[Skill: Autumn King's Conquest — Boost!!!]
Amber lightning cracked and licked across my gauntlets, surging in wild arcs as [Sephiwrath's] enhancements lit them with volatile, radiant energy—silver on the right, gold on the left.
Then I moved.
My silver-lit right fist drove into Faltha's chest like a thunderclap. The black chains parted instinctively, granting my strike clear passage. It landed square. A wet cough burst from his sealed mouth—blood spraying through the bindings as his ribs cracked from the pressure. The wall behind him didn't stand a chance, exploding outward in a haze of shattered steel and shrieking wind.
"You tweeting shit," I snarled, eyes wild, "we're not done yet!"
My golden arm followed—another punch, low and brutal, right into his gut.
"GhhaAAAHHH—!!"
His scream echoed through the tower. The sheer force of the strike knocked him off the ground.
Desperate, Faltha summoned aether—his chains froze solid and shattered as he fell, gasping, to the floor.
"Wh... what are—"
I gave him no time.
My fist crashed down again, this time straight into his face—slamming him headfirst into the concrete. I followed it with a savage boot to his spine and a golden punch that thundered down into the back of his neck like a divine guillotine.
The floor caved beneath him.
He went crashing through fifty stories—one after another—his crystalline wings breaking apart with each shattering level until nothing remained but flecks of yellow ice and broken empyrean armour.
I dropped into the collapsing shaft after him, landing silently behind the crawling wreck of a man he'd become.
The moment he sensed me, he tried to scream. Tried to gather power. But panic had broken his focus. What came out was a shriek so sharp it cracked the walls behind me. Tearing through my armour and peeling off my skin letting blood gush out its cracks before i forced my steps forward through the sound storm.
"Wh–what are you?" he trembled, eyes wide with something more than fear. "How are you even combating me? I've been empowered—elevated—to the level of a kralscell during an upending! You're just a... lesser Kralscell without any upending's happening! That's all you are! How am i losing to you when you're unawakened?!?"
Stealing a breath, I eased back on the offence just enough to slow the rush of aether in my veins. If I didn't, I'd burn out—like he was.
I laughed. "Hah! You didn't think you were the only one blessed by an empyrean, did you?"
"Huh...?" His expression twitched—eyes filled with disbelief, fingers twitching at his sides.
I raised a hand in front of my chest, letting the aether peel back the illusion.
My black armour shimmered—my flesh went translucent—until all three of my crystal hearts came into view, each pulsing out of sync as they pushed blood and energy through my body. In the centre, the largest heart glowed a soft lilac. And within it—two distinct silhouettes. Two interlocked gems.
Faltha's eyes widened. The breath left his lungs.
"The empyreans of Void and Horizon," I said, "fused to form the [Philosopher's Stone Empyrean]. The empyrean of Sentience. Just as the Kralscells of Void and Horizon became me... so too did their empyreans become mine."
"I've never heard of kralscell's of void or horizon. Much less empyreans or kralscell's energies being able to fuse!," Faltha hissed, voice cracking with madness and aether.
"Its not a very well known history admittedly. Only two other kralscell's beside you and me also know there are supposed to be fourteen instead of thirteen. Not even the witch knows I'm supposed to be two people."
I stepped over debris and ruin toward the trembling god. My voice dropped low and calm.
"Now, let me educate you about the empyrean's themselves. The Empyreans aren't weapons. They're not gifts. But neither are they curses. Their presence alone warps reality—twists the minds of mortals, immortals, everything. Just being on the same planet as an Empyrean for too long drives people mad. And for Kralscells like us, prolonged exposure?" I shook my head. "We become glutted with ego. With sin. With id." I pointed at him with my gauntlet finger. "Look at yourself. You weren't always like this. You used to create. Now you want to rule."
"You... speak nonsense... no... no! If you're right, then help me! Don't trust the Severance! Don't trust the Fervour Queen!"
His voice split, splintered by fear and guilt and the unraveling of identity.
"NO! NO!! Get out of me!!" he screamed at the crystal breaking through his chest. "We must finish the Song of Genesis! Help me, Traveler!"
I had warned Propheira—'s Empress—of this fate. And most of the other Kralscells had listened, staying away from the thirteen Empyreans. But not all. There were always some with delusions of grandeur. Of salvation through madness.
It was me who had torn the Empyreans from the long ago. Me who had planned it all.
And I was the only one who could resist the Empyreans' madness.
Because I was already insane when I fused the [Philosopher's Stone Empyrean] into my heart.
"GET THIS THING OUT OF ME, TRAVELER!!" Faltha screamed, tearing at his clothes, at his skin—ripping the fabric from his chest where yellow crystal bloomed through him like a parasite.
"Sure," I said, grinning. "But you'll have to do one little favour for me first."
He blinked, twitching in pain.
"Let me beat the shit out of you. Willingly. Sound good?"
His expression flickered—then twisted in fury. The aether flared, swapping his fractured mind for the manic dominance of his Empyrean.
"OBEY ME!!"
[Skill: Bass Zeal — Amplification!]
