No! I don't want to be a Super Necromancer!

Beijing did not fall.

Though the skies cracked and fire rained. Though beasts clawed through its perimeter and missiles cratered its surface, it did not fall.

It bled.

It burned.

But it endured.

The capital's defensive matrix, after countless last minute efforts to defuse the mana pools, was still at a relatively high 50% functionality.

It was able to hold back the worst of the beast wave. Powerful spells shone like dying stars across the city's airspace.

Towers overloaded, sparking wildly. Arcane shields flickered in and out like desperate breaths, but they remained.

And the defenders made every second count.

Hundreds of elite units surged through the inner districts. Mana Awakened strike teams leapt from rooftop to rooftop, launching spells from elevated positions.

Every mecha, from cutting edge 6th gens armed with proton cannons to practice mechas armed with only steel rods, marched like titans between the buildings, flattening charging beasts beneath titanium feet.

In the skies above, mages hurled down lightning and molten steel. In the underground rail tunnels, flame casters and gravity adepts redirected surging masses of monsters into collapsed paths and pre-triggered traps.

And at the heart of the city, in the command post beneath the National Defense Fortress, President Jiang stood surrounded by her most trusted advisors… or at least what remained of them.

Generals Riki, Maru, and Hong Fei, three of the four Eight Heavenly Generals still breathing, watched the red blinking lights with clenched jaws and hollow eyes.

Four of their brothers were gone.

Not retired. Not missing.

Gone.

Cracked mana cores. Broken bones. Hearts that exploded from within as they shielded the capital from incoming warheads and ripped through S-Rank beast commanders without hesitation.

General Zhou Yu, the Shield Warden, had thrown up three continent-class mana barriers in the span of one minute. The third one shattered as he screamed in defiance, buying ten seconds for a school complex to be evacuated. His core exploded a moment later.

General Xian Fei, Soul Guardian and the greatest long-range caster China had ever known, stood atop the Xiang Gate. She fired one last spirit arrow into an SS-Rank Storm Hydra's skull, collapsing it mid-charge, then collapsed to her knees as her soul disconnected from her body. She died smiling, bow drawn.

General Liang, the Wind Spear, cleared four city blocks with one desperate charge, impaling three S-Class flying beasts in one motion. He bled from the eyes, ears, and mouth before his body froze mid-lunge, overdrawn, overburned. His last breath was a whisper: Hold the wall.

And General Fei Bao, Earth Reaver and Siege Breaker, fought in the crater of the Second Ring Highway. He held the line against a horde of tunneling death wyrms. One broke through. He crushed it with his bare hands… and was swallowed by the second. His last recorded message was, I am not done yet.

They died where they stood.

Legends. Reduced to ash and silence.

Now, only the defensive General Qin Hui, God of Iron, and the three remained in the war room.

"We're wasting time," General Maru growled, slamming his palm into the command table. "We can't direct the entire defense from here. We're not strategists, we're warhammers."

"They're dying out there," General Hong Fei whispered, voice shaking. "They're dying… and we're here. In a fucking room."

President Jiang didn't stop them.

She just nodded.

"Go."

General Riki, the oldest among them, placed one hand on her shoulder. "Forgive us."

"There's nothing to forgive," she said quietly. "Make them pay."

They vanished.

Not with fanfare. Not with ceremony.

They simply left.

And the earth outside trembled seconds later.

On the West Wall, General Zhao Heng of the Celestial Flame Division had become a furnace given form.

His entire body was wrapped in glowing sigils etched directly into his skin. His armor had long since melted into slag, and his flesh hissed beneath the heat of his own power, but still he stood.

He fought a crag tusk juggernaut, a colossal beast plated in living stone. Each charge from its molten hooves cracked the foundation of the wall, and each roar sent shockwaves through the defensive lines.

Zhao met it head-on, fists wreathed in sunfire, his strikes detonating with the fury of solar flares.

But the juggernaut refused to fall. Every time it staggered, it rose angrier. A second charge brought it within meters of the command relay tower, too close. Too fast.

That was when lightning struck from above.

A bolt carved down from the heavens, splitting the air, shattering the beast's momentum.

General Riki, the Heavenly Lightning, landed in a blast of thunder. Electricity danced across his shoulders, his cloak flaring behind him, eyes blazing white.

"You take the left," Riki said.

Zhao nodded once.

