Affinity: Chaos

Chapter 1999: He’s… Dead?

Klaus’s body was invaded by the darkness particles the moment the protective barrier was removed, but he did not care. At the pace things were going, this was meant to happen sooner or later. Since he knew there was no way for him to avoid it, he planned to drag the Gnome down with him. Besides, he still had hope that he was going to survive this. There was no way the others would sit back and watch him die.

His aura exploded out as the darkness around him slowly started to show signs of freezing. He was pushing his domain to work at the maximum, while he tried to lock down the aura of the Gnome.

“Come out you filthy little thing!” He yelled as he randomly attacked.

The effect of the darkness in restricting one’s senses made it almost impossible for him to even distinguish right from left, much less pinpoint the location of the Gnome in the darkness.

The Gnome did not even bother replying to him, only carefully dishing out one attack after another. He knew how dangerous this Human was, and now that he had the opportunity to kill him, he did not want to make any mistakes.

Klaus attacked uncontrollably, sending out a series of attacks that were lost in the darkness. He did not give up though, his aim was simple right now, locate the Gnome.

The Gnome, on the other hand, while trying to strike Klaus down, made sure to dodge each of Klaus’s attacks. The freezing ability of Klaus’s attacks was something he had experienced first-hand, he did not want to experience it again.

Klaus quickly realized attacking in a frenzy will get him nowhere. He changed his approach, putting most of his focus on defending while trying to use each of the Gnome’s attacks to pinpoint his location. Under normal circumstances, it would only take him a few attempts before finding the location of the Gnome. However, after being invaded by the darkness element for a period of time, he realized he was slowly starting to lose touch with his senses. He found it extremely hard to keep his eyes open, and it was getting harder and harder to block the attacks, much less track it back to where it was coming from.

At this point, he had stopped attacking, he did not even have the strength to continue defending. The only reason he was still standing and able to defend was from sheer willpower.

As his vision started to become blurry, the thoughts of his Father, wife, and friends flashed through his head once again. Only this time, he did not have the energy to even speak, it was as if his body was about to fully shut down.

The Gnome noticed Klaus’s state and snickered, this was what he was waiting for. Once invaded by the darkness essence, it was only a matter of time before he lost consciousness and also his life.

Outside the darkness.

Reynolds, who was preoccupied with his opponent had noticed Klaus being swallowed by the darkness element but could barely rush over to give him a hand. At first, he could still sense Klaus’s aura, albeit barely. However, as time went on, he realized something that made his scalp tingle; Klaus’s aura was dwindling.

He could clearly sense it, like a flame that was about to be extinguished. He knew what it meant, Klaus’s life was in danger, and he had to help before it became too late.

Reynolds was not the only one who sensed this, Alice, Hugh, and even the Commander at the Peak of the Sovereign Plane sensed this as well. Since these people all sensed it, it is normal that the Gnomes also sensed it as well.

The Ninth stage Sovereign battling with the Commander saw the other’s flustered expression and knew that he wanted to assist the Human who was in trouble. There was no way he was going to allow his opponent the chance to go over to assist someone who was on the verge of death. From what he heard, Klaus was largely the reason a Ninth stage Sovereign died in the hands of this Commander due to launching a sneak attack when his opponent was not watching. Although they scolded the silver robbed Gnome for his incompetence, they had to admit that after seeing Klaus in action, there was barely anything the former could do to stop him when he was also distracted by others.

One thing they have come to understand after Klaus and the others took a short moment to attack the Ninth stage Sovereign fighting with Reynolds is that the trio had impeccable synergy and did not even need to talk to one another to get their messages across. They could perfectly assist each other while still engaged in combat with their opponents. This is something that can only be born after fighting together for years.

Alice was agitated, she was the only one whose opponent is not in the Ninth stage of the Sovereign Plane. When she tried to go in that direction, the Gnome stepped in front of her, blocking her path.

“Fuck off!” She swung her fists in the direction of the Gnome. Even though Alice’s fist was not as large as that of Klaus and Reynolds, it packed a shocking amount of power. The Gnome has watched his Puppet almost destroyed from those fists, there was no way he was going to let it land on him. He dodged to the side, evading the blow by a hair’s breath.

Alice was still trying to get past the Gnome when the dwindling aura of Klaus suddenly vanished. Her entire being jolted the moment the aura disappeared as she jerked her head in that direction with bloodshot eyes.

Not just her, Reynolds, Hugh, as well as the Commander all looked in that direction. There was only one reason behind Klaus’s aura disappearing, yet none of them wanted to believe it.

Reynolds did not continue his fight with the Ninth stage Sovereign, he retreated as he looked in that direction with bloodshot eyes, his entire body shaking vigorously.

“He’s… dead?”