The moment Liu Shen stepped through the obsidian gate, the world shifted.
There was no sky, no ground—only floating shards of what once was: broken weapons, shattered cities, fractured memories. The very air felt ancient, carved with truths the heavens had tried to erase. This was not just a realm—it was the scar of history.
A single step carried Liu Shen across a field of suspended ash, where time seemed to drag. His shadow moved in reverse, and the beat of his heart echoed as thunder above and below.
Then he saw it—on a floating islet of blackened stone, a figure knelt before a shattered banner, its emblem worn but not forgotten: a crimson sigil of the Sovereign's First Legion.
Kael.
Once called the Warden of Cataclysms, Kael had been the first general to kneel when Liu Shen rose in rebellion. His loyalty was unshaken even when the world turned against them. And yet, when the Demon Sovereign fell… Kael vanished.
The man before him was still clad in Abyss-forged armor, rusted and cracked, but his presence was titanic. Two massive greatswords were stabbed into the ground beside him—one made of obsidian, the other of starlight shattered.
But Kael did not rise.
"Kael," Liu Shen called.
No reply. Not even a flicker of breath.
He moved closer, but as he stepped onto the stone, the world roared.
A barrier ignited around Kael—an ancient oath still active.
"Only one who bears the Sovereign's Flame may awaken the Warden."
From the heavens of this twisted realm, a dozen ethereal swords descended like meteors, each bearing a memory from Liu Shen's past—his victories, his regrets, his betrayals.
They were not just attacks.
They were judgments.
Liu Shen drew his hand back, and black demonic flame erupted from his palm, coiling around his arm like a serpent. He slashed through the first blade, but it didn't shatter—it sang, echoing a scream from when Kael held the line alone against the Divine Tribunes.
More swords followed. Each one a moment in time.
—The last battle on the Sable Steppes.
—The sealing of the Demon Throne.
—Kael's final words before he vanished: "Even in silence, I will hold."
With every strike, Liu Shen was forced to remember what he lost. Who he failed.
Blood trickled from his eyes—not from pain, but from memory forced into flesh.
And then, at the final sword, he let go of resistance.
He did not strike it.
He embraced it.
The blade stopped inches from his chest. The judgment ended.
The barrier around Kael shimmered and cracked.
"I am the Sovereign," Liu Shen said softly. "Return to me, Kael. I never abandoned you."
The seated figure finally moved.
Kael raised his head.
His eyes—silver once, now molten red—focused on Liu Shen, unsure. Broken.
"You… live?"
"I returned," Liu Shen answered. "Not as I was. But I carry what we vowed."
Kael stood, towering and war-scarred. "Do you still seek war?"
"No," Liu Shen said. "I seek truth—and vengeance is only part of it."
The silence between them was a storm. Then Kael gripped the hilt of his starlit greatsword and raised it high.
"In the name of the Abyss, I answer your call."
The sword shattered in his grip—not broken, but transformed—molding into a new weapon of abyssal-black, etched with the Sovereign's sigils. A new pact formed.
Liu Shen's mark pulsed in answer.
Kael knelt.
"The Warden of Cataclysms returns to your command, Sovereign."
Liu Shen extended a hand, and Kael rose—his oath reborn.
Behind them, the realm of floating ash began to tremble. Something deep in the Abyss knew what this reunion meant.
Liu Shen had reclaimed his first general.
And the war that the heavens buried… was waking up again.