The march had become a blur of endless footsteps and muted voices. After the punishing training with Vael, Kirin spent two full days doing nothing but letting his body heal itself back together. The drills still haunted him in small flashes... the way his muscles had screamed under the weights, the icy terror of the illusion, the smell of his own sweat and blood mixing with the cold mountain air.Two days wasn’t nearly enough to heal. His bones still ached with a dull, stubborn throb, but the army never stopped. The endless line of soldiers tramped forward, boots grinding mud and frost into the dirt, banners snapping faintly in a restless wind. Kirin didn’t know where they were headed, he hadn’t thought to ask. All he knew was that every step carried them farther from the Demon Lord’s advancing horde.The retreat felt both comforting and shameful. Comforting, because survival was survival. Shameful, because each mile was another admission of defeat.On the morning of the third day, so

Vael POVThe storm split the horizon like a wound that refused to close. Crimson lightning raked the clouds, casting a bloody glow over the battlefield. Vael stood at the front lines, boots sinking into mud already thick with the dead. The air reeked of iron and scorched flesh. His soldiers, ragged, bloodied and terrified formed a wavering wall behind him. They were all that remained of an army meant to hold a continent. And tonight, they were about to break.Vael’s eyes swept the enemy lines, searching for the one figure who haunted every nightmare he still allowed himself to have.The Demon Lord.'He's not here...'He exhaled through clenched teeth, a flicker of gratitude cutting through the tension like a blade of cool water. He could still feel the scars from their last meeting, four days of ceaseless fighting across shattered valleys and burning skies. Four days trading blows with a monster that wielded power itself like a second heart. He had nearly died in that endless duel, an

Vael could not understand.The Demon Lord, the walking calamity whose very breath made this realm of Malakar decay was speaking Master Yose’s name as if it belonged to an old memory.That shouldn’t be possible.No one knew where Yose came from. Not the sages, not the ancient sects, not even the Celestial Council that claimed to record every grain of cosmic history.Yose had simply always... existed.Always there.He was a silent presence when storms threatened to drown the world, a steady hand when heroes faltered.But a history or a birthplace? He had none of those. He was an existence that only intervened when the state of a realm was in distress, such as Malakar was in now.Vael’s heart hammered as the Demon Lord’s voice rolled across the shattered sky.“So,” the monster rumbled, molten veins glowing like veins of hellfire, “you finally crawl out of your quiet little hole, Yose.”The name sounded strange in that abyssal tone, like a secret being dragged through broken glass.Vael’s

Vael POVThe world was ending in silence.It was a strange thing to notice silence while three Demon Lords shredded the crust of Malakar like wet paper. The sky above wasn’t even a sky anymore, just a warped blur of molten red and collapsing dimensions. And yet, through all the screaming stone and burning air, Yose’s voice cut through like a bell.He wasn’t shouting. He wasn’t even breathing hard.“You fight for freedom,” Yose said, sidestepping a column of void fire as if it were a lazy breeze. “But tell me, do you even know what that word means?”Mal’Garoth answered with his fists. His entire body was a furnace of collapsing suns, a moving earthquake wrapped in molten armor. He roared and smashed forward, each punch shaking the bones of Malakar’s dead.“Freedom is power!” Mal’Garoth’s voice was a volcanic detonation, ripping apart the atmosphere itself. “To take what was denied! To burn the cage until it cannot hold!”Yose tilted his head. He caught the demon’s fist on a single fing

The sky above Malakar peeled back like damp paper, bleeding streaks of black violet light. Vael could barely keep his eyes open inside the shimmering shell of subspace that Yose had folded around him. The barrier felt like standing inside a bubble of molten glass, too bright to stare at, too dark to see through. Every heartbeat rattled the air like a gong.Outside, Yose moved with the patience of a man untangling knots rather than fighting for his life. He stood at the eye of the storm, robes rippling in the pressure, one hand raised and fingers curved like a conductor calling an orchestra to attention. Around him spun three chains of light so dense they looked carved from diamond. Each chain floated like a serpent, humming with a pitch that set Vael’s teeth on edge.Mal’Garoth, the Lord of Endless Rage, hurled his body forward, every muscle dripping red flame. He swung a claw big enough to cleave a mountain in half. Yose merely tilted his wrist. The nearest chain bent with a soft chi