Chapter 543 - 490: The Shackle of Collective Will, The Final Sword

Chapter 543: Chapter 490: The Shackle of Collective Will, The Final Sword

Yemiga’s words were like a cold scalpel, precisely laying bare the most dangerous truth of Roland’s current state.

He knew deep down that Yemiga spoke the truth. The cost of Mad Soul and the erosion of Dragonification were like two ever-tightening nooses, strangling his soul and his very existence.

It was precisely because he knew this that when his gaze pierced through the churning blood mist and boiling fury to once again catch the serene, knowing look on Yemiga’s face—as if everything was under control.

The rage from the depths of his soul, like a flame doused in scalding oil, suddenly erupted, surging to an unprecedented peak.

This was not an out-of-control frenzy, but a kind of...

...an absolute rage born of being backed into a corner with no escape, a rage that incinerated all other thoughts.

It was anger at his own powerlessness, anger at the brutal deaths of his comrades, and an absolute loathing for Yemiga, who treated everything as calculable, controllable, and easily resettable "parameters."

This rage was so incandescent it threatened to burst through the confines of his Dragonified body, erupting forth as tangible flames.

His heart pounded like a war drum, each beat pumping more scalding blood—blood that seemed to be molten rage itself—throughout his body.

However, at the very zenith of this rage, a strange yet distinct sensation of Stripping suddenly washed over him.

Roland felt the fury that had been completely entangled with his consciousness, as omnipresent as background noise, suddenly...

...get "drawn out."

It was no longer just an abstract feeling that dominated his emotions and actions, no longer just the chaotic fuel for his burning Mad Soul.

It was as if it now possessed...

...a "form."

Like a mass in the core of his chest, hotter than a dragon’s heart and more viscous than Magma—an "entity."

It was at once a violent vortex, constantly sucking in the last few fragments of his reason and the scorched remnants of his Spirit.

And yet it was also a cold, heavy, indestructible "cornerstone" that, within the furnace of his collapsing consciousness, bizarrely provided a twisted "sense of stability."

’Anger... it doesn’t have to be just a ’feeling’...’

A vague thought, like a match struck in the dark, instantly illuminated his chaotic mind.

’It can be ’fuel,’ it can be ’power’... but why can’t it be... a ’weapon’? Why can’t it be... ’Armor’?’

The words he had long since memorized from the Path of Ancestral Spirits and Fury - Barbarian Initiation Rite surged into his mind like a tide.

He began to "try," no longer just "feeling" the anger or "being" driven by it.

Instead...

...he would "capture" it, "grasp" it, "shape" it.

He immersed his consciousness in the boiling, almost tangible rage.

He didn’t resist its scorching heat and violence. Instead, with almost self-destructive courage, he actively merged his remaining conscious will with it.

Not to be devoured, but...

...to declare his sovereignty.

’My anger... what is its cause? It is because what I protect has been trampled, because those I cherish have been erased, because this cold Order presumes to define everything!’

’Then, this flame of rage... shouldn’t just be the kindling that consumes me. It should become...’

He let out a sudden roar that pierced the clouds.

The majesty of a dragon’s cry was still in the sound, but now it held an unprecedented penetrating power—the power of "will."

In the instant another of his furious slashes was diverted by Yemiga’s exquisite Space-Time deflection, his power seemingly spent on empty air.

Roland showed not the slightest hesitation or frustration at the missed attack.

Deep within his eyes, which burned with dark red flames and showed clear signs of Dragonification, a single point of supreme "clarity" suddenly lit up like a cold star at dawn.

The rage he had actively "grasped" was guided, compressed, and tempered by his clear will!

It was not released outward. Instead, following his will, it surged like a torrent both scorching and freezing into his sword arm and into the blade of Bright Moon.

The faint glow of the Time Trace Weaver’s Engraving Blade on the sword’s edge instantly resonated in a strange way with this newborn, newly "tamed" torrent of rage.

The pale gold and dark red intertwined with the pure, condensed red of the furious Flame.

The next moment, he twisted his body and spun his wrist, slashing once more with unbelievable angle and speed toward the area that seemed empty but was in fact filled with multiple Space-Time folds and delay traps set by Yemiga.

The trajectory of this slash seemed no different from the last.

But wherever the blade passed, the Space-Time turbulence that Yemiga had meticulously woven to deflect and delay attacks seemed to encounter a kind of "foreign substance" that it could not completely "digest" or "shift."

The condensed rage, bearing the distinct imprint of Roland’s will and mixed with the Engraving Blade’s trait of interfering with Space-Time structures, actually managed to briefly...

..."burn through" a part of the chaotic Space-Time structure.

Although it was only for an extremely brief instant, and although it only opened up a minuscule, fleeting "channel."

But the point of this slash drew closer, more real than ever before, to the inner layer of Yemiga’s silver-white Domain.

The tip of the sword even lightly grazed the surface of the innermost Space-Time barrier, stirring up ripples of Energy that were far more violent and brilliant than before.

Yemiga’s flawless figure, which had moved as if every evasion route was perfectly calculated, hitched for the first time, however minutely.

A jolt went through Roland’s heart.

He latched onto the sensation of that moment.

It wasn’t brute force, nor was it speed. It was a "quality" that transcended conventional Energy Attributes, produced after his will and emotions themselves had undergone some ineffable "tempering" and "imbuing."