Back in the outer desert, just about a hundred kilometers away from the Crimson City, my teammates sit in a circle, absorbing orange divine fragments. Weak ripples of yellow radiation from my fight reach their senses, and Maria is the first to speak up. "That's Jay... First, he leaves in a hurry claiming that we'll need to use this power sooner than we think, then he borrows our stats and mana control. Now, these pulses of energy can only be the result of a fight." Fisher smirks, looking up while still sitting in the lotus position, and responds. "And he didn't even think to invite us in on the fun. Come on, even though we haven't consolidated our orange cores yet, we're still leagues above what we were days ago..." Lydia turns to him, opens one eye, then closes it and shakes her head. "It's too dangerous. He isn't one to draw out a fight... whoever, or whatever, he's facing, they're definitely at or above his strength... We wouldn't last a full second near that battlefield." Abby is the last to add to the group's words. "I can't sense a thing, he's so far to the south... As far as I know, there is only a dead zone of desert for thousands of kilometers until..." They all sit in silence, knowing that the only thing they can do is become stronger and wait for good news. That is, until the outward ripple from the center of the abyss meets its outer ring. A wave of invisible grey energy pulses outward, similar to all of the surges triggered by the abyss in the past, but this one is far stronger than ever before, easily three times as powerful. The outer edges of the dark abyss creep outward a few more kilometers into the desert. The four of them feel it harmlessly ripple through them but recognize that feeling from past surges that have caused mass dungeon breaks and calamities. The grey shockwave that erupts from the abyss begins triggering even more breaks throughout the Dark Continent, and even further into the 8 Great Regions, spreading further out into the world like a massive sonar. My doubles back in the Crimson City feel it too and immediately jump into action. One of them heads out to Sector 3 to handle the breaks in the farmland, while the other alerts the Crimson Army to stop their training immediately and begin securing all of the dungeons within the canyon. Once they are stabilized and guarded by the proper ranked hunters, farming will be allowed for rare and unique loot for a limited time, just like the last surge. Lith and Monk have the proper strength alone to handle Sector 1, and the armed guards led by Chester are high enough level to manage the overflow in Solara and surrounding villages up in Sector 4. Far out in the Apex Region, my double that's farming dungeons feels it too and uses a teleport crystal to head back to the guildhall immediately, breaking up the family reunion of Bri and Rodrigo to learn the proper protocol to handle breaks in the 8 Great Regions. A double nationwide dungeon break emergency has been triggered by the battle that has just begun. High above the impossibly large crater dividing the Dark Continent and the Volcanic Region, our battle rages on. Every clash in the sky we exchange leaves both of us milliseconds away from making a fatal move. I don't even try activating my elemental or extra magic as a distraction; it's impossible to predict what direction the silver sword wielder will come from, and I only have fractions of a second to make my counter each time. The most effective strategy is using my fully charged blades, which happen to be my strongest offensive and defensive move. You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to Find your next favorite novel on NovelHub today! True Core-enhanced Soul Energy within these two blood-bonded weapons is the only thing that can possibly block her relentless strikes, and it's the only weapon that can pierce through her defenses as well. Both of us must keep total concentration on solely the fight in front of us, or it will be the final lapse in attention one of us will ever make. The fight only becomes more intense, colliding up to ten times per second, releasing more nation-destroying shockwaves into the atmosphere, and riddling each other with holes and slashes. Her excitement and thrill for the fight only grows the longer it goes on, and the worse shape both of us look. The woman I'm clashing with may be the only human in the world I've ever met with a crazed obsession with battle that matches mine, or is possibly more severe than my own. I'm enjoying every millisecond of our battle. It feels like the most natural, free-flowing dance in the sky. We both want exactly the same thing: to kill the other. No emotions are being held back, and the other participant in this deadly dance knows exactly what the other wants without a shadow of a doubt. As I clash with the silver sword wielder in the sky again, the third surge ripples through both of us, and the shiver it sends down my spine is reciprocated in my opponent. Despite being mid-clash, both of our attentions waver. We've been in a flow state of pure battle for hundreds of exchanges, but this powerful burst of energy is too strange to ignore. Our eyes meet, simultaneously realizing there is another threat among us, and both make the decision to use up valuable Divine Energy to send out pulses of perception to see the result of our actions at the center of the Dark Continent.