Together, flame and lightning engulfed the beast in a spiraling storm of destruction. The juggernaut thrashed and screamed, its armor melting, cracking, then finally bursting apart in a thunderclap that lit up the sky.

There was no time to speak.

Another wave crested the horizon, and the two generals leapt into the next fight.

—

Above the southern edge of the city, General Lin Kexin, the Silent Gale, moved like mist through the air. Her scythe arced in graceful loops, slicing through sky razors, avian monstrosities with blade-feathered wings and sonic shrieks that tore open flesh.

She had been airborne for nearly an hour, weaving between windstreams, turning enemy momentum against itself. But there were too many. They regrouped fast, adapting mid-air, forcing her to burn through precious mana reserves just to stay aloft.

When three of them closed in from above, too fast to dodge, Lin's eyes narrowed.

And then they were gone.

A jet of compressed air exploded upward from below, collapsing the entire column of enemies. General Maru, the Compression Master, shot into the sky like a cannonball. His gauntlets glowed with dense mana, and he swung his fists like falling stars.

"No words?" he asked, meeting her mid-glide.

She shook her head. Smiled faintly.

Together, they spiraled through the enemy formation, wind and pressure combining into devastating currents. Where Lin sliced, Maru shattered. Where Maru compressed, Lin guided the winds inward like scissor blades.

The sky razors didn't just fall.

They were erased.

And already, more shadows loomed beyond the clouds.

—

Deep in the eastern streets, General Zhang Muyu of the Bloodsteel Regiment fought amidst the wreckage. His orders still came between gritted teeth, clear and sharp, even as blood soaked his uniform and his limbs failed him.

Three S-Rank manticores circled him, massive beasts with obsidian-scaled hides, eyes like molten gold, and barbed tails that lashed out with the speed of lightning. One had already torn off his leg. Another had crushed his left arm.

He kept fighting anyway. Kept calling artillery coordinates. Kept his blade ready.

Just as the beasts pounced for the final strike, a geyser of flame erupted from the street corner.

General Hong Fei crashed through the wreckage with a bellow, his fists encased in molten gauntlets. Flame burst from every pore, setting the entire block ablaze in controlled fury. He caught one of the manticores mid-pounce, grabbed it by the throat, and drove it headfirst through a stone wall.

"Zhang!" Hong Fei shouted, spinning to parry a second tail-strike. "Take a breath. I've got this."

Zhang tried to answer, but only blood came out. He collapsed against the wall, smiling bitterly.

Hong Fei roared and charged the remaining two manticores alone, flames rising in towering pillars around him. His fists moved faster than the eye could follow, hooks, elbows, fire-coated haymakers, all backed by mana compressed into superheated bursts.

One manticore screamed as its wings ignited and fell.

The second turned to run.

It didn't make it.

Hong Fei stood alone in the rubble, panting, fire trailing from his shoulders. Behind him, med-drones descended to retrieve Zhang.

The street was silent once more.

But not for long.

—

And high above the capital, where the sky itself was burning, General Bai Yuan of the Astral Guard faced the impossible.

A flying Leviathan, a serpentine beast of myth, longer than a carrier, its scales shimmering like stars, soared around him. It lashed out with a tail that cracked thunder, and six shimmering wings that shredded clouds with every beat.

Bai Yuan's silver blade clashed against it again and again, holding a sky no one else could.

But the Leviathan learned. Adapted. Each pass was closer, each roar louder, its intent now clear, to bring down the capital from above.

Then a second light joined the sky.

General Riki had returned, this time in full aerial combat gear, arcs of lightning spiraling around him like divine chains. He struck the Leviathan mid-flight, stunning it with a wave of high-frequency thunderbolts.

"Need a hand?" he called.

Bai Yuan didn't answer. He was already climbing into position.

Together, they launched a coordinated assault, one wielding astral precision, the other divine wrath. The Leviathan flailed and coiled, tail cracking towers and wings stirring tornadoes, but the two generals closed in.

Bai Yuan landed the final strike, his blade plunged into the base of the beast's skull. A quiet snap echoed across the clouds.

The Leviathan fell like a meteor, trailing starlight.

And Bai Yuan, bloodied but breathing, didn't wait to land. He turned toward the next aerial alert, sword still raised.

All across the capital, China's mightiest warriors fought with everything they had.

Every single one of them were injured.

And soon, more would die.

The capital was slowly turning from a battlefield into a graveyard of broken gods.