"I'm serious, stop this," Seth said calmly, his voice light despite the danger. But Dwalin just sighed at this plea while summoning more and more items from his inventory without hesitation.
Some items sealed abilities and prevented their use, some sealed space and time itself to prevent escape, and the list went on and on, pretty much ensuring that Seth, no matter what he tried or how powerful he was, was trapped here in this location without any way out.
The Golem pulled back its arm and punched towards Seth with devastating force, but this time Seth didn't dodge or move out of the way. Instead, the Vector behind that fist was suddenly reversed and sent back at the Golem that launched it, destroying it completely in an instant.
It took some time and effort, but Seth had managed to alter the Nexus Barrier to be able to affect these golems properly. They were not like the sword from earlier, which was just a prototype and incomplete; these golems were the real deal and far more dangerous.
The golems were destroyed one after another as the Vector was sent back at them with devastating effect. Their absolute barrier was destroyed as Unchangable had been added to that Vector sent at them, making the defense useless. Dwalin's eyes were, of course, shocked by this result, since those Golems had Absolute Defense as one of their core abilities.
They had the perfect defense that should have been unbreakable, their bodies adapted to any harm thrown at them, they were able to divide the damage they took evenly between the entire army of golems to spread it out, and lastly, their bodies were so incredibly durable that even the black hole in the center of the Galaxy wasn't enough to remotely damage them even slightly… so how did Seth just destroy not just one, but all of them at once thanks to the fact the damage was divided amongst all of the golems? He had one-shot the entire army of golems in a single attack, not even giving them a chance to adapt to his power or defend themselves properly.
Dwalin stepped forward with determination, and instantly, he appeared directly before Seth without traveling the distance between them. The whole act of moving said distances, the whole concept of cause and effect was completely ignored and bypassed. For as soon as he stepped forward, the effect was that he appeared before Seth immediately, without any of the steps in between mattering.
As soon as he swung the sword at Seth's neck, the effect was that it affected Seth instantly, bypassing all the cause-and-effect nonsense that would normally occur. Unreachable and Unstoppable were both bypassed completely as if they didn't exist. Seth's head would have been cut cleanly off his shoulders if not for Chu Yin, who quickly covered him in an Ice that froze cause and effect itself.
Thanks to that crucial intervention from Chu Yin, Seth barely managed to dodge the fatal blow that had been aimed directly at his neck, although his arm was still cut cleanly off by Dwalin's sword as the blade passed through his defenses. The severed limb fell away into the void of space. Dwalin let out a soft sigh, his eyes shifting to look at Chu Yin with newfound respect and wariness.
Her ability to freeze even something as abstract and fundamental as cause and effect itself was a genuine pain to deal with in combat. SSS, an ability like Omni Fire could have done that as well, but the degree to which they could do it was what impressed him. The scale she was using her ice allowed her to create an Ice capability of shielding, limiting his sword's Ur tier ability enough so that Seth could fight back.
If she were at tier 2 or 3 with more power and experience behind her, he would honestly not be sure how to deal with someone like her and her troublesome abilities that could freeze the very laws of reality on an absolute scale.
Nexus Barrier was powerful and had incredible potential for growth. But Seth simply didn't know the complex math behind cause and effect and how they functioned on a fundamental level of reality; therefore, he couldn't really do the necessary calculations to counter it properly or defend against it.
Secondly, although Unchangeable could have blocked the attack if it had been available to use, he had just used it to destroy the entire army of golems moments ago, and it was currently under cooldown and unavailable for use until enough time had passed.
"I want it to go down in record that I said not to come here." Chu Yin said calmly, her voice matter-of-fact despite the dangerous situation they now found themselves in. It was the whole reason she had joined him on this trip in the first place, as she knew how bad an idea it was for them to come here without proper preparation or a plan. Now they would be facing serious trouble that could have been avoided entirely… but Seth had been too arrogant about his abilities, having full confidence in his talent to carry him through any situation no matter how dangerous.
"I will listen to you next time," Seth said with a heavy sigh of regret while looking at Dwalin, who was deliberately avoiding using his cause-and-effect ignoring ability repeatedly to prevent Seth from adapting to it and countering it through his adaptive abilities.
Dwalin instead made a decision and switched out the gear set he was currently wearing. He equipped a fire armor gear set from his collection, which instantly began burning away everything around him in a vast radius, even space and time itself being consumed by the intense flames that surrounded his body.
"This was the worst person you could have faced; it's like facing a sea of Ur tier abilities fused into one person. Since he is now our enemy, enslave him and force him to work day in and day out creating weapons for us." Chu Yin said calmly, her tone practical and cold as she assessed their situation.
This made Seth's eyes roll at her suggestion as he shot backwards through space at high speed, avoiding the flames which were somehow burning their own Vector in a paradoxical manner that defied normal logic.
This gave the flames a short lifespan before they burned themselves out, but with Seth unable to control the Vector properly due to its paradoxical nature, plus the flames burning space and time with the increased power they gained by burning their own Vector as fuel… well, the attack bypassed both Unreachable, Unstoppable, and Unchangeable all at once, rendering his three main defenses useless.
Dwalin watched with satisfaction as the flames burned Seth and Chu Yin, erasing them from existence completely as they were consumed. But the very next instant, much to his shock and disbelief, he saw Seth and Chu Yin appearing a few light-years away from their original position, standing there unharmed.
This stunned him at how Seth had crossed such an overwhelming distance in less than a second. He had moved so fast in fact that even Dwalin's enhanced eyes, which could track movements at incredible speeds, only saw after images of their forms… yes, the Seth and Chu Yin he had burned with his flames was just after images left behind in space, the real deal had moved long ago to dodge the attack before it even landed on them.
"Paradox flames? You never saw that coming." Chu Yin said softly. She knew about Nexus and its abilities, well, mainly she knew about the novel Seth had read that featured it as the main power of the villain.
So, she knew that while the villain of that novel possessed Nexus as their power and used it in various ways, Seth had never for a moment thought of or considered a flame that simply burned away everything, even itself, in a self-destructive paradox that made it impossible to control or redirect.
"Yeah…" Seth said softly, his voice quiet and subdued as he processed the dangerous situation they currently found themselves in.
"And you can't keep fighting at this level of strength for too long." Chu Yin said once more, pointing out a critical weakness in Seth's ability. At this moment in time, Seth didn't have his infinite amount of energy to draw upon freely and use however he wanted, since he was using it all to fight on this level of power and maintain his current enhanced state without dropping.
For him to react properly and not simply be speed blitzed by anything Dwalin threw at him during this intense fight, he needed to do this and maintain this power level constantly without letting it drop even for a second.
But at most, even pushing himself to his absolute limits, he could keep this up for a few hours at best, and that's only if he avoided using any crazy levels of attack that would drain his energy reserves even faster. Infinity was cool and impressive and all, but of course, there were significant limitations to consider that couldn't be ignored.
Seth couldn't truly grasp true infinity in its complete and absolute form, not yet at least. Someone faster than the rate Seth could divide the distances between them could potentially reach Seth if they pushed hard enough and moved fast enough.