“Shatter!”

The space itself was breaking apart, opening rifts full of dark void, which spread towards the earth’s surface at a quick pace.

At that moment the itching intensified by a multiplier of 1000. After just one second it wasn’t even itching anymore, his body felt like it was cracking apart, slowly disintegrating into little pieces.

Despite this sensation, his body was still whole, but the same couldn’t be said about his surroundings. As the spatial cracks reached the surface of the earth, they started pulverizing anything that got in their way, yet strangely, there was no sound. The gravity seemed to disappear, the tops of buildings whose whole foundations got taken out just floated in the air as if time itself stopped.

The cracks continued spreading, but Theo couldn’t move, his body suffering more and more by the second, yet along with the entirely new kind of pain, he could feel something else. The feeling of freedom, like some invisible chains that were binding him, started breaking one by one. As the pain continued to increase, so did the strange new feeling… until the fractures reached him.

In front of his eyes, he could see a scene of a human body being dismantled by thousands of sharp spatial blades, yet even as the butchered pieces of flesh floated before his eyes, the lack of any sound whatsoever made the whole scene even more surreal and unbelievable.

Theo couldn’t see the faith of his own mortal vessel, but just like before, he couldn’t move, nor could he feel anything other than the excruciating pain and the strange sense of freedom.

The spatial shredding continued. In no time the earth was reduced to floating rubble, then to mere dust, until not even dust was left.

All Theo could see at that point was darkness, not even the sun was visible. The pain stopped growing but was still there, yet that didn’t bother Theo, because he couldn’t remember the last time he felt so good. It felt like this was the first time he ever took a true deep breath.

‘That reminds me, am I even breathing? Maybe I… died? Is this what it feels like to truly be dead?’ Theo didn’t know what was happening, but the possibility of him dying didn’t bother him in the slightest. Of course, if he had to pick between living a normal life or dying, he would still pick the former, but he wasn’t a picky person. Since god finally offered him the gift of death, he would accept it with open arms.

“AHHAHAHAHHAHA!” at that moment charming male laughter entered Theos ears, not that he was even certain he still had a pair of those.

“What is this energy? So pure, such high quality, it even feels as though it was alive.” The voice was full of joy and relief, relief of the fact that the gamble paid off, relief of the fact that he might really be the first person to achieve a whole new realm.

“I didn’t know that even the great world spirit could succumb to the sin of greed. Old hag, I see you have quite a treasure here, you don’t mind if a borrow it for a while, right?” Said the owner of the voice with a clearly sarcastic undertone.

The question seemed to solicit a response, as the female voice returned. Yet this time, it was not angry nor even a little panicked at failing to stop the man from doing as he wished. Rather it seemed calm with a hint of disappointment.

“So foolish, so very foolish. You may be strong, stronger than a vast majority of life to ever exist, but despite your belief, you are not the strongest, not even close. The world is not as simple as you think, nor as small as you would like to believe. You have committed a grave mistake, one that even the sacrifice of your own life cannot rectify. I do not know what is to come of this now, but I do hope you have not just doomed us all.” The serene voice ended, not bothering to put up a meaningless struggle, and continued to observe.

This sudden change of tone and the woman’s sentence truly baffled Kundrarra, he didn’t know what she was on about, but the sudden information was truly shocking. As the world spirit, she was of course shrouded in mystery, even for Kundrarra himself.

To say he wasn’t the strongest wasn’t pleasant to hear, but he could accept it. But to claim that there was someone who was so much stronger than him that he couldn’t even come close, he just couldn’t accept, no, he wasn’t willing to believe it. He was always the most talented, the strongest, the one that came out on top. Even now, he was the top, he reached the pinnacle, it was impossible to reach a higher level, there wasn’t enough energy, nor were there any resources in existence that could increase his strength for even a fraction.

As for considering the people of other epochs possessing greater resources. Even more impossible. It was well known that the cycle of epochs is the world's way of evolving and growing, if anything, the difficulty of someone reaching his level would only increase.

He decided to put those things at the back of his mind and focus on the present. The only thing he could do now is make use of the situation, it's not like he can just turn around and leave such a treasure trove behind. Just the thought of absorbing such energy sent shivers of excitement down his spine. None of his cultivation partners could bring this kind of excitement out of him anymore. It reminded him of the time when his journey on the path of supremacy just began.

For starters, he decided to travel to the source of this strange energy to gain some additional information. Normally, this would be completely unnecessary, since his senses already surpassed all realms of reason, but this energy seemed to inhibit any and all attempts of infiltration with his detection abilities. Even his eyes couldn’t see far in this swirling orb of white energy, which was gigantic even in comparison to his form. That just showed its sheer magnitude, since it eclipsed a man that could even pick up galaxies with his bare hands.

Entering the white mass almost made him feel like mortal wandering through thick fog, a sensation he hadn’t felt for so long it basically seemed new.

The sensation of being immersed in this energy felt strange, to say the least. On one hand, it felt amazing, but on the other, it seemed as though the energy rejected him. It was not a rejection on a level of two magnetic poles repelling each other, it was a rejection of a sentient being who despised the thought of interacting with a lower existence. That was the impression that he got, an impression that confused even himself.

Finally, he arrived at the center, or at least its near vicinity, as this was as far as he could go before the energy got so dense that even his senses would completely fail. He wasn’t too certain what the right approach was, this was a one-of-a-kind situation after all and although this energy was rich and pure, that doesn’t mean that direct absorption is the smartest idea. Normally he would just trap it in a pocket dimension and take it with him, but unfortunately, even space couldn’t contain something this powerful, which was made abundantly clear by the fragmented space and time in the vicinity of this energy.

Running out of options, he decided to absorb a fraction of this energy and experiment with it until making further actions. A decision that would lead to his doom.