Chapter 127: Riven Reveals His Trump Card, Mirrored Samsara Shadow Incarnation Finally Manifests!

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Goki laughed while running around and jumping with impressive dexterity. If there was one clear advantage he held compared to other ninjas, it was his hybridized combat style. He had been raised as both a Shinobi and a Monk, which made him incredibly tough and highly capable in close-quarters battles.

At the same time he retained a ninja’s natural agility and deadly assassination arts. As he threw a series of explosive kunai at the giant skeleton, the monster, unable to fully manifest its lower half, remained mostly a massive upper skeletal torso that floated through the air while chasing after him relentlessly.

Riven used that opening to reach Ryujin as the chaos unfolded around them. Label appeared behind him a moment later after being teleported by Noir’s living shadows. The black wolf and Ren moved in to engage the Inugami while Hinata assisted Goki in keeping the Gashadokuro occupied.

"I have to say, your ninjas are really useful," Ryujin said with open amusement. "They will help me smooth out my lunch before I take them down myself."

Ryujin laughed louder as his spectral form solidified further under the power of the Blood Moon Lantern. His body grew three times taller until he resembled a crimson skeleton clad in ancient shogun and samurai armor. He carried the glowing lantern in one hand and a massive naginata in the other.

"HAH! Do you truly believe you can take on my Spectral Soul Avatar?" Ryujin laughed. "This is no mere illusion, kid! This is a full manifestation of my Class. A powerful double, if I say so myself. With him active I do not even need to move from the place where I am hiding!"

"Really? I happen to have something similar!" Riven answered with a wide, confident smile. "Wanna see my little dark twin?"

"...What?"

Ryujin’s eyes widened as he watched Riven’s own shadow surge upward and take on an identical form and shape.

"?!"

It was not an illusion either. As a master of spiritual arts, Ryujin understood the moment he saw the figure that it was not a simple magic spell imitating Riven’s appearance.

"My Shadow has eaten enough of the souls of the poor bastards employed under you," Riven said calmly. "Well, rather, they are not that poor, are they? The darker the souls, the tastier they become. My Shadow does not eat clean or good souls. It finds them disgusting. It feeds on malice and negativity above all else..."

"...Y-You’ve been eating my subordinates’... souls...?!" Even Ryujin possessed no such malefic power within his vast arsenal.

The ability felt almost purely malicious and evil. Taking a life was acceptable to him, but destroying a soul entirely meant denying that person any chance at an afterlife.

Who was truly the worse person here now? From certain perspectives it almost felt as though Riven was the greater villain.

Riven, however, did not give a single damn about those men or their souls, or whether they deserved a second chance in the afterlife.

"Human traffickers like you deserve worse than hell. You deserve to be torn to shreds and have your very existences destroyed..."

Suddenly a voice that sounded almost identical to Riven’s echoed across the battlefield, yet it was filled with raw anger and malice and exuded pure curses. The figure resembled Riven closely.

It shared the same heavy musculature and large arms, but its skin was paler, its black hair longer and wilder, and its eyes glowed a deep red-purple. Its entire body constantly released an aura of pure void energy.

This was Riven’s "Mirrored Samsara Shadow Incarnation" Manifestation.

At long last he had reached the necessary threshold of consumed souls required by his shadow. Like an egg finally ready to hatch, the being emerged in direct response to his call.

Riven glanced at his own Shadow Self and noted that it was already quite strong, though it still had room to grow stronger. It currently inherited roughly 25 percent of his total stats and could continue developing and leveling up over time.

It had even awakened an Unranked Class called "Shadow," which would allow it to grow even more powerful by killing enemies.

"You’re using all that power for this? Instead of gathering together and helping humanity’s ascension..."

The shadow continued speaking in that same cold, furious tone.

"You make me sick."

Ryujin laughed and took a heavy step forward. The ground beneath him shattered from the force.

"Say whatever you want with your little spirit. You are a nobody who has no right to tell me what I should do with my power!"

RUMBLE!

As he stepped forward, his phantasmal naginata thrust outward with tremendous speed. His aura erupted violently, and dozens of afterimages that resembled his own specter were unleashed at once.

A single attack was divided into hundreds of simultaneous strikes.

Riven intercepted the assault with Fenrir’s Fang gripped firmly in his hand while his Shadow held the Fallen King’s Sword instead. Phantasmal flames surged from both blades at the same moment.

Together they unleashed a Dual Abyssal Assault, stacking several skills onto their weapons as they swung the swords downward, upward, vertically, and horizontally in perfect unison.

SLASH! SLASH! SLASH! SLASH!

CLAAASH!

"Nnnggh?!" Ryujin was forced backward as his technique completely broke apart. He groaned in disbelief at what he had just witnessed. "...He blocked my Hundred Thousand Bladed Technique...?!"

Riven gave him no time to calculate what had happened. He appeared directly in front of Ryujin within a single millisecond. Icicle spears erupted from every direction and pierced straight through the ghostly form.

Ryujin still laughed.

"You cannot harm me with normal attacks. Not even magic can— UGH?!"

He was wrong. The ice itself was pure magic, further imbued with Riven’s ki and magical poison. The corruption began spreading rapidly through his spectral body.

Even so, he swiftly purged most of the darkness as he narrowly evaded a follow-up attack from Riven’s shadow, barely escaping a wide slashing cleave that would have cut him in half.

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