Chapter 2362: Converging

Chapter 2362: Converging

The grew chiller and chiller as the Rui relied on acoustic cooling to lower the temperatures of the domain further and further, fueled by his enemy's attacks.

WHOOSH WHOOSH WHOOSH!

Master Stephen turned into a powerful berserking beast that unleashed destruction with each swing.

Yet, despite the countless attacks that he threw at Rui, not a single one of them had yet to touch him.

A monotonous dance had unfolded between them.

One where the Convergence struggled to land even a single powerful blow on his opponent while Rui did everything in his power to incapacitate him with the cold. However, something had to give.

And something did.

Master Stephen's body began shivering as the cold crossed a preliminary threshold of tolerance. His body staggered unsteadily as he grew colder and colder. The liquified drops of atmospheric gases that had settled in his body caused his skin and flesh to burn with frost.

"DAMN YOU...!" he cursed. Rui wasn't doing too much better himself.

"Cough..." He spat a bout of blood from within his lungs. The two took a moment of reprieve as they recuperated from the exertion that they had been subjecting themselves to over the course of the battle.

Rui was hardly in a better condition.

His body was battered by the destruction that his opponent had unleashed upon him. The man truly seemed to have endless energy reserves in the depths of his Body. It was no wonder that he had managed to become a peak-grade Master. It was hard to imagine how he could even be defeated in conventional battles. He had the power to simply overpower everything with raw might. Rui wasn't sure how the man wasn't a Sage yet with the power that he had accrued. It most likely meant that his mind had a deep issue that prevented him from gaining an understanding of who he truly was. "Enough..." Master Stephen's panting voice quivered with exhaustion. "I've had enough."

Rui frowned even as he gasped for air. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

He wasn't sure what came over the man.

But he wasn't complaining.

He desperately needed a few moments to stop his wounds from bleeding.

"Huff..." the opponent Master exhaled a long, deep breath as his rage disappeared.

Strangely enough, it wasn't as though the man's control over himself had managed to pacify his extreme emotions.

It was pure and sheer exhaustion that brought him back from the brink of madness.

For the first time in centuries, Master Stephen felt hollow.

He had vented every ounce of emotional energy that he had bottled up deep within him for years. Emotions born from his desire for prestige and renown. Emotions that had festered deep within like a toxic swamp that swallowed him up, blinding him.

Now, all of it was gone.

Because the boy was stealing his prestige and renown?

"No..." A whisper escaped him as he gazed deep into the depths of dark blood in Rui's pupils. He could sense the ferocity of Rui's Martial Drive. Its inevitability.

He could sense the grandeur of his ambition.

It made him feel small.

"Why..." A tired whisper escaped him. "Why do I care about prestige and renown again?"

Understanding dawned on him as he truly looked at himself with clear eyes and a clear mind for the first time in his life.

He introspected himself unimpeded by the many emotions that swamped in the depths of his mind, poisoning his thoughts and obscuring clarity.

It was a simple question.

Why did he care about prestige and renown?

Why were they so important to him?

Why?

"Ah..." The softest and most tender of whispers escaped him. "...I see."

A serene smile lit up on his face as his eyes shined with peace and harmony.

"They never truly mattered in the first place."

Enlightenment.

RUMBLE

Rui's eyes widened with shock as he felt a profound singularity of power erupting from deep within the Convergence's being. A power that far exceeded the limits of the Master Realm.

The power of a higher Realm.

He beheld the Convergence with an unholy fusion of horror and wonder. His Martial Mind witnessed the ephemeral divide between Mind and Soul erode away as the inner and outer halves of self converged upon each other.

They become a single whole.

A celestial union of harmony and peace.

RUMBLE!!!

Heaven and earth mourned as Gaia welcomed the birth of a new Martial Sage.

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