Chapter 85: The Last Enemy
Frank stood before the formidable gates of the stronghold, his sword still in hand. An inexplicable feeling gripped him, a sense of unease that defied the silence and the swirling smoke rising from the ruined streets. Something primal had shifted in the air, a heavy weight pressing against his chest, a coldness unlinked to the night’s chill.
Beside him, Lysandra froze, her grip tightening on the rods until her knuckles went white.
"Frank," she whispered, her voice trembling. "Something’s horribly wrong."
He didn’t respond, eyes fixed towards the Tribunal, where the sky had already begun to bleed with an ominous hue, heralding an approaching storm.
Vora sank against the vault wall, her legs giving way beneath her. Around her, Eidolon agents hurried to tend the wounded and secure the doors. The battle for the core had ended, yet she couldn’t stop trembling.
At first, she attributed it to exhaustion. Then a strange sensation arose, a pull deep within her chest, as if something had reached out and brushed against her very soul.
She looked up.
Above the Tribunal, the sky was wrong, the clouds swirling against the wind in unnatural patterns.
"No," she whispered desperately. "He wouldn’t. He can’t."
But even as the words left her lips, she knew she was wrong.
Vex stood in the grand main hall of the Collegium, her gaze fixed on the injured and exhausted mages she was tending to. Suddenly, a chilling sensation swept through the space, and the air around her transformed into a brittle chill.
𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮
This was not her magic. It was not her doing. The shimmering frost that began to creep ominously across the ancient stone floor was emanating from an unseen source. It spread steadily from the large, ornate windows, seeped across the carved stone walls, and seemed to permeate the very atmosphere of the room. Her breath immediately fogged in the icy air, forming fleeting clouds before her face.
The junior mages nearest to her froze in place, their hands trembling as their spells faltered and sputtered out. One of them, clutching a tray of fragile vials containing rare alchemical ingredients, dropped it with a loud crash, shards of glass scattering across the cold floor.
"Lady Vex—" one of the less experienced mages stammered, eyes wide with fear.
Vex raised a commanding hand to silence them. Her gaze was unwavering as she stared through the shattered, rain-streaked windows toward the distant sky, now ominously darkened.
"It’s begun," she declared calmly but urgently. "The lich is burning through its own seal."
At the city gates, the Imperial soldiers paused their cleanup operations. The fierce fighting that had erupted here was finally over. The Church’s cells had been completely purged, and the flames consuming the debris were being extinguished.
Suddenly, one soldier lowered his spear.
He couldn’t explain why. There was no immediate threat, no sound, no visible enemy. It was a vague intuition, like the sensation just before a lightning strike, when the hairs on your arms stand on end and the air thickens with the scent of burning wood.
"Look," another soldier said, his voice tinged with unease, as he pointed toward the sky.
They turned their gaze upward.
Above the city center, the sky was spiraling ominously. Pale streams of light emerged from the streets, from the windows of shattered buildings, and from the bodies of the fallen soldiers and civilians. These ethereal tendrils twisted and coiled upward, converging into a raging vortex of black clouds and crackling purple lightning. At the heart of this swirling chaos, a solitary figure floated, arms outstretched, gradually enlarging as if engulfed by the storm itself.
"What in the name of the Emperor..." the first soldier whispered, his voice trembling.
Silence fell among them, heavy with foreboding.
The vortex expanded rapidly, its tendrils reaching beyond the Tribunal district, swallowing the smoke and the pale daylight that had been struggling through the clouds. The sun dimmed as if a great hand had been laid across the heavens. The sky, already darkened by the day’s fires and the lich’s magic, now turned black as deep night, darker than any natural darkness, as though the very concept of light was being devoured.
A freezing chill swept through the deserted streets, crawling like icy veins up crumbling walls, across the bloated corpses sprawled on the ground, and over the faces of the terrified living. Frost formed intricate patterns on windows that cracked under the pressure of the cold, the glass splintering into shards.
Birds fell from the sky, their small bodies frozen mid-flight. Horses screamed in their stables. Dogs howled and went silent. The world was holding its breath.
The entire city seemed to groan and shudder under the immense weight of the impending disaster.
Suddenly, the lich’s voice roared across the entire capital, echoing through the streets and alleys.
"Children of the Empire! Hear me now, for these are the final words you will ever hear!"
The voice emanated from every corner simultaneously, the vast expanse of sky, the cracked earth beneath, and the hollowed-out bones of every living being caught in its grasp. It was not a loud scream but a colossal presence, a resonant vibration that filled every atom of the world.
