MMORPG : Ancient WORLD

The incorporeal phantoms, reflections of Zarach given form through the web of fate, numbered close to a dozen, and a single glance was enough to confirm their purpose.
They were echoes of possible futures, each one representing a different outcome for Zarach.
Some raised their hands in defense against unseen attacks, while others struck forward, weaving offense from invisible threads, all of them incomplete truths, waiting to be written into reality.
Zarach, a master of fate, saw what each possibility offered and, within mere instants, chose the one most favorable to him. One by one, the phantoms dissolved into nothing, their unreal forms unraveling back into the tapestry of fate.
The Moth Empress followed closely behind her master. Her hands clasped together, palms aligned, before she drew them apart, and between them, a dense column of incorporeal essence took shape, swiftly molding into a bow.
She moved in a wide circle around Alex, her speed rivaling even his own Void Walk. The mist within her glass-like eyes swirled as she pulled back the string, a ghostly white arrow materializing in her grasp, its tip flickering like a frozen flame.
Alex reacted in kind, invoking the two aspects of his Ancient Heart, Mana Amplification and Mana Overdrive, making his veins feel on fire while he simultaneously unleashed the Tenebrous Shard Enclave.
Darkness surged from him like oceanic tides, spreading outward with him at the center. In that storm of shadow and absence, Alex charged forward, his two blades, Misery and Sorrow, cloaked in a multitude of weapon intents, all fused under the concept of unification.
Both blades were also veiled beneath a calm layer of darkness, imbued with the aspect of erasure, the two energies woven together so tightly they pulsed as one.
He did not use any of his legacy-class skills because he had learned from Odeseus that anything below a certain threshold of power would be stolen by Zarach, absorbed through the theft of fate itself.
Using any support skills like Ruler of Emptiness, Thought Acceleration, or Dark Dominion would only waste his mana, and worse, hand Zarach another weapon to use against him.
That left him with only a handful of options, and even among those, Reaper’s Contract was useless.
The summoned Reaper would always target whoever had received the most damage during the time the contract was set. Against an opponent like Zarach, someone capable of reversing fate itself, even for a single instant, that would only backfire.
Similarly, using Summon Elemental was out of the question. In its normal form, it relied on chance, and no matter how elite the summoned being might be, they would stand no chance against Zarach or his Empress Spirit.
He could not summon Nyla either. As powerful as she was, an elite among elites, she would still fall before a monster like Zarach.
As the dome of darkness took form around them, Alex and Zarach met in a head-on clash, the honed edge of twin dark blades colliding against the now-visible silver strings of fate.
The weapon intents, wrapped in darkness, burst forward like waves, yet both surges were pushed aside, failing to pass through the shimmering strands.
Alex watched as the silver strings, after a certain length, turned incorporeal, some linking to the fate threads of his left sword, others entwining with the mana from his right leg, and even the space and ground surrounding it.
He pressed with his left hand, forcing Zarach back, before swinging his right sword low, cutting through the threads anchoring his right side.
This, in turn, forced him to abandon his chance to turn the left-hand swing into an upward thrust, having realized that it would miss by an inch, and the decision would leave him open on his left.
Zarach did not possess destructive power like Alex, but what made him truly dangerous, even in close combat, was his ability to manipulate the fate of everything around him, ground, space, opponent, weapon; it made no difference.
He only needed to touch the fate of his opponent’s weapon to ensure their attack would miss by a hair’s breadth. And with his foresight, that single misstep could be chained into creating an opening for his own strike, just like now.
A single mistake against him meant paying with blood.
Zarach stepped back, swinging his right hand wide, his strings cutting through the darkness as they came at Alex like ten razor-edged blades.
At the exact moment, a ghostly white arrow manifested on Alex’s left side. He swung Sorrow to counter the strings, while reversing his grip on Misery to meet the arrow.
On one side, sparks flew where the silver threads ground against the unyielding blade, and on the other, darkness flared as it devoured the ghostly arrow into its abyssal depths.
Right then came the second attack, a dozen strings tearing open the ground before him. Alex stomped hard, unleashing a tide of darkness that surged upward to meet them.
In the same breath, he dashed forward, narrowly avoiding a soul arrow aimed at his leg. His figure pierced through the wall of stone and shadow like a bullet, jagged-edged dark wings flaring open across his back, forming a protective shell.
The wings unfurled wide, slowing his advance. His gaze locked onto Zarach, now standing amidst rising walls of darkness on both sides.
Alex looked down at Zarach, having raised both blades above his right shoulder, but alarm bells screamed in his mind the moment he noticed something was wrong.
The figure before him wasn’t Zarach. Though it bore his aura and carried his fate strings, it was only a puppet of flesh and blood.
The realization struck, and Alex’s body moved before thought could catch up. The dragon seal on his hand burned black, darkness surging as the world quivered beneath the awakening aura of the Monarch.
At the same time, his legacy skill, concept Erasure, erupted outward, singular in its purpose, to strip fate’s hold from his reality.
But he was already a second too late, as before the swelling darkness could fully form, Hundreds of incorporeal silver threads descended from the sky, twisting and writhing like living serpents as they streaked toward him.
They were cleaved apart beneath the edges of his dual blades, erased by the surging tides of power bursting from each swing. Yet the onslaught did not end, for every string he severed, two more emerged to take its place.
The strings drowned Alex in the blink of an eye, latching onto every possible thread of fate stemming from him, his body, mind, muscles, swords, and even the smallest motion or thought.
None was spared.
In an instant, he felt his control over his very being slipping away. His muscles tensed, refusing his commands, while his mana and mind grew sluggish, like they were drowning in tar.
He looked like a puppet strung by invisible hands, as hundreds of silver threads were pulling him in every direction, and just like a puppet, he was losing control piece by piece.
The trap Zarach had set was perfect, leaving him no moment to counter it or plant Error into his attack. While Alex struggled to break free from the web that bound him, he stood completely exposed, vulnerable in every sense.
Alex had learned much about what fate could do, and he quickly recognized the skill Zarach had used at the start of their exchange, one that birthed phantoms of possible futures.
That ability could serve two purposes: either to reach a specific fate or to avoid one where he suffered a setback.
He didn’t know which path Zarach had chosen, but he knew better than to waste time trying to change the outcome itself. Instead, he needed to prepare for whatever came next, and, more importantly, he needed not to get distracted by it, as it could all be a distraction.
So, while the speed at which Zarach executed such a major technique caught him off guard, Alex was far from unprepared to counter it. And in that fleeting window, he realized something deeper.
Zarach hadn’t used just one or two skills, he had used three. One that forcefully turned Alex into a marionette, binding his fate to Zarach’s will.
Another that concealed his own fate, rendering him invisible to reality for a small period, and the third, the most insidious of all, fate borrowing, which allowed a simple puppet to bear his fate in his place.
That was how Zarach had deceived even Alex’s eyes, eyes that saw through multiple shades of existence.
Alex knew that performing two minor and one major fate skill in under three seconds was beyond even Zarach’s normal limits.
So for him to go that far, he wasn’t simply attacking to hurt; he was aiming to end the battle outright.
As Alex’s mind and body strained against the invisible shackles placed upon him, instinct took over. He moved with a clear mind, not allowing a hint of panic to cloud his mind, and reacted with the only way he knew to avoid the blade that would come to end his life.