Lord of Annihilation

From the outside, the phenomenon of void energy corrupting patches of space did not look that bad. At least, to the naked eye, it seemed as if a dark veil was expanding and enshrouding the area behind it.

However, in the eyes of a learned person like Ka'lor'ah, this phenomenon was hardly simple.

'Shit! That's the motherfu*king VOID that is eating up space and expanding!! Shit! Shit! Shit! SHIT!'

Looking at the dark veil become larger and larger, the panic within her heart also proportionally increased.

'Why the fu*k did the void appear in here!? And why now!? Dammit! If it expands outside the range of my [Isolation Barrier] then I will not be able to hide the evil and dangerous nature of the void energy. The moment the Giants outside detect it, we'll all be neck-deep in shit!'

The Giants were one of the long-standing, core members of the [Good] faction whose abhorrence and intolerance for the [Evil] faction was no less than that of the Heavenly Sovereigns. 

This hatred originally stems from the higher authority of the Giants, which were the Titans, whose hatred for the Dragon Race extended across many Eras. (The Dragon Race is another Grade 6 race similar to the Titans and one of the core members of the [Evil] faction.)

Lucius' Void Energy as miraculous and broken as it was, emanated an aura that felt viler and more dangerous than even the purest form of Demonic Energy. 

This being the case, there was little thought required to what would happen if the Giants outside were to catch a whiff of his energy's scent.

'A CRUSADE! They'll mount our heads in a fu*ing pike, that's what'll happen!'

Repressing her tumultuous emotions, Ka'lor'ah slammed her hands against the ground and imbued more of her soul power into the large-scale formation extending the [Isolation Barrier]. 

Her mind whirred at incredible speeds as she rapidly performed calculations within her head.

'My spell can extend up to a maximum distance of 500m. Factoring my soul power, I can maintain the spell at the maximum range for exactly one-hundred and ninety-two seconds!'

'The rate of expansion of the void is…volatile. Dammit! It's expanding at a random as opposed to a constant rate! I can't calculate it like this!'

The situation with the void's expansion was unpredictable. Since the appearance of the cracks, less than thirty seconds have passed and the void has already expanded to cover sixty-nine cubic meters of space.

The matter that incensed Ka'lor'ah the most was the random rate of its expansion. At times it expanded at a measly 0.1 cubic meter per second while at others, it jumped to a whole five cubic meters per second.

In short, it was hella stress-inducing!

'What do I do!? I can't simply stay here and watch it expand right before my eyes. But I can't get too close to it either!'

'Not only do I lack methods to protect myself against the void's corruption, but I don't have any specialized 'Space Locking' or 'Dimensional Anchoring' spells within my arsenal to slow it down either!'

With sweat trailing down her face, Ka'lor'ah looked at the dark veil before her with unwillingness and thought.

'Is this it? Is this the end?'

Just as the feeling of hopelessness appeared within her heart, a feeling of irascible anger rose appeared within her eyes. Opening her mouth, Ka'lor'ah let out an indiscriminate yell.

"Lucius, you son of a bit*h!! Wake up and rein in this mess!"

Silence.

"LUCIUS!  I SWEAR! If you ruin this attempt and all of OUR combined THIRTY YEARS of hard work and planning! I won't let you go!! I will haunt you forever in Heaven, Hell, Limbo, or whatever place that we end up in!"

"WAKE UP RIGHT NOW!!!"

There was no response once again.

"ARGGH!!" Ka'lor'ah groaned in frustration.

Misty, void energy continued to incessantly pour from the cracks on the surface of the sphere and the void continued to indiscriminately corrupt space and expand.

A little over a minute had passed and the void's boundary now stood at one-hundred and nine cubic meters. Ka'lor'ah's soul power was also depleting at an equal pace and would last for a little over two minutes.

'Soul power, soul power, soul power, dammit! With the black body sphere blocking my soul connection with him, I can't even borrow more soul power!'

Another ten seconds passed and the void extended by another twenty cubic meters. This time, however, it wasn't as simple as simple corruption of space as the boundary reached the remaining few dozen Stage 4 Wild Beasts corpses that Lucius hadn't consumed.

The instant the dark veil touched the edges of these corpses they simply…ceased to exist.

The void devoured these materials things, broke them down into the simplest particles and energy, and used that energy to further fuel the expansion of the void!

The reason Void Eaters were so feared and hunted to the point of extinction in the past, wasn't due to their cheat-like growth rate, inexhaustible power, or even due to their ability to steal other abilities.

No, the foremost reason for their extinction was due to the simple fact that these creatures were the spawn of the Void and its extension. 

The ultimate goal of existence for all Void Eaters wasn't absolute power or eternal domination. Their very reason for existence was to consume all material and immaterial things in existence and return them to the void!

Having said that, that's exactly what happened here the moment the rapidly encroaching void touched the corpses of the Stage 4 Wild Beasts. The corpses were near-instantaneously devoured and broken down into simple particles of energy which was then used to accelerate the void's expansion.

As for how much it accelerated…

…by an entire hundred and twenty-four cubic meters!

In but an instant, half of Ka'lor'ah's [Isolation Barrier] was encroached by the void. Space started to shudder and Ka'lor'ah's spell grew increasingly unstable.

'Argh! For fu*k's sake! Dammit! At this rate, the worst-case scenario might actually occur!!'

"LUCIUS, I BEG YOU! PLEASE WAKE UP! I CAN'T HOLD THIS TOGETHER ANY LONGER!" Ka'lor'ah cried, the helplessness within her voice becoming apparent.

She collapsed her material body and reverted back into her original form; the dark-golden Existence Crystal. This change saved her a few units of soul power buying her a whole two seconds.

But alas, her cries seemed to fall on deaf ears. There was no response from the black-colored sphere and the void continued its wanton corruption.

In fact, it started to eat into the stone floor beneath their feet seemingly having realized something from consuming those Stage 4 corpses. Being present in a materials Universe, there was material all around them; the stone floor beneath their feet was no different.

Devouring the stone floors and the dirt underneath them, the rate of expansion of the void continued to increase.

Even though the energy contained within such abiotic objects was incredibly scarce and couldn't be compared to something like the Stage 4 corpses, the void did not discriminate. 

It simply devoured all.

Another thirty seconds passed and the void's expansion had already closed four-hundred cubic meters and was rapidly approaching the borders of Ka'lor'ah's spell. 

The moment it crossed these borders, it would spell doom for the party and would be the end of their quest. They would have failed.

Failure.

"Hahaha, so this is how it ends," Ka'lor'ah let out a listless laugh. 

Her emotions couldn't be discerned in her crystal form for her obvious lack of features. Her voice, however, was expressive enough.

"A shame. I really wanted to see what a Universe without the Rules would look like," seeing the void meters away from her, Ka'lor'ah softly sighed in resignation.

Just as the void was about to consume her and the spell was about to break, a voice confidently spoke up from behind her.

"So that's the ultimate plan, huh? A Universe without the Rules. I like it."

Ka'lor'ah shut 'eyes' snapped open and looked behind her.

"I would like to see it too."

Draped in magnificent purple robes and floating in the air while radiating a power that shouldn't belong to a newly ascended Stage 3 being was a goddess.

Or at least, the closest human equivalent to a real goddess.

With her mesmerizing eyes glowing with bright violet light and her waist-length hair flailing under pure soul power, Olivia opened her mouth and smilingly declared.

"Deploy Domain…"

-To be continued-