Aboard the Sky Fortress Valkana, hovering above the wasteland's edge, panic erupted.
"He's really awake?!" General Kallis shouted, slamming his fist on the control table. "That can't be possible! The Sealing Order was absolute! Even the Dragon Priests said—"
"—they were wrong," said the masked man seated in the corner. Unlike the others, he was calm. Almost reverent.
"He crushed an Apex Wyrm without moving. That's not a man. That's a god who hates us."
Kallis turned on him. "Then what do you suggest? Bowing?"
The masked man stood.
"No. I suggest we remind him that the world moved on without him."
—
Back in the Wastes, the First Calamity stood on a cliff, watching the sky.
He could feel them coming.
Twenty Elite Hunters. Two Archmagisters. One Prophet. Trained assassins of the Empire. Magic armor. Time-stop seals. They thought numbers could save them.
"Fools."
They descended like wolves. Coordinated. Efficient. Professional.
The Prophet opened with a time-binding spell — a golden circle that froze space midair.
The First Calamity took a single step.
Time shattered like cheap glass.
He appeared behind the Prophet and whispered:
"I remember your kind. You used to chant. Now you just speak."
He shoved his hand into the Prophet's chest — not through the flesh, but into the soul — and tore it out with a black-red flame.
Screams followed. The hunters broke formation.
Too late.
He weaved through them like a storm given shape. Each movement dismembered. Each glance paralyzed. Within seconds, only three were left breathing — kneeling, broken, staring at him with primal fear.
He stared down at them.
"I am not your enemy," he said flatly. "I am your reckoning."
Far above, the Empire watched in silence.
And for the first time in five centuries, their scryers failed to speak a word.
Because what they saw…
Was not a man.
But a sleeping God.
And he had awakened.