Chapter 75: Awakened Emperor
The ruined courtyard of Solaris was completely silent. The wind howled, blowing cold ash across the cobblestones, but none of the Arena Champions moved. They all stared at the old man with the canvas wrapped broadsword.
"Dad," Kairos called out, his voice gentle as a whisper. "We need to stop the calamity coming over."
Karl Wade Vedaryan let out a rough, tired sigh, leaning his iron sword against the broken stone wall and crossed his thick arms. The terrifying, raging inferno of fire magic burning inside his core was suppressed, but it still made the cold air around him shimmer with heat.
"We will," Karl said, his lone dark eye looking at Kairos with quiet pride. "Long before you were born. I fought for the kingdom ruthlessly, now I will destroy the demon army for a single goal. I just wanted a quiet life to raise my son."
"Thats why, you entered the tournament," Ignis said, his voice crawling across the place.
Karl’s expression turned cold. He looked past Ignis, his gaze landing on Crown Princess Seyana.
"Because a quiet life is a luxury we no longer have," Karl said. "When Malgreth woke up in the underworld and declared war on Solaris, the entire continent panicked. The Demon King didn’t just declare war to conquer land. He declared war because of my son and her."
Karl pointed a callused finger at Seyana. Kairos turned to look at Seyana. The Crown Princess stood tall in her dark iron armor, but there was something different about her now. For a few months, a faint warm golden light had begun to radiate from her skin. It was not a normal magical affinity. It was an awakened divine power. It felt like pure sunlight, opposite to the toxic black mist and the boiling hellfire.
"Malgreth wants to devour the Princess," Karl explained, his voice echoing loudly in the courtyard. "Her divine power is the prize. If the Demon King eats her, he will absorb that light, corrupt it, and become unstoppable. He will break the world in half. That is why King Raezon hosted the Colosseum tournament. Normal armies cannot stop a demon horde. We needed generals with monstrous internal cores. We needed killers."
Veldra Dracortis stepped forward, resting his heavy halberd on his armored shoulder. The second oldest of the legendary siblings nodded. "Lord Vedaryan is right. The moment Malgreth made his declaration, the arena was opened. We bled in the Colosseum to prove we were strong enough to hold the line, and Kairos managed to kill the demon god of time."
Daemon Sylphyros crossed his arms. "And now the horde is here. Scouts reported eight massive silhouettes standing on the southern ridges, leading the demon army. Eight Generals of the Demon army. We have to march south before they reach the city walls."
"We will," Seyana commanded, her voice carrying the warm weight of her divine power. "All of you, along with General Kairos, General Terravarous and General Ignis, will form the iron wall in the south. You will protect the capital from Malgreth."
"What about the East?" a quiet voice asked. Marin Valcoran, the scarred woman holding the swirling water trident, frowned. "The Black Mist Knights tore these gates down yesterday. If we all march to the southern ash, who is going to stop the shadow army from flanking us and burning Solaris from the other side?"
Seyana looked at Kairos. They had discussed this late last night.
"Princess Catherine and General Velanor are already preparing to lock down the eastern ruins," Kairos said smoothly. "But they cannot hold the Black Mist alone. They need huge support. They need our gravity."
Ignis rubbed the back of his neck. "Luna is still trapped in a coma in the infirmary, Kairos. The cosmic energy shredded his nerves. He isn’t waking up anytime soon."
"He will wake up," Kairos stated with pure confidence. "He promised."
****
Inside the Royal Infirmary, the air was still. Soltheia sat in the wooden chair next to the bed. She looked exhausted. Her beautiful blue tunic was stained with dirt and blood. Her ocean blue eyes were small and dark. She held her hands hovering over Luna’s chest, pushing a tiny trickle of golden green water magic into his heart to keep it beating.
But her internal core was empty. The mana in the room was starved. She was running on pure willpower.
"Please," Soltheia whispered, a single tear falling onto the white sheets. "You have to come back. The demons are coming. We need you, Luna."
Inside Luna’s mind, there was no infirmary. There was no Solaris. There was only an endless, void of starry black space. Luna was lingering in the dark. He couldn’t move his arms or legs. He was paralyzed by a crushing weight. Wrapped tightly around his soul, there was a massive, shining golden chain. The First Cosmic Lock.
When he had opened it on the Great Dam to stop the black sun, he had pushed the lock just a fraction of an inch. But closing it had been sloppy. The chain hadn’t sealed perfectly. A drop of infinite, primordial mana was slowly leaking into his mind. It was a magnificent silver liquid. Every single drop felt like a mountain crashing into his skull. It was slowly expanding his mind past the breaking point, trying to force a mortal vessel to understand the vastness of the universe.
It is too heavy, Luna thought, his consciousness slowly fading into the dark. I cannot hold it.
He was ready to surrender. He was ready to let the silver liquid consume him and turn him into dust. He had always hated hard work anyway. Sleeping in the void seemed so much easier.
Then, a voice echoed through the starry dark.
You promised! It wasn’t a booming, god-like voice. It was a soft, crying voice. It was Soltheia.
Luna’s consciousness spasmed. He remembered the cold stone balcony. He remembered her wiping the blood from his face. He remembered the terror in her ocean-blue eyes when she thought he was going to die.
I promised her I wouldn’t be a tragic hero, Luna realized, a sudden spark of stubbornness flaring in his chest. I hate breaking promises.
Luna didn’t try to pull the golden chain. Librarian Jovian had warned him about that. Instead, he gathered every ounce of his fading mortal willpower. He pushed outward, forcing his own human magic against the leaking silver liquid. He didn’t fight the cosmic energy; he embraced it. He let the leaking silver drops fuse with his own mana.
