Chapter 502.2: Absolute Trust (2)

Warning bells rang in Roel’s mind.

He had instinctively understood that Flooding Death had the power to slowly devour a person’s body through its curse, which was why he had opted not to summon all of his ancient gods to fight with him.

He knew that neither Witch Queen Artasia nor Primordial Earth Goddess Peytra had a strong resistance against the curse of death, which was why he had chosen to fight with Undead Giant Sovereign Grandar. But from the looks of it, Grandar’s resistance wasn’t enough to make him immune to the curses of Flooding Death.

While it was true that the undead had exceptionally high resistance against curses, it was worth remembering that there had been undead civilizations in the ancient era. From the death throes Roel could vaguely discern from the shrilly calls, the terrifying calamity had means to corrode all beings.

What Flooding Death conceptualized wasn’t just curses but the plague of death itself.

Bringing death to the undead might seem paradoxical, but in essence, the undead was merely a race cursed with the trait of immortality. Theoretically speaking, it was possible to use other curses to interrupt the undead race’s immortality curse and thus bring them death.

Naturally, Grandar was well aware of it too.

As soon as he noticed the curse on his arm, he attempted to sear them with his crimson flames, but it wasn’t very effective. The curse was like a parasite; it swiftly absorbed the giant’s mana to strengthen itself and proliferate. It was nigh impossible to fully eradicate it once it latched on.

Flooding Death cackled loudly at the sight, mocking Roel and the others for their ignorance.

The failure to defeat the enemy in a single strike and instead getting afflicted with the curse placed Roel in a highly disadvantageous position.

Flooding Death had noticed that, and it had no plans of letting Roel catch a breather. It gathered a flood of curses and sent them down on Roel like a rain of black worms.

Roel’s Crown Origin Attributed trembled intensely against the swiftly approaching plague. The frost aura and pale yellow wind within him were provoked by the death curses, and they rushed out to halt them in their path.

The result? A standstill.

Flooding Death couldn’t bypass the protection of the Crown’s Stones to hurt Roel, but conversely, this also meant that Roel couldn’t use his Crown’s Stones to defeat it.

What was truly frightening about the Six Calamities was their higher-order abilities. Be it Glacier Creator’s frost aura or Tempest Caller’s time-siphoning wind, there was no transcendent in the world who could put up a proper defense against those.

The same applied to Flooding Death too.

Its black fluid curses grew stronger by sapping the life force and mana of the living, and it was practically impossible to defend against it. Putting aside Grandar and Peytra, even Artasia and her long-ranged spells wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it.

It looked like the only way to defeat this terrifying monster was through the Crown’s Stones, but that seemed to be what Flooding Death was going for. If things really did come down to that, the only outcome awaiting him was death.

A clash between the Six Calamities would likely come down to a war of attrition. No matter how powerful a transcendent was, there was no way their mana capacity could compete against something of the scale of a natural calamity. Not to mention, Roel was in a terribly weakened state at the moment.

Using an analogy, it was like a human pitting his strength against a mountain. The outcome was already decided from the very start.

“So that’s the reason you dare show yourself before me?”

Roel looked at the abominable black monster in the sky and murmured under his breath. He seemed unfazed by the pessimistic situation he was in, but Grandar could sense that his anger was already reaching a breaking point.

The fact that Flooding Death thrived on the life force and mana of others meant that its current strength must have come from somewhere…

Charlotte’s life force.

That realization flicked a switch in Roel’s head. His entire being burned with anger, but oddly enough, his mind remained perfectly calm. While eyeing the monster in the sky with flickering golden eyes, he began to retract his mana.

From the moment he awakened to his bloodline, he had been through countless dangerous situations, be it the Witness State or the assault of the evil cultists. Many powerful enemies had swung their blades at him, only to eventually fall to him.

Of course, the incredible potential of the Ascart Bloodline played a huge part in that, but what was more important was his intellect.

It wouldn’t be far-fetched at all to say that Roel was someone who danced with death. Every near-death encounter he had was another addition to his resume. All of these experiences taught him an important life lesson:

The more desperate the situation is, the more one should remain calm.

It was not impossible to defeat the Six Calamities—Roel was certain of that. He remembered Astrid telling him that he wasn’t the first awakener of the Kingmaker Bloodline to possess a Crown’s Stone. In fact, the Ardes had been using them as their weapon for many years now.

And just a few centuries ago, Winstor Ascart had defeated at least one of the Six Calamities—Sire Darkness.

In the decades after Sire Darkness had devoured the love of Winstor’s life, Isabella Sofya, he traveled all around the world and successfully hunted down that ancient monster, thus avenging his beloved. Thanks to that, even as the Six Calamities started awakening from their hibernation in the present era, there were still no traces of Sire Darkness to be seen.

It was like a prank of fate how their descendants, Roel and Charlotte, were facing a similar situation as they did. But unlike Winstor, Roel still had a chance to protect his loved one. He was determined to cling onto this speck of hope no matter the cost.

Staring at the massive entity covering the sky, Roel’s accelerated heartbeat slowly calmed down. He had a mysterious feeling that the centuries-old regrets of the Ascarts and the Sofyas had fallen on him. Having experienced the pain of nearly losing a loved one himself, he knew that it was time to put an end to the enmity that had lasted across the generations.

The nature of Flooding Death made it impossible for any transcendents to kill it—those who attacked it were cursed, and those who were cursed became its source of power. However, there were always exceptions, and the possessors of the Crown’s Stones were the exception.

“Grandar, do you trust me?” Roel suddenly asked.

Grandar was momentarily startled by the question, but he soon gave a calm answer to it.

“Of course.”

“… I see.”

It was an answer he had expected, but it made him chuckle a little. He raised his head and looked at the towering giant behind him. It was just a brief exchange of eyes, but it was enough for them to know each other’s intentions.

Then, Roel closed his eyes and began channeling his mana.

Whoosh!

A pale yellow wind rose into the sky and enveloped the surroundings, forming an encirclement that caged everything within it. At the same time, a silvery frost aura flooded out from Roel’s body and drowned out everything in the vicinity.

Within mere moments, the frost aura had already completely devoured Grandar’s body.