NOVEL NEXT Chapter 287: The Heavens Will BURN!
The battlefield is still trembling when Mhazul's words land like a hammer. His gaze pins Gorvak and Selira in place, sharp as steel.
Selira lowers her head, flames flickering faintly around her. Her voice is tight, almost formal.
"…Yes, Sir Mhazul."
Gorvak wipes blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. His gravelly voice rumbles out steady.
"We'll see it done. Wouldn't dare keep the King waiting."
Mhazul studies them both for a moment longer. The chains on his axes clink softly in the quiet, a reminder of the violence they had just witnessed. Though they all stand at peak Tier 6, the weight of his presence crushes down heavier than the spirit beast ever did.
They know it—both of them. Even together, they wouldn't last long if Mhazul chose to turn his weapons on them.
With a final grunt, Mhazul turns and follows after Alix, his heavy steps fading into the silence left behind.
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Brarth's fists crash against Kaelen's storm-cloaked arms, sparks and fire spraying like molten rain. Ravok surges in from the flank, his stone-clad fist slamming into Brarth's ribs with the weight of an avalanche. The air shudders with each exchange, every blow carving new scars into the burning district.
Brarth's chest heaves, breath ragged. His flames, once towering and fierce, now gutter and twist like a dying bonfire. Blood trickles from the corner of his mouth, sizzling as it drips onto the molten ground. He snarls, forcing himself forward, fists blazing anew.
"Two against one—and you call yourselves warriors?! Pathetic curs!"
Kaelen's laugh is sharp, carried on the crackle of lightning that arcs around him.
"Better pathetic than dead, Brarth. Look at yourself—you're cracking!"
Ravok presses in, his earthly aura flaring like iron fresh from the forge. His voice is a low growl, dripping venom.
"You had your time at the top… now it's over. No throne of flame can save you."
Brarth roars and unleashes a torrent of fire, forcing them both back for a breath. His body trembles, veins glowing faintly beneath charred skin. He is losing. He knows it.
Where are they? His thoughts churn like a storm inside his skull. We agreed—if any of us were attacked, reinforcements would come. Rank Ten would stand together. That was the pact!
But the battlefield is empty of allies. No banners in the sky. No footsteps rushing to his side. Just fire, lightning, and stone crashing against him again and again.
Did they betray me? Did they decide I was expendable? His rage twists tighter, hotter. The fury is almost worse than his wounds. His clan is being slaughtered, his legacy burning before his eyes—while his so-called equals watch from afar, silent and still.
He bares his teeth, eyes bloodshot with fury as he launches himself back into the fray, fists like blazing meteors.
"You think my clan will fall so easily?! I'll drag you both into the pyre with me!"
Kaelen meets him head-on, lightning spearing down his arm. Ravok crashes in from the side, stone and flame colliding in an explosion that rattles Ember City to its bones.
Brarth staggers, but he does not fall—not yet. His pride refuses. His fury refuses.
The night sky blazes brighter than day. Firestorms clash with storms of lightning, and shards of molten stone fall like meteors into the ruined streets below. The clash of Rank Ten shakes the heavens themselves.
Brarth's fists hammer against Kaelen's storm-wrapped arms, his flames raging, but weaker with each strike. Ravok's stone-encrusted fist slams into his side, cracking ribs, forcing a gout of blood from Brarth's throat. He reels, his aura sputtering—yet still refuses to fall.
His chest heaves like a bellows, golden flames clawing from his cracked skin. His eyes burn with something deeper than pain: betrayal.
"WHERE ARE THEY?!" Brarth's roar tears the sky apart. Fire erupts from his body in a pillar, punching through the clouds. "WE HAD A PACT!"
Kaelen hovers opposite him, lightning sizzling along his arms, his eyes narrowing.
"No one's coming for you, Brarth. They've abandoned you."
Brarth's laughter bursts out, jagged and broken. It echoes across the battlefield, the sound of madness breaking free. Blood pours from his mouth, his aura boiling hotter, fiercer, more unstable.
