2025-06-16 16:55:38
Previous Chapter
Latest Chapter
293
The air over the French Highlands shimmered—not from heat, but from distortion.Leylines once frayed by Archive experiments had reknit themselves, but where they converged, the world pulsed with ancient tension. There, within the ruins of an inverted cathedral buried in limestone cliffs, lay Saint Noëlle’s Gate—the last known home of the Shard Caller.Joey adjusted his coat, scanning the landscape from a broken arch. “This place reeks of unburied ghosts.”Sarah crouched beside a moss-covered glyph, her fingers glowing faintly blue. “That’s because it’s not empty. This cathedral remembers every scream it ever heard. It sings in trauma.”“Cheerful.”“Focus, Joey. We’re not here for therapy. We’re here for Elienne.”Joey grunted. “Elienne tried to collapse the Eastern Axis three years ago.”“And Samuel still said she was vital.”“That’s his new hobby,” Joey muttered, “hiring old villains.”They entered the hollow nave.What was once an altar was now a circular pool, not of water, but of
292
remains. I’ve seen it.”Joey turned to Rheon, his eyes searing. “Say something. Anything. Convince me not to end you right now.”Rheon raised his head slowly. “I’ve come not for pardon. Not for comfort. But for debt. I burned a world. Now I build one.”Silence. Only the whisper of wind in the starlit branches.Joey spat to the side. “This will break the Vanguard.”Samuel turned toward the Sanctuary tree. “Then let them break. And decide what they become after.”They gathered at dusk.Every Vanguard squad stood in the temple ruin, lit by floating orbs that pulsed with thoughtlight.Samuel stood before them, hands open. Beside him, Rheon—head bowed, unarmed.“Some of you lost family to this man,” Samuel said calmly. “Some of you bled because of him. Some of you died.”A murmur rippled. One woman clenched her jaw until her sigils glowed red.“I am not asking you to forget,” Samuel continued. “I’m asking you to choose. Does the Vanguard stand for legacy… or for future?”The murmurs turned
291
The seed Samuel planted beneath the ash tree did not glow. It pulsed softly, like a memory remembered in the dark. He watered it every morning with dew from the cliffside and never once spoke to it. Some said it was a relic of his lost divinity—others said it was just a seed.But today, the tree had sprouted.A stalk of translucent white branched toward the sky, and along its spine, tiny symbols unfurled like leaves: the sigils of Archive, Veil, and something else. Something unnamed.Joey returned just as the first blossom opened.“That’s new,” he said, tossing his travel pack to the ground.Samuel smiled without looking up. “You came back.”Joey chuckled. “Didn’t think I’d miss the moment your ghost plant decided to bloom.”Samuel touched the stalk gently. “It’s not magic. Just memory, finally ready to grow.”He stood, brushing soil from his hands. His cloak—once laced with radiant threads—was now simple cotton, frayed at the edges. But when he turned to Joey, there was something str
290
No longer split between dimensions, no longer bleeding energy from the Veil or suffocating beneath the rules of the Archive—now it breathed, truly, for the first time in generations. Trees bent not with decay, but with weight from golden blossoms. Skies held a soft azure without fractures. Mountains hummed with new frequencies.And in the center of this renewed world stood Samuel, beneath the Tower of Reconciliation.Its foundations were made from the shards of the old Archive pillars, fused with shadowglass harvested from the Veil. The structure rose endlessly, twisting like strands of fate into the sky. Symbols from both orders pulsed together—light and void intertwined.Samuel looked up at it, calm but distant.“You didn’t want to be a god,” Joey said beside him, brushing the dirt off his coat. “Yet here we are. You’re about five feet from it.”Samuel smiled faintly, the kind of smile that knew weight.“I never was a god,” he said, “only the possibility of one. But even possibility
289
The sky was no longer cracked, but fractured shadows lingered in the air—thin, stubborn echoes of rifts that refused to heal completely. Dawn broke over the sprawling Sanctuary: rows of tents, training grounds filled with Ascendants, and the broken ruins of the old watchtower rising like a silent sentinel.At the center stood Samuel, aura blazing softly—neither light nor shadow, but both, in constant fusion. Around him, veterans and Ascendants prepared for battle. Joey paced beside him.He spoke quietly. “Are you ready?”Samuel tilted his head, eyes like twin dawns. “I’ve never been more. What they didn't expect… is a force that has already rewritten reality.”A pulse in the ground signaled the arrival of the enemy.From the east marched Veil’s remnants, fluid shadows coalescing into humanoid forms, eyes flickering with half-light. From the west pressed on the Archive’s constructs, crystalline armor and arcane glyphs glowing with disciplined threat.In the center, leading a formation
288
The storm had passed, but the sky remained fractured—threads of purple light stitching across the twilight like an open wound. The remnants of the last battle still hung heavy over the land. But in the silence that followed chaos, Samuel stood alone at the edge of the Cradle of Light, a sanctuary of ancient magic buried beneath layers of time and sorrow.His eyes, once dimmed by exhaustion and grief, now glowed faintly gold—imbued with something more than power. The wind whispered through his cloak, but he didn’t move. A decision lingered on the edge of his soul.“I feel it,” Samuel murmured, raising a hand. The wind bent unnaturally, wrapping around his fingers like silk. “The Veil’s echo… it’s not gone.”Behind him, Joey approached carefully. “No. But neither are you.”Samuel turned, the weight of the last few days carved into every line of his face. “I was never supposed to survive this long. Veil marked me for destruction. The Archive wanted to harness me. And this world… this wor
You may also like
Drakon of the Seven Armies
Maddy Taurus455.9K viewsThe Billionaire's Revenge
Hare Ra79.3K viewsThe Billionaire Heir
Teddy129.1K viewsThe Billionaire's Supremacy
Butter Cookies95.0K viewsWrath of Nathan Poroit
Pseudonym omoye 18.9K viewsHidden Billionaire's Heir
DC Carnelian971 viewsRags to Riches: Rise Of The Abused Son In-Law
ASystem16.6K viewsSupreme Awakening Of The General's Lost Son
Divi Chris766 views