Chaos Devourer System: My Classless Ascension-Chapter 84 - 83: Determination!

Following a brilliant flash of light, the remaining participants were teleported out of the Spire..

The empty platform suddenly became a little bit crowded...

"Ahhh finally...!!"

"Thank the gods... we’re out.. I survived.."

"Damn it.. those things were impossible to fight, who’s idea was this..."

Incessant chatter filled the place as the newly arrived participants groaned, some weeping tears of relief, others looking like they were still alert to any kind of threat..

"Humph.. fools.."

"Overestimate yourself and this is the outcome.."

"Classless plebeians.."

Whilst others complained and cried, there were still those who retained their strong postures, confidence radiating off their bodies in spades..

They looked like they’d gone through a storm and survived, no. Not just survived, they conquered...

I looked around slowly, assessing their conditions...

The first thing I noticed, asides the obvious reactions of the crowd, was the significantly smaller number of people on the platform...

The innumerable numbers I’d seen before going in, the thousands of aspiring youths and dreamers, all reduced to a small number of a few thousand..

And of those numbers, many looked like they were on the verge of collapse..

Some looked like the time limit had actually saved them from inevitable peril as I spotted a young man with his guts spilling out, the on-site healers trying to get him patched up...

The smell of copper and iron that filled the air told a story louder than words itself..

I was stunned for a brief moment..

The forlorn expressions, the lost and lifeless gazes..

Faces that told stories of dreams shattered in the wake of reality, of hopes squashed in the true brutality of this world...

It was a sudden wake up call...

I’d forgotten, in my wild and maddened tower climb that actual lives were at stake..

I always knew there was danger involved, but when you had a talent that literally rejected the concept of damage, of death, you tend to forget that others are a lot less durable than that..

A solemn realization settled within me.

"If I didn’t have chaotic denial, if I didn’t have something as broken as abyssal firmament dominion.. hell if I didn’t have my devour ability.. I could have easily been one of those unfortunate souls"

All my dreams, aspirations, hopes.. gone.. just like that..

Not on a battlefield..

Not when I was taking vengeance..

But in a stupid trial that only acted as a qualifying round for an academy...

My name forgotten, discarded, as others go on to become pillars of the world and beyond...

The flame of determination that had begun to go lukewarm due to my overwhelming abilities, my terrifying potential, suddenly ignited once more, burning brighter than ever...

My eyes shone with intensity as I took in the conditions of my fellow candidates...

Yes. I had chaotic denial..

Yes. I had abyssal firmament dominion..

Yes. I had something as broken as DEVOUR, which simply means I was going to just keep getting more and more ridiculous abilities...

And with titles like <LIMIT BREAKER> and <SON OF CHAOS> odds are, those same abilities would be more reality breaking, just like Abyssal Firmament Dominion..

But even with all that, I still had a long way to go..

I was nowhere near invincible, nowhere near untouchable...

All these abilities, for all intents and purposes, scaled to what I could currently handle..

Hell, proof is in the fact that even with Bloodline/Physique assimilation, I still couldn’t safely fuse with my sealed bloodlines..

Chaotic denial and Abyssal Firmament Dominion charged such an absurd amount of energy they’d become only trump cards against true threats..

I. Was. Weak.

There were still people who could squash me so hard chaotic denial would be useless..

People like Mormon and Omari Du Mont, my so called "grandfathers" who controlled such an absurd concept that even with all the time I spent comprehending it, devouring fragments of it, I was still a far off way from crossing the 1% threshold..

One of these days I was definitely going to encounter monsters that wouldn’t pull punches cause of relations..

And if I didn’t want my outcome to be like those poor souls, lost without any accomplishments to their name..

Lost without ever leaving their mark on this world..

Then I had to get strong. Fast.

Not just strong..

I had to become the strongest..

"Yes.. the plan still never changes..

Train..

Devour..

Get Strong..

Repeat.."

The plan remains the same...

"Welcome, everyone!" Valen’s voice pulled me from my thoughts..

The surrounding chatter dying down slowly as all eyes trained towards the man himself..

Valen had returned to his usual robotic expression, his stoic gaze took in the crowd’s condition with no change in expression..

"Congratulations.. you have finally been introduced to a little bit of the face of the reality you live in" his words weren’t of coddling..

They weren’t congratulatory words, hell he barely even acknowledged their success...

"Those of you standing here right now are those that have gained the qualifications to see the true face of the world, it is not a fantasy, it is not a fairytale, the world is a cruel, harsh, unforgiving place that could claim your pitiful life within an instant" he drew his gaze across the entire crowd..

His words had silenced not just the participants..

The entire city had gone silent..

Those watching had gone silent..

A realization settling within them..

This wasn’t a mere trial..

Aeternum’s tests never were..

They were introductions..

A welcoming show to the true face of the world they lived in..

"Others might paint the world as some place where power begets you the right to life, but let me make it clear, power only begets strife, and unless you’re the strongest..." the moment I heard that, my body trembled violently..

My eyes sharpening as I suddenly found myself focusing intently on every word coming out of his mouth..

"Unless you’re the strongest, the absolute, the one who’s one move could silence the world, you have no true right to life, for even the strong perish, even the powerful have the day death welcomes them, even if they’re unwilling.." his gaze seemed to linger on me for a brief instant, our gazes clashing briefly and I swear I could see sadness, pain, shame and anger? Within those black eyes before he turned away..

"So, I will not congratulate you, for you’ve done nothing worth congratulating you for, you’ve merely passed the introduction.." he paused, letting his words sink in fully..

"From here on out, what you do determines what type of life you live, for even though the strong have no true right to life, they’re the only ones worthy enough to contest it.."

"So, get strong.. get strong enough to not be at the whims of death, get strong enough to claim your fate, for then and only then, can you truly say you are alive.."

His words settled deeply within me, and I could tell from the hardened expressions around me that I wasn’t the only one feeling it..

"Most of you will perish along the way, but you shall do so knowing fully well you never had a choice from the start, it was either perish while striving for freedom, or perish in mediocrity like those who didn’t survive this little exam.." he concluded..

I know he didn’t intend his speech as a motivation.

For the fact that his expression barely twitched the whole time.

The man didn’t seem to be the type to motivate no names, yet that was the effect it had, I could feel the very air being charged with determination..

"Heh.. now this is more like it.. it would’ve have been less fun crushing already dead hopes"..

"And so, without any further delay, let’s see just who has gained the qualifications to continue in this journey.." and with that, the massive leaderboard reappeared, displaying the names of the Top 1000 that would be going to the Imperial City, for the final hazing..

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A/N: damn, man is as hard as a rock.. didn’t even congratulate them..

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Thanks for reading...