Venthros tilted his head, and a corrupted smile twisted across his face.
“Adorable. These desperate mortals truly believe that just because of a newly ascended cultivator, the game has suddenly changed. That he will make the difference. That the outcome hasn’t already been decided.”
His laughter echoed through the battlefield not only in volume but also in resonance. Like a cracked bell ringing through the soul, shaking the foundation of confidence in all who heard it.
But Quinlan didn’t waver.
Rongtai stepped up beside him. Blood oozed slowly from a long gash in his arm, where wind had torn through his flesh. Bruises decorated his chest, and even his steady breath had begun to labor. The unshakable monk-like figure now bore the marks of fatigue, but his eyes, as always, remained steady like ancient stone.
“Our attacks aren’t enough,” he said bluntly, without any form of embellishment. “This monster… doesn’t bleed like he should.”
He glanced at Rykar, who knelt on one knee to the ground not far behind. His four prosthetic limbs now sparked erratically, struggling to keep up with the furious pace of battle.
And still, he stood.
“Rykar has spent too much,” Rongtai continued. “And I, too, am exhausted. The two of us can delay him. Hold his eyes, shift his stance. Serika can disrupt his rhythm.”
He turned toward Quinlan.
“But only you can break him. I can feel it from your aura that you have what it takes.”
There was no pressure in his voice.
No burden.
Just the clean, immovable truth of a cultivator who had seen countless battles and recognized the shape of this one.
Quinlan nodded once.
“Understood.”
Then…
A flicker of flame.
A whoosh as heat exploded to the right.
Serika blurred into view, blazing like a sun unbound.
Her hair was a whip of molten gold, her fists cloaked in writhing fire, her eyes twin infernos locked on a new target.
Nalai’s soldiers.
Hundreds of them, charging in to assist their new ally in the battle. Reinforcements, perhaps, or cowards thinking the tides had turned.
They were wrong.
They never had a chance.
“You talk too damned much,” Serika spat at Venthros.
Then she launched.
Her body was a streak of flame cutting through water. She landed in the heart of the enemy formation with an eruption of fire that split stone and boiled blood in an instant. Each punch turned bodies to ash. Each kick split the ground.
One, two, five, ten, fifty, hundred soldiers vanished under her fury.
A whip of flame spun around her like a serpent of judgment, incinerating the next wave before they could even scream. When the smoke cleared, there was no trace of them. Only scorched, ruined earth.
The Flame Sovereign stood at the center, bathed in light.
Breathing calmly.
Beautiful.
Terrifying.
Alive.
And then she turned. Not toward her father, who was her pillar of support for many years. The man she’d finally been reunited with after all these years of longing.
But to Quinlan.
Her gaze, those blazing eyes that had once held only fire and fury, now softened.
Not with weakness, but with something even more powerful:
Pride.
Relief.
Faith.
He had done what none of them could. Broken through in the middle of war, amidst corruption and despair. He had stood when others might have faltered, and emerged not shaken, but still.
In that moment, Serika didn’t just see a prodigy.
She saw a true pillar of strength she could lean on in turbulent times.
Her flame steadied. Her posture straightened.
She looked at him like he was her equal.
Her partner.
And for the first time in her long, blood-soaked life, the Flame Sovereign declared:
“I’m proud of you, Quinlan Elysiar.”
Quinlan’s eyes softened for just a breath.
It wasn’t the praise that struck him. Not the words. Serika wasn’t a stoic teacher who never praised him before—hell, she even gave him ‘good job’ massages.
What made this expression of hers was the way she looked at him. Like a true, proper comrade. Like someone who no longer saw a lost boy beneath the weight of legacy and expectation, but a warrior standing tall in his own right.
His fingers tightened around the hilt of his saber.
A small, genuine smile touched the corner of his lips.
“Thanks,” he said quietly, with a sincerity that didn’t need to be louder than that. But then, his features hardened as he declared, “Let’s roll, Serika Vael.”
She grinned like a wildfire catching wind, her flames brightening with joy that chased away the last shadows of her sister’s betrayal.
“Hells yes.”
They moved as one.
Two streaks of fury and flame exploded toward the corrupted god, carving twin trails through the battlefield.
Behind them, Rykar groaned.
“Damned youth… Too much energy, no respect for pacing.”
Then he rocketed forward in a sonic boom of fire and force, leaving a crater in his wake.
Rongtai alone remained still for a moment longer. He sighed, as if mourning his own calm, then lowered into a stance. No explosions. No theatrics. Just legs pumping with brutal efficiency as he sprinted after them.
The four of them closed in on Venthros together.
And for the first time…
He looked annoyed.
The god swept two arms forward, conjuring a surge of corrupted earth that rose like jagged blades. Quinlan twisted his body out of their path and sliced clean through so that the ones behind him wouldn’t have to dodge as he did.
He landed hard from the maneuver, rolled forward, and struck again, this time forcing Venthros to block with a pair of arms while the other two lashed out in retaliation.
But the god missed.
Because Serika blasted in from the left, spun in a flaming spiral, and kicked him in the face.
The force of it didn’t break anything in his overly sturdy body. But it left trails of fire dancing across his vision, interrupting his corrupted elemental combat attack.
Venthros snarled and swung at her, but hit nothing. Quinlan had already slid beneath him with a sweep of his saber that nearly caught the god’s ankle.
Then Rykar collided with Venthros like a falling star. The old warrior’s flame-punch smashed into the god’s side, drawing a grunt from Venthros and sending him back two steps.
Four arms swirled, summoning wind and water corrupted with ash-black veins. But just as one arm shot forward, ready to strike…
*Clang!*
A stone-coated palm caught the god’s wrist.
Rongtai stood there, grimacing as the corrupted elemental energy burned into his skin.
“Withstanding is my forte…” he announced through gritted teeth.
Quinlan didn’t hesitate to capitalize on the opportunity the old man had bought them.
He moved.
With his trusty Soul Reaper saber in hand, he became motion incarnate.
Every step flowed from the last, his body carrying elemental qi in perfect synchronized harmony. Fire flared underfoot as he dashed, water rippled around his arms to soften counters, earth rooted his swings with precision, and wind danced across his shoulders for agility.
He was the Avatar.
He wasn’t just using the elements—he embodied them.
Venthros suddenly roared, unleashing a corrupted blast of wind that was a bastard fusion of elements turned venomous.
Quinlan raised a layered defense. Earth coiled around water, wind funneled to reduce pressure, and fire burned a hole straight through the blast. He cut through it with one stroke, wielding the elements like extensions of his will.
He closed the gap in a flash.
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