Chapter 251: The Sovereign’s First Step
The Demon Lord swung its halberd downward.
The weapon tore through the air, dragging dust and loose stone in its wake. Kael stood directly beneath its path. Samantha lay broken in the rubble a few feet behind him. He could still move. If he threw himself aside, the halberd might miss him—but it would not miss Samantha.
Despair rolled off the twenty-meter giant, pressing against Kael’s mind as heavily as its gravity. His legs trembled from blood loss. Every breath pulled at the deep gash across his chest. His Sovereign Aura was nearly gone.
But Samantha and the wounded cadets were behind him.
Kael remained exactly where he was.
His flickering golden aura snapped inward.
The scattered light compressed violently against his skin and chipped longsword. The wasteful flare disappeared, replaced by a dense, thin layer of liquid gold wrapping his body and weapon.
At the edge of the crater, Lucien saw two System notifications flash across his vision.
[Protagonist Trait Activated: Sovereign’s Defiance] [Sovereign Aura has entered its First Ascension.]
Kael raised his sword.
He did not attempt to block the halberd directly. Even with his aura compressed, the sheer impact would crush him. Instead, he angled his blade and caught the descending iron shaft along its edge.
Iron scraped across golden steel. The compressed aura reinforced Kael’s arms as he turned with the blow, forcing the halberd’s momentum to slide past him.
The weapon slammed into the courtyard beside his left boot. Its heavy head buried itself deep into the cobblestones, sending a tremor through the surrounding buildings. Kael’s boots carved trenches through the pavement. Searing pain shot through his shoulders, but he remained standing.
The attack had missed Samantha.
"Bordon!" Kael shouted, never taking his eyes off the Calamity. "Get the instructor out!"
Bordon planted his jagged length of rebar against the ground like a crutch and lurched forward. His shattered kneecap nearly folded beneath him, but he reached the collapsed building. He hooked both thick arms beneath Samantha’s shoulders and dragged her from the rubble. Blood ran from the corner of her mouth, and her mangled arm hung uselessly at her side.
Bordon hauled her back toward Mariella and Elisha at the edge of the crater.
Kael stepped over the buried halberd.
The compressed aura weakened the abyssal pressure around his body. His breathing steadied. The panic clouding his thoughts completely receded.
The Demon Lord was still impossibly powerful, but Kael could finally read its movements. He saw the shift in its balance, the angle of its weapon arm, and the precise opening Samantha had created in its right wrist.
He moved before the Demon Lord could rip its weapon free.
Kael slipped inside its massive reach and drove his golden blade into the damaged joint. Black ichor hissed as it boiled around the steel.
The Demon Lord tried to lift the halberd.
Kael planted his boots, twisted his hips, and forced every remaining trace of his power through his sword. His compressed aura burned fiercely through the dark mana filling the joint.
The Demon Lord’s balance shifted.
Its right foot moved backward.
One step.
That was all Kael forced from it.
But the creature that had ignored Alicia’s Level 9 plasma and shattered Samantha’s Platinum aura had been forced to take a step back.
Kael tore his sword free, dragging its golden edge across the Demon Lord’s forearm as he retreated. A thin, molten line remained across the dark armor.
The wound was insignificant against the Calamity’s enormous body. Samantha had pierced an opening between its armor plates. Kael had carved the first visible mark across the abyssal steel itself.
The Demon Lord stopped.
It raised its arm and examined the shallow, burning cut. Then, its black visor tilted slowly toward Kael.
The creature released its halberd. Its left hand snapped forward with terrifying speed.
Kael saw the movement, but his exhausted body could not react fast enough. The massive gauntlet closed directly around his longsword. Golden fire hissed furiously against the abyssal steel.
Kael pulled with both hands. The sword did not move.
The Demon Lord tightened its grip.
Cracks raced through the blade. Then, it shattered.
Jagged fragments scattered across the courtyard. The violent kinetic force traveled through the ruined hilt and tore into Kael’s arms. His compressed aura broke apart, bursting from his skin in fragments of fading golden light.
Kael tried to gather it again. Nothing answered.
The Demon Lord seized him around the torso before he could retreat. It lifted him effortlessly from the earth and drove him back-first into the courtyard.
Stone collapsed beneath him. Broken cobblestones tore through his padded uniform, biting deep into his flesh. Blood burst from his mouth as a shallow crater formed around his body.
Kael remained conscious, but his limbs refused to obey. He tried to raise one arm. Nothing happened.
The Demon Lord stood over him and reclaimed its halberd. The heavy iron tore free from the courtyard, scattering broken stone around Kael. It raised the blade for another execution strike.
At the edge of the crater, Lucien lifted the Lumeveil Enforcer.
He shut out the screams and the collapsing masonry. Panic would not reveal a weakness. His remaining mana was enough to produce exactly ten piercing shots.
Lucien studied the Demon Lord’s damaged right wrist. Corrupted black mana flowed into the injury, filling the cut like molten pitch. The mark Kael had carved across its forearm was already closing.
The creature was regenerating.
Lucien pushed [Detection] as far as it would go.
The darkness surrounding the Demon Lord shifted before his enhanced vision. Thin streams of corrupted mana stretched from its broad back to the open rift above the ruined altar. Ordinary eyes could not see them.
Together, they formed a tether between the Demon Lord and the Abyss. Power continued pouring through the connection, repairing the incarnation whenever someone managed to injure it.
Lucien understood.
The ritual had failed to bring the entire creature across. What stood in the courtyard was only a portion of the intended Demon King, still completely dependent on the open gate.
"That isn’t a Demon King," Lucien said.
The halberd began descending toward Kael.
"It’s an incomplete incarnation."
Lucien aligned the Enforcer’s front sight with the damaged right wrist.
He pulled the trigger.
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