MIDNIGHT PRINCE: Empire of Sin



The start of the fight between the mother and son pair was electrifying, to say the least. Viktor thought as such while he watched the dainty woman so much smaller than him throw a punch that created a long trench through space at chaotic speeds before reaching Adam in a flash.

The attack had been so sudden and instantaneous that all it took was a blink of an eye to lose what transpired before them. This had already gone out of the realms of the average supernatural fight and it was only a spar…

'What..'

The ground rumbled and a wall of dust and rubble settled on the atmosphere along with the barrage of the super speedy attack, but when it finally settled down, they were able to witness Adam's visage, completely unscathed from the previous blow.

There was a translucent wall of intangible space surrounding him. Most likely, the intangible space was some sort of ability he had used to protect himself at the very last moment from Cecilia's attack.

"Heh, I would have been sorely disappointed if you had become down for the count with just that."

Cecilia laughed under her breath and began to stretch her body even more, a bloodthirsty, battle-hungry grin was plastered on her face as her eyes reflected the vigilant and cold look of her son.

"Very well Adam, let's continue the warm-up, shall we?"

She was not finished speaking before… she suddenly buckled down slightly. As though she was suddenly weighing too much or something was pressing down on her body, she crouched on the solid ground hard. It seemed like an intangible undetectable force was forcing her down to the ground…

The ground cracked under her feet and Viktor immediately understood that Adam was using his power over gravity to suppress Cecilia down to the ground. Surely, this skill of his was extremely versatile. Even if all he could do was increase or decrease the gravity of his surroundings, it was still a game changer.

"Oh? Been a while since I felt my weight increase so much. But you see Adam… That is completely useless against me. Anything is before absolute power…"

Cecilia took one step forward and instantly, her body flashed before landing right in front of Adam as though the previous suppression on her body had been a lie, ready to bring her son down with another one of her deadly punches.

Adam reacted much more readily this time, deflecting her fists rather than clashing against them head-on. Then the spectators could only watch as the two started exchanging punches and kicks and all sorts of combat techniques at speeds many times faster than what even supernaturally trained eyes could perceive.

"Grandfather. I thought Adam was a long-range fighter."

"He is. But take a closer look, he is quite skilled at short range too, all things considered. He realized that fighting directly against her would be severely hard. Almost impossible. From the information we have of him, I believe he is slowing down her movements in his mind with his Accelerated perception. Then, using gravity to lower his own weight while increasing that of Cecilia, he is able to react much faster than what he would be able to do in normal situations."

Viktor looked at Makarov with new eyes before focusing once again on the fight. He filled his eyes with Prana and while things still looked blurry, he was at least able to perceive the fight between them a bit better than before. It was clear enough for him to understand the general trend of the fight.

"It seems like Adam has the advantage for now?"

Even though Adam was under multiple attacks, it was clear that he could parry all of them with ease. He simply needed an opening to put Cecilia down! Or so Viktor thought in his mind…

"Well, the boy is certainly giving us a great show of his capabilities. But… This is just the start. He needs to take his distance if he wants to survive against Cecilia."

Indeed, even though Adam was able to follow and repulse Cecilia's attacks to a certain extent, even the wind pressure coming from her fists was enough to leave wounds and scratches all over his body.

Furthermore, his arms and hands were not unscathed either. He could feel them throbbing even as he fought against Cecilia with all his might. His psychic shield was also under great pressure due to the constant battering of his mother's attacks.

'She really is way too fucking strong.'

He cursed in his mind as he acknowledged his mother's undeniable supremacy. It was quite clear that she was simply playing around for now but the results had become evident from just that.

'Using close combat against her is blatantly stupid of me.'

He made up his mind to go all out. He increased his perception of time through his skill… it was to the point where her fist became so slow, they looked like they were now normal jabs that came from an ordinary back alley ruffian.

Bending his waist, he managed to avoid her attack narrowly and grabbed her by the arms before making a throwing motion.

"Oh?"

Once Cecilia was in the air, he immediately used his telekinesis to grip her body tightly.

Huff~

Breathing deeply, Adam spoke as he smiled,

"It seems like I managed to incapacitate you."

Moving and reacting at the speed Cecilia had been casually going against him had not been easy. She was basically as fast as Makoto at her fastest possible speed and it seemed like she had not even begun to start trying anything.

Cecilia shrugged, "Being caught like this does feel weird I must say. I can feel the Prana around me, but it doesn't really feel like you are grabbing me that way. How interesting."

"You seem quite relaxed, Mom."

