the very last second, raised his leg, and delivered a 'Knee Break Strike' straight into Abu's chest.
Abu stumbled back slightly, but instantly extended his hand and seized Aslam's left shoulder using his 'Iron Lock Grip'.
The crushing pressure from the devil rattled Aslam's bones.
Aslam almost screamed in agony, but he ground his teeth together.
He instantly activated his 'Body Shock Burst'.
A heavy, close-range electric blast erupted from Aslam's entire body, shocking Abu and forcing him to release his grip.
Aslam dropped to the dirt and rolled backward.
His breathing was completely failing him now.
He had fought more than half the battle relying on just one arm, and his body's limits had been entirely crossed.
Abu Al-Salasil did not pause.
He stepped forward and, to deceive his enemy, used his 'Phantom Chain Strike'.
Aslam's focus was on the chains coming from the front, but utilizing the cover of invisibility, a chain erupted from beneath the ground and violently struck Aslam's right leg.
Aslam lost his balance.
This was the exact opening Abu had been waiting for.
Abu moved with a strange and sudden speed that Aslam's exhausted mind couldn't predict.
Surging forward, Abu suddenly wrapped his dark chains around his right leg, forming long, sharp, and terrifying black spikes.
And without giving Aslam any chance to recover or dodge, Abu delivered a brutal 'Thorns Spike Chain Covered Kick' straight into Aslam's stomach.
The impact of the kick was so horrifying that Aslam couldn't hold his ground for even an inch.
The sound of his ribs snapping echoed clearly in the silence.
He was sent flying through the air like a piece of lifeless wood, dragging across the dirt for several feet until he crashed violently into a massive rock nearby.
The collision was so severe that the rock chipped from behind, and a fountain of blood spurted from Aslam's mouth.
He fell face-first into the dirt in a half-dead state.
His vision was blurring, and his mind went numb.
He looked incredibly weak.
He clawed at the dirt with the fingers of his left hand in a futile attempt to get up, but his broken ribs were piercing his lungs.
He couldn't even move properly.
Seeing Aslam in this agonizing condition, a wave of panic washed over Maazin's calm and tactical mind.
"Aslam!!"
Maazin screamed with sorrow and desperation, his throat dry.
"Did you give up this easily, Aslam?!
Do not forget the promise you made to me!"
Abu Al-Salasil spun his chains in the air and stared at Maazin with a demonic, cold laugh.
"What are you looking at over there?
Do you want to die just like him?!"
Chapter 10 JUDGMENT OF WARRIOR (part 1) End