The SSS Ranked Villain's Return

"Hmm... it's not very easy to absorb this strange place of yours," Gluttony remarked, floating right in front of Neraxis.

"Well, what do you know? Maybe it's because I spent 500 years reinforcing it?" Neraxis said mockingly.

"Boy..." Gluttony sighed. "Do you even fathom my age? I've taken naps longer than 500 years."

"But you did say it was a bit difficult to absorb, so I'm sure it's working just fine," Neraxis replied with a chuckle.

Then, with a simple push of mana, he sent it toward the red ground that Gluttony produced.

It seemed strange, since the ground was covered in mana so potent that it absorbed his Void realm itself.

It was clear that Gluttony had the strength to back up his talk, even though four of the Sovereigns were dead and he himself was weakened.

But still...

With every passing moment, Neraxis was able to push back slightly.

And after God knew how long, he was able to finally absorb Gluttony's red domain, causing Gluttony's eyes to widen.

"Hah... you really have a knack for everything, don't you?" Gluttony snickered. "Being the perfect vessel, and not only that, you have all the talents of Lagus himself."

His eyes widened. "But I suppose that's to be expected by the one who was birthed by a demon. You killed your mother, didn't you?"

Neraxis didn't even budge at those comments, since in the end, that wasn't him.

Sure, he might've been a brat who once accidentally overused his powers and killed his first mother.

But as it stood, he was currently in control of more power than his past forms ever managed to manifest.

After all, despite so many attempts, not a single one managed to kill a Sovereign.

And here he was, about to kill the fifth.

He pushed ahead, finally appearing in front of the Sovereign of Gluttony.

The two stood eye to eye, until eventually, Neraxis raised his hand, shattering the space around the two.

His Void realm clashed with whatever energy Gluttony was manifesting, making them fall into another realm in between the two.

It was pitch black, with only the two of them being present.

However, every time a thought manifested, it seemingly appeared in this strange realm in the form of a starry night sky.

It seemed to be choreographing their fight in the motion of the stars, and before Neraxis threw a punch, the stars already knew what he was going to do.

So with that, he began throwing punch after punch, while also manifesting several Arksteel weapons, mainly swords and scythes.

Each of those weapons traveled toward Gluttony, who easily fended them off, but due to their sheer volume, at least one managed to hit.

And because of that, a huge crack appeared across Gluttony's mask, shattering it.

And when it was finally shattered, Neraxis was met face to face with an unexpected figure.

Although Gluttony's eyes were crimson, his face...

He looks just like me?

"Pfft... cat's out of the bag now, isn't it?" Gluttony smirked. "Do you want to break the news to Violet?"

"What are you talking about?" Neraxis asked, narrowing his eyes.

"Oh? You still don't know?" Gluttony tilted his head. "That body she's aiming for is impossible to manifest. Care to guess why?"

Neraxis fell into thought for a moment, then looked Gluttony up and down.

He had a lot of theories about why it wasn't possible, but he was pretty certain the explanation he was looking for was the simplest.

And before he could state it, Gluttony finally spoke up.

"You died many times, Neraxis. Yet you always came back. Have you ever thought of why that was the case?" Gluttony asked, tapping his own cheek.

The moment he did, his eyes turned purple, just like Neraxis.

In that moment, he looked like a perfect clone, and if Neraxis had put the pieces together perfectly, then that was the case.

"Delta had erased you from existence, but Lagus was kind enough to scavenge the remnants of your soul and put you back together..." Gluttony's grin widened. "An immortal system, truly a magnificent creation... the first system in the entire universe, Neraxis Destine."

Gluttony coughed. "Sorry, I mean to say Neo Entropic Reincarnation Algorithm. Nera, right? Isn't that the pet name your friends gave you? It's quite cute, if I might add."

Neraxis's brows furrowed, yet in the next moment, a flood of memories emerged.

They were distant, incredibly so. However, he could see them as clear as day.

The moment after Delta threw that weapon at him, and the moments after he died.

Lagus rushed toward him, but it was too late, as Delta used an erasure skill.

Because of that, Lagus suddenly destroyed the entire world and used its core as fuel to manifest Neraxis's conscience.

It was only a fragment at most, but through the ever-evolving and developing system, Neraxis was able to regain a huge portion of his memories.

It wasn't perfect by any means, and he couldn't even escape the chains that were the system itself.

That was until he finally got a body, and after that, several more bodies he scattered around through time itself.

Neraxis's head began to ache as he looked that far back, but he finally arrived at the moment he was looking for.

The first rebellion against Lagus after Neraxis finally gained enough free will.

He summoned dozens of bodies to rise against Lagus, each one forged with a different shape, yet the same memories. But he wasn't successful.

In the end, only eight bodies remained, and each had their own quirky characteristics.

After all, Neraxis didn't have a set form at the time, so he tried all sorts of genders, all shapes of appearance, until eventually, he settled on the form he had been using for the last few eons—and even now.

But at the time, those eight bodies consisted of seven men and one woman.

Neraxis gazed deeper into the past, and he was finally able to make out their appearance.

Violet, Ash, the rest of the Sovereigns, and finally, Neraxis himself.

Gluttony was the one that resembled Neraxis the most, and the more he recalled, the clearer it became why.

Being lazy, he created variations of himself, each with different traits, and out of everyone, Gluttony managed to survive till the end.

They attacked all at once, and all of a sudden, a fierce pressure hit all of them.

Following that, Neraxis's main body at the time suffered it the worst, as seven fragments shot out of his body, heading into each of the remaining seven bodies.

His emotions dulled significantly.

Whether it was his anger, his sorrow, even his pride or greed. The moment those seven fragments left his body, everything turned blank.

And that was exactly when Lagus blanketed the entire memory in darkness.

A few years passed, maybe more, and Neraxis finally regained consciousness again.

It was a distant past, and he was inside the hospital, staring up at his mother Sophia, and his father, Roskaris, by the side.

Both seemed incredibly happy to see him, and only then did Neraxis find out he had just been born.

After that, the memories came flooding in all at once.

All the previous lifetimes, all his deaths, all his tragedies merged into one.

Each memory went by in the blink of an eye, until eventually, Neraxis gazed down at his hands, having witnessed everything up to the present moment.

"Hahaha... you remembered it now, didn't you?" Gluttony's grin reached ear to ear. "You must've noticed that after killing us, you lost a part of yourself..."

Gluttony stepped closer, standing face to face like a mirror with Neraxis.

"But that's the great irony, isn't it?" Gluttony whispered. "You've spent all this time chasing power, escaping fate, fighting your past... pfft..."

He leaned in close, their eyes aligned.

"But every time you struck us down..."

"You were just killing yourself."