Lord of the Truth

Chapter 1979 Hour

Crack

The dark orange brow of Guardian Silas furrowed deeply, harsh lines forming across his forehead, while the sharp popping of his finger joints intensified as the echo of Aro calling him a dog lingered in his ears.

That wretch-no, that utterly trivial thing, a creature with barely a few hundred years of accumulated service and experience-dared to address him in such a manner?!

But... silence.

If he responded with an insult, and Aro replied in kind, and the exchange devolved into mutual slander, then he would look no different from a quarrelsome child. His authority would erode, his dignity would fracture, and the image he had spent centuries cultivating would suffer an even greater blow. Aro...

The name detonated inside Guardian Silasʼs mind, overflowing with venomous hatred and restrained fury. That pitiful existence, shackled within the combat emperor realm, was truly the mastermind behind every calamity that had befallen him?

How absurd. How laughable.

It was more humiliating than the loss of the empire itself.

If the decision were his alone, he would have erased the entire planet at this very moment, reducing it to drifting ash and silence.

But reality was cruelly inconvenient.

All Nexus States and Wing Lords would survive such an act. Most of the remaining vessels would escape as well. Everything that represented the Doubled Centennial Grave Empire would endure-everything except Aro, who would perish instantly.

After that, Ranther would likely seize control, steady the empireʼs foundations, and continue its expansion as if nothing had happened... or worse, the hidden controller ruling from the shadows might send another successor, someone perhaps far more cunning and ruthless than Aro himself-though Silas found it difficult to imagine such a monster.

Was that a worthwhile gamble?

No. Absolutely not.

If, however, he could slaughter everyone here-if he could annihilate the Wing Lords and wipe out this entire armada-then the gamble would succeed, even if some of his own followers were sacrificed in the process.

But-

Grrrr

Zooooooom

One of the main cannons of the Supremacy Note-4 mothership roared to life, unleashing a shot from its primary battery. The shell took the form of a piercing blue beam, freezing the surrounding air along its entire trajectory, leaving crystalline distortion in its wake.

”Damn it!”

One of Silasʼs subordinate Nexus States realized too late that the shot was aimed directly at him. He slammed his hammer outward in a wide-ranging strike, blasting his opponent away, then shouted, ”Hyaaa!” as he raised the weapon high.

The hammer-second-grade planetary armament-came crashing down upon the incoming beam. The projectile shattered instantly, dispersing into fragments of frozen light that were burned away by the searing, glowing orange heat.

But-Bam

”Argh!!”

His opponent struck from the blind side, driving a blade of terrifying precision beneath his armpit. The Nexus State staggered backward, blood spraying as he retreated to a safer distance. This wound would undoubtedly disrupt the remainder of the battle unless he withdrew to treat it properly.

Silas observed the chaos below with slow, measured breaths. His posture was calm, composed-but his expression was rigid, cold, and anything but tranquil.

The arrival of nearly thirty Supremacy Note-4 vessels had drastically shifted the balance among the Nexus States. Despite their massive size and predictably slow attack patterns, they wielded their cannons with tactical intent-firing not to kill, but to disrupt, distract, and fracture enemy momentum. Their brief, intermittent barrages made their presence infuriatingly difficult to ignore.

The same held true for the dozens of surviving Note of Destruction-4 vessels and the hundreds of Note of the Flood-4 that had endured the first wave of assault. Together, they heavily stabilized the World Cataclysm battlefield, preventing total collapse on either side.

At the very least... balance still existed.

If Silas were to extinguish the domain of the Heavenly Lawʼs Blessing now, that fragile equilibrium would shatter instantly, and the battle would devolve into a merciless, one-sided massacre.

The clash dragged on for nearly an hour-

”Why donʼt you just die already?!”

Wing Lord Igtar roared in blind fury. He was a high-level Nexus State, his body

scorched and charred, burns covering nearly every visible inch of flesh.

His opponent a low-level Nexus State-was barely holding on, gasping

desperately.

”Huff... huff...”

The overwhelming heat caused his eye to flicker violently, and his orange body began to radiate intensely, glowing like a miniature sun born of rage and desperation. With a hoarse shout, he charged forward once more.

Merely standing near him was suffocating-

and fighting him was nothing short of torment.

Since the battle began up until now, seven Nexus States from both sides had fallen-some killed outright, others left with grievous, near-fatal injuries that would take an immense effort to recover from. As for the rest, none of them were unscathed; every remaining Nexus State bore severe wounds, yet all of them continued to fight, driven forward by will, pride, and sheer desperation rather than strength alone.

Even Ranther, the strongest Nexus State within the empire, had paid a visible price-one of his fangs had been knocked out, and one entire side of his face. was scorched and blackened, the burns still faintly glowing with residual

energy.

As for the World Cataclysm battlefield, it was even more savage, far worse in both scale and losses. Dozens on each side had been killed or crippled beyond recovery, and dozens of massive vessels had been annihilated. The surface of the planet had transformed into a sprawling graveyard of shattered starships, twisted hulls, and burning wreckage-and, inevitably, a mass grave for tens of thousands of soldiers who had been trapped inside those vessels when they fell.

Yet despite all this carnage, there seemed to be no clear end in sight... The forces of Silasʼs family continued to surge forward relentlessly. Their control over their newly acquired power steadily deepened as the battle dragged on, and despite the prolonged fighting, they showed no obvious signs of extreme exhaustion. In contrast, the armor worn by the forces of the Grave Empire healed them at a noticeably slow pace-painfully slow, in fact-but still just fast enough to keep them alive and standing on the battlefield, refusing to

collapse.

There were only two individuals who truly appeared to be in terrible

condition...

The first was Aro. He stood below, shouting himself hoarse as he barked orders in every direction-some frantic and pointless, others sharp and timely enough to save lives at the last possible moment. From his position, he could only watch as the losses on both sides remained almost perfectly balanced, even after the Note-4 fleet had joined the battle. He looked powerless, screaming into the chaos like a man trapped in a nightmare he could no longer control.

The second... was Silas himself.

Clear signs of fatigue had settled onto his face, no longer something he could fully conceal. It was evident that maintaining the Domain of the Heavenly Lawʼs Blessing was an immense burden, one that continuously drained his focus and

strength.

Even so, he kept it active.

What alternative did he have?

To descend and fight personally.

But if he chose that path, he would be forced to deactivate the domain-a construct that demanded the entirety of his concentration and mastery over the law just to sustain-before charging into the battlefield himself. And then... what would truly happen?

The gap in power between Nexus States and the Law Domination Realm was significant, but not impossibly vast. If Silas descended and targeted someone like Ranther, he could kill him after only a few exchanges-but doing so would immediately give everyone else the opportunity to escape, Aro included.

If he instead hunted weaker Nexus States, he might manage to kill three or four before the rest scattered and fled in all directions.

If he went straight for Aro, he would undoubtedly kill him-but once again, everyone else would escape just as easily.

His only genuine chance lay in wiping out everyone present by continuing to empower his followers.

There would be no second opportunity-of that, he was absolutely certain.

”...This isnʼt working.”

Silas clenched his teeth hard, irritation and frustration boiling beneath his

composure as the battle dragged on far longer than he had ever anticipated. The sudden appearance of so many advanced weapons and planetary-grade armaments, combined with the Note vessels focusing purely on support and disruption rather than direct combat, had prolonged the conflict far beyond his

calculations.

If this continued unchecked, both sides would grind each other down

completely within a few more hours, leaving nothing but ruins and corpses

behind.

”...”

Silas raised his brows slightly as the thought fully settled in his mind. ”Perhaps... that wouldnʼt be such a bad outcome after all.”