NOVEL NEXT Chapter 104: The Intervention
The Iron Cathedral was a graveyard of twisted metal and black frost. The silence following the explosion was heavy, broken only by the rhythmic hiss of escaping steam from the severed pipes. Vane lay in the center of the crater, his fingers twitching toward the star-steel spear that had rolled a few feet away. His mana core felt like a burnt-out furnace: cold, hollow, and jagged. Every breath was a labor of agony, the air in his lungs feeling like a mixture of iron filings and freezing mist.
The phantom of Senna had vanished, but the psychic weight of the [Perfect Copy] lingered like an echo. Using the combat logic of an Expert in an Elite body had exacted a terrifying price. Vane could feel the microscopic fractures in his bones and the way his mana channels were frayed, like wires carrying ten times their rated voltage. He looked at his hands; they were trembling uncontrollably, the skin blackened by the frost of the Sovereign's Mantle.
Five meters away, Isaac Glacium leaned against the remains of a fallen iron gear. His sapphire eyes were half-lidded, his chest heaving as he struggled to pull oxygen into lungs that felt filled with ice water. The obsidian armor he had worn was gone, shattered into dust by the final resonance of the Argent Horizon. They had pushed each other to a threshold no Elite should have touched. They were two kings who had dismantled their own throne room, and now they were simply two exhausted boys waiting for the world to resume its pace.
"Look at this," a voice sneered from the shadows of the upper gallery. "The genius Monarch and the slum-born freak, both crawling in the dirt like wounded dogs."
Vane forced his head to turn. His vision was a blurred mess of red and grey, but he recognized the silhouette stepping onto the twisted remains of the central platform.
It was Jax of the Blue Tower. The Fire-aspect noble who had spent the entire semester in the shadow of the Princess. He was a Rank 3 Elite, his hair immaculate and his face twisted into a permanent sneer of superiority. Behind him, the three teammates Vane had humbled at the elevator chokepoint stepped out of the gloom. They looked better than Jax—their armor was largely intact, their breathing steady—but they followed Jax with the hesitant steps of scavengers entering a lion's den.
"Anastasia is already securing the objectives on Floor 3," Jax said, his voice echoing off the broken obsidian pillars. "She didn't even bother coming to the Hub. She said neither of you were worth the detour once the gate entry points were secured. She has the efficiency of a true ruler, unlike you two, who decided to play at being legends in a basement."
Jax stepped closer, his boots crunching on the frozen debris. He conjured a jagged blade of fire-mana in his right hand. It wasn't the refined, solar heat of a Sol; it was a hungry, flickering orange flame that smelled of sulfur. His teammates fanned out, their eyes darting between the prone Vane and the slumped Isaac. They were terrified, even now. They had seen the wreckage of the Cathedral. They knew that if either of these monsters had a single drop of mana left, Jax would be a smear on the floor.
"But I?" Jax's smile widened, revealing teeth that seemed too white against the grime of the Labyrinth. "I think there's a certain prestige in being the one to officially 'eliminate' the two strongest students in the year. The hierarchy demands a correction, Vane. A rat who bites a king must be exterminated, and a king who falls to a rat must be replaced."
Jax raised his hand, the flames humming with a high-pitched, murderous frequency. Vane tried to reach for his spear, but his arm felt like it was made of lead. He could feel the Usurper authority deep in his soul, but it was a parched desert. There was nothing left to take, no one left to copy. He was empty.
"Die with some dignity, Vane," Jax spat.
He launched the fire-blade.
It didn't hit.
A spear of blinding, golden radiance tore through the darkness of the gallery, intercepting the fire-blade mid-air and shattering it into molten scrap. The heat was so intense it caused the remaining frost on the floor to vanish in a sudden, violent cloud of steam.
Valerica Sol stepped out from behind a fallen pillar. Her golden armor was scuffed and her hair was a mess, her cape torn to a ragged sliver, but her eyes burned with the calm, molten intensity of a star. She didn't look back at Vane, but she positioned herself directly in front of him, her Celestial Heart mana flaring in a protective aura that pushed back the remaining shadows of the room.
