Revenge: A Path of Destruction
Chapter 116: One Down

Chapter 116: One Down

Minutes passed.

The world around Alex blurred, the chaos reduced to muted embers and broken stone. His body screamed with every heartbeat, every twitch of movement. Consciousness dangled by a thread, and only sheer will kept him from collapsing.

He didn’t move—couldn’t, for a while.

But then... he did.

Slowly.

Each step forward felt like dragging his soul through broken glass, but he walked—toward the man still on his knees, the so-called champion of the Earth God.

Khepri.

He hadn’t stood.

Not once.

The disbelief carved into his face was still etched deep like a scar that refused to heal. His hands trembled at his sides, dirt and blood smearing the remains in his once-pristine armor. His lips moved constantly, muttering, babbling, ranting to no one—except maybe himself.

"I can’t lose," Khepri spat, his voice hoarse and cracking. "I was chosen by the Earth God. Their champion. How could I lose... to a boy who isn’t even in the same rank!?"

He began crawling backward, knees scraping across the stone and ash, dragging his broken body in futile retreat.

"There’s no way! What did you do?! Did you sell your soul to the devil!? There’s no way—no way I could have lost!"

But Alex kept walking.

No answer. No expression.

Just slow, deliberate steps.

The glow from his blade had faded, but the memory of its fury lingered in the air like a ghost.

He stopped in front of Khepri, who now stared up at him with bloodshot eyes, chest heaving. Alex looked down at the wreck of a man who had once stood as a legend.

Then, finally, he spoke.

"You’re the cause of your defeat," Alex said, his voice low, hoarse, but steady. "If you hadn’t kept the emergence of another Legend-ranked beast secret—if you had told the other Clans the truth... things might’ve gone differently."

He leaned in slightly, eyes narrowing.

"But no. You hid it. You wanted the glory. You thought you’d tame it and use it to rise even higher. And even worse... You didn’t tell anyone that after days of searching, you still couldn’t find the beast."

Alex’s lips curled into a faint smirk.

"That stupidity helped me more than you can imagine. It was all part of the plan. If you’d done the smart thing, I would’ve had to change everything. But I was betting on your greed."

He stepped closer.

"You didn’t disappoint me."

Khepri’s mouth hung open.

Disbelief filled his eyes like floodwater breaking a dam. He shook his head, as though trying to reject the reality presented to him. He planned for this...? The boy accounted for my silence? My arrogance, my greed?

"You..." Khepri rasped. "You manipulated me...?"

Alex didn’t respond.

Instead, he raised his katana—slowly, calmly, with the solemnity of a final rite.

Khepri’s rage tried to resurge, but something stronger had taken hold now.

Fear.

As the blade rose, his breath hitched. His pupils shrank. And in that moment, the truth struck him harder than any blow ever had:

’I don’t want to die.’

Panic overtook him. He tried to move. Tried to flee. But his body was long past saving. The wounds from Alex’s slash had broken him in ways he hadn’t yet registered.

Still, he tried. He begged his limbs. Move. Run. Crawl.

But Alex stepped forward again, blade fully raised.

And Khepri, desperate, played his last card—the only thing left.

"W-Wait!" he stammered. "I have a secret—don’t you want to know why....?"

But Alex didn’t flinch.

Didn’t speak.

Didn’t care.

The katana came down in a clean, ruthless arc.

Khepri’s voice was cut off mid-sentence.

His head struck the ground seconds later—still frozen in a final expression of disbelief and rage, as if even in death, he couldn’t fathom that the story had ended this way.

Alex stood over the body.

Breathing hard.

Bleeding.

Victorious.

---

Nyxara—the great tigress—moved like a shadow of death across the scorched battlefield, her obsidian-striped fur crackling with arcs of black lightning. Thunder rumbled beneath her paws with every stride, leaving smoldering footprints in her wake. On her back sat Thutmose, silent, his face carved in stone—but behind that stillness was a seething fury that only deepened the longer he watched.

Behind her, dragged in a reinforced, lightning-bound cage, were the remnants of Khepri’s bloodline and the Earth Clan’s elders—stripped of their dignity and domain, now prisoners. None spoke. Not a single voice dared rise above the growl of the wind or the occasional scream of a dying beast that made the mistake of standing in Nyxara’s path.

She did not slow for battles.

She did not pause at the sight of human soldiers, beast hordes, or the clashes of blood and steel below.

She tore through them all—indiscriminately.

Every beast that approached was struck down instantly by arcs of black lightning from her tail or claws, disintegrating before they could cry. When humans dared to stand in her way, confusion in their eyes, the same fate awaited them. Blood soaked the plains beneath her, and even Thutmose’s clenched fists couldn’t stop it. His jaw tightened with every corpse that fell, but he said nothing.

None of the elders behind him dared to rebuke the carnage. Their pride had already been shattered the moment their bindings clicked shut.

Only one among the Khepri family had been spared from this humiliation—Second Princess Talibah. She had been ordered by Thutmose to remain behind. Everyone else was here. Everyone that mattered.

And they were helpless.

A few minutes earlier, Nyxara had received a call from Alex.

A word—telling him to bring the prisoners over, but she could feel it, through their bond, the pain he was currently going through.

Alex.

She had not questioned the order. She had charged in the direction at once, adjusting her gait to accommodate the fragile bodies she carried. If she had moved at her true speed, the wind alone would have reduced the prisoners to pulp. But even at this measured pace, the land blurred beneath her and burned in her wake.

And then... they arrived.

To the ruins of what had once been a land full of pure mana.

No terrain left. Just scattered debris, ruptured stone, and the blackened remnants of power.

The very air was still trembling from what had happened here.

What was more terrifying than the destruction was the silence that clung to the ruins like death itself.

And at the center of it all—stood a man.

Bloodied. Burned. Bruised. But standing.

In one hand, he held a katana slick with fresh crimson.

In the other...

A head.

Khepri’s head.

The Patriarch of the Earth Clan.