All Chapters of Vengeance of The Reborn Heir: Chapter 91
- Chapter 100
172 chapters
The Disappearance Echoes
Dawn broke across Thalara Academy, yet a strange heaviness clung to the air, like morning mist that refused to burn away. Students trained, hallways bustled, but a quiet current of unease pulsed beneath everything.Seven days since his disappearance. Seven days without a trace.Elder Stoneclaw, a man whose presence was always loud, intrusive, and drunk, was now a silent ghost.And people had begun to notice.Rumors drifted between students in the hallway, “Stoneclaw hasn’t been seen since the allocation announcement.”“He normally buys more alcohol by noon, he hasn’t been to the vendors.”“Someone checked the taverns… he hasn’t stepped into any of them.”“I passed by his house last night. It was dark. And quiet. Too quiet.”These weren’t jokes anymore.Not mockery.Not casual commentary.These were observations.Patterns.Evidence.***Principal Voss stood by his office window, arms folded behind his back, staring out across the courtyard, completely lost in thought. The normally comp
The Descent Begins
The hum of ion engines filled the interior of the military transport vessel as it cut through the upper atmosphere — a metallic beast soaring toward the frontier. Rows of armored seats held students from different academies across nations, all buckled in. Some were pale, some vibrating with excitement, some whispering prayers under their breath.Ronan sat near the middle.Selene beside him.Lucien near the front.No one spoke loudly.No one laughed.This was not school anymore.Above them, holographic panels displayed the flight trajectory, passing through atmospheric layers, skimming orbit, then descending toward the designated landing zone.Then the lights dimmed.A hard-faced officer walked up the aisle.When he spoke, his voice carried through the vessel with cold authority:“Attention candidates. This is your final briefing before deployment.”Every face turned.“The Outer Frontier is a living battlefield. Every day, without exception, there are incursions by interstellar beasts.
In the Quiet Room
The military aircraft was massive, layered in internal compartments. Most students remained in the main transport hall… but far toward the front, behind two armored doors and a sound-dampening barrier, a different gathering was taking place.A circular table glowed with tactical projections. Seated around it were several officers and coordinators from various academies, their faces lit by the flickering blue holographics.A stern colonel from the Myrien Academy leaned forward, tapping a finger on the air-display where Lucien’s name hovered beside his rank.“Let’s discuss the other problem,” he said. “The boy named Lucien Cross.”Another officer frowned. “During the genius tournament… there were accusations of cheating, were there not?”“Yes. Not proven.”“But highly suspicious.”“And the resulting penalty was severe.”“And that,” the colonel continued, “is the point I am making. If the boy’s actions were questionable enough to warrant punishment and reassignment… then why is he here?
First Contact
The aircraft shuddered as it broke through the final atmospheric layer over the Frontier region. The sky here was an unkind color — the hue of ash and pale lightning. Below them spread plains of shattered stone and cracked earth where life struggled to exist.A metallic chime sounded.“Prepare for disembarkation.”The ramp doors opened — and a blast of dry wind swept through the hold.The moment the first students stepped out —A SCREECH tore through the air.Then another.And another.Shapes moved in the dust. Low to the ground — fast — predatory.Selene inhaled sharply. “They’re already here—”The commanding officer shouted:“DEFENSIVE FORMATION!”Blades were drawn. Essence was activated.And then the beasts appeared.They looked like wolf-sized reptilian predators, their bodies covered in carbon-hardened plates, their jaws exposed with exposed luminous veins of energy.Small beasts, the officer said earlier?No.These were Rank 4.And the smallest among them could tear through the
Frontier Camp
Later that day, they build a camp which was erected with military precision. It was a defensive heartbeat in hostile land. The final glow of Arken’s sun bled along the cracked horizon as dusk settled. Day one of the exam had officially ended.Rows of energy pylons thrummed with pale-blue forcefields, forming a protective crescent like a half-closed eyelid sheltering the students within. Military tents sprouted in the dust like armored fungi — tens of them, each housing supply caches, command nodes, medical arrays, and portable holographic monitors radiating steady light.The wind carried a smell of scorched mineral and dry iron, scraping along the ground in bitter gusts. For most of these students, this was their first time outside the safety of civilized sky-lanes. Their first time breathing air that tasted raw and hostile.The commanding officer strode up onto the center platform, his boots echoing against reinforced metal flooring.“Present your cores.”A hush followed.One by one,
