Hitman with a Badass System

After Rowena left the area to search for her mother, Michael, and Gaya was left with the shadow monster alone.  Michael wasn't afraid of being alone. On the contrary, he felt relieved to fight the monster alone. Granted, freezing the monster with the Doom bringer would take way longer than with the Cold flames, but he could comfortably land the last strike on the monster in the end. Suppose Rowena or Noah was here, and their strikes took down the monster. All of his experience points would go down the drain. Michael needed those points to reach the Half Celestial stage.

"Keep those beasts off my back," Michael said, looking at Gaya in the air. As he prepared for the battle, the shadow monster dashed at him. This time, the shadow monster seemed really pissed off at him. The monster's eyes glowed brighter than before with intense hatred and rage. Two fists materialized over the monster's head and moved at high speed toward Michael.

Michael's cat-like reflex made him raise the black shield and block both the shadow hands. The ground around him cracked open due to sheer force as Michael held off the monster's hands with his black shield. The shadow monster kept one hand on the shield and tried to punch him with the other. Michael quickly hit the ground with the Doom bringer creating an ice wall between him and the fist. The fist shattered the wall and sent Michael flying backward. However, Michael comfortably landed on his feet and cracked his neck.

He was totally unharmed by the shadow monster's attack. Now that Michael had fought the monster for four hours, he had a pretty good idea about the monster's capabilities. As a result, he calculated the monster's moves and avoided its attacks without breaking a sweat. Of course, the monster seldom came up with new attacks and made Michael spill some blood. But overall, Michael had the upper hand in the battle. Despite everything, Michael knew he couldn't go on longer with the battle. Even the Dark Lord had his limits and eventually would grow exhausted. Hence, Michael poured all his energy into the Doom bringer and fired a constant stream of bone-chilling ice at the shadow monster. Once he cast the Lightning dash, Michael almost turned invisible. He ran around the monster, trying to freeze it.

Although the ancient ice core could freeze a Core Formation cultivator to death in a minute, it couldn't hold a torch to the Cold Flames. Compared to the ancient ice core, the Cold Flames could freeze one in a second. The power gap between the ice core and the Cold Flames was huge. Simply put, Michael knew he had to spend days if Rowena hadn't returned to the monster and helped him with the Cold Flames.

An entire day passed as Michael spent his time battling the shadow monster all this time. It took him an entire day to freeze the shadow monster's core with the Doom Bringer. Once he had completely frozen the center, he covered his fist with the Dark Flames and punched the monster, shattering its core yet again. The monster roared with the large hole in its shadowy body. As a result, its cultivation power dropped from Half Celestial level 2 to level 1.

After two more days, Michael finally managed to bring the shadow monster to the Immortal stage. Thanks to all the potions and pills, Michael continuously fought the monster for three days. Meanwhile, Noah was facing his heavenly tribulation on the other side of the Fire Realm. Now that the shadow monster had become Immortal, Michael easily avoided all its attacks. However, it took him longer than he liked to freeze the damn thing. Luckily, Rowena returned to him when the sun rose in the horizon.

"You found your mother?" Michael asked Rowena.

"Yes," Rowena nodded.

"Sorry for leaving you all of a sudden," Rowena apologized to Michael. Normally, Rowena wouldn't apologize to anyone except to her family members. But she broke that rule and said sorry to Michael without realizing he was not her family. Michael just shrugged it off and raised his Doom bringer, sending a steam of bone-chilling ice. Rowena joined him this time as the Cold flames merged with the steam of ice. Even from afar, Gaya felt the sudden chilliness in the air. She could even see her own breath before her eyes.

The ice from the Cold flames and the ancient ice core rapidly formed a layer of ice in the monster. Michael and Rowena slowly moved forward as the monster was pushed backward. It screamed and roared, slowly getting frozen in its core.

"Remember, it's my kill," Michael warned Rowena. She wasn't going to argue with him as she knew he deserved to land the final killing blow. After all, he was the one who had been fighting the shadow monster for days. Once, the shadow monster's core turned into a crystal which Michael punched with enough force to shatter completely.

As the battle continued, Michael and Rowena repeated the same process of freezing its core and shattering it with brute force. Eventually, Michael and Rowena managed to freeze the shadow monster's entire body. Since the sun had fallen down, the darkness enveloped the world. As a result, Michael was at his peak power. Looking at the fragile monster, he knew it would only take one more punch to kill the monster once and for all.

