The sparkling silver dust floated away into the cold night sky. Adam Cook’s human body was completely gone. But Adam did not die. He fell. He fell through a soft, quiet, gray cloud. He did not feel any pain from his broken bones. He did not feel the freezing mountain wind. He felt perfectly peaceful, weightless, and calm. Then, his boots touched a solid, smooth floor. Adam slowly opened his eyes. He expected to see the snowy courtyard or the bright blue sky. Instead, he was standing inside a massive, endless building. It was a library. But it was not a normal library with wooden shelves and dusty paper books. The shelves were made of cold, perfect white marble. They reached up so high that they disappeared into a dark, endless ceiling. The books on the shelves were not made of paper. They were made of pure, pulsing light. Some books glowed with a sick, angry red light. Some glowed with a bright, beautiful blue light. Others were completely pitch-black. The air was freezing cold an

The dark red portal snapped completely shut. The masked woman was gone. Adam Cook and Catherine stood alone in the ruined courtyard. The air around Adam continued to crackle and pop. It sounded like thin sheets of glass breaking over and over again. Catherine took a deep, shaky breath. She looked at Adam. He did not look like a giant monster covered in black crystal anymore. He looked exactly like the normal, pale boy she cared about. He wore a simple black coat. His dark brown eyes looked warm. "Adam," Catherine whispered. A relieved, happy smile spread across her dirty face. "You are back. You are really back." She ran across the frozen stone floor. She threw her arms open, wanting to hug him. She wanted to hold the boy who had just saved the world from the ancient gods. She stepped close to him and reached out her warm hands. But as Catherine stepped within three feet of Adam’s body, her happy smile instantly vanished. She did not touch him. She could not. The invisible atmos

The cold mountain wind howled across the snowy ridge. Adam Cook stood perfectly still, holding Catherine’s warm hand. They were staring up at the massive, pitch-black ship that had just ripped out of the True Realm. But suddenly, Adam’s highly evolved ears picked up a terrible sound. It was the sound of the sky tearing apart. Adam snapped his head toward the southern horizon. Far away, past the frozen valley, three bright lights were flying through the gray clouds. They looked like falling stars, but they were not beautiful. They glowed with a sick, toxic green fire mixed with a dull, dead gray smoke. "Adam, what is that?" Catherine asked. Her blue eyes widened in fear as she pointed at the sky. Adam did not answer immediately. He opened the "Grave of Kings" protocol inside his mind just a tiny bit. He pushed his Void-Senses outward to scan the flying objects. The cold, silent machine inside his brain zoomed in on the three glowing stars. Adam saw the truth. They were not stars.

The sky was totally empty. The massive black ship had vanished into thin air. Adam Cook hovered in the freezing, gray clouds. His physical body was bleeding and broken. He had just absorbed the explosive power of three catastrophic bombs, saving the valley below. But the victory felt like ashes in his mouth. The creator had stolen Catherine. Adam did not scream. He did not let the panic take control. Instead, Adam closed his glowing white eyes. He stopped looking at the physical world. He reached deep into the center of his own chest. He searched for the Void-Bond—the invisible, magical string that connected his pitch-black soul to Catherine’s bright blue Primordial Frost magic. He found it. The string was stretched incredibly thin, vibrating wildly as the creator’s ship crossed into another dimension. Adam grabbed the invisible string with his mind. He pulled it hard. Instantly, the cold wind and the gray clouds disappeared. Adam projected his consciousness directly into the mag

The one hundred green-eyed clones screamed. They shot through the bruised, violet sky like angry missiles. Their hands burned with toxic, boiling green magic. They were starving, and they wanted to tear Adam Cook into tiny pieces. Adam hovered in the freezing stratosphere. He did not raise his fists. He did not try to fly away. Instead, Adam closed his glowing white eyes. He completely ignored the deadly monsters rushing toward his face. He pulled his focus deep inside his own soul. He returned to the cold, silent marble library in his mind. Standing in the center of the vast, empty library was the golden figure of the System. The figure made of floating letters and numbers looked at Adam. The golden light was very dim now. Adam had outgrown the machine. He did not need its cold rules anymore. "They are coming, Sovereign," the System whispered. Its ancient, wise voice echoed in the white marble room. "The creator’s army will tear your physical shell apart. Will you unleash the ex