Fate Sovereign vs. Light Sovereign

Norman was the Fate Sovereign, and the Bryan he spoke of was the Light Sovereign.

In the Celestial Realm, there were three Sovereign-level experts: Norman, the Fate Sovereign; Bryan, the Light Sovereign; and Tristan, the Water Element Sovereign.

Though there were said to be three Sovereigns, in reality, the Celestial Realm had only two.

Tristan was the weakest and had been a Sovereign for the shortest time. No Sovereigns followed him in the Celestial Realm.

Instead, squeezed between the Fate and Light Sovereigns, Tristan had hardly any territory.

The Celestial Realm had only one supercontinent. Norman, the Fate Sovereign, occupied its northern and eastern regions, as well as most of its center.

Bryan, the Light Sovereign, occupied the western and southern regions.

As for Tristan, he was wedged into another small area in the center, serving as a buffer between the two. Whenever they fought with the Sovereigns under their command, Tristan was affected to some extent.

The Celestial Realm was unlike the Netherworld, where the Sovereign of Death kept the Wind Sovereign on the defensive. Nor was it like the Life Divine Realm, where the Sovereign-level experts all disliked fighting, or the Infernal Realm, where powerful Sovereign factions maintained a delicate balance.

Both the Fate Sovereign and the Light Sovereign were fiercely competitive, and each commanded roughly the same number of Sovereigns.

More than a hundred thousand years of fighting and friction had brought out their true anger.

Now, taking advantage of so many Sovereigns gathering in the Spatial Turbulence, Norman, the Fate Sovereign, had challenged Bryan, the Light Sovereign. Clearly, their conflict had reached the point where it could no longer be reconciled.

Hearing Norman challenge him before so many Sovereigns, Bryan was clearly not the sort to swallow the provocation either.

Clad in white robes, Bryan immediately took a Sovereign Artifact spear from his spatial ring.

Without regard for whether the other Sovereign-level experts might take advantage of them after their fight, Bryan shouted his acceptance at the Fate Sovereign. "Norman, if you want a fight, I'll oblige! Today I'll send you crawling out of the Celestial Realm!"

As he spoke, Bryan unleashed the full force of his Might of the Will. His dense aura of light was like a sharp spear, and the Sovereign-level experts present could not help growing more wary.

Neither the Light Sovereign nor the Fate Sovereign was weak. Whichever of them lost and left the Celestial Realm today, it would be bad news for the other three Overgod Planes.

Whichever of them left the Celestial Realm with the Sovereigns under his command would surely need somewhere to settle. No matter which Overgod Plane he chose, he would throw it into chaos.

After all, the rules governing Sovereigns had yet to be established, but almost all the territory in each plane already had an owner, leaving no room for outsiders to interfere.

Under the gazes of the assembled Sovereigns, Norman and Bryan took their fighting stances.

Norman took his Sovereign Artifact from his spatial ring. It was an extremely unusual weapon, a blade shaped like a long saber, with a series of thumb-wide grooves along its back. Its edge had not been sharpened.

Compared with the Light Sovereign's spear, the Fate Sovereign's Sovereign Artifact was indeed a strange weapon.

Both sides swore an Overgod Oath, staking their respective territories in the Celestial Realm. The surrounding Sovereign-level experts also swore Overgod's Oaths to oversee the fight without intervening.

After years of accumulated resentment, the two exchanged no pleasantries. The instant the oaths were sworn, a cold glint flashed in each man's eyes as they looked at one another.

The Fate Sovereign's strange saber and the Light Sovereign's spear each slashed toward the other from an extremely tricky angle.

The saber fell, striking the Light Sovereign's shoulder, but he turned into an afterimage.

The Light Sovereign's spear struck the Fate Sovereign and churned in his chest, but it was as though it had plunged into a quagmire, causing him no harm.

Clearly, the two were old opponents who knew each other's methods inside and out. Such probing attacks could not do either of them much harm.

Bryan attacked with extraordinary speed, bringing the speed of the Laws of Light to its utmost limit. Any Sovereign of an elemental system or one of the other three Edicts would have been hard-pressed to cope with his attacks.

But the Fate Element was the most mysterious and unpredictable of the Four Edicts. Norman uttered a few syllables, and the space around him instantly began to warp.

The Light Sovereign's Sovereign Artifact struck Norman with fierce attacks, but like a clay ox sinking into the sea, they had no effect on him whatsoever.

"What a bizarre technique," Bowen said in a low voice as he stood beside Redding. As an Earth Elemental System Sovereign, Bowen was an expert in defense, yet he could not see through Norman's move.

It was not like the Four Divine Beasts relying on their Sovereign Artifact-level toughness to withstand attacks, nor was it like an ordinary Sovereign protecting himself with a shield.

It was more like an ability akin to dodging, except that Norman had not opened any distance between himself and Bryan. Instead, he had strangely deflected the attacks.

Water Element divine power drifted through the surroundings. A glimmer flashed in Redding's eyes. "The Edicts of Fate... so that's how it is. They can be used like that!"

At that moment, Redding finally pried open a crack in the door to progress in the Edicts of Fate, which had troubled him for over a thousand years.

The others did not understand Norman's method, but it could not escape Redding, who also had a Fate Element Divine Clone.

Bryan's attacks were extremely fierce. If Norman used ordinary methods of defending against material attacks, he would never be able to withstand them.

But the most mysterious aspects of the Fate Element lay beyond what ordinary God Level beings could imagine.

Norman took all of Bryan's attacks, splitting the damage into countless portions and transferring it to his future self.

The methods of the Fate Element were mysterious and unpredictable. Norman used his own future fate as a means of defense in the present; at some point in the future, he would suffer the damage from Bryan's attacks.

That was why Bryan's seemingly fierce attacks had landed on Norman without causing any damage.

But Redding knew that, formidable as Norman's move appeared, its flaws were enormous.

Fate could be borrowed, but it could not be manipulated. The damage from Bryan's attacks would return to Norman at some point in the future.

Norman could not predict when the attacks would come due. If they struck when he was gravely wounded, these attacks, which would not normally be fatal, could be the final straw.

After attacking hundreds of times, Bryan grew increasingly impatient. His attacks had no effect on Norman, while a casual swipe of Norman's strange saber would leave a sizable cut on him.

Though the cuts were not fatal, the feeling of being unable to dodge or block made the Light Sovereign attack more and more frantically.

No, I can't go on like this. I'll use that move!

In an instant, Bryan's gaze sharpened. He sneered at Norman. "Norman, if you fall to this move of mine, don't blame me!"