[Skill: Warming Tune — Hypnotic Melody!]
A melodic hum spilled from his mouth like a lullaby laced in poison. It crawled into my ears, into my skull—burning my nerves raw. My eardrums, only just healed, split again.
"I'm not the obeying type."
[Skill: Horizon Chain — Hypnosis Resistance!]
My boot raised and kicked him in the nose—hard—immediately he tried to return the favour with a desperate, flailing kick to my side with a cleaver made of yellow crystal growing from his ankle.
I caught it in my palm with a psychic burst. Then I yanked him up by the ankle and slammed him into the floor—cracking the ground and dropping him several more stories down the collapsing tower.
[Aspect: Singing Dreams Siren — Rock Song!]
The echo of his impact weaponized itself—becoming a real explosion. Wind and ice blasted out from the impact zone, flinging me up through the tower's upper levels as ceilings shattered around me.
"Ugh..." I rolled with the momentum, landing roughly amid shattered desks and fractured stone. Debris fell like hail. A slow tilt began to pull everything—tables, chairs, jagged metal—toward the windows. "...Oh, come on. You never shut up do you?"
[Aspect: Singing Dreams Siren — Electric Synth!]
Faltha clapped his hands together from below. The sound wave surged—physical, rippling, unstoppable.
It obliterated the floor between us and sent half the tower listing further, preparing to collapse into the city below.
"Hahaha! Try escaping this unscathed, Traveler!!"
Madness lit his golden eyes. Overloaded with aether, a mockery of a god, he stared up into the sky with a grin far too wide for his face.
And the whole tower began to fall.
[Skill: Winter Inverse — Armouring!]
With a sigh, a new knight's helmet slammed shut around my skull, encasing my head in heavy silver plating. My right gauntlet still pulsed with silver radiance, charged by [Sephiwrath's] fifth-stage enhancement.
[Aspect: Taken Devourer — Telekinesis!]
Several colossal black gauntlets surged into existence, grabbing Faltha mid-air and dragging him through the shattered floors below until he floated before me, restrained and struggling.
"You didn't think I'd take this alone, did you?" I asked, voice distorted through my helmet.
"What are you doing?! I don't want to be here!" he shouted, panic bleeding into his voice.
With a resonating blast of sound, he shattered the black hands holding him.
Ripping my gauntlet's fingers free from the buckling floor, I slid down the tilted surface and launched myself forward—tackling Faltha mid-ascent.
"Here you are!" I snarled as I slammed him back-first into the glass wall. The impact webbed cracks through the transparent barrier behind him. I pinned him there, eye to eye—though I wore no eyes in that helm—dripping bloodlust like rain.
Behind him, past the crumbling horizon, the tower's final support gave out. The entire spire tipped toward the skyscrapers below, casting its shadow like an executioner's blade.
My fist cracked into Faltha's cheek.
Then the other side.
Back and forth, I pummelled him against the wall until fragments of my own skull and splinters of glass fell like hail.
Bu-dush!!
The tower hit the next rooftop. The jolt flung us both into the air. Below, the floors collapsed like dominos into the city.
[Skill: Tweeting Track — Weaponize!]
Faltha manifested a golden rapier and frozen yellow wings exploded from his back. In a flash, his blade lashed out—piercing through the bone of my left arm. Pain detonated through the limb, and a frequency so high it shattered everything behind me rang through my marrow. My arm vibrated on the edge of implosion—until it did.
Furious, I caught his arm with my right and hurled him through several crumbling walls.
Glancing down at the shattered bone, blood and flesh visibly pulsing, I watched it mend in two seconds flat. My regeneration, enhanced by aether and unburdened by the [Cadenza Note Empyrean]'s interference, worked flawlessly.
[Skill: Hollow Void — Void Step!]
Teleporting to a nearby pillar, I dodged a barrage of yellow icicles flying toward me.
"Star Parade!" I called, igniting orange and silver lights around me. They met the incoming shards and exploded into clouds of dormant aether.
[Skill: Astral Third Eye — Compass!]
[Skill: Autumn King's Conquest — Enhancement!]
Raising my left hand, I conjured a swirling sphere of black-silver fluid. A simple push sent it surging forth like a divine flood. It crashed into Faltha, freezing over his face with black ice that locked out air, sound, and light.
Du-du~
The building trembled again—tilting further. The skyscraper was beginning to roll, about to spill down into the next tier of high-rises.
"Oh boy," I muttered, brushing dust from my armour.
Leaping from one support pillar to the next, I closed in on Faltha as he clawed helplessly at the suffocating ice.
[Skill: Fervour Queen's Symphony — Shatters!]
"OAAHHH!!" The black ice detonated from his face in a shockwave of raw voice. The scream cracked glass, buckled steel, and rattled the floors—until I silenced him with a left hook that launched his body through the ceiling. Amber lightning burst around me, erasing everything in my wake.
[Skill: Autumn King's Conquest — Boost!]
[Skill: Fervour Queen's Symphony — Vocal End!]
