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Return of the Fallen Volume 9 Chapter 88

Kazuki was slowly being dragged backward, toward the black hole.

(Damn this pull. If I could use my aura, I could escape this but this black hole is just too much.)

Kazuki had only seen a few of these black holes in his entire life and the ones that developed were tiny in comparison. The one currently pulling him to its center started at the size of a small rock. As it continually pulled in the element of space from all directions, both its strength and size grew. It was now the size of an apple. An apple could arguably be laughed at but this was no laughing matter. The power of this black hole was more than what Kazuki was capable of quelling.

He had seen from Glacious’s memory, the dragon slayer himself destroy black holes with a wave of his power but they were on a much smaller scale. The one pulling him to his doom was many times stronger than those and Kazuki clearly felt it.

Kazuki had very few options but these options weren’t bad. If he couldn’t use space magic or his own aura, he could still use gravity. His eyes lit up with emerald light and his weight shifted and grew. His body swiftly exceeded millions of pounds in one fell swoop and he came plummeting to the ground below.

Both Torzz and Zetrazz’s power were pulled up like loose tiles and sucked into the black hole so the moment Kazuki crashed into the ground with his newfound excessive weight, he left a large crater in his wake.

Millions of tons of debris were launched into the air from his landing and they were all sucked into the black hole before the dust could even form a blinding cloud of dirt and more.

With his weight at this level, the pull on his body had reduced but he could still feel it. Extending an arm, he grabbed at the ground but before he could latch on, the ground gave like a weak dried-out stick and broke away, flying directly to the source behind.

Kazuki now found himself in a curious situation. With his weight being in the millions, he could avoid most of the pull behind him but at the same time, he found it difficult to move further away.

His dense weight was crushing the ground around him. At first, this wasn’t too bad. He quickly tried to reinforce the ground around him, making it as touch as diamond or Orichalcum but Torzz began to interfere. Torzz purposely sent his power into the ground around Kazuki. Kazuki would harden the ground around him but before it could settle, Torzz would uproot Kazuki’s change and make the soil soft and brittle.

(This Titan BASTARD!)

Kazuki then changed tactics. Raising a hand above him, he balled up a fist and smashed it hard toward the ground like a meteor.

(If I can’t pull myself forward then I’ll simply smash the ground beneath me. With my new strength, I can destroy the entire continent now. I’ll easily create a hole several hundred miles deep and escape downward if need be.)

Just as Kazuki’s fist came smashing down, Torzz once more made a change.

*PShhhh*

Kazuki’s hardened fist met soft sand. His impact was greatly reduced and a pillar of sand several miles high rushed up to the sky from his blow. Kazuki’s eyes widened and his anger and frustration grew.

(SAND! You think this will stop me. I don’t need strength to remove sand.)

Kazuki opened his mouth and roared.

*RAHHHHHHHHH!*

White flames came rushing out of his mouth as he breathed like a draconic demon. The flames spread out in a shock wave and hit the sand all around him all at once.

In an instant, the heat from his mouth turned the sand into a land of pure glass. Even the pillar of sand that had yet to finish falling all the way became a tower of see-through before it collapsed under its own weight and flew into the black hole.

With the sand turned into a river of broken glass and sucked away, Kazuki once more raised a dense fist.

“I don’t think so!”

Torzz changed the gravity on the ground and made it push Kazuki’s heavy body upward. He wasn’t directly reducing Kazuki’s weight but was instead making the ground act as a magnet. Instead of the forces being opposite and attract to one another, Torzz made them similar so Kazuki was pushed up and away.

Kazuki’s body, even with it weighing more than a hill was forced up and into the sky where he was promptly pulled backward. Kazuki’s eyes lit up again and he increased his weight by another million times. Just like this, Torzz would increase his power in the ground, disallowing Kazuki from descending fully while Kazuki constantly increased his weight and fell back toward the ground.

The two did this several times over and were pushed to the limit. Torzz was finding his control over gravity was near what he was capable of while Kazuki felt his body straining. He was tough, incredibly so, but he could just barely handle all of the added weight he put upon himself. It was like he was being crushed from all sides by thousands of mountains.

Every bone creaked at this point and his flesh seemed as if it would tear from the pressure. Not only did he have to deal with this crushing force but because he could not latch onto the ground, the black hole was still slowly but surely dragging him backward.

At this time, Both Torzz and Kazuki exchanged glares. One clearly wanted to kill the other, while the other only cared about survival for the moment.

“Why won’t you just die already!”

Torzz lifted his hand and metal started to materialize around him. A small ball formed in front of him and grew as metal wrapped around it rapidly. Seconds was all it took for a sphere the size of a mountain to form in front of him. Without another thought, Torzz launched the metal mountain at Kazuki, or rather he launched it at an angle up into the sky.

The mountain flew in the shape of an arc at a terrifying speed. This mountain was a planet killer. Torzz still cared for the world and didn’t launch this without reason. He understood what would happen if it struck the world but he knew it never would. Sending it flying in an arc flight path, the mountain was on the edge of breaking the black holes pull but just before it could it came flying back almost like a boomerang.

Its path though had clearly changed because of the pull. It was now coming back toward Torzz but before it would hit him, it would hit Kazuki who was further ahead. Not only that but after it knocks Kazuki back, instead of continually falling and crashing into Gordonia, it would continue flying backward and would be sucked into the black hole.

The idea was clever, something Torzz didn’t usually have in his arsenal but unfortunately for him, his match-up was with Kazuki. Someone who prided himself in cleverness. In this case, though it wasn’t cleverness that he needed but his own strength.

As the mountain of metal swiftly approached Kazuki, there wasn’t a sign of panic in his expression. A blade of god metal materialized in his hand and was just as long if not slightly longer than the mountain was tall. Just as the mountain flew seemingly far too close, Kazuki swung the sword with a good portion of his strength.

*Schink*

A clean-cut cleaved through the entire mountain, causing it to split in front of Kazuki. Torzz knew Kazuki could create a large amount of Orichalcum, he had seen it but he didn’t think he could create so much in an instant. The mountain he made and threw took longer than the time it took for Kazuki to create a blade and cut it apart.

This already brought frustration but what Kazuki did next made Torzz feel like an idiot. Just as the mountain split in front of Kazuki, Kazuki instantly changed the blade in his hand and shrunk it down, reducing its length to as wide as his body was. Turning the blade sideways, Kazuki instantly lengthened the blade and caused both ends to pierce the mountain.

Kazuki purposely dulled the blade the moment both ends penetrated the two halves of the mountain. Because of this, both ends of the blade sank deeply into the mountain without cutting it apart again. Once the blade was stuck, Kazuki circulated his ki as fast as possible and used all of his current strength to pull himself forward.

His strength pulled the two halves of the mountain behind him while simultaneously launching himself forward at a ridiculous speed. In an instant, he had covered several miles before the pull reduced his speed and once more had started to drag him backward. This new gap though bought him precious time while also infuriating Torzz.

Torzz did not expect this and quickly created a wall of flames. At the same time, Zetrazz did not sit idly by. If he couldn’t use his magic directly upon his older brother then he would have to use it on him indirectly.