In the void.
Watching Orsaga's idle figure.
The Jade Emperor asked calmly:
"Is it over?"
"I thought you wouldn't heed those people's warnings."
His words carried some surprise at Orsaga's decision to stop.
After all, the fellow before him truly was not someone who listened to advice.
Fighting one against many was hardly anything incomprehensible to him.
"I originally didn't want to listen."
"But then I realized there didn't seem to be much point in it."
"A battle where both sides were still holding back."
"Continuing to fight would only amount to that much..."
"A draw was a draw..."
"Even if we fought for a while longer, at most one side would gain a slight upper hand during some particular phase."
"The outcome still wouldn't fundamentally change."
"Besides, with troublemakers ready to enter the fray at any moment, I, an outsider, was obviously at a disadvantage and could easily be besieged..."
"So stopping decisively was also a very good choice."
Yet faced with such a sensible assessment of the situation, the Jade Emperor smiled. "But you shouldn't be that rational."
Orsaga did not deny it, replying:
"Of course."
"But pointless work is pointless work."
"It was enough to find someone to fight."
"Actually trying to kill someone of the same level was, in the end, far too uncertain..."
"If I had been confident just now, I naturally would not have chosen to stop."
His words brimmed with undisguised melancholy and disappointment.
"The exhilaration between life and death... I truly haven't experienced it in many years..."
Speaking of this, he shook his head again.
"But isn't that simply what happens when one grows stronger?"
"Or rather, immortality itself is one of the fundamental reasons countless lifeforms pursue power."
"If becoming stronger still meant dying easily, then power itself would presumably have