CLEAVER OF SIN-Chapter 107: Passionately kissed
Orvak and Malrik plummeted from the heavens, as though even the boundless sky had grown weary of bearing the weight of their existence.
Yet even as gravity seized them in its grasp, their battle raged on, relentless, unthinking, unpaused. Chaos incarnate.
They struck the earth with thunderous force, crashing into a vast dune that shuddered beneath their might. Sand erupted skyward in a colossal plume, and soundwaves pulsed through the atmosphere, warping the very air.
From within the drifting veil of dust, two figures emerged, one Human, the other Sinvaira. Both stood tall, unbothered, drawing breath as if endurance was a birthright carved into their bones. Their bodies remained immaculate, unscathed, unsullied. Not even dust dared cling to them; not even moisture dared stain them.
No wounds. No sweat. Nothing at all.
Overhead, the moon began its descent, slipping beneath the edge of the world, while the first rays of dawn stretched across the horizon, drawn, it seemed, to bear witness to a clash the world hadn’t seen for quiet a few decades.
"I must admit," Orvak said with a smirk, his voice smooth and edged like his weapon. "For a Human, you are remarkably strong. Even a Rank 10 Emovirae would’ve perished after enduring two of your strikes, barely."
His scythe hung effortlessly across his shoulder, perfectly balanced without the aid of his hands, as though it too bowed to his mastery.
Malrik smiled in return, the gesture both playful and proud. "Well... what can I say? I am the First Sun for a reason."
Orvak chuckled, a red gleam in his eyes. "Then as the First Sun, it’s only fitting you’ll be the first to die, don’t you think?"
Malrik’s smile twisted into a smirk, tinged with smugness. "That won’t do. If I die, my sister would never let me hear the end of it. Besides, the youngest hasn’t seen my strength since his True Awakening. As the eldest, I have a reputation to uphold, every now and then, I have to put on a show."
He paused, then added with a theatrical sigh, "Pity you have no family. I would’ve killed them too, in order to make it a touching little reunion in the afterlife."
Orvak tilted his head, eyes narrowing as he studied the sadness on Malrik’s face, exaggerated or not. "Sometimes I wonder," he said, "if you’re truly Human... or a Sinvaira hiding in plain sight."
"Believe me," Malrik replied, his voice low and calm, "even I’m impressed by what I can do."
"That wasn’t praise," Orvak said flatly. "I was referring to your tendency to erase entire bloodlines."
Malrik’s brows lifted slightly. "Ah, that." He raised a hand to the hilt of his sheathed katana. "Well, if you’re that curious, just cut me. See if I bleed red... or something else."
Orvak’s smirk deepened, his hand shifting as the scythe slid fluidly from his shoulder into his hand. "I’ll be sure to listen for the sound of your scream."
With a sudden burst of motion, so swift it defied the very notion of time, Malrik appeared before Orvak. In a single, fluid arc, his katana was drawn and cleaved forward, the movement so seamless it felt less like an attack and more like a natural extension of his existence.
The sand where he had stood just a breath ago reacted belatedly, erupting outward in a concussive blast, as though struggling to comprehend the velocity that had just left it behind.
The blade, glinting with an eerie blue sheen, howled through the air as it carved its path toward Orvak’s neck. But Orvak, ever composed, responded in kind. With a precise flick of his wrist, he raised his scythe and angled the snath expertly, intercepting the path of deadly arc with practiced ease.
Just as the katana and snath were on the verge of colliding, Malrik’s body shifted once more, seamlessly, effortlessly. His center of gravity realigned with masterful precision; his shoulders, footwork, and waist flowed in perfect synchronicity, like a dancer executing a movement choreographed by instinct itself.
In that instant, the trajectory of his strike transformed. The blade, once aimed for Orvak’s neck, veered suddenly, redirecting toward his right shoulder with surgical intent.
Orvak reacted on pure reflex, his instincts honed and razor-sharp, but it was a heartbeat too late.
The katana sang as it struck, a blue arc of death flashing through the air.
Steel kissed flesh. A savage gash split open, and a torrent of green blood burst forth in a violent spray.
But before the wound could deepen, the threads woven into Orvak’s body came alive, wriggling like serpents, they surged from beneath his skin, stitching the torn flesh with unnatural speed. Within seconds, the injury sealed shut, as though it had never existed at all.
"I suppose that makes you the one to draw first blood," Orvak said calmly, unfazed by the gash across his shoulder. In a blink, he surged forward, a blur of lethal intent.
His scythe arced high into the air, then descended like a guillotine, aimed to sever Malrik’s neck from his shoulders. But Malrik dropped low, his knees folding beneath him in a fluid crouch. In the same motion, his katana snapped forward like a thrusting rapier, piercing the air with deadly precision.
Orvak’s response was instantaneous.
He retracted his scythe with practiced ease, twisting the snath just in time to intercept the incoming strike. Sparks flared in the air as steel passionately kissed steel, the shriek of clashing intent hanging between them.
But Orvak did not falter.
In the same motion, he shifted from defense to offense with the grace of a seasoned predator. With a twist of the shaft, he deflected Malrik’s katana aside, then pivoted, his scythe’s crescent edge swung down and inward, collapsing toward Malrik’s exposed back with ruthless momentum, threatening to carve it open in a single merciless stroke.
But Malrik twisted away at the final moment, fluid as smoke, not even bothering to block or parry. As he rose to his feet, the side of the scythe’s snath was already hurtling toward his head with bone-crushing force.
With seamless coordination, his left hand snapped to his waist, unhooking the scabbard. In a motion befitting a true ambidextrous master, he raised it just in time to absorb the blow, steel meeting wood with a thunderous clang.
Simultaneously, his right hand lunged forward like a serpent striking with fangs bared, his katana slashing toward Orvak’s chest with surgical precision, aiming to carve straight through his heart.
But Orvak bent backward, spine arching until his body was parallel with the ground. The katana hissed through empty air, barely missing him as it tore through the space where his torso had been.
Without pause, he twisted with inhuman agility, flowing into a series of five rapid backflips, his scythe spinning beside him in a lethal orbit, an extension of his will, whistling through the air like a blade caught in a storm.
Orvak’s eyes flicked skyward, catching the first golden sliver of the rising sun.
’I can’t afford to drag this out any longer,’ he thought coldly.
Around his scythe, a strange black energy began to unfurl, blooming into existence like a poisonous flower. It wasn’t aura. It wasn’t Astra.
It was something far more primal, something far more destructive. The scythe became shrouded in it, cloaked in a shifting veil of darkness that seemed to devour light itself.
As a Sinvaira born of Carnage, Orvak wielded the very essence of devastation, an energy capable of bestowing ruin upon all it touched.
Malrik’s gaze sharpened, his pupils narrowing as he observed the ominous shroud. The sand at Orvak’s feet was disintegrating, being erased, without the scythe even making contact. No movement, no swing. The mere presence of that energy consumed everything around it.
He said nothing.
With measured calm, Malrik returned the scabbard to his waist. Then, his katana flared to life, an intense golden orange glow bursting forth in a blinding wave of radiance. The air shimmered, distorted by the searing heat, as the very atmosphere seemed to recoil in anticipation.
This was Malrik’s innate element.
The Sun.
