Chapter : 1329

  Jager’s mind was a storm of pain, shame, and a new, deep, and very scary worry about his beliefs. He made one last, animal-like jump. It was not a planned move. It was just a twitch, the last movement of a dying animal. He did not have a weapon. He did not have a voice. He did not have a spirit. He only had his bare hands and the last, tiny, and completely sad sparks of his will to live.

  Lloyd did not even move. He just raised an eyebrow. It was a sign of small, almost bored, and very insulting surprise.

  From the slippery black ice under Jager’s broken body, a dozen more shards of black ice shot up. They did not form a clumsy cage. They were a piece of art, a beautiful, complex web of impossibly sharp, frozen needles. And they went through his limbs—his arms, his legs, his shoulders. They pinned him to the ground like a rare and beautiful butterfly on a collector’s board. He was held on a cross made of his own frozen, and now very real, sadness.

  The Winter King stood over him. He was a grand, terrible, and completely cruel figure of absolute, final judgment. The time for lessons, for talks, for the slow, beautiful examination, was over. The time for the final, harsh, and needed final mark had come.

  “You were a tool, Jager,” the Winter King said. His voice no longer had any educational warmth or interest in beliefs. It was the cold, flat, and final voice of a killer reading a sentence. “A beautifully made, and very expensive, tool. But just a tool. And now,” he added, his golden, dragon-like eyes showing a hint of something that was almost, but not quite, pity, “you are a broken one.”

  He looked down at the broken, bleeding, and now totally silent killer. For a quick, almost human moment, he felt a sting of something that was not victory. It was a deep and very tired sadness. “Your master has already left you,” he said. The words were a final, quiet, and brutally honest truth. “He left you to die the moment he faced a true king. You were a sacrifice, a piece in a game you thought you were winning. You died the moment you were sent to face me.”

  And then, he prepared his final, all-or-nothing move. The battle was won, but the war was not over. Jager was a creature of the Seventh Circle. His soul was not his own; it belonged to the Abyss. To just kill him would be to set him free. It would let his being, his memories, his knowledge of Lloyd’s own impossible powers, return to his dark masters. He would become a file to be studied, a failure to be learned from, a new weapon to be made to use against him.

  Lloyd would not let that happen. He would not just win this battle. He would wipe it from the history books. He would leave no proof, no witnesses, no ghosts.

  He closed his eyes. His silver-white hair, which had been buzzing with a controlled blue energy, began to float around him as if he were underwater. His grand, crystal-like wings began to shed a bright, diamond dust of pure, total frost. He began to pull on the last, deepest, and most dangerous pools of his and Bingyu’s shared power. He was no longer just gathering energy; he was pulling it from his own soul. It was a suicidal, one-time use of power that would leave him a hollow, empty shell.

  The air in the space screamed, a high, thin, and terrifying sound, as he began to create his ultimate weapon. The faint, soft light in the empty space did not get brighter; it got dimmer. It was swallowed by a new, impossible, and world-ending thing that was forming in his hands. It was the end of the song. A final, silent, beautiful, and star-destroying end.

  The white, empty space, which had been a kingdom of pure cold, now became something else. It became a place of deep and scary emptiness. The very material of Lloyd’s personal dimension, a space that was outside the normal rules of the world, strained under the power he was calling. He was no longer just using his own spiritual power or the divine power of the Ice Dragon mixed with his soul. He was pulling on the basic building blocks of reality itself. He was like a god creating his own destruction, and his enemy’s.

  Chapter : 1330

  In his outstretched hands, which were held together like he was holding a small, new bird, a new thing began to form. It was not a blade of ice. It was not a spear of lightning. It was an idea. It was a perfect, silent, and wonderfully beautiful ball of pure nothingness.

  It was the size of a fist, but it was as heavy as a dying universe. It was a tiny, collapsing star of pure cold, a point of anti-energy. It did not send out cold, but instead pulled in all heat, all light, all energy, all life. The clean white of the dimension, which had seemed so total a moment ago, now looked like a dull, dirty gray in comparison. The very light of this plain world seemed to bend and twist around the ball. This was a silent, screaming sign of its impossible and powerful gravity.

  Jager, held on his cross of black ice, watched it being made. The terror, the pain, the shame—it all faded away. It was replaced by a strange, final, and almost calm feeling of deep, expert respect. He was an artist of death, an expert in destruction. He had spent his life studying and practicing the most graceful, effective, and beautiful ways to end a life. And he knew, with the total, solid certainty of a master seeing the work of a god, that he was about to see the most beautiful, perfect, and final work of his chosen, terrible art. It was an amazing and very humbling final lesson.

  Lloyd, the Winter King, opened his eyes. They were no longer the liquid gold of a dragon, burning with a cold, old fire. They were two perfect, empty holes that swallowed light, just like the impossible, terrible ball that pulsed gently in his hands. He was an empty container, a channel for a power that was unmaking him even as he used it. He had poured every last bit of his will, his energy, his very soul into this final, amazing, and self-destructive move.

