Grand Ascension-Chapter 95: Divine Repulsion

Dark energy poured directly out of Cheryl. It was as if she had become a portal, a door to something unknown.

A door to the deep! Makun realized.

This is bad.

The only times he had formed a connection with the outermost layers of the deep, he had attracted demonic entities.

Entities that needed flesh, a way to enter the physical world.

And the result from that was devastation.

He had lost control of himself and had sought blood. He had killed a dog that had nothing to do with this and had almost killed an innocent child.

He had even defeated Mark Kane at that time, who was a third grade Initiate, while he had just been initiated. This proved that those entities granted tremendous strength.

The more powerful the practitioner, the more powerful the entity, Makun concluded.

Makun was not informed on the deep, but he could guess that the more powerful a practitioner was, the deeper they could access.

As an Initiate, he had access to the outermost layer of the infinity known as the deep.

What layer does she have access to? he thought.

He did not need to know to figure out that higher-tiered practitioners could house powerful beings.

The quality and quantity of their Ashe was higher. This gave enough substance to those entities.

Makun hurriedly looked at Orel. Is he not too calm? What does he mean by "in vain"? Makun needed to know before the situation got worse.

"What is happening?" he asked, only to be ignored.

Orel did not bother looking at him. Most of the time, he despised explanation and clarification.

The only time he explained was when his opponents would take a mental blow from it.

He loved watching despair etch itself on their faces.

Other than that, if he did not have to, in case of a mission, he would not.

And right now, he deemed it useless to explain to Makun.

Makun could change nothing with their situation.

Makun got that message from Orel’s attitude.

He closed his mouth and under heavy pressure glanced at Amelia, who was striking by now.

SLASH!

Amelia struck, aiming to sever Cheryl’s head from her body.

However, Cheryl did not move. She stood still as if she was not the target of a deadly assassin.

The blade inched closer to her neck. Closer to removing the light from her eyes.

When the blade was about to hit, Cheryl turned abruptly.

CLANG!

She caught the blade with her mouth. She gritted her teeth and CRACK! The blade cracked.

Cheryl extended her petite hand, reaching for Amelia’s neck.

Amelia’s gaze shifted. She had not been expecting such a thing. She hurried to erase her presence, but her gaze narrowed.

She could not erase her presence. She could not move at all. She had been fixed into place.

Panic slowly crept up her spine. She had no idea how to get out of the situation.

Cheryl’s hand reached for her neck and—

GRAB!

She grabbed Amelia’s neck hard. Veins bulged on Amelia’s face as blood was forced to move up to her brain.

BOOM!

An explosion happened where Cheryl stood.

Dark, eerie energy clouded everything. No one knew what was happening anymore. All they could see was a massive shadow forming behind Cheryl.

A smoke-like shadow. Huge, measuring around two and a half meters. From its mouth, massive fangs extended. Smoky blood dripped out of it.

It had muscles and looked like an otherworldly ancient warrior. It held two machetes in both hands and wore a combat skirt.

It scanned throughout the battlefield, raised its head, and screamed.

KRRRRREEEEEEEEEKKKKKKK

The scream was ugly, something Makun had never heard in his life. This was a sight he had never seen before. He was shaken.

It looked like it came straight from a horror fantasy book.

Makun trembled, blood dripping from his nose. The pressure was too immense.

He knew it. Cheryl had been possessed.

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Makun watched as Amelia was thrown to the ground headfirst, again and again.

Cheryl grabbed Amelia by the head and hurtled her into the air.

She jumped and struck, her claws extended.

BOOM!

Amelia crashed into the ground back first, blood leaking from her nose, mouth, and eyes. The speed at which she had been thrown was too much.

FLASH!

Cheryl accelerated headfirst, diving straight to Amelia, while the creature laughed uproariously behind her.

It was having fun for the first time in quite a while.

It was going to see blood, be fed by the blood of that woman who lay there struggling to move.

Cheryl moved, aiming for her chest where her Route Core was located.

BOOM!

Before she could arrive, she was thrown back by Jorg’s gravity.

