Journey to Become the Zenith

Echoed Blades Beneath a Silent Sky

Victor kept on swinging the branches around as if they were swords. Even though his main weapon had always been a scythe—its weight, its cruel arc, its overwhelming dominance—there was something about the swordsmanship he had witnessed in those visions that refused to leave him alone. It lingered. It pulled at him. It felt... right.

Not new. Not foreign.

Familiar.

The branches in his hands cut through the air with a soft whistle. Again. And again. And again.

His breathing slowed.

His golden eyes sharpened.

Each movement, each step, each shift of weight... it wasn’t random anymore. It was becoming something deliberate. Something refined.

Victor didn’t notice when his surroundings faded.

Didn’t notice the whispering leaves.

Didn’t notice the way the forest air had grown colder, quieter—as if even the world itself was holding its breath.

All he could feel... were the ”swords” in his hands.

Back when he was Anos—the Supreme Demon Emperor—his swordsmanship had been terrifying.

But it had also been flawed.

Brutal. Absolute. Overwhelming.

And careless.

Victor’s lips curved slightly as he moved.

Back then... I didn’t need defense.

Why would he?

Everything died in one strike.

That was the logic he had lived by.

If the enemy survived the first blow, then he would simply strike again—faster, harder, without hesitation. His philosophy had been simple:

Attack. Overwhelm. Destroy.

Defense?

Pointless.

A waste of time.

That was the arrogance of someone who stood at the peak.

And yet—

The swordsmanship he was copying now... was different.

Completely different.

It didn’t reject defense.

It embraced it.

No...

It didn’t even separate offense and defense.

They were one.

Seamless.

Flowing.

Like water turning into a blade.

Like a storm that could both destroy and protect in the same breath.

Victor’s movements sharpened.

A step forward—his right hand slashed downward.

A pivot—his left hand followed, cutting through an imaginary counterattack.

No pause.

No break.

No hesitation.

Each movement flowed into the next like it had always belonged there.

The forest responded.

Leaves drifted down from above, caught in the invisible current of his motion.

And then—

Slice.

Slice.

Slice.

They fell apart.

Cleanly.

Effortlessly.

Each leaf split into two before even touching the ground.

Victor didn’t notice.

Not the leaves.

Not the precision.

Not the terrifying control he was beginning to display.

He wasn’t using mana.

Not a single thread of it.

This was pure technique.

Pure instinct.

Pure... memory.

Somewhere behind him, Diana stood quietly.

Her crimson eyes didn’t blink.

Didn’t waver.

She had been watching from the very beginning.

At first, there had been curiosity.

Then surprise.

Now—

Something deeper.

Something heavier.

”...Master...”

Her voice was soft, almost swallowed by the wind.

But she didn’t step forward.

Didn’t interrupt.

Because what she was witnessing right now...

Wasn’t training.

It was awakening.

-----------

Time passed.

Minutes blurred into hours.

Hours slipped into something longer.

The sun had shifted overhead, casting new shadows through the dense canopy.

Victor didn’t stop.

Didn’t slow.

Didn’t even seem to feel fatigue.

His body moved endlessly, repeating the same motions—yet never the same.

Each swing was sharper than the last.

Each step more precise.

Each breath more controlled.

It was as if his body already knew this path...

And was simply remembering it.

Diana’s fingers curled slightly.

Her gaze softened.

That movement...

That rhythm...

That presence...

Her chest tightened.

A feeling she shouldn’t have.

A feeling that didn’t belong to something like her anymore.

And yet—

It was there.

Clear.

Undeniable.

”You might simply be a reincarnation of him...”

Her voice was barely a whisper now.

Not weak—just... restrained. Like something fragile forced through a throat that hadn’t spoken his name in years.

The wind caught the words the moment they left her lips, tugging at them, thinning them into nothing before they could fully settle into the air.

”...and a different person altogether...”

She didn’t blink.

Not once.

Her eyes remained locked on Victor as if the act of looking away—even for a fraction of a second—would break something inside her.

”But I just can’t help it...”

Her lips parted, slow and uncertain.

