1183 Reaper
Planet after planet exploded like it's some balloon. But unlike a balloon, what accompanied the death of a planet wasn't air, it was endless debris mixed with the sickening scent of blood and death.
Lives in the count of billions evaporated. Only a few silhouettes rushed out of this debris and escaped into distant space. These were strong rank 5s who didn't bear the brunt of the attacks.
But before they could even leave the solar system, their bodies mysteriously dropped dead and vanished.
The remaining powerhouses of the planet, including the peak rank 4s were dying in the debris as their injuries grew exponentially worse every passing moment.
Perhaps a dozen of them could survive by taking precious elixirs—provided they had them in their possession.
Of course, none of them would survive. They wouldn't allow any survivors.
For a planet with more than 50 rank 4s, it was a despairing reality. But for the rest, it was a dead end.
Everyone else was already dead.
"They're crazy! Three fucking planets are g—!" Varian teleported and landed on an asteroid with a solemn expression.
The pursuing team stopped. But it wasn't because they changed their mind. They…
The leader of the pursuing team, a low rank 6, a skeleton over 9 feet wrapped in black robes, leisurely stepped forward and unleashed a bit of his aura.
The moment he did, Varian, who had already crossed three planets from him shuddered as an eerie feeling snuck into his mind.
His body screamed at him to run. His soul shivered in fear. His powers grew agitated. They were all telling him one thing.
This wasn't a battle he could win.
'Shut up!' Varian instinctively tapped into the power of slivers he didn't want to use. His eyes glowed black and white before a brilliant silver light burst out from him.
The intimidating aura emanating out of the skeleton warrior dissipated without warning.
"Hm?" The Skeleton powerhouse opened its mouth and its hollow eyes suddenly glowed with red lights. Its jaws moved down and up, making some weird noises.
The rank 5 standing closest to it, a bald man with a face full of tattoos, nodded fervently and pointed at Varian. "You ant, to counter my master's aura, you must've lived an honorable life until this point. Your bravery is commendable, become the master's slave and save your life."
"I—I'm sorry?" Varian tilted his head in genuine confusion.
"You aren't worthy of repeating my master's words!" The bald man hummed with anger.
The Skeleton shook its head and the bald man reverently nodded before turning to Varian with a disdainful expression. "It's your extreme honor to serve as master's slave. Thank Master Reaper for his generosity on your knees."
Varian parted his lips with the intent to say something. But as he looked up at the group chasing him and into the burning red fire in the eyes of Reaper, he paused.
Perhaps because he had the power of spirits and the weirdness of the skeleton's soul, Varian was able to glimpse into something that was otherwise impossible.
He saw a warrior from the Mors Empire, a skeleton who was only one-foot tall.
Unlike the 'living', this skeleton or its kind didn't grow naturally. They had to consume one thing—the death of living and the consumption of fellow undead. The skeleton went on sprees of slaughter right when it was conceived. It slaughtered half of its own tribe, and burned down half of its own planet before it reached the age of a century.
Then, it was hunted down across hundreds of star systems. The skeleton then hunted down a sovereign bone dragon and with it, its power underwent a fundamental shift.
After reaching the celestial ranks, the skeleton began to kill more and more, without any impunity.
Perhaps that's why, when it reached the peak of rank 3, it chose the path of assimilator.
Since then, it kept killing and devouring.
How many?
Just how many?
When Varian blinked his eyes, the dark space, the star system, Maria who was still running away, the pursuing team, and Reaper all disappeared.
He saw a huge spherical object floating in space, almost as big as Jupiter—a planet that could fit more than 1,000 Earths inside it.
But this wasn't a planet. It had no soil, no water, and no atmosphere. From its outermost layer all the way to its core, it's made of corpses.
So many corpses that even Varian who killed dozens of millions of abyssals had never seen.
How many billions were there?
How many races were slaughtered?
How many planets would one have to destroy to kill that much life?
Varian felt a chill shot up his spine.
This man, no whatever this thing was, was monstrous beyond measure and held absolutely no value for life.
The Skeleton looked at Varian and the glowing red light in its eyesockets turned black. With a thick killing intent, it waved its bony palm impatiently.
The floating pieces of flesh, bones, and drops of blood around the debris of the three exploded planets grew agitated.
Like a sheet of paper flapping in strong wind, they shook. It was as if they resisting something horrible with all their might but that only lasted for a moment before every piece of the former living flew off to the back of the pursuing team in a tornado.
The bones formed the outer layer of the tornado, the flesh bits the inner part while the blood remained at the center.
They spun above the Reaper and with a snap of his finger bones, they began to compress. As they did, a horrifying power began to leak out of the tornado.
The power was fueled by death, resentment, and vengeance.
The tornado suddenly glowed and a wave of red light passed through Varian. It seemed like nothing happened, but Varian felt as if someone stamped a mark on his life.
'Oh no…'
It wasn't just him, Maria Virdis who almost ran to the host star also paused as she noticed something was off with her body.
Reaper raised his hands and the huge tornado split into two fist-sized red orbs.
"Maria!" Varian yelled.
"I know!"
Maria didn't hesitate any more and threw out a hexagonal silver gem.
Without any hurry at her action, Reaper raised his hands and pushed the orbs towards them with his palms.
Varian, who had been slowly building up the momentum with his space power while 'wasting time' by 'talking' with the enemies blinked in and out twice, appearing next to Maria, grabbing her, and then disappearing, this time into the far reaches of space.
BOOM!
Almost at the same time, an explosion shook the entire star system. The star of the system, as big as the sun, slowly cracked and shattered. Not too long after, the planets in the star system exploded.
The two orbs, now downsized, but still exceedingly potent, chased into the distant space and vanished.
Reaper shook his head once and turned around. Even he could barely sense Varian's location before he went beyond the range.
If it's only rank 4s and rank 5s who came to hunt, he might've easily escaped.
The reason he hadn't made a serious move so far was to assess their strength and not accidentally overplay his hand and kill them both.
But now? He had a good idea of their limits.
No matter where they run, they'd be pushed to the brink of death but won't be killed.
They'd be brought back alive.
Just like intended.
