Chapter 468: The Sealed Sky
Meanwhile...
Ignis tumbled through the crack in reality, her wings snapping open on instinct as the world spun around her. Wind roared past her ears. The sky above was wrong, just a dull grey expanse without sun or cloud, like the inside of a sealed jar. Below her stretched a vast plain of cracked, barren earth, reaching in every direction until it vanished into a faint, shimmering haze at the edges.
She caught herself mid-air, wings beating hard, and slowed her descent. Her boots hit the ground with a muffled thud. Dust puffed up around her ankles. She straightened, flames flickering along her arms, and looked around.
She only saw empty ground and a strange wall that was blurry in the distance, pulsing faintly like a living thing.
Ignis narrowed her eyes. She raised one hand and sent a small burst of flame toward the haze.
The fire hit the barrier and scattered, swallowed without a sound.
"Tch. A cage."
A slow, metallic clap echoed behind her.
She spun around. Wincent stood a few paces away, his mechanical arm gleaming under the dull grey light. He was calm, unhurried, like a man who had all the time in the world. Steam hissed softly from the seams of his arm.
"Welcome to my domain," he said.
Ignis stared at him for a beat. Then she grinned, wide and sharp, flames already crawling up her shoulders.
"A domain? You brought me to your own private little world just to fight me?"
Wincent tilted his head slightly.
"You misunderstand. This isn’t a place for a fair fight." He flexed his mechanical fingers, the joints clicking. "This is a place where I decide everything, where distance, timing, and terrain all bend to my will."
Ignis’s grin didn’t fade. If anything, it widened.
"Then you picked the wrong person to trap."
Flames erupted from her body in a blazing corona, lighting up the grey plain in shades of orange and gold. The heat warped the air around her.
"You can control the ground all you want," she said, stepping forward. "But you can’t control fire."
Wincent watched her come, his expression calm. The orange veins in his arm pulsed brighter.
"Let’s find out."
Wincent moved first.
His mechanical arm pulsed, and the ground beneath Ignis shifted. The cracked earth rippled like water, then erupted upward in a jagged spike aimed straight at her chest. She twisted aside, flames trailing from her shoulders, but the spike grazed her side and drew a thin line of blood across her ribs.
She glanced down at the wound, then back at Wincent. Her grin widened.
"That all you got?"
She planted her feet, and fire exploded outward from her body in a wide arc. The flames rolled across the plain like a wave, swallowing everything in their path. The ground blackened. The air shimmered with heat.
Wincent raised his mechanical hand. The air in front of him cracked, and a wall of fractured space absorbed the flames. The fire vanished into the tear like water down a drain.
"Your fire is impressive," he said. "But it means nothing if it never reaches me."
Ignis clicked her tongue. "Then I’ll just have to get right up close and punch you in the face."
She launched herself forward, wings snapping wide. She closed the distance in an instant, her fist already cocked back and blazing white-hot.
Wincent didn’t dodge. He raised his arm to block.
The impact was deafening. A shockwave tore across the plain, shattering the ground beneath them into a web of cracks. Wincent skidded backward, his boots carving trenches in the earth, but he stayed on his feet. Steam hissed from his arm, the metal groaning under the heat.
He looked at her, a flicker of something like surprise in his eyes.
"For a dragon, your attacks are surprisingly simple."
Ignis didn’t answer. She lunged, wings snapping wide, and closed the distance in an instant.
Her fist shot toward his face, wreathed in white-hot flame. Wincent tilted his head aside, the blow grazing past his ear, and answered with a straight punch aimed at her ribs. She twisted, letting it skim past her side, and drove her elbow toward his jaw. He raised his forearm, metal clanging against her flame-wreathed elbow, and shoved her back.
She didn’t give him room to breathe. She stepped in again, knee rising toward his stomach. He dropped his elbow to block, then countered with a short hook. She ducked under it and swung her heel toward his head. He leaned back, the kick carving a burning arc through the air inches from his face.
Wincent stepped forward this time, taking the initiative. His mechanical fist came down like a hammer. Ignis sidestepped, flames trailing from her shoulders, and slapped his arm aside with her palm. The impact sent sparks scattering across the grey plain. She spun with the motion, her backfist already flying toward his temple. He caught it with his open hand, the impact sending a shudder through his arm.
For a moment, they stood locked, her fist pressed against his palm, neither giving ground.
Then she ripped her hand free and drove her knee up again. He blocked low, but she was already moving, her elbow crashing toward his collarbone. He twisted away, and her strike hit nothing but air, flames roaring past his shoulder.
He countered instantly, a straight punch aimed at her chest. She leaned back, the wind from his fist brushing her face, and snapped her head forward in a brutal headbutt.
Then the ground beneath her feet turned to liquid.
Ignis sank ankle-deep before she realized what was happening. The earth had softened, then hardened again in an instant, locking her legs in place.
"Terrain," Wincent said quietly. "I told you. I decide everything here."
Ignis strained against the hardened earth. Flames roared from her legs, trying to melt through, but the ground resisted. It was denser than stone, packed with something that drank heat like a sponge.
Wincent walked toward her, and his mechanical arm glowed brighter, joints hissing.
"You’re powerful," he said. "But power without control is just noise."
Ignis stopped struggling. She looked at him, and her grin returned.
"You sure like hearing yourself talk, old man."
She slammed both fists into the ground.
The plain shattered.
It exploded outward in a shockwave of raw force and fire, ripping through the hardened earth like paper. The blast caught Wincent mid-step and hurled him backward. He crashed into the barrier’s edge, the haze rippling where he struck.
Ignis rose from the crater, smoke curling off her body, wings spread wide. Her eyes burned like twin suns.
"You said this is your domain," she said, stepping forward. "But fire doesn’t ask permission."
Wincent pushed himself up, one hand pressed to his side. Blood seeped between his fingers. For the first time, his calm expression cracked—just a little. A thin line of irritation crossed his face.
He straightened slowly, the mechanical arm hissing as it recalibrated.
"I’ll show you why they call me the God Hand."