He reached Amelia and stood in front of her.

"Let me take care of it," he said.

"T...Take c...are of me?" a voice spoke. It struggled at first before forming a complete sentence.

Makun did not recognize it. It was deep, the deepest voice he had ever heard, and it had come from Cheryl’s mouth.

The creature turned its hollow gaze upon Jorg, rage curdling the air around it.

He had spoken.

That word.

Blasphemy.

"Die."

The shriek that followed was not sound alone. It was distortion.

The temperature dipped as if something had exhaled from a deeper and more sinister place.

The shadow behind Cheryl swelled.

It towered, its edges fraying like torn smoke, yet dense and wrong, as though darkness had been forced into muscle.

Two elongated arms formed, each gripping a jagged machete wrought from condensed night.

Both blades rose slowly.

And Cheryl mirrored it perfectly.

Her arms lifted above her head, her joints bending too smoothly, too precisely, while veins darkened beneath her skin, crawling upward like ink spilled under glass.

Then—

SWOOOOSH.

The shadow struck.

The machetes came down in a twin executioner’s arc, and the sky answered.

Above Cheryl, darkness folded inward. Thick and oppressive energy gathered, swallowing light as it condensed.

A sword formed.

A sword more than twenty meters long.

A slab of weaponized void.

The air beneath it screamed as pressure collapsed downward. Asphalt cracked before the blade even touched. The ground bent in anticipation of impact.

It fell.

It fell with the sole goal of destruction, execution. Everything beneath it was being sentenced.

Jorg braced himself. He did not move.

Instead, he inhaled once.

The pressure was overwhelming, something an Adept should not have released.

But it was here, and he could not avoid it.

Behind him lay Amelia. A single mistake meant their death.

But amid chaos was opportunity, and he saw it.

His feet dug deep into the asphalt. Veins popped on his head. His eye sharpened as he entered a state of focus he had never entered before.

Jorg slowly lifted his hand.

For half a heartbeat, the world tightened around him. The air thickened, compressing inward as if the city itself inhaled.

The streetlights present in the bounded field bent subtly toward his center. Loose gravel trembled, skittering in tiny circles at his feet.

The sounds dulled. The pavement fractured in thin, nervous lines radiating from where his boots had dug in.

"Divine Repulsion!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, his Ashe surging outward.

Space convulsed.

A translucent sphere erupted outward from him, visible only as a violent distortion, like heat haze turned solid. The compressed air detonated in every direction at once.

BOOM.

The falling void-blade met the expanding field.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

The sword buckled against the repulsion sphere, its dark surface rippling like struck water. Pressure cascaded in shockwaves that peeled asphalt into spirals, snapping the streetlights.

Jorg’s boots sank into the ground as gravity anchored him. Veins stood out along his neck. Blood trickled from one nostril.

The blade pressed harder.

It pressed harder and harder, but the repulsion pushed against it, distortion happening everywhere around it.

For a moment, everything stopped.

Then the repulsion fractured the descending strike just enough.

The void-sword split, its energy deflecting sideways in twin arcs that gouged trenches through the parking lot behind him.

Silence crashed in afterwards.

Jorg remained standing, barely. He had emptied the remaining Ashe he had after his fight against Bol.

The ground beneath him had cratered, his knees trembling, one hand still extended as if holding back the weight of a falling god.

Across from him, Cheryl slid back.

One, two, three steps. Skrrrrt! Her heels scraped against broken pavement. Then she stopped and lifted her head.

A bloody smile spread from ear to ear.

The smile was followed by laughter, a hideous one, but it was not Cheryl’s own laughter.

It was layered with that of the entity.

"How fun!" it said, clearly having enjoyed the clash against Jorg.

But it was time to end it all.

It lifted its hand a second time, performing the exact same motion. Performing the same strike.

If it landed this time, it was over. It meant death.

Jorg knew it. Makun knew it. Everyone knew it.

It was at this time that Orel’s voice landed. "Boss, now."

An icy presence covered the bounded field.