BOOM!
The stone ceiling of the keep shattered, slabs of rock collapsing inward as sothing swift tore through them. Whatever it was did not stop at the floor, it continued downward, pulverizing stone and earth, crashing through layer after layer until it finally ca to rest deep within the catacombs of the Black Citadel.
It was Asher.
Asher surged forward in a single step, the ground rupturing beneath his feet. Midway through, a wall of fla roared toward him. He thrust his hand out instinctively, and the inferno split apart, forced to his left and right, scorching the walls as it rushed past.
Without slowing, he plunged deeper, breaking through the last barrier of stone and landing in a vast cavern.
The space was enormous, wider than any hall he had ever seen, its ceiling lost in darkness. At its center lay a dragon larger than anything Asher could have imagined. Mountains of bones surrounded it, fused together by old heat and ti.
Its head alone was the size of a tower, its neck coiled thick and ridged, scars layered over scars like armor grown from flesh.
Saelix rose.
Her wings unfurled, stretching to the very edges of the cavern, scraping stone as they opened. The air trembled under her presence.
"Yet another of I Am’s chosen," Saelix said, her voice echoing through the chamber, vibrating through Asher’s bones. Pebbles and fragnts of rock rained down from above. "I will eat you and leave not even a bone behind."
Her eyes burned as she leaned forward.
"The sa will be done to your army... and to the rest of the realms."
Flas gathered in her maw, condensing into a blinding core before erupting outward.
Asher raised Ithamar and ford a barrier in front of him. The flas slamd into it like a tidal wave, forcing him backward step by step. Cracks spread through the barrier, light bleeding through them, then it shattered. Fire engulfed him completely.
’I’ve never felt heat like this,’ Ithamar’s voice echoed inside his mind, strained and sharp.
Asher felt it too. His body burned, his skin screaming under the pressure. Even his king’s body, hardened by countless battles, began to give way. This was not ordinary fla. This was the apex of dragonfire, ancient and overwhelming, beyond anything he could bend or command.
The blast hurled him into the cavern wall. Stone exploded on impact as he crashed into it, carving a deep crater.
Saelix roared and beat her wings, surging upward. The catacombs above collapsed as she tore through them, entire sections of the citadel giving way under her ascent.
When she erged into the open sky, terror swept through the United Army.
"Inferior races deserve to be wiped out," Saelix’s voice bood across the battlefield, vast and rciless. "You are unfit to rule yourselves!"
She inhaled, and then released a sea of fire.
The flas rolled outward like a living tide, devouring everything in their path. Soldiers vanished where they stood, reduced to ash in monts. Thousands died in a breath, the ground left blackened and smoking.
Apollyon staggered, lowering his weapon as he stared at the devastation. More than half of his forces were gone, erased in an instant.
His grip trembled.
Was this... the true power of the Dragon Queen?
"Run!" n shouted as ranks shattered, discipline collapsing under raw fear. Shields were dropped, formations tore apart, and soldiers stumbled over one another in their panic.
Kryos slamd the butt of his spear into the ground, ice erupting upward in a towering wall that clawed toward the sky. His lips moved in a low mutter, barely audible beneath the chaos.
"Did he fail?"
"We can’t let that thing into our world!" Ilios roared, lifting into the air as flas wrapped around his body and wings. He surged forward just as Saelix’s fire washed over the ice wall. The inferno didn’t stop, it burned straight through it.
The massive barrier hissed, cracked, and peeled away, leaving a gaping opening. Through it, they could see a single eye.
Fear multiplied.
Saelix chuckled, the sound rolling across the battlefield like a slow tremor. As it echoed, a soldier suddenly scread, spun, and drove his spear through the chest of the man beside him. Another followed. Then another. Panic twisted into madness.
Through fear alone, Saelix slipped past their physical defenses, burrowing into their minds. n turned on comrades, shrieking, laughing, crying as they killed. The one thing no armor could stop, terror, ripped the army apart.
Saelix stepped through the ice wall as if it were nothing more than loose snow.
"Brother!" Ilios bellowed, calling to Kryos and Aniketos as he hurled himself toward her. The three brothers moved together, converging from different angles, but Saelix beat her wings once.
A gale exploded outward.
The force was brutal, cold enough to bite through magma. It hurled soldiers, shattered siege engines, and flung the brothers away like debris. None of them could get close.
Then ca the dragonfire.
It poured from her jaws in a rolling wave, swallowing the ground. Ilios forced himself forward, flying straight into it. His flas strained against hers, his wings beating hard as he broke through the other side, but the fire around him was weaker now.
