NOVPUBThe only [Universal Orbs] Alex had left were the [Orb of the Unbreakable] and the [Orb of Purity].
As usual, they were the only two that weren't meant for offense, just utility and defense.
All the other orbs had been consumed in earlier battles or broken during brutal exchanges, which meant that now, right here, with the tension mounting and danger encroaching fast, Alex had very little left in his arsenal that could turn the tides through raw force alone.
In front of him and Kaelios now stood two fully powered beings, [Selvaron, God of the Moon] and [Lunareth, Chosen of the Moon].
The light above them, the moon itself, glowed brighter than ever before, radiating with unnatural brilliance.
It wasn't just nightfall, this was divine alignment.
The moon was granting them its full blessing, its full strength.
Every skill they had was now supercharged to make it even stronger than before.
BOOM!
A silver beam of light slammed into the arena like a spear from the heavens.
It was so bright and blinding that for a brief moment, everything in the world seemed to go white.
When the light faded, Selvaron's figure was revealed once more, but now, he wore shining, plated moon armor, every inch of it glowing with radiant power.
His [Moon Sword] pulsed with layered enchantments, arcs of pure energy vibrating along its edge.
The strength behind it was palpable.
With their [Moonscorch] percentage now at 100%, both Selvaron and Lunareth were able to use every skill in their arsenal without restriction.
They were no longer holding back, and that meant Alex and Kaelios had just been flung straight into a storm that neither of them was fully prepared for.
"Remind me again why we didn't just go for [World Cleaver] at the beginning?" Alex muttered under his breath, eyes narrowing as the pressure around them intensified.
Kaelios, shielding his face from a gust of magical wind, growled.
"Because we needed a second of calm to grab the hilt from the mental realm, and these bastards never gave it to us."
Alex gave a curt nod.
"Right."
It hadn't crossed his mind that the first fight would be this overwhelming.
They had expected resistance, of course, but this?
This wasn't resistance, it was overwhelming force.
He and Kaelios stood bloodied, bruised, and already partially drained, while their opponents looked like they had only just begun.
Maybe if they had attacked faster, maybe if they hadn't been so cautious at the beginning.
But that was the thing.
There was no point thinking like that anymore.
Regret would only slow them down.
Because right now, Selvaron had begun chanting.
"Face your fears," his voice echoed with divine weight.
His eyes, now glowing like silver suns, locked onto Alex and Kaelios.
"For now, the moon will expose your true natures."
And with that declaration,
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Blasts of silver light erupted above as the moon responded.
Alex's mind snapped into focus.
This wasn't just the usual empowerment effect.
This wasn't some simple divine buff.
The moon, it was an entity.
And it was acting on its own.
While he and Kaelios had assumed that Selvaron and Lunareth were merely being powered up by the celestial body overhead, they hadn't considered the possibility that the moon was also gathering its own energy.
That it had its own will.
That it was a weapon by itself.
In that instant, it unleashed two devastating abilities at once.
[Moon Beams], dozens of searing, concentrated energy beams that could disintegrate nearly anything they touched.
[Moon Soldiers], ten warrior-like entities formed directly from moonlight, summoned with full power and loyalty to the moon alone.
Each one hunted down anything the moon judged unworthy.
Above, the moon began spinning erratically, like some celestial weapon being primed to unleash hell.
It also started to grow, swelling until it was nearly the size of the colosseum arena they were trapped in.
"What the hell…" Kaelios muttered, staring skyward.
Alex's expression didn't change.
"Hmph."
Then, on the surface of the enlarged moon, the [Moon Soldiers] began to take shape.
Humanoid in form but towering at nearly four meters each, they radiated divine pressure.
Each of them wielded a different weapon, one had a gleaming sword, another a spear, a third had clawed gauntlets, and one, bizarrely, carried a shining silver whip.
All ten wore the same expressionless, full-moon mask with a simplistic smile carved onto it.
Their armor shimmered with lunar energy, polished and unmarred.
As soon as they finished forming, they leapt down from the moon with thunderous crashes, landing across the arena floor, one after another, without so much as a scratch.
They rose silently and turned toward Alex and Kaelios.
No hesitation. No speech. Just raw intent to kill.
At the same time, the moon, still spinning, prepared to fire its [Moon Beams].
Glowing intensely, it began gathering silver light at its core.
Alex could see it clearly now.
The arena, vast as it was, had become a cage.
Only one massive celestial threat hanging above, ten summoned killers standing ahead, and two gods preparing for something even worse.
"What's the condition for activating your domain?" Alex asked suddenly, his tone calm but his eyes sharp.
He realized that in all their time together, Kaelios had never told him that.
The [God of Destiny] looked over, surprised.
"I need 200 Destiny Points," he answered quickly, "but I also need to—"
He didn't get the chance to finish.
FWOOSH!
The [Moon Beams] came down like a divine execution.
The silver light struck them dead-on.
[You have died.]
In the very next instant, both Alex and Kaelios reappeared, gasping as [Destiny Shift] undid their deaths and warped them a few meters away.
But the beams kept coming.
More were charging up, and above, the [Moon Soldiers] hadn't moved.
Nor had Selvaron or Lunareth. Something was wrong.
Alex looked more closely, and then he saw it.
All of them, Selvaron, Lunareth, the soldiers, had raised their arms, and energy was condensing around their bodies in rippling waves.
They weren't attacking because they were preparing something else.
'Shit,' Alex realized.
It wasn't just another [Moon Beam] coming.
It was going to be either
another [Forbidden Skill], or worse, their [Domain].
Either outcome would be disastrous.
"Kaelios!" Alex shouted, his voice cutting through the chaos, "Forget the domain, we won't have time!"
The two of them were forced to split again, dodging in erratic, high-speed motions as more beams carved into the stone and air around them.
But Alex knew this wouldn't work forever.
They were delaying the inevitable.
He flared his wings, pushing through a gust of pressure, and made his way to Kaelios.
"Prepare yourself!" he shouted.
And then, he activated the [Orb of the Unbreakable].
FWISH! BAM!
A shimmering, spherical barrier erupted around the two of them.
Pure white, slightly translucent, and humming with power.
[Activating this orb grants an indestructible barrier for five seconds that cannot be moved, reflecting all incoming damage back at its source.]
The [Moon Beams] struck the barrier in rapid succession, but instead of phasing through or breaking it, they bounced.
And where did they bounce?
Straight back at the moon.
Selvaron and Lunareth hadn't reacted.
They probably assumed this was a last-ditch effort, something desperate and pitiful.
But they were too absorbed in their own ritual to notice that the reflected beams were racing straight into their lunar anchor above.
FWISH! BAM! CRACK!
The moment the first beams struck, the surface of the moon cracked.
Then another. And another.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Silver light exploded in waves as the [Moon Beams], now redirected by the orb's reflective barrier, tore into the entity that had spawned them.
The moon entity wasn't immune to its own power, especially not when reflected perfectly.
In under three seconds, its surface was webbed with glowing fractures.
The once-majestic glow began to flicker.
It stopped spinning. 𝑛𝑜𝑣𝑝𝑢𝘣.𝘤𝑜𝘮
The [Moon Beams] ceased.
Kaelios exhaled, impressed.
"Well done, human," he muttered, his eyes narrowing on what remained above, "For the record, my domain requires the [Scale of Destiny] ritual to complete, and I'll explain the rest, if we survive long enough."
Alex gave a single nod, eyes shifting forward again.
Selvaron, Lunareth, and the ten [Moon Soldiers] were done charging.
They turned toward Alex and Kaelios, silent, but smiling.
Something in their eyes said it all. And it was going to end, very soon.