  He looked at Jager. For a last, quick moment, he did not see the killer, not the monster, but a man. A broken, defeated man who had picked the wrong side in a war that was older than both of them. A war that had now, finally, reached its harsh and total end.

  “Goodbye, Jager,” the Winter King whispered. His dual voice was a soft, final, and almost gentle farewell. It was a quiet blessing for a soul that was about to be wiped from the book of existence.

  And then, he launched it.

  The ball of pure cold did not fly. It did not travel. It did not explode. It simply grew.

  There was no sound. There was no flash of light. There was only a silent, beautiful, and unstoppable growth of absolute, perfect nothingness.

  The white empty space was erased. The floor of black ice, the cross of frozen needles, the very idea of a floor and a sky—it all just stopped existing.

  Jager and the broken, frozen pieces of his spirit, Kroth, were not just killed; they were unmade. Their bodies, their spirits, their souls, their very existence were not burned or broken or torn apart. They were taken apart at the idea level. Their pieces were returned to the basic, meaningless static of the universe before it was born. They were not just a memory; they were a rumor, a story that had never happened, a dream that had never been dreamed.

  The silent, growing wave of nothingness washed over Lloyd himself. For a single, terrifying, endless moment, he felt his own existence start to come apart, his own atoms start to forget what they were. But he was the center. He was the eye of the storm. The wave passed through him, and he was left standing in a new, and very different, empty space.

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  The white was gone. In its place was a soft, gentle, and total blackness, the quiet, peaceful dark of a universe before the first star was born. His personal dimension, his beautiful, clean cage, had been wiped clean. It was a fresh start. A new beginning.

  And he was alone in it. His wings of frozen starlight were gone. His horns of ice were gone. His silver-white hair, in a slow, shining fall, returned to its normal, simple dark brown. The connection with Bingyu was broken. Her own divine power was completely used up. He was just Lloyd Ferrum again. A tired, aching, and very, very empty man.

  Chapter : 1331

  He had won. He had not just beaten his enemy; he had erased him from the book of life. It was a victory so complete, so total, that it was a new and very lonely kind of sadness. He had saved the wedding. He had protected the kingdom. And the cost had been a small but important piece of his own soul.

  At the same time, in a different reality, in the stormy, damaged skies above the capital city of Bethelham, the other war, the war of the gods, reached its own amazing and very loud end.

  Arch Duke Roy Ferrum, a giant of storm and mountain, had been fighting a smart, harsh, and very tiring battle against Beelzebub and his two evil Sovereign spirits. He was a force of nature, but even a force of nature can be worn down by the sneaky, endless decay of the Abyss.

  He was losing spiritual energy. Gog’s amazing granite body was full of deep, ugly cracks from the Crimson Oni’s constant, mountain-breaking attacks. Magog’s spinning, messy storm was starting to weaken. Its pure lightning was struggling against the Black Dragon’s constant, evil breath of shadow-fire. Roy knew, with the cold, hard certainty of a long-time commander, that he could not win a long fight. He had to end it. Now.

  And then, he saw his chance. Beelzebub, in a moment of great, proud, and showy confidence, had let his two spirits go too far. He had ordered them into a planned, powerful pincer attack. It was a classic and very effective move meant to crush Gog between them, to break the mountain and, by doing that, to break the Arch Duke’s will.

  It was a perfect move. A textbook attack. And it was a deadly, terrible mistake.

  Roy’s eyes, the color of a winter storm, had been focused on a desperate defense. Suddenly, they flashed with a cold, hunting, and winning light. The time for defense was over. The time for the Lion of the North to show his true, terrible, and famous teeth had arrived.

  He did not give a loud, roaring, and dramatic command. He gave a single, silent, and total order that was a perfect display of planned, powerful, and beautiful violence.

  Gog, the living mountain, did not pull back. He did not get ready for the hit. He charged forward. He ignored the Crimson Oni at his back and slammed his entire, huge body directly into the charging Black Dragon. It was a massive collision, a meeting of rock and shadow that sent a shockwave of pure force through the sky. The boom was felt, if not heard, by every person in the city below.

  At the same time, Magog, the ancient storm, did not just attack the Oni; it became its cage. The spinning, messy storm of wind and lightning, which had been a large, defensive shield, collapsed inward. It did not become a spear of focused energy, but a solid, inescapable, and beautiful ball of pure, packed storm, a small sun of pure elemental anger. It trapped the Crimson Oni in its center.

  It was a perfect, beautiful, and completely surprising counter-pincer attack. Beelzebub’s two amazing spirits, which a moment ago had been the hunters, were now trapped, separated, and hopelessly, beautifully open to attack.

  And then, with the calm, focused, and terrible grace of a master artist, Arch Duke Roy Ferrum released the full, terrifying, and famous power of his SSS-class Steel Blood.

