"That person, that being, he might be behind all of this." Rudeus said, looking at Adam with serious eyes.

If it weren't for the situation, one would believe that these two were old friends working hard to find their nemesis, after listening to Rudeus's words.

However, Adam was not attentive to Rudeus's words as he didn't even know what Rudeus was talking about. Moreover, the fact that Rudeus talked to him irritated him, after all, Rudeus was supposed to be a heartless villain devoid of human nature, or so Adam believed, looking at what he did to Liu.

But now, Rudeus looked more like a disoriented person than a villain. Still, it might be one of the facets of his personality, and deep inside he is a bloodthirsty monster.

"What are you even talking about? Are you going to kill me or not? Because if not, can you just let us go?" Adam said, trying to provoke Rudeus.

Rudeus looked at Adam and pondered for a while before replying.

'Did he really consider it?' Adam thought. 'He seems like he is becoming a different person. What's the deal with him?'

"I can't do that.. I am sure of nothing." Rudeus said.

If he let Adam go now, and turned out that he let his only chance to obtain two fragments go, he would probably regret it later, or so Rudeus thought.

There was nothing concrete about the reason why Adam and Rudeus were fighting, but both of them knew that they couldn't let the other one go.

There was a feeling of doubt in their heart, but for their goal, they couldn't let the other one win.

Nevertheless, they felt like something was not right, as if there were too many coincidences leading up to this moment.

"I feel like I was manipulated, but no matter how I looked at the situation, the benefits were worth the sacrifices. I will get everything back, my world, my family, everything. But how? If I managed to collect all of the fragments, what would happen? Moreover, such a thing wouldn't bring anything to that person. Did they help me out of kindness?" Rudeus said as if he was thinking out loud.

After spending a long time alone inside of his castle, Rudeus began to think about what happened on that day, but no matter how much he pondered about it, his thoughts were always messed up, but now, he could finally gather all of his thoughts, and come up with a conclusion, only after meeting Adam.

"How the hell should I know? Anyway, you have gone too far, it's too late to go back now!" Adam shouted, and leaped towards Rudeus once again.

Rudeus didn't miraculously grow another arm, but even so, he could keep up with Adam and block all of his attacks.

Thud!

After that, Rudeus used kicks more often to retaliate, and they were as powerful as before.

Boom!

The whole castle was made of strong materials, but even these materials couldn't handle the shock created by the fight and started to crumble.

Still, Rudeus felt like Adam was limiting his potential and something restricted him, but he didn't know what or why. Maybe it was just because he was ignorant and lacked experience, but from his power alone, Rudeus could tell that Adam's background was not that simple.

Each of Rudeus's attacks was powerful enough to kill a level 7 gift holder instantly, but Adam managed to take a couple of hundreds of hits from him, but still stood up.

Moreover, Adam kept telling himself that his strength had decreased, but Rudeus knew that the power of his attacks was still the same.

"Why are you limiting your growth? Are you scared to die?" Rudeus said, looking at Adam with puzzled eyes.

"What? What are you talking about dude? Are you telling me to show you my full strength so that you can say: 'Finally, It's time to take this seriously or some bullish like that?" Adam answered, and he was quite surprised by Rudeus's words despite what he said.

Of course, Rudeus didn't understand what Adam was saying. "Well, your woman's time is counted." So he just a few words that made Adam react.

"Bastard!" Adam shouted.

*****

:::[Adam's POV]:::

'I am limiting my growth? What is this dude talking about?'

I didn't like his attitude, looking like he was thinking about something extremely deep while fighting, and then talking about nonsense while sounding extremely serious.

I thought that he would try to kill me without saying anything and that our flight would be extremely violent, but the dude in front of me was different from how I pictured him.

He was huge, and his look was imposing, with that black cape and dark skin along with the ripped muscles.

'Tch, is he one of these monsters who like playing with his prey and try to break them mentally before torturing them? No matter how I look at it, he is not normal.'

However, I thought about what he said, without taking my eyes off of him, even a minute.

For some reason, he never attacked me unless attacked him first, making me look like I am being played with. 'Tch, this is the worst. Even though there is no time.'

I believed that he did this intentionally to make me feel desperate and lose my cool.

I circled him slowly, as if trying to figure out my next move, but from the look of it, beating him with one hit I thought would be difficult.

Every time I deactivated my power of nullification, he managed to use that ability to move instantly from one place to another, which was a pain.

I thought that it was just because of his physical strength, but it seemed like he had another hidden card.

'Limiting my growth, huh?'

Was he trying to tell me that I should use that power without holding back? Was he trying to stir up my pride so that I would make a mistake? If so, he was extremely manipulative. He even used Liu to ignite my anger so that I would lose control.

But..

When I thought about it, I felt like even though his intentions were not good, his words made me think about something.

Up until now, I only used my power to destroy things, and I never used it to create anything.

I was thinking about the reason why I couldn't use my full power, and Cristal said that it was because my body was too weak to handle it.

That meant that I could use the power of creation, but I just didn't know how to do it.

'I need to think.. This might be the key to winning this fight and saving Liu.'

From what Cristal said, the power of Destruction was constantly active inside my body, protecting my soul from being crushed.

I didn't even know how that worked, but I believed that the threat that this power was protecting me from didn't come only from this world but another dimension. 'It was only for a few moments but I perceived it when Verte fused with me.'

Then, as soon as Verte went to that place, I couldn't feel her presence anymore. So in theory, all of my supposed godly power is inside that place, and it my power of nullification was the only thing that prevented me from accessing my full power. 'How strong is my power of Destruction anyway. And how much power do I constantly use without me noticing to keep it active.'

But if I released all of that in one go, my body wouldn't be able to hold it and I would probably die on the spot, and now understood why. 'It was not a matter of becoming a level 10 gift holder, or something as insignificant as that, it was about creating a whole universe, or destroying it.'

Of course, all of that was just my theory, but I was more powerful than I expected. 'Limiting my own growth, huh? Maybe he wasn't wrong..'

All I had to do now was to open that gate somewhere inside my body and bring Verte's power back, giving me access to another form of power other than nullification.

It sounded extremely easy, but I couldn't even imagine how having another form of power inside of my body felt.

'If the first place, I don't even know how to open that gate. Well, if I mess this up, I may actually die.'

******

"Lalalala. Lalala."

The existence walked around the room, but Rudeus and Adam couldn't even take notice of his presence.

"Your job is not over yet." The existence said, picking up Cristal's core. "This Adam should not stray from the path I set for him."

The existence was behind that record–

[Can you not interfere with me? And stop depicting me as a villain, we both know that all of this is for Adam's sake.]

p ...historical

[Don't look at me like that, we had agreed on this.]