The Tale of the Void Emperor

Right after Athan and others departed from the Chaos Monolith Hills, something started to happen among the core members of the Star-Breaker hill faction who fought in the trial challenge by Athan and others.

After they lost, they had to disband the Star-break hill faction, but the core members remained in the group and became residents in one of the hills instead of joining other hill factions because they planned to re-establish the star-breaker hill faction.

However, Nevitia, who fought against Athan, started screaming in pain right after the day when Athan and others left Chaos Monolith Hills.

Her body started to feel hellish pain as she was mysteriously injured internally, but it also healed itself back after that.

The Seed of Nightmare that Athan left inside her first released a tiny bit of abyssal darkness to damage her internals, but right after that, it released a bit of void pulse to recover the injury.

"H-help...," Her eyes revealed pain as she pleaded for help while laying on the ground, but the other members didn't come forward. They already tried once, and when they did that, they were also injured and had to spend a ton of effort to heal their little internal flesh damage while feeling terrible pain.

None of them wanted to feel that pain again.

She was being recovered by voidpulse since Athan had scanned her structure, but others didn't receive such treatment from voidpulse after they were slightly injured by a bit of abyssal darkness.

"Il-illias, help...," Nevitia had tears coming out as she asked for help, but Illias shook his head and sighed.

Nevitia's soul was also feeling heavy and tired as she couldn't do anything because the seed of nightmare had also had Athan's soul power, and it worked to suppress her soul.

At this time, someone arrived hurridly with worry and panic on his face. He was the guy with long, wild white hair and four hands. His name was Ulbarka.

Actually, he had secretly loved Nevitia but never expressed his feeling to her because he knew that Nevitia didn't feel anything for him.

When Nevitia started to suffer, he was outside, but his friend called him since he knew his feelings for Nevitia and rushed here.

"Nevitia!" Ulbarka rushed to her as he saw Nevitia's trembling body due to pain.

"W-what happened to you, Nevitia?" Ulbarka asked as he sat down beside her and supported her.

"Help...," Nevitia couldn't collect her thoughts and could only repeat one thing due to the soul suppression.

Ulbarka put his hand on her forehead as he sent his soul sense inside, but right after that, a little bit of abyssal darkness traced his soul sense and entered inside his body before devouring a bit of his internal organ's flesh.

"Arghhhhh..." Ulbarka also cried in pain like others but seeing Nevitia's painful face, he gritted his teeth with red eyes and endured this hellish pain before he started using his healing powers to heal the mysterious wound he suffered.

However, after thirty seconds, a bit more abyssal darkness entered his body and devoured a bit of his internal organ's flesh, causing him another round of hellish pain.

"N-Nevitia...whatever this is, I will endure it to-together with you," Ulbarka spoke before he gritted his teeth with bloodshot eyes and veins visible on his head.

Athan didn't put that much abyssal darkness since he only wanted their entire group to suffer 1% of the pain he went through.  However, nobody helped Nevitia share the burden except for Ulbarka.

He had also speculated that, and if that happened then, this incident would completely disband the Star-breaker hill faction.

In Athan's thought, if he were in place of Illias, then as the group's pillar, their close friend as well as the leader, he would definitely help share their burdens. This will create a strong bond, and others would be inclined to be more loyal to him.

This hellish pain was proof that one must care for the person to share this pain, and he knew that those bunch wouldn't do it, and it would lead to complete erasement of Star-breaker hill faction because It indicated that Illias wouldn't help them share their burdens either if he didn't even help Nevitia.

Nevitia and Ulbarka suffered together for a while, and finally, the seed of nightmare disappeared.

This incident helped Nevitia and Ulbarka get together for obvious reasons. Ulbarka's action moved Nevitia, and his feelings got through her. She would be stupid to turn away from a person who cared for her this much.

Both of them also left the group, and one by one, others also left the group since everyone had already gotten an invitation from other hill factions right after they lost their position as a hill faction. But Illias wanted to re-establish the Star-breaker hill faction, and they also hoped for it, so they stayed. But after this incident, they lost their spirit to re-establish the faction and just accepted an invitation from various hill factions.

Now only Illias alone remained as he sat down alone on the chair and in a dilemma on what to do now.

...

On the other hand, Mike and Qerin's special training had already started as they were sent to participate in Rift Battles.

Head Zangrel's plan was different, but the announcement of Rift battles from upper-Chaosverse arrived right on time, and he directly gave them a quota before sending them to participate. Anyway, this time's host was Great Bridgade Palace, so he had no problem in sending two people who just recently broke through to Zen order elite.

Rift battle is held at a special place where many chaos phenom dimensions are connected to each other and have very rich resources. Everyone is also given a special device on their wrist that will calculate their points based on the chaos beasts they have killed, rare items they have found, and such things.

In addition to the rewards they get from the rift battles, they can also exchange their points to train at a particular place arranged by all organizations where their training speed would increase by leaps and bounds.

This time's rift battles only allowed Zen order elite and Zen order masters to participate.

Naturally, participants were also allowed to kill each other, and it was a chaotic battle within a chaotic battlefield that is a large network of many chaos phenom dimensions. Once they enter the giant entry portal of Rift battle, they would often be swept by rift waves and appear in other chaos phenom dimensions.

Although Atha and others couldn't participate in Rift Battle, the place they were at, the special-grade Chaos phenom dimension, was even more useful for their growth than the Rift battle...However, It was also way more dangerous.

...

Mike and Qerin arrived at the grand canyon where many Zen order elites and Zen order masters had gathered.

The leaders of all major organizations, including Head Zangrel and Dean Lenix, were also present as they sat on a floating open-air pavilion.

"Hahaha, let's see which organization's members perform the best this time."

"Don't forget to do body count for dead as well. We got a lot more quota this time since this Rift Battle is for Zen order elites and Zen order masters."

"Dean Lenix, Is that Athan from your organization participating or not? After all, I heard that he also broke through to Zen order elite," The Pavilion Master of Boundless Pavilion asked. He was human without any special body features and looked like he was in his late thirties.

Everyone here had seen that mirage crystal and knew that Athan was no simple entity since he had such a massive backing called Void Emperor behind him.

"Hahaha, of course not! He doesn't put this Rift battle in his eyes, and to progress faster, he...went to a special-grade Chaos Phenom Dimension," Dean Lenix spoke with a grin.

"What?! He went to special-grade CPD even though he just broke through to Zen order elite?" Blue Arrow's leader spoke in disbelief.

"Well, I also heard that Athan and his entire group, who just broke through to Zen order elite, actually have battle power surpassing Zen order master and nearing the battle power of Zen order grandmaster," Pavilion Master spoke again with a faint smile.

"Dean Lenix...," The scroll master from Jade Scroll organization narrowed his eyes and said, "Your aura....how come I feel that you can actually break through to King-realm anytime?"