Gaya watched Michael walking toward the monster with the dark flames coiling around his fist excitedly.

"Dark….Lord…" The shadow monster muttered. Its voice turned into a whisper as it stuck within bone-chilling ice. Ignoring the monster's words, Michael punched the monster as fast as he could. He didn't want Noah to appear out of thin air and end the monster's life. If that happened, Michael would definitely lose his calm and go berserk on Noah's entire family. Luckily for Noah, he was still facing his heavenly tribulation.

Finally, Michael punched the shadow monster, shattering its entire body. As soon as the shadow monster flew into countless glassy shards, Michael felt an intense surge of power within him.

[Ding! Congratulations to the host for killing a Half Celestial level 3 cursed shadow monster. The reward is 5,000,000 Experience points and 100,000 Badass points]

[Ding! Congratulations to the host for successfully being a badass. The reward is 60,000 Badass points]

[The System has stored the experience points needed to reach the Half Celestial stage in the storage and will keep them until the host upgrades the system to version 9.0]

[Congratulations to the host for killing a Half-Celestial being for the first time. As a reward, the system has gifted the host with a Legendary Gift box]

The system filled Michael's vision and head with the system notifications. Michael felt the excitement coursing through his veins when he received a Legendary gift box. Whenever he received a Legendary gift box, it boosted his power to another level. Thus, he couldn't wait to get alone and open the box. But first, he needed to deal with Rowena.

"We did it," Gaya said, landing beside Michael.

"We held up our bargain, Holy Maiden. We lifted the curse off your father. When you return to him, he'll be good as new," said Michael.

"I know you agreed to do it because of what I did back in Mazeroth. But by saving my father, you saved my family. I will not forget this,"  said Rowena.

Michael didn't say anything for a moment. He slowly turned around and looked in the direction of Hell city.

"If you ever feel like you have to do something for me in return, pay close attention to what Skyhall does behind your back. I am not the real villain as your brother and his guild believe," Michael warned Rowena as he slowly ascended into the air.

"They should back off while I still have my patience. Once I crossed that line-" Michael didn't finish his sentence. Instead, he let Rowena fill in the rest. As he reached higher and higher, Rowena saw the sky and the area around turn pitch black. The dark flames shrouded his body, raising the temperature in the air. He shocked Rowena with his power. At that moment, Rowena felt power radiation several times stronger than the shadow monster from him. The stormy clouds gathered above him and rumbled. When she looked at Michael, Rowena saw the lightning streaks in the dark sky. They felt like an ominous warning for whoever intended to cross his path. To be honest, Rowena had never felt such intense power.

"We will meet again," said Rowena. Michael looked at her without uttering a word before disappearing into the dark clouds. The darkness gradually faded away after he left the area. After he disappeared, Rowena looked in the direction of bright light rays and flew straight toward them.

While Rowena was on her way to Noah's tribulation, Michael headed straight to Hell City. One would expect him to be happy. But on the contrary, he had a frown on his face. Even Gaya didn't know what just happened that wiped off the smile she just saw a few seconds ago. Without uttering a word, he just headed straight to Hell city for some reason. The city was located on the other side of the realm and far from where Michael defeated the shadow monster.

"What's going on?" Gaya asked the questions countless times, but Michael remained silent. Only when Gaya saw the outskirts of Hell city did Gaya realize why Michael headed straight here. She heard a powerful humming in the air followed by a crisp ding like someone had plucked a veena's string.

"Is that Angel's veena?" Gaya couldn't help questioning herself. There was nothing except Angel's veena could have created such a powerful buzz in the air. Gaya could feel the violent energy fluctuations around her. The closer they got to Hell city, the louder the buzz sounded. If that wasn't enough, Gaya vaguely saw a figure floating above Hell City, covered in an emerald green light.

"I am sick of chasing you around, bitch!" Gaya heard a thunderous roar echoing through the fire realm.

"YOu are coming with me, dead or alive!" The angry guy shouted, loud enough to cause tremors in the ground. In his fury, he failed to notice the sky turning darker. Anger blinded him from seeing his death coming in the form of the Dark Lord.