The remaining billions of angels finally began to move.
There was no longer any distance between them. The entire sky was filled with two-winged figures, halos shining above their heads. They came from every direction, sealing off every remaining space around Valt.
Swords of light descended simultaneously.
Spears, chains, and various sacred weapons pierced through space. Each attack carried a different kind of power, yet they all shared the same objective.
To execute Valt Nacht.
Valt stood motionless.
One attack after another approached him.
Yet not a single one managed to touch his body.
It was not because Valt dodged.
The space surrounding him had changed on its own.
The distance between Valt and the incoming attacks continuously shifted, making anything that attempted to reach him seem as though it had never truly possessed a destination.
Valt stared at the billions of angels before him.
"You really can't die."
An angel answered.
"We are angels. Death has no place within our existence."
Valt fell silent.
For several moments, there was no expression on his face.
Then—
Valt's existence began to tremble.
Not because of an attack.
Not because he had been wounded.
But because something that had remained buried deep within him was beginning to move.
The eyes surrounding his abstract form slowly opened one after another.
The clown faces that had appeared within the void gradually stretched into wider smiles.
The space surrounding Valt began to bend.
Then—
it cracked.
Valt lowered his head.
"Then..."
His voice was lower than before.
"...I don't need to hold back anymore."
The entire battlefield suddenly fell silent.
Valt raised both hands.
"The Second Restraint..."
His existence trembled even more violently.
"RELEASE."
BRAAAAAAM!!
There was no explosion that destroyed the world.
Yet reality itself seemed to lose its stability.
Space warped.
Dimensions trembled.
The boundary between existence and nothingness became blurred.
Something that had been restraining Valt's power for so long finally collapsed.
Valt's body began to change.
It was not a transformation into another form.
Rather—
he began to lose his form altogether.
His body disappeared.
His head disappeared.
His hands disappeared.
Even the boundary that defined where Valt's existence began and ended vanished.
What remained was something that could no longer be explained through physical form.
Dozens of clown faces appeared within the void.
Then hundreds.
Then thousands.
Eyes emerged in countless places.
Within space.
Outside space.
Between dimensions.
Even in places where there should have been no such thing as a place.
Every eye opened simultaneously.
Red.
A crimson so deep that the light surrounding them seemed to lose its color.
Billions of angels stopped.
For the first time since their arrival, they did not immediately attack.
They sensed something different.
Something they could not comprehend.
One of the angels stared at Valt's form, fear beginning to creep into his voice.
"What kind of existence is that...?"
Valt did not answer immediately.
Then his voice came from every direction.
"Until now..."
"...you were only fighting Valt Nacht while he was still restraining himself."
One of the crimson eyes opened wider.
"The one standing before you now..."
"...is Valt Nacht after his restraints have been released."
The billions of angels raised their weapons once again.
They did not care about Valt's transformation.
They would still carry out Gabriel's command.
"Execute."
The entire army attacked once more.
Valt did not retreat.
Instead—
he vanished.
In an instant—
BRAK!
One angel was sent flying.
Valt appeared behind him.
A single punch struck the angel's body, sending him through several layers of space.
Valt turned.
A kick struck another angel.
His body shot forward and crashed into the ranks of angels behind him.
Dozens of angels were thrown away.
Before they could even recover—
Valt was already in their midst.
His hand seized one angel.
The angel's body was spun around and slammed into the surrounding army.
Valt moved again.
One punch.
One kick.
One slash.
One strike.
Not a single movement was wasted.
Every attack destroyed several angels at once.
Yet they continued to rise.
There was no blood.
No permanent injury.
No death.
Every angel that was destroyed simply stood back up.
Valt finally stopped.
He stared at the billions of angels.
"You have no death."
All of the crimson eyes surrounding him opened completely.
"Then..."
Valt's voice became unnaturally calm.
"...I will create it."
The power of the Red Eye of Nacht began to move.
But this time, it was not being used to create a sword.
Not a weapon.
Not energy.
Nor a phenomenon.
The Red Eye of Nacht reached something far deeper.
A definition.
A possibility.
A concept that the angels had never possessed before.
Valt raised one hand.
"Death."
One word.
Yet all of reality seemed to hear it.
"From now on..."
"...you possess it."
Every crimson eye illuminated simultaneously.
There was no explosion.
No flash of light.
Yet the billions of angels felt a change taking place within their very existence.
Something that had never existed before—
had now become a part of them.
Death.
One angel stared at his own hand.
"What...?"
His body suddenly stopped.
The light surrounding him began to fade.
The halo above his head cracked.
His two wings slowly dissolved into fragments of light.
"No..."
He tried to move.
"No... this is impossible..."
His body became increasingly transparent.
"We do not possess death..."
Valt looked at him.
A faint smile slowly appeared among the countless abstract faces surrounding him.
"That's right."
"Because you never needed it before."
The angel finally vanished.
For the first time—
an angel had died.
The silence lasted only for a moment.
Then—
the entire army attacked once again.
But this time, they were no longer immortal.
One angel fell.
Then ten.
A hundred.
A thousand.
Millions.
Valt moved faster.
He tore through their ranks without hesitation.
One angel was struck and sent flying into the distance.
Valt appeared behind another and struck before the angel could even raise his weapon.
Three angels attacked simultaneously.
Valt twisted his body.
One hand stopped the first sword.
The surrounding space shifted, causing the second sword to lose its trajectory.
His other hand struck the third angel.
Its body was sent flying.
Valt then pulled the first angel toward him through spatial manipulation.
BRAK!
The angel's body was slammed into the ground.
Before he could rise—
Valt was already above him.
A single kick sent his body through space.
Billions of angels attempted to surround him.
But Valt was no longer fighting to survive.
He attacked.
Again.
And again.
Every movement carried death.
Every attack brought the existence of one or more angels to an end.
The sky became filled with shattered halos.
Millions of wings dissolved into light.
The angelic formations began to collapse.
Their numbers decreased rapidly.
Yet more continued to arrive.
Valt finally stopped.
All of the crimson eyes surrounding him stared at the remaining army.
"Still not enough?"
There was no answer.
Only billions of weapons once again aimed toward him.
Valt slowly drew a breath.
Then—
all of the crimson eyes opened simultaneously.
"Then..."
"It ends now."
The concept of death that Valt had created spread throughout the entire army.
No one could escape it.
Halos shattered.
Wings disappeared.
The light surrounding their bodies collapsed.
One by one.
Thousands.
Millions.
Then billions.
The entire angelic army vanished almost simultaneously.
There was no massive explosion.
No screams.
Only silence.
Valt stood alone within the void.
His form remained something that could no longer be explained.
The clown faces still appeared around him.
The crimson eyes remained open.
Then one of those eyes slowly closed.
Valt spoke.
"If you want to execute me..."
His voice echoed throughout all of space.
"...don't send an army."
One crimson eye opened once more.
"Come yourself."
Far above the reality that had been destroyed—
something moved.
A presence far greater than the billions of angels that had just been erased began to open its eyes.
And for the first time since Valt had released the Second Restraint—
the smile within the void disappeared.