"Abandoned? Betrayed? Hah… HAHAHAHA!" His body trembles as flames burst from every crack in his skin, molten blood dripping from his limbs like falling stars. "Then let them watch! Let them all see the pyre I'll make of this world!"
His aura swells monstrously, the fire around him collapsing inward like a dying star. His body becomes a furnace of self-destruction, his life force igniting as fuel.
Kaelen's eyes widen, lightning faltering.
"He's… burning his own core—!"
Ravok snarls, stepping forward, molten aura bracing.
"Damn fool's turning himself into a living sun!"
Brarth spreads his arms wide, fire spiraling around him in titanic whorls, the very air warping with heat. His voice is thunder and flame, broken with fury and grief.
"If I fall, I'll drag the skies down with me! If this is my end, then the heavens will BURN!"
The sky erupts.
Brarth's final scream—half madness, half defiance—rips across the battlefield as he gathers the last of his life into a furnace of self-destruction. Lightning and molten stone hang in the air; Kaelen and Ravok brace for the cataclysm that should follow.
Instead, a column of light tears down from the direction of Alix's carriage—pure, white-heat fire, sharpened like a blade. It slams into Brarth's raging core.
The beam doesn't scorch. It consumes.
Flame meets flame and the world seems to blink. Brarth goes from living inferno to nothing so cleanly that for a heartbeat the air itself is stunned — no charred remains, no ash, no bone. The pillar of fire collapses inward and is gone. A pocket of perfect silence swallows the spot where the clan leader fell.
Kaelen and Ravok hang in the air, sweat and blood spattering their faces, their auras still roaring. For an instant they only stare — disbelief, relief, an animal gratitude that tastes of fear.
They turn together toward the carriage silhouetted beyond the ruined avenue. Through the smoke they see it: a dark shape at the city edge, cold and implacable even as the battlefield rages. Alix stands on its platform like a statue come alive.
Kaelen's voice cracks first, raw and hoarse.
"Your — Your Majesty…"
Ravok's posture folds, muscles loosening; he forces out the words the moment his chest unclenches.
"Thank you, Your Majesty. You saved—"
He doesn't finish. Both men bow mid-air, not just from habit but because the sight of that carriage, and the utter annihilation it produced, bends the spine as surely as any command.
Alix's figure is a shadowed silhouette against the glow. He doesn't widen his stance to accept praise. He doesn't look pleased. He merely lifts one pale hand; the gesture is casual, almost bored.
"Finish this already," he says. His voice is soft, but when it reaches them it lands like an order hammered on steel.
Kaelen straightens with speed that is military and immediate.
"As you command."
Ravok's eyes flash once—fear, hunger, calculation—then he grips his fists and drops, diving back into the fray with renewed, ruthless intent.
The carriage rides like a dark prow through the smoke. Outside, the city still bleeds light—fires guttering, walls crumbled, the sporadic flare of spells painting the sky in angry bursts.
Inside, the air is cool and perfumed with the faint iron of blood lingering on the leather seats. Alix sits motionless, fingers steepled. Mhazul stands by the open hatch, one massive hand resting on the chained haft of his axe. He looks like a statue of war waiting to move.
A courier-bird—black-feathered, its eyes ringed with runes—lands on the carriage rim. Mhazul plucks the sealed strip from its leg, breaks the sigil, glances once, then hands the parchment to Alix without expression. He speaks in that low, efficient voice that never rises even in battle.
"Your Majesty," Mhazul says. "I have news from Zurrak, Grathum, and Virela's fronts. They sent reinforcements—three low-level Tier 6s in total and a hundred thousand soldiers. They pushed in, but they were disposed of easily by them."
"Good." He breathes the word out like a verdict. "Tell them to hold where they are for now.
Mhazul inclines his head. "As you command. I'll send the order and stand the reserve down."
He lets the carriage rock a moment and then, quietly, almost to himself: "If those humans could gather every force they have and strike together at one point… even I couldn't ignore it. Put all their banners in one field and they become dangerous."