Chapter 80: [80] : March of the Sovereigns, The Shadow Legion

The white marble landing of step fifty turned pitch black.

The dark and bubbling pools of shadow on the ground stretched upward, pulling themselves into solid physical forms. It happened in perfect and horrifying synchronization.

One hundred figures materialized around Declan.

They were exact copies of him. They wore the same long and high-collared Predator’s Coat. They wore the same heavy Spiked Striders. But they were not made of flesh and bone.

The clones were forged entirely out of dense and swirling dark matter. They had no facial features, no skin tone, and no hair. They were pure silhouettes of a Warlord. The only color on them was the bright and glowing purple energy that burned where their eyes should be.

And in their right hands, every single one of them held a perfect and shadowy replica of the +40 Eclipse Severance halberd. The tiny black holes spinning in the center of their axe heads hummed loudly, creating a collective vibration that actually shook the massive stone staircase.

Declan stood in the center of his new army. He looked around.

"I look intimidating," Declan noted casually.

He didn’t have to wait long to test them.

Up on step fifty-one, the dark void warped. A massive group of twenty Phantom Kings stepped out of the shadows. The system had doubled the spawn count.

These phantoms wore heavy and glowing paladin armor and carried massive golden greatswords. They were Level 60 legends from other servers, completely coordinated and ready to grind the challenger down into dust.

They raised their swords in unison and charged down the stairs.

Declan didn’t raise his weapon. He didn’t shift into a combat stance. He just pointed a single finger at the incoming wave of heavily armored ghosts.

"Clear the stairs," Declan ordered.

The Shadow Legion moved.

It wasn’t a disorganized mob rush. With 100% of Declan’s base stats, the clones possessed his exact Agility rating. One hundred dark figures blurred forward at the exact same time, crossing the distance so fast the air cracked like a whip.

The first clone reached the lead paladin phantom. The phantom swung its massive golden greatsword in a perfect and textbook parry.

The clone didn’t try to block. It just swung its shadowy halberd straight through the glowing sword!

The Spacetime Laceration trait triggered.

There was no sound of clashing metal. There was just the distinct noise of thick canvas tearing in half. The shadow blade ignored the phantom’s weapon, ignored the heavy armor, and literally severed the game space the phantom occupied.

The paladin froze. A jagged green line of binary code appeared across its chest. A second later, the phantom split in two and dissolved into useless gray ash.

It took exactly one second for the clone to secure the kill.

Behind that clone, the other ninety-nine crashed into the remaining nineteen phantoms.

It was not a battle. It was an industrial meat grinder!

The system’s carefully designed Level 60 guardians were completely helpless. Every time a phantom tried to strike a clone, their weapons just phased harmlessly through the dark matter bodies. The clones didn’t have health bars. They couldn’t be stunned, staggered, or killed.

But every time a clone swung its halberd, the physical space warped and a phantom was deleted.

Declan watched a group of four clones completely surround a massive tank phantom. The ghost raised its shield desperately. The clones didn’t care. They brought their four halberds down at the exact same time. The sheer kinetic force of the ’Weight of the Warden’ trait multiplied by four completely caved the stone stairs inward.

The tank phantom was crushed into a tiny cube of light before being deleted entirely.

The entire fight lasted four seconds.

Twenty Phantom Kings were reduced to nothing but floating ash!

The clones didn’t celebrate. They didn’t pause. They immediately turned around, formed a perfect two-column escort formation, and waited for Declan.

"Well," Declan smiled, resting his original halberd on his shoulder. "That is highly efficient."

He started walking. He stepped onto the fifty-first block. He didn’t run. He just maintained a casual and leisurely stroll.

He opened his digital inventory and pulled out a cheap and scavenged-tier health potion. It was basically just a glass bottle filled with red fruit juice. He popped the cork with his thumb and took a sip as he walked.

Step fifty-five.

Thirty phantoms spawned. This time they were a mix of rapid-firing archers and heavily armored brawlers. They didn’t even get to fire a single arrow.

The Shadow Legion surged forward like a tidal wave of black ink. The clones used Void Blink automatically, teleporting directly into the backline and instantly decapitating the archers. The brawlers were grabbed by their spectral armor and literally thrown off the edge of the staircase, plummeting silently into the endless dark void below.

Declan just kept walking and sipping his red juice.

Step sixty. Step seventy.

The system AI was clearly panicking. It started throwing ridiculous combinations at him to try and stall his progress. It spawned fifty phantoms at once. It spawned phantoms that cast massive area-of-effect ice storms. It spawned phantoms that turned invisible.

None of it mattered.

The clones were utterly ruthless. If an ice storm froze them, they just shattered the ice with pure brute strength and kept moving. If a rogue turned invisible, the clones just swung their halberds in wide and sweeping arcs until they accidentally deleted the hidden target. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

The staircase was a constant blur of purple eyes, flashing shadow blades, and the sickening sound of tearing reality.

Declan felt incredibly happy and content. It was as though he was a VIP walking through a highly secure corporate lobby. He didn’t lift a finger. He just watched his personal army completely dismantle the game’s ultimate trial.

"You guys are doing great," Declan called out as he watched a clone casually kick a crawling phantom directly in the face, shattering its helmet into pixels.

Step eighty. Step ninety.

The physical environment of the void was screaming. The sheer amount of data being deleted by one hundred Spacetime Laceration traits firing off every second was causing the marble stairs to glitch. The pristine white stone flickered with green error codes.

The system couldn’t render the destruction fast enough.

Declan reached step ninety-nine.

He finished his health potion and tossed the empty glass bottle over the edge of the stairs. He watched it fall into the darkness until it disappeared.

The landing for step one hundred was just ahead.

It didn’t look like the rest of the stairs. The dark void around the top of the tower abruptly ended, replaced by a glaring and blinding sphere of pure white light. It looked like a miniature sun resting at the peak of the climb.

The system chimes didn’t ring. The air was totally silent.

Declan stopped walking.

The one hundred shadow clones instantly stopped as well. They fanned out and formed a perfect defensive semi-circle around him. Their purple eyes locked onto the glowing light ahead.

"Alright," Declan cracked his neck. "Let’s see the manager."

He stepped onto the one hundredth block.