Chapter 233: Reaching Supreme!
Remedy and Cornelia sat cross-legged, facing each other across the polished floor. The air inside the domain felt heavier than before, like the space itself was listening. Outside, Ivy waited, tense and uncertain, but inside, the real negotiation had already begun.
Cornelia studied her in silence for a moment, then spoke calmly. "So... where do we begin?" Her tone was casual, but the weight behind her words wasn’t. A monarch asking guidance from a master, if anyone witnessed this, disbelief wouldn’t even begin to cover it.
After all, monarchs weren’t ordinary beings. They stood at the very peak, leading the war against monsters, capable of wiping out entire hordes alone. With their domains, facing millions wasn’t just possible, it was expected. That was the level Cornelia stood on.
Which made this situation even stranger.
From her perspective, there was no real downside in their deal. Either her domain improved... or she gained someone like Remedy under her command. Both outcomes were wins. But even so, something about her felt off.
Remedy broke the silence first.
"Do you know how domains are formed?"
Cornelia paused. The question caught her off guard, if only slightly. Her first instinct was to question her back. You’re sitting inside one I created. If anyone should be asking, it should be her.
But she didn’t say that.
Instead, she gave a short nod. "Yes. I do."
Remedy didn’t react to her answer. Her gaze stayed steady, almost expectant, as if testing something deeper than her words.
"Then tell me," he continued, "what’s the most important thing needed to create a domain?"
Cornelia narrowed her eyes slightly, thinking. It wasn’t a difficult question, at least, not on the surface. She had lived through the process herself. She understood what it took.
After a brief pause, she answered.
"Territory."
Remedy nodded once.
"Correct."
The confirmation was simple, but it carried weight. Just like a master needed enlightenment to step into the Lord realm, a Lord required territory to manifest a domain and ascend into a monarch. It was a fundamental truth, one no one questioned.
And yet...
"That’s good," Remedy said calmly. "But for now... I need you to throw all of that away."
Cornelia’s brows furrowed.
"...What?"
Her gaze sharpened as she stared at her, trying to read her expression. Throw away what she knew? The very foundation of domains? That wasn’t just unconventional, it bordered on absurd.
Inside, a single thought surfaced.
I hope I’m not getting scammed.
Still, she didn’t interrupt. If nothing else, she wanted to hear how far she would take this.
"...Go on," she said, her voice steady but edged with curiosity.
Remedy leaned forward slightly, the faintest shift in posture, but the pressure in the room changed instantly.
"What I’m about to show you," she said, "isn’t something your current understanding can handle."
A brief pause.
"Because territory... isn’t the only foundation of a domain."
****
The pressure in the room still lingered from Remedy’s last words, but far from that office, Adam had no such luxury to hesitate. While she guided a monarch, he was deep in the grind, surrounded by ruin and decay.
The battlefield around him was a mess of fallen bodies. Or at least, what passed for bodies. Calling them corpses felt wrong. They had been zombies, undead things that never truly lived to begin with.
Adam didn’t dwell on it.
His focus stayed sharp, locked on what mattered.
He exhaled slowly as he summoned his panel and the numbers settled in his mind. After the last wave, he had gathered enough existence. More than enough. The effort, the risk, the constant fighting, it had all led to this point.
62,600 existence.
A small grin formed on his face.
"That’s it."
Skelly had been with him from the start. Every fight, every close call, every narrow victory, it had grown alongside him. Now, it was time to push it further."Evolve."
Adam spent 62,400 existence in one motion.
The reaction was immediate.
A surge of essence erupted behind him as Skelly manifested, its form unstable at first. The air distorted as two forces clashed and merged, wind and death affinity twisting together into something far more violent.
The ground beneath them trembled.
Skelly’s transformation began without pause. Its old, brittle bones cracked and shifted, then were swallowed by something darker. Plates of abyssal armor formed piece by piece, wrapping around its body like living shadow.
The presence it gave off changed instantly.
Inside its hollow skull, something ignited.
At first, it was faint. Then it grew. The sockets, filled with burning green flames, expanded outward until they crowned its head in ghostly fire, alive with raw essence.
This wasn’t the same spirit anymore.
The weak skeleton Adam once summoned was gone.
In its place stood something else entirely.
A sentinel.
A guardian shaped by death and sharpened by wind.
As the final fragments of its old form disappeared, the transformation completed. The air grew heavy, almost suffocating, as if the world itself recognized the shift in power standing beside Adam.
Then it hit him.
A surge.
It felt like something sealed inside him had been forced open. Like a dam cracking under pressure, then finally breaking. Power rushed through his body in a violent wave, sharp and overwhelming.
Adam steadied himself, eyes widening slightly.
"...So this is it."
Above him, a massive pillar of energy erupted into the sky. Death and wind affinity spiraled together, tearing upward in a violent column that refused to be ignored.
It wasn’t subtle.
It wasn’t controlled.
It was a declaration.
And far away, deep within the rift untouched by light, a figure sat upon a throne of bone. The chamber was silent, heavy with an ancient presence that hadn’t stirred in a long time.
Until now.
The figure’s eyes snapped open.
"What... is this?"
Its voice echoed through the chamber, low and filled with interest. The air around it trembled as it leaned forward slightly, sensing the surge from afar.
"So much death affinity..."
Before the throne, three figures remained kneeling, motionless until called. They didn’t dare speak first. They didn’t need to.
"Bring them to me."
The command was quiet.
But absolute.
"Yes, my lord."
The three figures vanished instantly, their forms dissolving into shadows as they left the chamber. Not a trace remained, as if they had never been there at all.
The figure on the throne leaned back slowly, gaze still fixed on something far beyond the rift.
"...Soon enough."
Its eyes closed once more.
And the hunt began.