"The Sol family does not leave its debts unpaid, Jax," Valerica said, her voice like grinding rock.
Jax's teammates recoiled, their own mana-auras flickering in the face of her radiance. They weren't fighting a crippled Vane anymore; they were facing the Sun of the Sol House, a woman who looked like she was ready to burn the entire Cathedral down to protect her teammate.
"Valerica?" Jax hissed, taking a step back as his own flame wavered. "This isn't your fight. Vane is a commoner. Why waste your mana on a tool? We can split the credit. We can tell the faculty that Team 5 was eliminated by the Blue Tower."
"He isn't a tool," Valerica replied, her voice steady as she raised her solar lance, the tip glowing with an expensive, white-hot light. "He is my teammate. And unlike you, Jax, he actually earned his standing. He didn't wait in the shadows like a vulture. If you want his head, you'll have to go through me first."
Jax's face contorted. He looked at his teammates, but they were already backing away. They knew Valerica's reputation. They knew that even exhausted, a Sol was a different breed of mage. Before Jax could make a decision, before he could let his arrogance override his survival instinct, the entire cathedral began to vibrate.
A massive, booming tone echoed through the Labyrinth, a resonant sound that vibrated through the obsidian floor and the very air in Vane's lungs. It was the sound of the Zenith Evaluation Buzzer.
The blue emergency lights of the Hub turned a vibrant, victory-gold. A massive holographic screen materialized in the center of the wreckage, floating above the crater where Vane and Isaac had clashed. It displayed the final standings of the Second Practical Evaluation, the letters etched in light for the entire year to see.
Rankings:
1st: Team 5 Vane
2nd: Team 1 Isaac Glacium
3rd: Team 2 Anastasia
Jax's face turned a pale, sickly grey as he stared at the board. He had waited too long. The evaluation was over, and the medical drones were already descending from the ceiling, their red-and-white lights flickering like fireflies as they moved to stabilize the wounded. His chance to "correct" the hierarchy had vanished in the chime of a bell.
Valerica didn't lower her weapon until the drones had hovered over Vane. She exhaled, the golden radiance of her armor fading, though her eyes remained sharp and protective. She knelt beside Vane, her hand hovering over his shoulder.
"We did it, Vane," she whispered, her voice cracking with a rare moment of emotion. "First place. You actually did it."
Vane looked up at the holographic screen. He saw his name at the top, sitting above the Monarch of the North and the Princess of the Empire. He saw the "Team 5" designation and remembered the faces of Ashe and Isole, whom he had pushed through the gate minutes ago. He had fulfilled his promise. He was no longer the boy digging his mother Helena out of the mud in Oakhaven. He was a King in a palace of iron.
Isaac Glacium managed to sit up as a drone began to knit his skin back together with a green, cooling mana-gel. He looked at Vane, then at the leaderboard. He didn't look angry; he looked satisfied. The predatory boredom that had defined him was gone, replaced by a cold, sharp respect.
"The rankings are correct," Isaac rasped, a small, bloody smile touching his lips. "For today, Vane, you are the King."
Vane felt the last of his consciousness slipping away. The weight of Senna's memory, the pain of the [Perfect Copy], and the sheer exhaustion of the duel finally caught up to him. As the medical drone's sedative hit his system, the cold of the Cathedral faded. He saw one final image in his mind.
It was Senna, her raven-black hair falling over her eyes as she leaned against the wall of the high-tech training hall at Zenith. She wasn't coughing blood. She wasn't dying. She was just watching him with that half-smirk, the look she gave him when they were alone in her quarters after a night of training. He remembered her warmth, the way she had loved him when the rest of the world saw only a slum-born boy with a stolen spear.
'I'm the best, Senna,' he thought, as the darkness claimed him. 'I told you I'd be the best for you.'