  The sky above Bethelham had been a mess of wild, elemental violence. It was a chaotic painting of shadow, lightning, and stone. Now it became the workshop for a single, amazing, and terrible act of creation. Arch Duke Roy Ferrum, his face a mask of cold, northern anger that was as beautiful as it was scary, raised his hands. In that moment, he was no longer just a fighter, a lord, or even a king. He was a master artist, a divine blacksmith. And he was about to build a cage for gods.

  He did not pull chains from his hands, which was a simple trick for lesser men. He pulled them from the very air, from the iron in the dust floating in the dim light, from the very idea of 'tying' something up. A thousand chains, each one as thick as a castle wall, appeared. Each one was the color of a starless, total, and light-eating midnight sky. They did not just appear; they were made in a single, silent, and world-breaking moment. Their dark, heavy, and evil steel hummed with a power that was ancient, total, and completely, beautifully unforgiving.

  Chapter : 1332

  This was not the graceful, sword-like art of his son, a dance of a thousand tiny, exact cuts. This was the giant hammer of a king, a single, final, and total blow.

  The chains did not whip out. They did not lash out. They flowed. They were a thousand rivers of dark, living, and smart steel, moving with a silent, unstoppable, and scary purpose. They all came together on the two trapped, struggling, and now completely terrified spirits of the Abyss.

  The Black Dragon was still caught in Gog’s unbreakable, mountain-sized hug. It let out a silent, mental shriek of pure, deep terror as the first of the dark chains wrapped around its bony body. It breathed its shadow-fire, a force that could unmake reality itself. But the chains were not from this reality. They were a physical form of Roy’s total, firm will, and they were, in this moment, the most real thing in the universe. They tightened. The sound of ancient, fossilized, and demon-made bone, a hundred times stronger than human steel, cracking and breaking like dry sticks, echoed in the silent sky.

  The Crimson Oni, trapped in the beautiful, terrible center of Magog’s storm-prison, did no better. The chains went through the spinning, messy storm as if it were just morning fog. They found the raging, struggling demon inside. They wrapped around its arms and legs, its body, its single, jagged horn that was covered in lightning. They formed a perfect, complex, and inescapable web of total, firm control. The Oni’s cursed lightning, a power that could break mountains and boil seas, sparked harmlessly and sadly against the dark, evil, and completely uncaring steel of the Ferrum family power.

  The cage was complete. A giant, complex, and darkly beautiful ball of a thousand connected, living chains held the two amazing, Sovereign-Level spirits of the Abyss. It was a masterpiece of fighting skill and total, overwhelming power. It held them in an unbreakable, and now slowly, unstoppably, crushing hug.

  Arch Duke Roy Ferrum lowered his hands. He looked at Beelzebub. His storm-gray eyes showed no victory, no anger, no feeling at all. There was only the cold, flat, and final judgment of a king who had just given a death sentence.

  And then, with a slow, careful, and almost casual move, he closed his fist.

  The cage of a thousand chains collapsed inward.

  There was no sound. There was no explosion. There was only a single, silent, and terrible squeeze. The Black Dragon and the Crimson Oni, two amazing, terrible beings from myths and legends, two masterpieces of evil, were not just broken; they were crushed into a single, dense, and totally meaningless point of evil, dead dust. Their spirits, their power, their very existence, were destroyed in a single, silent, and disrespectfully beautiful act of total, overwhelming, and final force.

  Beelzebub stared. The bored, proud, and beautiful smile was gone. It was replaced by a mask of pure, glowing, and totally helpless anger. His toys, his beautiful, broken, and carefully made pets, had just been unmade before his very eyes. He had underestimated the Lion of the North. He had mistaken his patience for weakness, his control for a limit, his quiet, northern calm for a lack of passion. He had made a deadly, strategic, and very, very personally shameful mistake. And the cost had been the loss of two of his most valuable and irreplaceable helpers.

  He looked at Roy, who now stood alone in the sky. He was a single, amazing figure of total power. His own two spirits had pulled back, their job done. He looked at the man, a being of just flesh and blood, who had just by himself, and with a scary, beautiful grace, beaten two Sovereign-Level spirits. And for the first time in a thousand years, Beelzebub, a prince of the Abyss, a god of sadness, felt a flicker of something that was almost, but not quite, fear.

  It was respect. A cold, hard, bitter, and very unwelcome respect for an opponent who was not just powerful, but a true and terrible master of his art.

  With a final, angry snarl that was a silent, screaming promise of a future, and much more terrible, fight, Beelzebub ripped open a new tear in reality. It was a bleeding, crying wound of shadow and sadness. He did not offer a final, parting shot. He did not make a final, dramatic threat. He simply left. The lord of the Seventh Circle, the god of sadness, the grandmaster of the long game, had been beaten. He had lost this battle.

  He stepped back into his hellish world, and the tear in the sky closed behind him. It left behind only a bruised, silent sky and the lasting, metallic, and very, very personally shameful taste of his own, deep defeat.

  The war was over.

  For now.