Under Red Skies
The alarm blared through the Frontier camp, long and unbroken… a sound that meant one thing: lethal incoming threat.Red lights flashed over tents and scanners. Force barriers flickered. Soldiers shouted orders.From the horizon emerged not one — not two — but three Rank 7 beasts, sprinting with terrifying velocity.Muscles like steel. Jaws like siege engines. Eyes like molten obsidian.Rank 7 beasts were not mere creatures — they were terrors equal to Rank 9 human cultivators, capable of tearing through fortified defenses and crushing entire squads.The military force stationed at the camp was understaffed and composed mostly of lower-ranked officers, because the elite divisions were deployed across the wider frontier, holding other breach points. Under normal circumstances, three Rank 7 beasts would require a full tactical battalion to counter — not a handful of recovering soldiers and a cluster of untested students.No one expected that they would appear in this safe zone. The zone
The Night After
Night returned to the Frontier like a dim, bruised veil draped over broken land. The battlefield had been scrubbed of gore; medics and clean-up units had long since finished their work.The bodies of the Rank 7 beasts were loaded into sealed transport containers and flown away for military analysis. What remained was silence — and exhaustion sunk deep in bone.The Earth Battalion tents hummed with faint luminescence, each shelter alive with soft strategic chatter, medical murmuring, and the metallic smell of sterilizing agents. The students had been assigned rest quarters, but sleep was slow to come. Even the bravest of them still heard echoes of roaring beasts and snapping bone behind their eyelids.Ronan sat cross-legged on a crate outside his assigned tent, back straight, eyes closed. From a distance, he looked composed, as though merely meditating. But under the stillness, a pressure simmered — the Rank 8 ascension settled in his veins like a quietly pulsing thunderhead.He guided
The Missing Cores
Dawn broke dimly through a grey and bruised sky, painting the Frontier with a pale and tired light. The air carried lingering metallic scent from last night’s battle, mixed with the cold mineral smell of alien earth. Students slowly stirred awake — some exhausted, some jittery with adrenaline, some still pale from nightmares.Before breakfast was even distributed, the commanding officer summoned a handful of elite soldiers and reconnaissance specialists back to the battleground. The corpses of the Rank 7 beasts were supposed to be sealed and stored — yet something had gone wrong.Ronan, Selene, and many others watched from afar as the soldiers entered the area with scanners glowing low blue across blood-stained ground. Hushed voices rippled between them.One soldier said, “Look at this.”Another crouched. “It’s not here… the cores are missing.”Ronan narrowed his eyes.The core of a Rank 7 beast…was powerful. Volatile. Valuable.Equivalent in potency to a Rank 9 cultivator’s essence c
Midnight in the Ruins
The second night at the Frontier camp grew still, but far away at Thalara Academy—Aveline Westmere did not sleep. Instead, she walked alone through the silent halls, her steps soft, her presence deliberately unnoticed. At this hour, the Academy was empty save for the occasional patrolling ward-guardian— and even they would not challenge a Vice Principal moving with purpose.She left the academy boundary and crossed the darkened forest path that led to the crumbling stone residence of Elder Stoneclaw. The structure stood like a carcass of an old era: broken roof beams jutting like exposed ribs, walls eroded by time and wind, the air heavy with old alcohol fumes and stale essence. Aveline inhaled sharply through her nose—cloying, unpleasant—but she endured.She had been here before.But this time, she came for herself.The door creaked faintly as she nudged it open. Moonlight spilled in, painting the floor in pale lines. The furniture lay overturned where Lucien once searched. The shelv
The Ones Who Cannot Run
The second day of the Frontier Examination began under a heavy sky.No one felt the same as the day before.Not after watching students die.Not after seeing Rank 7 beasts rampage through living bodies like wet paper.Not after seeing Ronan and Lucien break through to Rank 8 in front of the world.And not after mourning the fallen.The plaza of the encampment was quieter now. Less chatter. Less arrogance. More steel behind eyes.Everyone respected Ronan Crowne now.Some admired him.Some feared him.Some hated him silently for rising so fast.But no one ignored him.And strangely… Lucien Cross received similar treatment. He too had reached Rank 8, though his aura wavered slightly, like a candle in wind. Still, the title was the title. The achievement was real.They were the two highest-ranking students on the field.Even though the Rank 7 cores had vanished, meaning neither could claim them, Ronan didn’t bother searching for excuses. The beasts died. The cores disappeared. Fine.Let t