Boom!
Mike felt as if he’d been struck head-on by the same heavy truck that had sent him into another world in his first life.
This time, however, he wasn’t transported anywhere.
His entire body was launched into the air and sent flying backward completely out of control before crashing down onto the Arctic ice cap.
The ice shattered beneath him, but his momentum didn’t stop there.
Like a stone blasted from a cannon, Mike continued skimming backward across the frozen surface while the wind howled past his ears.
Another thunderous crash followed as Mike smashed straight into the igloo Natik had built.
The outer walls and thick blocks of ice burst apart on impact.
Snow, ice, and debris scattered everywhere as the igloo collapsed through the middle, while the snow piled on its roof erupted upward and spread through the freezing air like a cloud of white dust.
Several kilometers away, Malekith remained where he stood with the black longsword in hand, a faint smile curving across his half-black, half-white face.
Then another explosive sound tore through the air.
Mike burst from the ruins of the igloo and landed again not far from Malekith.
He lowered his gaze to his chest, where Malekith’s previous blow had landed.
A dull ache still lingered there.
Then Mike looked up and returned Malekith’s earlier words to him.
“Looks like I underestimated you, Svartalfheimian.” “I’ll give you one last chance.” Malekith returned Mike’s own words almost exactly.
“Hand over the Aether, and I’ll let this go.” Mike smiled at him.
“I already told you.
It’s not for sale.” “Then I’ll have to kill you.” Malekith wasted no more words.
Gripping his black longsword, he charged across the ice toward Mike exactly as he had before.
His body left a dark afterimage across the frozen surface, while the sword dragged a trail of black light behind it.
Wherever the blade passed, the dark energy pouring from its edge carved deep trenches into the ice.
Mike charged straight toward him.
A ring of white vapor exploded beneath his feet, and the resulting shockwave hurled chunks of broken ice dozens of meters into the air.
The two collided head-on in the middle of the frozen plain.
In truth, Malekith had once been capable of fighting King Bor thousands of years ago.
In theory, even though Mike had now successfully awakened his Cosmo, he shouldn’t have been strong enough to face someone like that.
But there was an important difference.
Malekith had only just awakened after sleeping for thousands of years.
He also needed time to recover the strength he had possessed at his peak.
After all, in the original course of events, Malekith had been able to fight King Bor evenly thousands of years ago with the Reality Stone.
Yet when he obtained the Reality Stone again thousands of years later, all he managed was a fierce battle against Thor, and Thor ultimately defeated him.
More importantly, much of Malekith’s ability to survive a battle against King Bor had depended on the Reality Stone.
Once the Reality Stone was removed from the equation, and considering that Malekith had only just awakened from his long sleep, his current combat strength was actually not far from Mike’s.
Malekith’s black sword and Mike’s fists clashed again and again across the Arctic ice.
Shockwaves erupted from every collision.
The ice beneath them, dozens of meters thick, cracked apart in patterns like spiderwebs.
Dark seawater surged upward through the fractures.
The two raced across the ice cap, every exchange shattering the ground beneath their feet as explosions thundered continuously across the empty Arctic wilderness.
Malekith swept his sword horizontally.
The dark energy on the blade transformed into a crescent-shaped slash more than ten meters long, cutting a seemingly bottomless trench through the ice in its path and sending shattered ice flying dozens of meters into the air.
Mike lowered his body and slid beneath the dark blade.
His fist drove upward from below, and the force of the punch tore through the air.
A shockwave erupted toward the sky and instantly blew apart the clouds above them.
Mike had never felt anything quite like this.
At that moment, it almost felt as though he had returned to Sanctuary in his second life, once again throwing himself into an all-out fight with his companions on the training grounds.
His blood was boiling.
His Cosmo burned more fiercely than ever.
And somewhere far beyond Mike’s awareness, something else was happening.
As he devoted himself completely to the battle against Malekith and his Cosmo burned under the influence of the Aether, the constellations scattered across the vast universe—the same constellations that scientists on Earth had named and catalogued—began to respond.
The forty-eight Bronze constellations, the twenty-four Silver constellations, and the twelve Gold constellations had never before shown any sign of power in this universe.
But now, as though they had sensed something, each constellation began lighting up the stars closest to Earth.
It was almost as if all of them had turned their attention toward the planet, searching for something and trying to sense what had awakened there.
“This is more like it!” Fighting with everything he had made Mike feel as though he were reliving his second life.
His fist slammed into Malekith’s black sword and knocked the weapon aside.
Then Mike let out a battle cry.
“Again!” Malekith said nothing.
The instant Mike threw another punch, he vanished from where he stood.
But this time, Mike smiled.
He immediately pulled his fist back and drove it toward Malekith the moment the Dark Elf emerged from his shadow.
“The same move won’t work on a Saint twice!” It was practically a law among Saints.
Not because Saints somehow became immune to techniques after seeing them once, but because Saints were warriors born for battle and possessed extraordinary combat experience.
An enemy might injure a Saint with a technique the first time.
But once a Saint understood what had happened, that enemy would rarely be given the same opportunity again.
As Mike shouted, his right hand opened into a claw and reached toward Malekith.
The instant Malekith instinctively tried to retreat back into the shadow, Mike’s fingers clamped around his head.
His grip tightened like iron pincers.
Then Mike ripped Malekith straight out of the shadow as easily as pulling a root from the ground.
Crack!
Malekith tried to strike Mike, but a sharp breaking sound came from his right shoulder instead.
Mike didn’t stop attacking.
His right fist drove straight into Malekith’s abdomen, smashing through his armor.
By the time the sonic boom from the punch finally reached them, Malekith’s body had already folded forward around the blow, both feet lifted off the ground.
Mike immediately yanked downward with the hand gripping Malekith’s left elbow, dragging the airborne Dark Elf back toward him.
His left knee surged upward.
It slammed directly into Malekith’s chest.
Boom!
The chest armor shattered, sending fragments of metal flying.
Malekith’s pale face suddenly flushed as he spat out a spray of dark blood and was hurled backward.
He skidded across the ice for dozens of meters, carving a long trail into the frozen surface.
By now, the combat skills Mike had learned during his second life had fully integrated with his current body through the course of the battle.
He lowered his fists and stared at Malekith without expression.
“Last chance, Malekith.” “If I cannot restore the age when the Dark Elves ruled over everything, then I would rather die.” Malekith struggled back to his feet and stared heavily at Mike.
Mike smiled and nodded.
“I understand.” Then he pushed off the ground.
His body shot forward like a cannon shell and broke the sound barrier, leaving a white ring of vapor behind him.
In the blink of an eye, he was already standing before Malekith.
Mike towered over him with his right fist raised high above his head.
His blazing Cosmo wrapped his entire body in a blood-red glow.
Then his fist came crashing down.
Boom!