The Fading Light

Reality was nothing like a novel. In a novel, events needed logic and a long buildup. Reality needed neither.

One moment, everyone was dancing. The next, the end of the world had arrived.

It had happened. That was all.

Like a meteor striking the earth, it came without warning and could not be stopped.

Those caught in it had no choice but to accept it.

A gale swept up sparks that filled the sky and struck Xilian with a crackle.

Under one impact after another, the high wall had burned down to a towering ruin. More Burning Wind poured through the breaches, sweeping away everything in its path.

Xilian watched helplessly as the gate, repaired countless times, collapsed completely with a groan. White Cliff Town lay open.

The expected Demon invasion did not come. The Demons emerging from the Grey Fog turned to ash in the Burning Wind. Even the few survivors could only drag their burning bodies across the ground.

Suddenly, the Crimson Sun flared brighter. The entire wall buckled and collapsed with it.

With nothing to block it, the Burning Wind struck White Cliff Town head-on, hurling stones as it swept through.

Xilian ducked behind a building just in time. When he looked back, the sight sent a chill through his heart.

In the central square, the people who had yet to evacuate scattered like ants caught in a hurricane. Their flesh curled and sizzled in the scorching air. Familiar figures burned like fireballs, screaming as the heat slammed them to the ground. Then they fell silent.

Silk caught fire and scattered like fireworks. A child's wooden horse charred into a black skeleton. Painted glass burst into fang-shaped shards across the ground.

Xilian tried to make sense of what was happening, but his mind was blank.

The flames swallowed the screams, leaving only broken whimpers. People with severed arms convulsed in pools of molten iron. Survivors ran barefoot over burning bricks, the taste of blood rising in their throats amid the ash.

White Cliff Town would forever reek of charred despair.

After another burst, the Burning Wind beyond his shelter began to die down.

Xilian rushed out. As one of White Cliff Town's only two Transcendents, he had to shoulder the responsibility now.

Countless hideous figures appeared in the gap where the wall had fallen.

The moment the Crimson Sun stopped unleashing its Burning Wind, the Demons caught their breath and poured out of the Interstice Gray Domain in an endless stream.

A burning pain rose from the Ouroboros Mark. It hated. It raged. It yearned to slaughter every twisted, wicked thing.

It whispered: Kill them all.

Xilian raised his sword and answered like a beast.

"Just what I wanted!"

The Soul Marrow within him burned fiercely. Xilian split a Demon's skull with one stroke, then cut another in half at the waist.

Hundreds, then thousands of Demons massed at the breach, but they could not stop Xilian. He advanced like a walking meat grinder, leaving severed limbs and flying flesh in his wake.

Not enough. Still not enough.

The Demons' deaths did nothing to quell the Ouroboros Mark's fury, much less calm Xilian's heart.

Xilian carved a bloody path into the Wilderness. There, at last, he saw the Crimson Sun clearly.

The Crimson Sun's surface rippled with surging streams of red fire. Strangely, these streams had shapes too distinct to be flames: burning, curling tentacles spreading wildly along its edges. At its center lay a deeper crimson, like an abstract sun.

At that moment, the Ouroboros Mark's hatred reached its peak. What it wanted to destroy tonight was not the endless Demons. It was that thing.

Beneath its blazing light, the Crimson Sun watched all creation like a vast eye.

Rustling rose on every side of Xilian. Layers of ice crystals formed over ground the Burning Wind had scorched. The piercing cold bypassed his senses and sank straight into his mind.

The Interstice Gray Domain expanded again, pouring boundless power of Chaos into reality.

Looking at the Crimson Sun once more, Xilian suddenly realized its lower half was not behind the horizon. It was inside the Interstice Gray Domain, within the Spirit Realm.

The Crimson Sun's descent had crushed the fabric of reality around it.

"Te... Teacher?"

In the blood-red light, Xilian saw Nuen.

Nuen stood before the Crimson Sun, a sword in one hand and a mangled corpse dragged behind the other.

Applause rang out.

"Impressive as ever, Nunn Soflova. Even in old age, you're as powerful as the stories say. More powerful, in fact."

The Deathbird praised him. "I called upon my lord's power, and it still couldn't hold you back? Instead, you found an opening and killed Gene."

Nuen glanced at the remains in his hand. Half of Gene's face and body were gone.

No blood flowed from the wound. The instant the blade struck, the heat carried by the Boiling Sword had evaporated Gene's blood and charred his flesh.

Nuen let go. The remains hit the ground and shattered into chunks of carbon.

"So this is your master's power? An Abomination I've never seen before."

Nuen looked up at the Crimson Sun, grief in his voice. "I've spent too long in seclusion in White Cliff Town. What, has another Giant God fallen completely to Chaos?"

The Deathbird said, "Abomination? My lord doesn't much like being called that."

