It was one of the single worst quakes to ever strike in Komen's entire history.
All at once, the entire island was ravaged.
Buildings were destroyed—the ground split.
Even the great Olethros castle, which stood as a symbol of perfection for all on the island to admire, crumbled down the side of the mountain.
It took four minutes for the quakes to cease. But at that point, the damage was already immense.
Amidst a cloud of dust, a spiked black fist punched through the rubble.
Solomon's upper body crawled to the surface.
At the same time, a dull glow surrounded his severed half.
His legs grew back instantly, and he rose to his feet to let out another triumphant roar.
His eyes scanned the rubble for bodies.
There were many of them. Some were still clinging to life, trapped underneath the debris.
An overwhelming majority were not.
Solomon's heavily armored boots stomped over the broken stone.
He stopped in a specific direction and plunged his fist into the ground.
Grabbing hold of something, he yanked it free to a chorus of screams.
"No, no, no, you beast!! Let me go right now!"
Uriel flailed within Solomon's grip. His badly burned head and arms made his former beauty almost unrecognizable.
He punched Solomon's metal chest until his hands were broken.
"You think you're special, you fucking beast! Showing up out of nowhere and ruining every fucking thing! You and that filthy lowborn!"
Uriel tried to produce an aura blade, but in his badly injured and frantic state, he couldn't gather the necessary energy to make anything permeable.
"You greedy little shit, you are nothing! You turned that traitorous whore against me and cost me my chance at the thron-"
Large fingers were inserted into Uriel's mouth.
Uriel choked, gasped, and kicked as his jaw was pried open.
Solidifying his grip, the metal giant ripped away the man's entire lower jaw, exposing not just the inner contents of his esophagus, but his chest as well.
The body deteriorated at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Uriel was completely sentient as his flesh decayed and his bones became like fertilizer.
"Unbelievable… I have scarcely ever seen such a monster, even in my wildest days."
Solomon dropped the body and slowly turned around.
Encircling him were the heads of the great martial families.
Their glorious outfits were covered in dirt and soot, yet that seemed to be the worst of their injuries. Each of them was rightfully wary of what Solomon had become.
"T-The legends were right… He's like them!"
"Shut your mouth, you incorrigible weakling! This is not the place for fairytales and children's stories!"
"Well, what else do you want me to label it, Jeok?! He has been inflicted with two mortal wounds and has recovered from them both!"
"All of you, stop this foolishness right now." Zadkiel tightened his grip on his sword. "It doesn't matter what it is. Kill it and I'll give you feckless little sheep whatever you desire..."
"Look around, Zadkiel. You don't have anything left to give-"
"I SAID KILL HIMMM!!!!"
Zadkiel was so angry that he could have spat blood.
Everything he had worked for so tirelessly for his entire life, all reduced to rubble by an ungrateful outsider.
Zadkiel couldn't think. He couldn't breathe properly.
His vision was becoming filled with red. All he could think about was that the only way to save his reputation was to kill a seemingly unkillable monster.
The moon pierced through the clouds in the sky.
Holy, white light shone down on the ruins of the castle.
Zadkiel began to ascend.
Enormous white wings burst out of his back, created from the very light that he bathed in.
His hair began to float above his head and glow with a mystical gold light.
Zadkiel held his sword above his head.
The blade became a towering, majestic weapon. Longer than even the mountain on which his castle stood.
There could be no mistake. Whatever attack Zadkiel was about to unleash would make the island's earthquake look like an act of child's play.
The other clan heads were also gathering up the sum of their energy, creating a feeling of terrible dread all across the island.
Zadkiel started to drop his enormous blade on Solomon's head when the strangest thing happened.
Zadkiel's glowing eyes bulged. He suddenly brought a hand to his mouth.
Bile and vomit spilled past his lips as his stomach turned against the rest of him.
He couldn't control his body.
As he wretched, he defecated and plummeted out of the air.
His wings vanished. His hair returned to normal, and his sword vanished.
When he hit the ground, he let out a groan the likes of which he hadn't released since he was a newborn.
His entire body felt violently diseased.
Zadkiel was plagued with shakes, fever, and a mild sense of delirium that he could neither fight nor ignore.
He couldn't even see what was happening to the outside of his body.
Parts of his skin developed a blackish hue. Bloody mucus dribbled from his nose and mouth as his body slowly began to show signs of malnutrition.
And he wasn't the only one afflicted.
All of the family heads were slowly being corroded by a plague they couldn't even hope to stand against.
As they writhed along the ground, Solomon suddenly heard the sound of rubble moving about.
"Well... looks like we finally did it... Although I gotta say..."
When Solomon's eyes landed on Raizel, the infinite red haze surrounding his mind lifted.
But in that moment, he wished for nothing more than to be thrust back into it.
Because seeing his brother with that huge hole in his stomach overwhelmed him in ways he didn't know possible.
"When we said we were going to destroy this place.... I really didn't anticipate we'd do such a bang-up job of it.."