"Dear… I can't apologise enough. I don't know what happened to me back then…"

As soon as we stepped into the darkness of the changing room where I was given some time to prepare, Eve caught me from behind, wrapping her hands around my waist and burying her face in my back.

"What do you mean?"

To say that I was surprised by the sudden change of her attitude would be a great injustice to the shock that I survived. Right after I saw her happy to see me standing up for her, she turned apoglectic, as if she was about to reveal that she betrayed me or something. Just what the heck was going on?

"That man… I don't want to point fingers, but he had a strange influence on my mind. It's as if in one moment I wanted to hug and welcome him, only to spit and kick him in the very next moment. It felt… really weird…"

With her knees giving up, Eve fell down on her knees, instantly prompting me to turn around. Catching her by her arms before she could do herself any harm in this momentary lapse of concentration, I looked at her face with worry.

"Are you okay now, though?"

Caressing Eve's cheek, I continued to look her deeply in the eyes. Thankfully, instead of avoiding my stare, this lovely wife of mine returned the gaze and slightly moved her head to the sides.

"No. I still do fell lightheaded and it's hard for me to bring my thoughts together. Dear… Can't we just ditch?"

At this moment, a look of desperation appeared on Eve's face. Her entire face expressed her craving of just leaving this area, leaving all of this mess behind.

"Eve… Are you sure you want to leave?"

Putting both of my hands on her cheeks, I locked her face in place. This question was too important for both of us to let her just escape with her eyes.

"Leave… No… There is something… For some reason, I can't help it but want that man dead."

Shaking her head withing the embrace of my hands, Eve raised her own hand and placed her fingers on my palm.

"Dear… I want him dead, but I can't help but worry about you. Tell me, can you defeat him?"

There was definitely something really strange going on with Eve right now… But who would I be if I failed to fulfil her request? This was the very first time that Eve requested something directly from me. And I had no intention of leaving her emptyhanded after finally asking me for something!

"Don't worry, dear. While he doesn't seem to be some kind of pushover I don't think he can stand against me if I were to get serious."

Moving my thumb up and down Eve's cheek, I could feel that she was slowly starting to relax. Still tense because of the strange state of her head, I actually had to help her get back up.

"Don't worry, I will make it as quick as possible."

While leaving this place had some chances of succeeding if I were to use the last remaining teleportation seed that I always carried on me, I wasn't so sure that this city was free of people capable of not only detecting such thing but also either meddling with the route or tracking its end. For now, this teleportation seed was my absolute ace in sleeve for the situation where my position would turn disastrous and I wasn't really willing to use it any sooner than that.

Ring.

The sound of the metal hitting against metal brought me back to reality. Right now, all I had to do in order to leave the city, was to defeat the man that challenged me. Not only would that fulfil the request that my beloved gave me, but also open up the city gates for a calm leave. And that was what I was about to do. Leave the city with Eve safely and openly without worrying about anyone daring to chase me down.

"I will be right back. Enjoy the show you will see above."

Brushing my hand through Eve's hair, I smiled at her before standing up and moving towards the special gate of the dressing rooms. Thinking about it, it was quite strange that every single area that I visited so far was constructed in nearly the same way. While the details differed from place to place due to local customs, local traditions or even the dyes that were easily accessible around, but the overall layout of the building always roughly remained the same.

"Whatever…"

Moving past the entry gate to the proper arena part of the building, I pushed all those thoughts aside. As little as I cared for the man that challenged me, I wasn't naive enough to let some idle thoughts bother my mind in a potentially dangerous fight.

"So you came… Tell me…"

Starting to say something, the man that waited for me in the very middle of the area looked beyond my shoulder. Ignoring this obvious provocation I continued to step forward, only to see a huge smile suddenly blossoming on the man's lips.

"Now that you are locked in this arena with me, tell me. How did my daughter feel when attacked by this funny technique of mine? Did she managed to…"

Before any form of signal would be given for the fight to start, I already let the entirety of my power free. Exploding in a blast of energy ripping through the fabric of the space all around me and eroding it back to the void only to throw said void of balance and only escalate the ongoing cataclysm around me to even greater magnitude, I jumped towards the fucker that dared to play with the well-being of my wife.

Pushing my fist to the back, I allowed the energy from corroding void to push my elbow forward, executing the most powerful hit that I have ever unleashed in this world.

Yet, no flesh meet with my knuckles, as the man claiming to be Eve's father was already standing a few steps outside of my attack's trajectory.

"Quite impressive!"

Daring to laugh, he clearly wanted to throw me off the point. And in any normal case, he would most likely succeed.

But I wasn't naive enough to believe I was capable of taking the reins of this apocalyptic power exploding around me with just my normal senses alone. Even before I threw myself at him, the upgraded version of my predator's sense was already working in its full swing.

And it was thanks to this ability that I managed to notice how unstable the man's footing was, indicating that his dodge wasn't as simple to execute as he wanted me to think it was!

"I jumped across the entire arena, you barely managed to make a few steps. This alone should speak wonders about the difference in our strength. Surrender your life now, and I might consider sparing the rest of your household…"

Using all my willpower condensed by the predator's sense, I forcefully stopped the onslaught of magic all around me. Just for the briefest of the moment, the extremely condensed magic suddenly found itself diffusing in the air… Right beside the clouds of extremely condensed entropy.

In just one moment, yet another wave of energy washed off the arena, nearly uprooting the power that held its barrier together. If I were just a tad late with executing this ultimate attack that I could come up with, all the spectators watching the fight would find themselves in danger of being simply obliterated.

And then, once all this insane magic turned into a seemingly stable void, held by the same grip that put the rushing masses of both positive and negative energy to hold, I loosened my grip.

"Or keep standing defiant, and I will eradicate every last piece of your bloodline, allowing only Eve to remain."

Released from my firm hold, the void in the air instantly got influenced by the thick magic present in the city. With how nearly all of the immortal cultivators strived to remove all the energy from their bodies, this place seemed to be the richest natural reservoir of magic on this entire damned side of the universe.

And this extremely thick and condensed magic finally came in touch with the ultimate form of any energy, the void.