Spiral of Madness: Ascension of the Villainous Dragon Prince-Chapter 136: Cardoon Zorba [3] — A Battle Between Brothers

Chapter 136: Cardoon Zorba [3] — A Battle Between Brothers

The giant of bones, which Veynar had believed dormant because it had stopped moving, suddenly roared and stepped forward.

Its massive bony claws slammed downward. Veynar swiftly evaded the destructive blows that shattered the ground beneath him.

"Dark Knight!"

The Tier 7 Incarnation manifested, swinging its greatsword against Hecatoncheires and cleaving apart its claw and arm in an instant.

"SHAAAAAH!"

Yet the titan undead felt no pain. It regenerated dozens of new arms from its own components and began pursuing both master and Incarnation at once.

"Aw, come on. Is this all you’ve got to offer, Zorba?"

Veynar laughed, leaping through the air with incredible agility. He vanished from Zorba’s sight, then reappeared above the Undead, kicking Hecatoncheires’s head and blasting it into fragments.

BOOOM!

At the same moment, the Dark Knight appeared behind the Undead, slashing its back and splitting the giant into two halves, then three, four, five, six, ten, twelve, twenty...

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

Until Hecatoncheires was no more, exploding into countless pieces before Zorba’s stunned eyes.

Yet the Desecrated Soul smiled, clutching his heart tightly.

"Necromancer!"

A ghostly skeleton emerged—only Tier 9, utterly incomparable to his brother’s Tier 7 Incarnation. The difference in power was like heaven and earth.

But where Zorba lacked raw strength, he more than compensated with creativity.

He raised his hands. Shadows expanded outward, and dozens upon dozens of Undead rose.

At the same time, every undead corpse across the streets began shambling toward him.

"What sort of nonsense are you pulling now?"

Veynar closed the distance in an instant. With a single step, his spear thrust toward Zorba’s chest once more.

Yet Zorba managed to interpose a large shield of black bones, redirecting the force of the attack.

BOOOM!

The shield exploded, but the spear’s trajectory shifted just enough for Veynar to miss his mark once again.

Then, from directly beneath him, a massive hole yawned open. Veynar plummeted through it in an instant.

"Wha...?!"

He hadn’t even noticed the sinkhole beneath his feet, let alone that it had opened out of nowhere.

As he fell, however, he saw hundreds of skeletal hands that had dug the trap in advance.

"Wait, this is...!" Veynar gasped. "Did this bastard dig a hole using thousands of bones?!"

He clicked his tongue, kicked off the air, and surged upward, dodging the bony spears coated in curses that lined the depths.

But as he ascended, a gigantic skeletal fist descended, shattering into thousands of sharp, poison-laced, curse-covered spikes.

"Hm?!"

BOOOM!

Zorba watched in silence. Beside him rose a colossal arm forged from countless bones and ghostly souls—remnants of Hecatoncheires fused with many more undead.

The Dark Knight Incarnation, which should have attacked him, instead rushed to shield Veynar from the ambush.

RUMBLE!

The ground split apart as Veynar emerged, fury blazing in his eyes. Black armor covered his body; he gripped a long, curse-coated greatsword and swung it downward, unleashing a devastating rain of sword-energy slashes.

Zorba smiled bitterly and fled from the onslaught. The Necromancer appeared at his side, seized him, and lifted him higher and higher. But his brother kicked through the air in pursuit, merging with his own Incarnation to gain the power of flight.

"Zorba, you’re running now?!"

"Hahah... No, brother. I am not."

Zorba descended as his brother chased furiously behind him. He saw Zorba vanish into the interior of a large tower and followed with caution.

"Where are you?"

The inside was pitch-dark and ruined. Zorba was nowhere in sight. Enraged, Veynar swung his sword into the walls, cleaving the entire tower in two and sending it crashing onto the streets below.

CRASH!

As the tower collapsed, he spotted him. Zorba floated directly above the ruins, revealed when Veynar split the structure open.

Dozens of magic circles surrounded Zorba. He devoured Fantasium Cores nonstop; crystalline growths of Fantasium now sprouted from his body.

"Another trick?"

"Yes, another trick, brother."

TRUUUM!

The tower trembled. The upper half—now rubble—suddenly stirred as dozens of souls possessed the debris, transforming it into a towering golem.

"Oh?"

Veynar raised an eyebrow in surprise, then smiled as he swung his sword... only for the floor beneath him to quake and rebel. The lower half of the tower also came alive, possessed by dozens more souls, forming another golem.

"Hahah... how pathetic."

Veynar laughed coldly, slicing both halves apart with contemptuous ease. He mocked his little brother’s desperate, adorable attempts to harm him—none of them could ever truly reach him.

"How about you give up already, Zorba?"

"I can’t. Not yet!"

Veynar closed the distance, slashing through every obstacle. He materialized a black spear and hurled it at Zorba while unleashing waves of cursed sword energy in every direction, sealing off escape routes.

"Can you avoid this?!"

Zorba soared higher and higher as the attacks pursued him. His hands moved frantically; the configuration of his magic circles and runes continued to evolve at breakneck speed.

Then...

"Necromancer! Now!"

The Necromancer—previously unseen—acted instantly. It touched the ground, channeling Zorba’s magic circle. The entire district below them trembled and came alive.

All available souls were repurposed once more, possessing the area and forming a colossal hand of stone coated in ghostly energy—hundreds of meters long.

"Ngh?!"

Veynar tried to slash the gigantic hand, but its immense density and toughness resisted him. He was caught like an insect and slammed downward into the earth.

CRAAASH!

"Gaaahaa?!"

Veynar vomited blood as he was crushed into the ground. Zorba also coughed up blood, agony ripping through his body from overexertion and channeling far more Fantasium than he could safely handle.

The cursed wound on his shoulder still bled freely. His body now paralyzed and drained of energy, Zorba slowly fell from the sky.

"Hahah..."

As he gazed at the cloudy sky, he offered a bitter smile.

"To think I would die anyway... after trying so hard to live..."

His hands, barely strong enough to move, clutched his heart as he closed his eyes.

"Well... for someone like me, I suppose it’s well deserved..."

In the distance, Veynar slowly pushed aside the rubble, spitting blood and glaring up at Zorba’s falling form. He gripped his spear tightly.

"Zorba, you damn bastard..."