We crashed through to the next level—ice and lightning colliding in a chaotic ballet. Walls exploded. Floors disintegrated. We tore through the building as our powers raged in tandem—telekinesis and frequency competing to dominate.
I hurled half the entirety of ten floors at him from all directions with my telekinesis.
He countered with a sonic blast that shattered it all into dust. A flap of his wings cleared out twenty floors' worth of debris, glass, and steel, leaving us exposed to the rolling sky beyond.
Using [Void Step] and [Mach Rush], I darted through the vertical terrain, scaling ceilings and walls like gravity was a forgotten law. The tower rolled over onto the fifth skyscraper column. Its spine cracked under the weight.
Finally, the skyscraper split—clean in half—between Faltha and me. Our clashing attacks blew us in opposite directions.
My half of the building landed on the next rooftop. Faltha's half continued its descent.
There were no more towers to catch him now.
Only the city's surface far below.
"You're not getting away!!" I shouted, sprinting and diving from the edge, arms crackling with amber lightning and silver flame. "I'll reach into heaven if I must—to kick your ass!"
Terror widened Faltha's eyes as he saw me hurtling toward him like judgment itself.
In desperation, he fired blasts of sound and beams of aether. They shredded through my skin, tore chunks from my armour, and scorched flesh beneath.
[Skill: Autumn King's Conquest — Fragarach Spear!]
A golden-orange spear materialized in my hand—lightning dancing along its shaft. I hurled it with everything I had.
The [Fragarach Spear] split into a dozen perfect clones mid-flight.
Faltha's face fell when he looked up. His shield of sound and ice rose a heartbeat too late.
Spears pierced his wings and breached his barrier. And then—three seconds later—they detonated.
Each one imploded into a miniature black hole, erasing matter, sound, and light alike in bursts of horizon-born destruction. The remaining five spears had already stabbed through his shield and crystal yellow limbs.
Panicking, he tossed them away, but it was too late. The chained detonations hurled him smoking across the sky like a broken comet. He crashed down into the city's square, a divine wreckage surrounded by ruin.
[Skill: Winter Inverse — Mental Adaptation!]
Steam hissed from the joints of my black knight's greaves. Cracks webbed across the armour as I dropped like a meteor, crashing into the road between two skyscrapers. Concrete buckled and cratered beneath my boots. Glass exploded from every building within a block, raining down in glinting shards that caught the light like falling stars.
I stood in the epicentre of the blast, shoulders heaving, eyes locked onto Faltha's distant figure through the shimmering veil of glass. I bolted forward with a burst of [Mach Rush], the impact crater behind me vanishing as I tore down the ruined street—straight for him.
He had barely gotten to his feet.
Too slow.
I seized his throat mid-sprint, lifting him effortlessly, then launched my other hand into his chest. The [Ekrix Gauntlet] cracked forward like a cannon blast, and the road behind me disintegrated under the recoil. Faltha's body shot backwards like a bullet.
He tore through everything.
Walls of ice? Shattered like mist.
Whipping twisters of wind? He moved too fast for the air to catch him.
Only the side of a heavy concrete building finally stopped him—barely. His body hit with a sound like a meat truck crashing into stone. The wall cratered around his limbs.
He slumped inside the wreckage, gasping, broken rocks pressing into his ribs as he glared up at me with hatred drenched in desperation.
Then he roared.
Faltha punched the ground in raw, animalistic fury.
Aether burst outward from him in a wild surge—devouring the nearby structures. The scream that followed wasn't human. It couldn't be. It came from somewhere deeper. Somewhere no soul should reach.
"AHHHHHHH!!!"
[Skill: Bass Zeal — Amplification!]
[Aspect: Singing Dreams Siren — Material Sound!]
I raised my armoured arms and summoned a barrier of dense aether. The shield groaned under the force of the sonic blast as buildings around me ruptured, earth tore from beneath, and boulders flew through the air like paper.
"Ugh! Sathuna did tell me to try and leave the city intact..." I muttered, eyes narrowing behind my visor. "Guess there's no need to worry about that anymore."
Even inside my helmet, with every layer of sound protection I had, I could feel it. The scream wormed into my bones, into my lungs, into my heart. My organs quivered beneath my armor. It felt like I was being torn apart from the inside.
Blood filled my mouth.
I coughed it out against the inside of my helmet, breathing heavy through clenched teeth as the world turned to noise and fire. All I could do was endure—wait for his scream to burn out with his breath.
When it finally did, I was still standing. Barely. Waiting on my regeneration to heal the internal damage from the sound attacks as well as my eardrums that must have exploded a hundred times by now.
Faltha choked for air, gasping, knees buckling from the force of his own voice. "Damn it... damn it, damn it!"
Lowering my shield, I stepped forward—then stopped. And stared.
A hundred kilometres of city were gone.
Just gone.
A flattened wasteland stretched in every direction, littered with smoking rubble and fractured steel bones. Skyscrapers? Vanished. The only survivors were the furthest outskirt homes, the remnants of towers behind me. The rest had been obliterated by sound alone.
"...And I thought Thorn overreacted too much." I quipped with a slight wave.