Celestial Bloodline Chapter 950: How did he lose it?

A single day elapsed within the Layer of Ancients.

Followed by yet another, shrouded in utter quiet.

All around, an unsettling hush prevailed.

In the midst of this quiet, the shadows in the atmosphere thickened progressively, rendering it nearly impossible to gaze forward. The pale fog encircling the open space where Azazeal hovered, anticipating Nathaniel's emergence from his rest, shifted to an inky blackness.

The whole ancient domain—spanning as wide as innumerable enormous worlds—appeared entirely dominated by him.

A grin crossed his face upon detecting far-off screams of torment. Every one of his forms assembling near the open area sensed Cassian slaughtering any creature in his path.

Numerous lesser Celestials who ventured into the Layer of Ancients alongside the Rulers, yet got detached from their allies and endured up to this point, perished under his strike. He embodied death incarnate—unyielding—in his wanderings through the ancient domain, drenched in Celestial blood from crown to sole.

With each kill Cassian claimed, he delved deeper into the shadows' grasp. Azazeal deemed it entertaining how Cassian appeared oblivious to his own descent, or maybe he just didn't mind, as though he had forsaken all for vengeance. However, oddly enough, Cassian hadn't succeeded in dispatching even one of the seven targets he truly sought.

Ares, Guardian Zami, Gvette, Silver, Jolie, Tai, and Owin—each of the seven—seemed to have evaporated without a trace.

Yet Azazeal, possessing total vision, arched a brow at their pointless resistance and, acting as a benevolent overseer, relayed their positions to his premier Celestial Shadow General, who wandered aimlessly in loops.

Distant, atop an elevated spot akin to a lofty peak littered with shattered boulders, Ares's wounded figure concealed itself behind a huge stone, his frame quivering while he gnashed his teeth.

Gradually—agonizingly slow—he glanced from the stone's edge into the gloom trailing him, where a distinctly recognizable silhouette loomed.

There stood Cassian, gripping a shadowy blade, his tone eerily soothing as he beckoned.

"I know you are hiding there. Come out, Clan Leader. I’m here to help... I swear."

Ares's mouth jerked as he averted his gaze.

Trusting someone enveloped in such profound shadows would drive anyone mad—and that ignored the gore and corpse at Cassian's feet.

He brazenly polished the blade in his grasp, as though gearing up for another slaying!

Shudders wracked Ares's entire form as he balled his hands and squeezed his eyelids shut.

'What's become of him?! We parted just briefly! How did he unravel so?'

Ares muttered curses softly. His wounds remained untreated from energy depletion, turning each motion into torment. His physique lay irreparable, still he declined to forsake it and withdraw to seclusion for forging a fresh vessel for his essence—since doing so would leave no defender for the rest.

The torment intensified from the relentless struggle to barricade his essence against the shadows creeping toward his form.

Two grueling days had ticked by since Kyle whisked everyone to security, yet healing eluded them all. Fortunately, Ares had imprinted each before Kyle's relocation spell, easing his pursuit. Ultimately, Ares resorted to gathering their essences via a relic, their forms too ruined to mend. Should he escape the domain, treasures could craft new vessels for their essences.

Cassian alone evaded Ares's detection. The imprint on him blurred by some force. Still, he persisted in hunting—merely to encounter a figure wholly yielded to the shadows, one hunting allies to end them.

Thus, upon spotting him, Ares swiftly withdrew and concealed himself, safeguarding the gathered essences of his charges in the band encircling his wrist.

He inched from the peak, sight blurring with every shift.

"Can we... survive this...?"

Hoarse phrases escaped his parched mouth as equilibrium failed, sending him rolling down the slope, hauling stones in his wake.

The noise drew Cassian's focus. His scarlet gaze sharpened to thin lines as he advanced on the tumbling rubble.

Cassian observed the stones plummet to the base of the peak amid the fog.

Simultaneously, Ares gasped, digits shaking under the stone's burden, yet he shielded the band, tucking it under his frame. Its integrity must hold—destruction would doom his kin and allies to oblivion.

He attempted to shove aside the crushing load. For a mighty Celestial, this ought to demand trivial strength, but his condition rendered it a Herculean ordeal. Finally, he yielded, resting silently beneath the debris, breaths ragged.

Footfalls resounded across from him, sharp and distinct. Still, resistance proved futile.

Suddenly, a known emblem glowed on Ares’s hand's dorsum, piercing the gloom. It fragmented into tiny fragments that streamed into him, bestowing the might to dispatch his essence and awareness to refuge. Ares's mouth formed a bittersweet grin as he murmured.

"Even now... you are helping us. So young, yet capable of so, so much. But it seems I won’t be able to live to thank you myself."

He sealed his lids, channeling the fresh influx of might into the band on his wrist and propelling it distant. Remote from his spot, a soft metallic chime rang out in the obscurity.

In that instant, Zami’s awareness flickered. Her dormant essence roused, and she groggily surveyed her environs. Recollecting the events post-Kyle's evacuation from the open area, Zami comprehended fully. The band belonged with Ares, who had located them and harvested their essences to shield from encroaching shadows. But finding it discarded in the void, she realized grave peril had befallen the Clan Leader. No other reason would prompt him to desert it.

Invoking her essence's inner strength—a risky act few attempted, threatening their being—she seized the band and departed in quest of shelter.

Uncertain of their concealment duration or endurance against the enveloping shadows, she resolved to defend the juniors fiercely while hope lingered. Maybe an escape from this peril awaited.

Should it not, they would battle until the last breath.