"I am the voice of the Eternal Will! I am the instrument of your ultimate deliverance! And I shall erase this city from the memory of the world, destroying all traces of its existence!"
Frost rapidly spread across the rooftops of the ancient city, coating the tiles with a chilling, crystalline sheen. The temperature plummeted precipitously, causing glass windows to shatter with high-pitched crashes as their brittle frames succumbed to the cold. The remaining fires within the city, once lively and warm, guttered and died out, leaving only a faint, sickly pallor of the vortex’s eerie glow suspended overhead.
"You have fought! You have struggled against the inevitable." The voice echoed through the silent streets, its resonance trembling with latent power.
Above the withering lich, a magic circle spun with increasing velocity, its intricate runes glowing brighter as streams of deathly energy surged into it, swelling into a relentless flood. The lich’s form convulsed; its bones cracked and elongated grotesquely as shadows erupted from its eyes and mouth like black, viscous tears. It raised both arms skyward, causing the very heavens to seem to bow in submission.
"All that you are, all that you have built, all that you have loved, it shall become ash! And dust! And a memory that fades until even your gods forget your names!" The voice boomed, oppressive and overwhelming.
The pressure intensified, pressing down on every shoulder, every chest, every heart with tangible force. From fortified strongholds, civilians clutched each other in terror as children’s screams pierced the night. Soldiers, disoriented and trembling, dropped their weapons, unable to withstand the sheer weight of the voice’s authority. Even the seasoned adventurers, stepping cautiously toward the Tribunal, froze in place, paralyzed by the overwhelming sound.
The lich lowered its arms slowly, and the sky responded with a thunderous crack. Without warning, a beam of absolute darkness, neither fire nor light, but pure void, descended from the vortex above. It was a column of utter annihilation, so dense and black that it seemed to consume and drink in the very air around it. The deadly beam struck the capital, and within moments, every trace of life was erased where it had touched.
There was no ash, no rubble, not even a scorch mark. The destruction was total, absolute. A street corner that had stood for over three centuries simply vanished into nothingness. A well, which had served as a neighborhood landmark since before the Empire’s founding, disappeared completely, leaving an eerily perfect empty void where it once was. A watchtower on the eastern wall was there in one moment, then gone the next, its stones erased as if they had never existed.
The relentless beam continued its path, and beneath it, the entire city was unraveled and unmade, falling silent as it was annihilated into oblivion.
Dominic watched intently from his position beside Theresa. The beam sliced through the air, carving a devastating path directly into the heart of the capital. Wherever it touched, nothing remained, no buildings, no streets, no monuments, erased as if they had never existed. The void it left was an emptiness so complete, it felt like a wound in the world itself, swallowing light and hope alike.
Meanwhile, the lich continued its relentless ascent, feeding on the city’s destruction, growing more powerful with every moment.
"It’s gone beyond the rankings," Theresa’s voice crackled through the bond, thick with horror. "I can’t sense any limit to it power now."
"Doesn’t matter," Florence responded sharply, her tone cutting like a blade. "Nothing is unkillable."
"Wobbly still has the life source," Dominic added hurriedly. "But even Wobbly’s struggling. The phylactery is radiating more power than it can contain, it’s fighting back. We have to stop it from drawing more power."
The lich’s voice echoed again, booming with a finality that could shatter stone.
"There is no escape! No salvation! Only the Will, the eternal, unending Will! Rejoice, for your suffering reaches its end!"
The deadly beam surged toward the strongholds.
And with a heavy heart, Dominic made his choice.
"Florence, get ready, you’re throwing me," Dominic said through the bond.
Theresa’s response was immediate and decisive. Without hesitation, the grimoire ablaze in her hands, she released a blinding burst of golden light that surged directly toward Florence.
"I’ll make this throw count," Theresa declared, her voice sharp with focus.
Florence dismounted swiftly, landing with a heavy crunch on the broken earth. The spectral Ghost Horse reared and whirled away, its ghostly form dissolving into swirling smoke. She shook out her shoulders, then reached for Dominic.
"Ready, Master?"
She handed him the halberd. "You’ll need this."
Clutching it tightly, Florence grabbed him, then spun around, muscles coiling with anticipation.
Theresa’s magical amplification surged through Florence, doubling, then tripling her strength. The air around her vibrated with raw power as she wound up like a slingshot, her muscles tensing so fiercely they seemed capable of shattering walls. The ground beneath her cracked and splintered.
"Don’t miss," Florence commanded through the bond, a fierce grin curling her lips.
With a mighty throw, she launched him into the chaos.