A breath slipped out—unnecessary, instinctive... almost human.

”I can only see him.”

Victor’s foot stepped forward again.

Not rushed. Not hesitant.

Certain.

The branches in his hands moved with him—no, they followed him. Like extensions of something deeper than muscle memory.

They cut through the air in a perfect cross.

Sharp.

Clean.

Unstoppable.

The sound came a heartbeat later—

a low, slicing whisper that split the silence of the forest.

Diana’s gaze trembled.

Just slightly.

It wasn’t fear.

It was recognition.

”You might not be Azriel...”

The name lingered between them.

Heavy.

It didn’t belong to the present.

It dragged something ancient with it—something buried.

The Blood Monarch.

A name that wasn’t spoken.

It was remembered.

Carried.

Survived.

A name etched into battlefields that no longer existed.

Into screams that had long since faded.

Into a history that refused to die.

Victor moved again.

This time, faster.

The branches blurred—not wild, not uncontrolled—but precise. Each motion flowed into the next without pause, without friction. There was no wasted energy, no unnecessary flourish.

It wasn’t swordsmanship.

It was instinct refined into form.

”...but I...”

Diana’s voice faltered.

The words caught somewhere between thought and confession.

For the first time—

She hesitated.

Her fingers curled slightly against her palm, nails pressing into skin that no longer reacted the way it once did.

”...I can’t help it...”

The forest responded.

Or rather—

It stopped responding.

The rustling leaves fell still.

The distant cries of creatures... faded.

Even the wind seemed to withdraw, as if unwilling to interrupt what was unfolding.

Something unseen settled over the space between them.

Heavy.

Watching.

Waiting.

Victor didn’t notice.

Or maybe—

He did, and simply didn’t care.

His movements didn’t stop.

If anything—

They deepened.

The rhythm shifted. What had been practice became something else. Something quieter. More dangerous.

His shoulders relaxed further.

His grip loosened—yet the strikes grew sharper.

His body moved as if it had done this... countless times before.

Not learned.

Remembered.

The branches sliced downward—then twisted mid-motion, redirecting into a horizontal sweep that carried a subtle, lethal intent.

No hesitation.

No thought.

Just... flow.

Even more smooth.

Even more sharp.

Even more... alive.

Diana’s hand slowly lifted.

Not abruptly.

Not dramatically.

As if pulled by something she couldn’t resist.

Her palm pressed lightly against her chest.

There was no heartbeat.

There hadn’t been for a very long time.

No warmth.

No pulse.

Nothing to remind her she was still... here.

And yet—

Something stirred.

Faint.

Distant.

Impossible.

”...I still...”

Her voice broke.

Not loudly.

Not completely.

Just enough that the rest of the sentence never came.

Her fingers tightened slightly against her chest, as if trying to hold onto something slipping away before it could even take shape.

And in front of her—

Victor moved again.

A step.

A turn.

A strike that should have been impossible with something as crude as a branch—

Yet it wasn’t.

Because it wasn’t the weapon that mattered.

It never had been.

The air bent around him—not literally, not visibly—but there was a presence to it. A pressure. As if every movement carried weight beyond what the eye could see.

For a brief, fragile moment—

The world blurred.

And in that blur—

She didn’t see Victor.

She saw him.

Not clearly.

Not fully.

But enough.

The angle of the shoulder.

The tilt of the head.

The way the body shifted before a strike—

It was the same.

It was exactly the same.

And that—

That was what broke her.

Not the possibility.

Not the resemblance.

The certainty.

That something so precise...

so deeply ingrained...

could not simply be coincidence.

Silently—

She watched.

Not as Diana.

Not as who she had become.

But as someone who had once stood in a different place... under a different sky... watching the same movements carve through enemies instead of air.

Time didn’t move.

Or maybe—

She didn’t.

Victor continued.

Unaware.

Unbothered.

Alive in a way that had nothing to do with breath or heartbeat.

And Diana stood there—

Caught between past and present—

Watching someone who wasn’t the man she once knew...

Yet moved exactly like him.

Breathed like him.

Fought like him.

Silently—

She remembered the last time she saw Azriel.