Still, he pressed on.
He roared, swung his sword, and struck Saelix’s scales.
The blade bounced off.
Saelix turned her head slowly, staring at him. His flas flickered, his skin blackening, ember cracks spreading across his body.
"The sun pales before my fire," she said calmly. "I am the first of the first. It is an insult that you fight back."
She lowered her head, jaws opening wide.
Ilios laughed, breath ragged. "I never thought I’d lose in heat." He coughed, then roared with what strength he had left. "I’ve done my part. Aniketos!"
Aniketos answered instantly.
He hurled his spear with everything he had. The weapon tore through the air, shockwaves ripping open the hardened ground beneath it. The spearhead, coated in Kryos’ unbreakable ice, struck Saelix in the eye, carrying the combined force of two of the strongest talents alive.
Saelix didn’t scream.
The ice lted.
"Just another scar," she said flatly.
Her flas surged again, swallowing Ilios whole. His light vanished in an instant.
Saelix turned toward the remaining brothers.
Across the battlefield, despair settled in. Mortals and spirits alike stared in horror, every race wearing the sa expression as they watched one of the greatest fall, burned away as if he had never mattered at all.
"We stand! The king will co!" Alec bellowed, he was unrecognizable with blood stains, most from his foes and so from him.
"We are his brothers!" Alec roared louder, forcing people like Galanar off his feet. Adam pushed the bodies that were off him and roared, everything before him was destroyed.
He picked up his blood soaked weapon.
"It’s just a beast that talks like a woman!" The one eyed Moses said aloud. The rest of the Iron Saints burst into laughter. Even the orcs and ogres they fought were confused.
Saelix’s eyes glead as she watched the laughter spread amongst the ranks of the Iron Saints. It was defiance, even in the face of absolute death.
Kryos slamd his spear into the floor.
Abigail of the House of El who was on her knees gasped. She picked her weapon looking at the Ashbourne soldiers that stood defiantly.
The elves took their stand beside them, House Nubis also took their stand, the vassals of Mormont, the Sacred Fla Empire and others.
The cost of losing was just too much. For the first ti, death didn’t really seem like the end. Weren’t they already fighting beside people that had been dead for hundreds and thousands of years.
"Burn then!" Saelix lifted up her head and summoned flas in her mouth as she watched the armies set up formations. Did they think those priests and priestesses could protect them with those flimsy barriers?
Or did they really trust shields made of tal?
As she was about to breathe the flas, sothing moved in the rubbles. It was far away but she couldn’t ignore it.
A huge slab flew into the air and a hand ca out. It had cracks, like a volcano’s body, hissing with flas.
Asher pulled himself out, his long hair had transford into flas. His armour had lted off, leaving just a weak piece of loincloth.
Every part of his body had cracks, as if his body couldn’t hold what was within. Literal flas coursing, making their own channels which tore his flesh open.
His eyes were like magma and he held Ithamar in one hand. The aura Asher radiated was unprecedented. Beneath those rubbles, as he burned, he searched through an endless list of talents and finally found one.
Archaic Absorption. A talent that allowed him to absorb Saelix’s flas, every once of it, turning him into what stood before everyone.
"Still alive?" Saelix swung her massive tail. Asher looked at it from the corner of his eye and swung Ithamar. Pulsing red mist burst out as heated mana coursed through the greatsword.
It opened a massive wound in Saelix’s tail, causing her to breathe flas at him. Asher walked out of the flas, his hair billowing and as the last strand was about to leave the fla, everything was absorbed as if through that strand into his body.
More cracks spread through Asher’s body but he moved at that mont. His ten foot tall body, blitzing through kiloters in an instant.
"SAELIX!" Asher cried ferociously as his body cracked. Flas burst out of him as he made contact with Saelix.
Asher landed on his feet, breathing heavily as blood, hot enough to lt a volcano and open a ravine poured on him as a massive head fell not too far from him.
Saelix’s eyes were still wide with disbelief as his enormous body collapsed. It laid there like a mountain.
The dark clouds faded, allowing the golden light of the sun to pierce through, bathing the landscape.
It shone on Asher who fell on one knee, clutching his greatsword as steam billowed off him. His skin was still cracked.
Kings and emperors were shocked to see their soldiers kneel at the sight of this. That man represented Spirit, Mortal and Old Ones combined.
The final gift of I Am. He wasn’t man, he wasn’t anything. He was just.... A born king. If being a king was a race, the first of it would be that ten foot man kneeling beside the corpse of the dragon queen.
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