ARGHHH!! CLICK!
With an inner shout, Luna slammed the golden chain shut. The lock clicked into place. The infinite void vanished. In the infirmary, Soltheia gasped loudly as the golden-green magic in her hands suddenly flickered and died.
The air in the room changed. The wooden chair Soltheia was sitting on suddenly levitated two inches above the stone floor. A glass cup of water on the nightstand slowly rose into the air, the water defying gravity and forming a perfect, hovering sphere. Small pebbles and dust from the cobblestones outside drifted up toward the ceiling. Luna took a sharp breath of air. He simply opened his eyes and sat straight up in the bed.
Soltheia covered her mouth with both hands, tears of pure relief flooding her eyes. "Luna!"
She lunged herself forward, wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face in his shoulder. She didn’t care that her chair was currently in mid-air. She didn’t care about anything else. He was alive, that’s the thing she wanted.
Luna slowly wrapped his arms around her, hugging her back. "I told you," he whispered, his voice hoarse and raspy. "I am just taking a nap. Stop crying, Sol. You are getting my shirt wet."
Soltheia pulled back, wiping her eyes and laughing through her tears. But as she looked at his face, her breath caught in her throat. Luna looked different.
The terrifying strain of holding the First Cosmic Lock had altered him. His sleek silver hair was now completely white, like fresh snow. But it was his eyes that were truly shocking. His right eye was still his normal pale gray. But his left eye was changed. It glowed with a swirling silver cosmic light, looking like a tiny galaxy trapped inside his pupil.
"Your eye," Soltheia breathed, reaching up to gently touch his cheek.
Luna blinked. He looked around the room. He saw the glass cup. He saw the chair hovering off the floor. He just casually looked at the cup. The gravity snapped back to normal. The glass cup dropped onto the nightstand. The wooden chair hit the stone floor with a loud clack.
CLANK!
"The lock leaked," Luna explained quietly, his voice carrying a strange echo. "A tiny drop of the infinite mana fused with my brain before I could seal it shut. I don’t need to cast spells anymore, Soltheia. The gravity just listens to me now."
He slowly pushed the blankets off his legs and stood up from the bed. He was thin, and his muscles ached, but he stood perfectly straight. He looked at his hands, feeling the weight radiating from his own skin. He was no longer just a genius mage. He had touched the universe and survived.
"Where is Kairos?" Luna asked, turning his glowing left eye toward the door.
"In the courtyard," Soltheia replied, grabbing her medical bag. "The Arena Champions have arrived. Malgreth’s demon horde is marching from the south, and the Black Mist is hitting the eastern borders. We are splitting the army."
Luna reached over and grabbed his dark jacket from the chair. He slipped it on, adjusting the collar with his usual lazy swagger.
"Good," Luna smirked, though his face was serious. "I have a massive headache, and I really want to crush something."
****
CRANNKKK!
Ten minutes later, the wooden doors of the courtyard opened. Kairos, Karl, Ignis, Terravarous, and the Colosseum winners all turned their heads. Luna walked slowly out onto the cobblestones. Soltheia walked right beside him. The air warped around Luna’s boots as he walked. Small rocks and gray ash hovered upward, rejecting the earth’s natural pull as he passed by.
Ignis stared at Luna’s white hair and his glowing silver eye. The royal let out a low whistle. "Well. You definitely look like you got hit by a cosmic energy, Emperor."
"And you look like you still can’t cast a decent fireball, rage boy," Luna replied back smoothly, unfazed.
Luna stopped in front of Kairos. He looked at Kairos’ dull silver sword and his shiny silver eyes. Kairos looked at Luna’s white hair and his cosmic left eye. They had both broken the rules of the mortal world. They had both paid the brutal price.
"You shattered the screen," Luna noted.
"I became the law," Kairos nodded. "You closed the chain."
"I kept a drop for myself," Luna smirked.
Kairos offered his hand. Luna took it, gripping it tightly. It wasn’t just a handshake between academy students anymore. It was a silent vow between two gods walking in mortal flesh.
"The demons are in the south," Kairos said, his voice serious. "Malgreth wants Seyana’s divine power. I am taking the Colosseum champions to the southern ash to hold the horde."
Luna let go of his hand and turned his gaze toward the eastern horizon, where the black mist was whirling rapidly against the broken walls.
"Catherine and Velanor are already heading east," Luna said, his single cosmic eye narrowing. "The shadow army is not mindless. I can feel their pressure from here. The Black Mist Generals are marching."
"Can you hold them?" Karl Wade asked, stepping forward and resting his heavy broadsword on his shoulder. The old Zephyros General looked at the white haired boy with respect.
"I can hold the sky if I have to, old man," Luna replied arrogantly, turning back to Kairos. "Don’t let the demons eat you, village boy. I am not digging your grave."
"Don’t let the shadows cut you," Kairos replied with a faint smile.
The Vanguard Generals split. Luna turned and walked toward the eastern gates, Soltheia hurrying right beside him. They were walking straight into the black fog to face the true commanders of the dark.
Kairos turned his back on the capital. He looked at his father, at Ignis, at Terravarous, and at the terrifying Arena Champions. He looked at Seyana, whose warm golden light pushed back the cold ash falling from the sky.
"We march south," Kairos commanded, his silver eyes blazing. "We do not stop until the red sky turns black."
The elite army marched out of the broken gates. The two front war had officially begun, and the mortal world was ready to bleed.