Amid that hellish scene, the two spoke like old friends. Those watching had a harder time of it.

Toren silently edged to one side.

When the Crimson Sun rose, he had thought the Deathbird would dispose of Nuen with ease. Yet amid the roaring Burning Wind, Nuen had killed Gene as easily as crushing an ant.

Tania stared at the Crimson Sun without a word. No one knew what she was thinking.

Hiss—

A bloodstained blade emerged from the rolling mist. Its razor-sharp killing intent jolted Tania alert. She twisted aside on instinct, and cold steel flashed across her face.

A thin line of blood ran across the bridge of her nose and over her left eye, spraying droplets in its wake.

Tania clutched her blinded left eye and raised a hand to summon Source Energy. Before she could gather that pure power, Xilian burst through the mist.

"Die!"

Sharp metal severed several of Tania's fingers and bit into her palm before stopping.

Xilian tried to cut deeper, but Toren rushed in from the side. His swinging sword knocked Xilian's blade aside.

"Tania, are you all right?"

Toren forced Xilian back, then asked her anxiously.

"What do you think?"

Tania's face was smeared with blood, her heart pounding. If the Starwatcher's Omen Trait had not warned her of the danger, Xilian might have killed her with that single strike.

Nuen and the Deathbird, facing each other ahead, had also noticed Xilian's arrival.

"Another Torchbearer. Is he your student?"

The Deathbird was about to further undermine Nuen's resolve when he sensed something. His gaze snapped to Xilian.

The blood throughout his body grew hot, then hotter. This was a summons through the bloodline.

Not long ago, the Deathbird had sensed that summons. It had drawn him across a vast distance to the Outer Flame Frontier, where he had pieced together the clues pointing to Nuen from the information he had gathered.

The Deathbird turned on Nuen in fury. For the first time since their battle began, he lost his composure.

"You gave him the Torchbearer Sacred Blood!" the Deathbird cried. "You wasted a power so precious on him?"

"The Torchbearer Sacred Blood?"

Nuen did not understand the source of the Deathbird's outrage.

The Deathbird went still for a moment. "You don't even know what it is?"

"My God, Nuen. You carried that treasure all this time," the Deathbird said with a wild laugh, "and you have no idea what power it holds!"

"Captain Frey told me to protect it, so I did. That was all." Nuen remained calm. "And it seems you've missed your chance."

"That's all right." The Deathbird licked his lips, his voice hoarse. "He's only at Rank One. He hasn't fully fused with the Torchbearer Sacred Blood. Drain him dry, and we can still refine some of it again."

Nuen said coldly, "You sound as if you think victory is assured?"

The Deathbird said nothing. He gripped his sword and dagger and drove them into his chest again. Blood gushed out, and the Crimson Sun whipped up another scorching Burning Wind.

"This fragment of an Abomination's power is strong," Nuen said, pointing his sword at the Crimson Sun. "But the Abomination isn't here in person. Thinking you can use it to kill me is naive."

Nuen advanced again. The Boiling Sword glowed as though heated red-hot, its glare searing the eye.

"True. This power can wound you badly, but it isn't enough to kill you. However..." The Deathbird's voice dropped. "Nuen, you don't seem to understand the position you're in."

"If we'd met decades ago, I would never have been sure I could beat you. Back then, you were alone, full of hatred and rage, willing to do anything, with nothing holding you back.

"You were invincible."

The Deathbird looked into the distance. At the edge of his sight, part of White Cliff Town's high wall had crumbled. The Demons had tried to swarm through the opening, only to burn to ash in the holy light beyond it.

Torchlight Lighthouse still stood.

The Deathbird drove the dagger all the way into his chest. It sank into his flesh, binding to it until blade and body became one.

"But now?"

The Deathbird raised a hand in disdain, offering the Chaos Evils a spectacle to enjoy.

"Now... you're too much of a coward!"

The swollen, burning Crimson Sun collapsed inward. Countless flaming tendrils coiled together in tangled layers. The blood-red glow filling the night sky drew back to a single point, condensing into a long, narrow spear of dark crimson.

No one could follow the spear's flight. Everyone knew where it would strike.

The heavy darkness split open, revealing a scarlet sky. The point where its edges met fell precisely on Torchlight Lighthouse.

In an instant, a searing gale swept across heaven and earth. A monstrous whirlwind tore down the towering Torchlight Lighthouse with ease, snuffing out the dawn that drove back Chaos.

Pure darkness descended upon the land. Source Energy and Chaos churned and boiled within the Grey Fog, rampaging like beasts freed from their reins.

The unholy power tainted everything, driving it into a frenzy. Plants moved without wind, twitching as if in pain. Stones floated and trembled as if keening.

And so the tide that had receded returned, determined to drown every inch of land.