A Reaper's Philosophy-Chapter 56: Evnoia

We were now faced with a force field that blocked our entry into the planet. Armando was the first to approach and be repelled by it. I then pushed my hand against the force field. With little to minimal effort, my hand passed right through.

What was more strange was that the other half of my hand, that was within the force field, involuntarily, recomposed its flesh. I then pulled out my hand, and it was back to that of a skeleton.

’Interesting...’ I thought to myself.

"Tailed Lilith, try puting your hand through." I said to her.

She then proceeded to do so with no resistance from the force field. Armando and Terry nearly made it through with a lot of effort, but were eventually repelled.

As for Kitsune and Livia, they couldn’t even come close to the force field. The force field constantly released a pressure that they couldn’t withstand.

"It seems you have to have a certain level of strength to be able to pass through the force field." I said to them.

"I don’t know if other reapers are able to go to Earth, now that the meeting has happened, so it needs to be protected. I can’t have my own world be conquered. Wait for me on Earth, I’m going to go kill this legend. " I said confidently.

"Great Monarch, going alone would be too dangerous. I- I don’t think Dunamis is an opponent you can defeat." Terry said to me.

"Not as I am, but I should be able to get stronger here. Not that I can count on the tailed Lilith, but she can hold her own as well. There’s also Azrael, so I won’t be alone." I replied.

The tailed Lilith still remained unfazed by what I said, still keeping her poker face. She looked like she was in a world of her own.

"Livia, how much manga have you read so far from the pile in my cloud?" I asked her.

"I’m a little more than halfway through the pile, why?" She asked.

"If you report to Thanatos whilst I’m gone, I will burn all the manga in the dark cloud." I said to her then opened a gate with my cloud.

The dark cloud twisted and morphed in an irregular way.

"I don’t think it will be safe to use a gate here. The space here is unstable." I said as I stared at the ever-morphing gate.

"WAIT...!" Livia and Kitsune shouted before disappearing.

"Let’s go." I said as I went through the force field.

The tailed Lilith followed behind.

"WAIT...!" Livia and Kitsune shouted.

Immediately after going through the force field, I turned back into my human form. I and the tailed Lilith then both felt an indescribable pressure bear down on us, causing us to plummet towards the Goliath of a planet.

’Shit, its like the gravity on this planet only spiked as soon as we passed through!’ I thought as we continued to plummet onto the planet.

I tried to keep myself afloat, but the gravity proved to be more than I could handle in my human form. I could feel my strength was now halved.

I looked over at the tailed Lilith and saw her struggling in vain as well.

’This isn’t just gravity pulling us down!’ I thought to myself.

{Welcome to Evnoia.}

{Checking compatibility with exousia.}

{Compatible}

{The Theós System accepts you as a worthy host.}

A bunch of messages began to pop up in front of me, but I couldn’t focus on them as I was still trying to stop myself from plummeting. We finally crash landed into a wasteland. Two giant mushroom clouds arised following our impact. A massive crater was created where we landed.

{Objective: Kill 10 Ordinary Beasts}

{Good luck!}

"What the hell is this thing?" I asked out loud as I tried to touch the message in front of me.

"You see it too!" The tailed Lilith exclaimed.

"These words in front of me? Yeah, they’re hard to miss!" I said to her.

"Good, I thought I was really going crazy there haha!" She said to me laughing.

I then looked around and saw nothing but a rough landscape covered with sharp, looking rocks poking out of the ground as far as the eye could see. I looked up and saw a magnificent dazzling sky. Although it was daytime, I could still see the stars in the sky.

I tried to fly back up, but the gravity on this planet only allowed me to fly up to 50 meters or so before being pushed back down by the pressure. I then tried to open a gate back to Armando and the others, but the gate failed to take form.

{Your body is unfamiliar with exousia. Failed to open gate!}

"We can’t fly away and we can’t teleport. We’re stuck here!" I said to the tailed Lilith.

"Great, another one of your fuck ups." The tailed Lilith said.

"What’s that supposed to mean?" I asked.

"All I’m saying is we wouldn’t be in this mess if we had just stayed put on Earth." She said.

"Stayed put? Like a good little dog? You’re right, we wouldn’t be here if we "stayed put", but there’s no point bitching about it now. First things first, we nneed to figure out what this exousia is." I said to her.

"It is life energy." A powerful voice carried by a gust of wind sounded from behind us.

We quickly looked back, but found no one there. However, in the next instant, a human-like being, about 12 feet tall, appeared in front of us as if popping out of thin air.

I and the tailed Lilith then immediately retreated 100 meters back, but surprisingly found the Goliath of a man already behind us.

’Can he teleport!’ I thought to myself.

"You guys are really slow. I would think a reaper bold enough to come here would be stronger." The man said as if to answer my thoughts.

"How lucky of me to have seen you, of all reapers, falling from the sky. It’s a really big planet you know. What were the odds!" He added with a huge grin.

I could tell by the suffocating death aura he emitted that this man was in fact a reaper. Since we were in Evnoia, this had to be The Legendary Reaper, Dunamis! However, he didn’t look like the average reaper. The reaper’s that I had met were mostly skeleton and more spirit than physical. This guy, however, looked just like a man, a very tall man.

"You are Dunamis!" I said out loud.

He then took a closer look at me and his grin immediately disappeared after noticing something.

"Weak insect!" Dunamis said as he looked at me disappointedly, with his dark black eyes.

From his gaze came a powerful pressure, as though to solidify what he said. I instinctively tilted my head to the side and had my ear blown off.

A grand explosion then went off behind me in the far distance. I didn’t dare to look back and take my eyes off the legend in front of me, but I could feel the residue shockwaves. Those shockwaves alone felt like a hundred nukes exploding behind my back. This was the power released from just his gaze.

My entire body stiffened. Neither I nor the tailed Lilith dared to move. At that moment it felt like a crime to do so.

’If that hit me, I...!" I thought to myself with trembling hands.

Blood dripped from the wound of my ear and showed no signs of stopping. I had been through a few life and death situations, but this was the first time I felt truly helpless.

"Don’t talk to me so casually, insect!" Dunamis said to me with a commanding voice.

I then swallowed dry saliva and didn’t dare to speak.

"So, you are him, the reaper of prophecy. You really are just like me." He began to say.

"So how can you be so weak? You haven’t even comprehended exousia. I had high hopes for you...but you’re just a bug." He said then swung his hand towards me.

I swiftly crouched down and avoided the swing. His one casual swing caused the ground to rip open behind me. It was like a tsunami made of earth.

"RUN!" I shouted aloud then dashed away to the side with all my strength.

We then sprinted as far from Dunamis as possible, but he caught up to us almost instantly, stopping us in our tracks.

"You have good senses, I’ll commend that...but you could never escape me." He said out loud.

’If I can’t escape then...’ I thought as I gripped my trembling fist and threw forth a punch at his face.

"A mere bug has the balls to strike me?" Dunamis said as he took the punch head on without even flinching.

I then continued to throw a series of punches from all sides at an incredible speed, but he just stood there like an immovable mountain, and took them all. I should have been able to find a weakness from one glance of my eyes. I should have been able to see the make up of his being, but my eyes saw no flaws in his body.

"Insect, stop your trivial struggles for survival. It’s sad. Nobody wants to see a bug struggling before it gets squashed. I’m not so heartless." He said then threw a kick at my torso midair.

He then sent me flying hundreds of meters away, then kicked me back towards the tailed Lilith.

"You are his helper, aren’t you? Are you just going to watch him die? Will you not help him?" Dunamis asked the tailed Lilith in a cold and raspy voice.

The tailed Lilith then looked down at me and casually said, "No."