Chapter 2039 2039. Darker

Noah and King Elbas weren't strangers to the void. Still, their mission through that harsh environment had happened countless years ago. Their whole existence had transformed in that period, allowing them to inspect their surroundings with new eyes.

The void was still the same, but the space-time array was clearer now. Both Noah and King Elbas could sense laws that they didn't wholly understand mixed with true meanings belonging to Heaven and Earth's system. They were still inside the rulers' range, but the universe had already started to show part of its real face after crossing the sky.

In theory, the monster was impossible to recognize due to its innate emptiness. There was simply nothing to see, but Noah and King Elbas sensed it, and the same went for Sepunia. They could feel the presence of something that didn't exist, and the event naturally created odd reactions in their minds.

Those sensations only intensified when the void began to morph to launch simple attacks toward the group. Noah and King Elbas didn't even need to move their hands to destroy those blows, but their attention inevitably intensified. They could both express deadly sharpness through their auras, but they focused on studying their surroundings instead of vanquishing the threats.

Noah didn't know how to describe what he felt. He could sense that something existed around him, but he could only find non-existence. Even his powerful mind turned out unable to study the monster or its weaker parts. That empty creature belonged to a different system that his very nature made him unable to comprehend.

Noah's mind experienced the world through things that existed, but the monster was the exact opposite. It was a being that his centers of power couldn't even begin to study properly. He would need to turn himself into a non-entity to approach that realm, but that was obviously stupid. He would have to throw away everything gained throughout his life just to inspect a unique creature.

The lack of understanding didn't stop the group from developing countermeasures and plans as their flight continued. Everyone knew about the monster's weakness by then, and the dragon couldn't do much about it. However, Noah had the sharpness in his very being, Sepunia could create suitable illusions, and King Elbas appeared omnipotent in his current state.

King Elbas didn't only give to his aura a sharpness that seemed close to the power expressed by Sword Saint. He also forced the dragon to wear special claws that he had created on the spot. The creature basically gained a second innate ability thanks to those weapons, but the expert had to refill their power constantly.

Noah and King Elbas discussed their approach during the flight. They knew their respective intentions, but they cleared eventual blank spots in their plans with the new features witnessed after reaching the areas occupied by the monster.

King Elbas remained confident that he could contain the non-world, so Noah couldn't make him give up on the matter. Also, the experiments performed during the flight ended up being disappointing. Both experts tested containers and their influence on the pieces of the void affected by the monster, but they didn't lead to the desired results.

King Elbas didn't struggle to contain the non-laws that affected the void. He could create an environment that pretended to imitate their nature, but problems arrived when he tried to stuff more of them inside his items.

The main issue was his lack of control toward the non-laws. King Elbas could even add sharpness to his containers to increase their effects, but he still faced the same problems once he gathered too many samples. That non-energy eventually filled the area inside his items and forced him to create bigger ones.

That wouldn't be a problem if King Elbas only wanted small samples. However, he was after the non-world, which would force him to create something immense. He didn't even know how it would behave. After all, the sharpness wasn't a real weakness. That feature would exist as long as the monster continued to fear the severing from the sky.

The problems for Noah were radically different. He also used his sharp aura to isolate non-laws, but they didn't react as expected in front of his ambition. They appeared somewhat resistant to his existence, even if they eventually gave in to the forced improvements. Yet, they continued to evolve on their opposite path.

The fact that Noah's ambition belonged to a different type of existence didn't seem to affect the event. The non-laws simply became stronger non-laws. Some even tried to attempt the transformation into non-worlds, which failed due to the incompleteness of their path.

Noah needed a massive amount of energy to bring his body to the ninth rank. He required something as strong as the monster to complete that last breakthrough, but the non-laws only failed him. His only hope was that the non-world would react differently to his ambition, but he struggled to find it among that blackness.

Attacks had never stopped flying toward the group during their advance. Noah and the others had long since entered the monster, and the void had always morphed to assault them. However, they knew the empty creatures' weaknesses too deeply to let them affect their power.

The non-laws could annihilate laws, but the weakness to sharpness made them easy to handle. The group didn't meet any problems during their advance, but their search remained difficult. They didn't even know what to look for when trying to find a non-world.

The different depths of blackness were the only clue able to the matter. Noah and King Elbas could sense which areas had fallen under the monster's influence through the odd feeling that they sent to their minds. Hence, they instinctively flew toward spots where those sensations intensified, but the travel seemed endless.

Noah and the others had lived for many years. They could handle long travels, even when they happened inside the void. The lack of external energy was a minor issue for existences at their level, but the constant pressure radiated by their surroundings eventually started to annoy them.

The monster's weakness was the very feature that attracted it to the experts who opposed Heaven and Earth. That empty creature felt envy toward them since they could fight the rulers without fear.

The exploration reached the point when the group had to cut through the void affected by the non-laws to advance. The monster wasn't dense, but it didn't leave any path free of its influence. Still, sharpness-based attacks worked perfectly in that situation and allowed the experts to continue their exploration toward blacker areas.

Noah, King Elbas, and Sepunia could endure the dangerous feelings constantly radiated by their surroundings since they had access to sharp attacks on their own. Yet, the dragon ended up suffering more than its companions in that situation. It was simply outside its natural environment, in areas where it couldn't even absorb energy or defend itself without King Elbas' claws.

Luckily for the creature, the blackness affected by the monster seemed to disperse at some point. A mass of nothingness replaced it and filled the experts' senses. They felt fear even if the area in front of them was empty. Something told them that their whole existence would disappear if they dared to enter that darker zone.

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Author's notes: The second chapter is almost ready.