"Oh, I am. I had quite a good warm-up because of you. I am happy to see that you still know how to use your fists despite your newly acquired powers."

"I have had a good teacher."

"Heh, indeed. So let me teach you something else today."

A large and menacing grin formed on her face. Adam suddenly felt the temperature around him rise sharply. So fast in fact that the air itself seemed to ignite.

He immediately threw Cecilia as far away as possible from him and…

Whoosh~

The sky seemed to be covered in a blood-red glow as a crimson light lit up the surroundings in the air.

Then, like a star rushing at him, Adam could see Cecilia coming at him once again.

But this time… She was flying.

Fiery tongues of crimson red light had entirely covered her legs and it looked like she had attached a high-speed jet propulsor to her feet with how she was coming at him like that…

Adam let out a laugh filled with utter disbelief and immediately covered his body in silverly blue electrical lines that zapped away at his surroundings before also starting to fly in the sky… immediately rushing toward her with his dagger in hand.

What followed was a true clash that seemed to have come out of a mystical tale as blue and crimson light left traces in the air and zapped all around like there was no tomorrow.

Every time they clashed there would be explosions of power caused by the different elements they were both using.

Sometimes, Adam would create illusions of himself to throw her out of her game, but like a homing machine, she would always find him and make sure he could not escape her barrage of attacks.

The damage that Adam was receiving was progressively building as more and more time went on but he did not care, he did not have the time to compare. He was simply lost in the fight, used all his time to focus on his opponent, as he started using everything he had at his disposal.

He realized fast that Cecilia did not seem to use logic and reasoning for the duration of a fight. The reason why she could distinguish his illusions from reality wasn't just because she was strong.

She was basically purely moving out of her supernatural bestial instincts. Her mental fortitude was also such that his illusions seemed useless against her.

It was hard. But the more he went on, the more he understood just how rewarding his current clash against his mother was.

When they finally stopped, more than half of the plain surrounding them had been destroyed as the fire and lava that seemed to have erupted from hell spread everywhere as far as the eyes could see. The sky was also covered in black clouds, and the wind was picking up in the distance and slowly covering up the atmosphere.

"Adam, I think it's time to end this here."

This was not an official match after all, never was it a fight to the death either. There was a limit to how far they could go.

"I can still fight."

"Oh… I am sure you can still fight. But Adam…"

Even though they had been fighting for so long and were wounded to varying degrees, it was clear that Cecilia still somewhat held the upper hand in this fight.

If she had to be honest, she was surprised Adam had managed to even last this long against her. It had only been a few days since his fight against Makato but he was already showing signs of great growth. His speed of growing was simply unprecedented in all of history…

"Adam, you are really talented. Perhaps too much even. Which is why, I will teach you the greatest lesson I was taught as a Kid."

The relaxed atmosphere around her vanished completely.

"Sometimes, when you have no other choice, it's necessary to throw all caution to the wind and fight like a madman. This is the reality. But you see… Sometimes… It's okay to run. Running means that you survive long enough to fight another day…"

She knew that Adam was immortal. But he did not have some sort of super regeneration under his belt.

"So. Adam, let me show you something… let me show you… what it means to open the Gate of Truth."

She could easily use a power level between an executor and a director. It wasn't enough for her. But for now… This would do.

The air became dry as though the very existence of air itself was being turned nonexistent.

The grasses turned to ashes as they ceased to exist due to the fire that seemed it could annihilate everything without the slightest exception…

The clouds in the sky scattered as they made way for the void above and even there… the space distorted as though it was having a hard time existing before this power that was about to be released.

『 Phantasm Realm -::- Múspellsheimr 』 [1]

When Adam opened his eyes, he realized that he had been transported in a place that was much different from what he remembered.

Flame, flames, flames everywhere with seemingly absolutely no limit even when inspected with his dimension.

'Where is this place.'

"This place is the manifestation of my inner heart. Quite beautiful sad isn't. Well, Adam… Welcome to my world. "

—

[1]: For my reader of SHK, Phantasm Realm is kinda like a zone but not at the same time. The best example I can say for everyone (reading SHK or not) they are like Domain Expansion (Jujutsu) or Reality Marble (Fate). In a way, they are the Bankai of my world. Not many can have something like this.

(AN: I know some readers might not like when the mc loses. Though any of you guys who followed to this level certainly won't be bothered. I think this kind of moment is very important. Both to set the power level of the world and also to knock down some arrogance from mc. Trust me. I have a very cool power in mind for Adam that he will learn thanks to this experience.)