Chapter 40: The Castle of Eternity
The wreckage of ten Aethelgard Warships lay scattered across the muddy plains of District 9 like the bones of dead leviathans.
Smoke billowed from the twisted metal. The Platinum Golems, now deactivated, lay in heaps, their glowing eyes dim. To a normal person, this was a disaster zone. To a scavenger, it was a gold mine.
To me, it was Legos.
"Can we keep the big one?" Anya asked, standing on top of a severed warship engine. She was kicking a piece of loose plating. "It looks like a dragon head!"
"We keep everything," I said, rolling up my sleeves. "These ships are made of Void-Steel Alloy. The golems are pure Orichalcum. If I sold this scrap, I could buy a small moon. But we aren't selling."
I turned to Old Mo, the crippled janitor.
"Mo, you were the Vice-Headmaster. What is the soil composition of this island?"
Mo leaned on his broom, staring at the destruction with a mix of awe and terror. "Bedrock. District 9 is actually the tip of an ancient mountain that floats upside down. It's solid granite for ten miles down."
"Perfect foundation," I nodded.
I walked to the center of the courtyard, where our old, moldy villa used to stand (before the Fire Elder blew the porch off).
"Ria," I commanded. "Blueprint Mode."
Ria's eyes flashed blue. She projected a massive 3D hologram over the ruins.
"Drafting schematic based on User preferences. Style: Sovereign Fortress. Features: Void Shielding, Time-Dilation Training Rooms, infinite kitchen capacity."
"Add a tower for me," Seraphina interrupted, pointing a manicured finger. "High enough to look down on the Golden Palace. And make it black. I hate white."
"Noted," Ria adjusted the hologram. "Adding Spire of the Demon Queen."
"And a playroom!" Anya shouted. "With a slide!"
"Noted. Adding Tactical Rapid-Descent Chute."
I looked at the hologram. It was ambitious. A fortress of black steel and glass, bristling with defense arrays.
Normally, building this would take a team of Earth Mages ten years.
"We have ten minutes before lunch," I checked the position of the suns.
I stepped forward.
I raised both hands.
The Ouroboros Ring flared.
'Seal 1: War God (Physical Manipulation).'
'Seal 2: Divine Blacksmith (Material Fusion).'
'Clone Ability: Time Acceleration.'
I created a Time Bubble around the entire island. Inside the bubble, time moved 100 times faster than outside.
To the outside world, what happened next would look like a blur.
"Break down," I commanded.
I used Void Qi to disassemble the warships.
CRUNCH.
The massive metal hulls groaned and twisted. Millions of rivets popped. The steel plates peeled off like skin.
The wreckage dissolved into a swirling tornado of raw materials—steel beams, glass shards, mana crystals, and wires.
"Smelt."
I clapped my hands. Anya blew a stream of Phoenix Fire into the tornado.
The metal liquefied instantly, turning into rivers of glowing orange magma floating in the air.
"Reform."
I acted as the conductor.
I wove the liquid metal into shapes. Walls rose from the ground. Towers spiraled upward. The Golem cores were embedded into the walls to act as defensive turrets.
I didn't just build a house. I forged an Artifact.
Every brick was infused with my Will. Every window was tempered with Void Qi.
BOOM.
The Time Bubble popped.
The dust cleared.
Standing in place of the slums was a monstrosity of architectural beauty.
A massive, jet-black castle rose from the island. It looked like a sword stabbing the sky. The walls shimmered with protective runes. A massive tower (Seraphina's) loomed over the edge, surrounded by floating obsidian shards.
And in the center, a warm, inviting kitchen with a chimney puffing smoke.
"Welcome to Fortress Eternity," I announced, dusting off my hands.
Prince Valerian fell to his knees. "You... you built a castle in five minutes."
"I skipped the waiting parts," I shrugged. "Come on. I need to calibrate the defense array."
The Royal Palace: Throne Room.
High above in the Golden City, the atmosphere was apocalyptic.
King Aethelgard sat on the Rose-Gold Throne. He was a massive man, radiating the aura of a Late-Stage Demigod. His presence alone made the air heavy.
Kneeling before him was Prince Aethelred, looking disheveled and terrified.
"You lost the fleet," the King said. His voice was quiet, terrifyingly so. "Ten warships. Two Elders. And the dignity of our Clan."
"Father!" Aethelred stammered. "He is not human! He manipulated time! He cut the ships instantly! He is a monster!"
"A student from a Low World destroyed our armada with a sword," the King mused. "And he is protected by the Aethelgard Heirloom—Lady Seraphina."
The King stood up.
He walked to the window and looked down. Through the clouds, he could see the black spire of my new fortress rising from the slums like a middle finger to his authority.
"This Rudra... he is an Anomaly."
"We must kill him!" Aethelred pleaded. "Send the Divine Knights! Send the Grand Ancestor!"
"No," the King shook his head. "If we send the army, Seraphina will unleash her Demon Arts. If she fully awakens as the Demon Queen, this entire world will burn. We cannot risk a civil war."
The King turned back to the throne.
"We need a scalpel, not a hammer."
He pressed a rune on his armrest.
A hologram appeared. It showed a figure cloaked in white robes, wearing a mask with no face—only a single vertical eye painted on it.
An Arbiter Agent.
"My King?" the Agent's voice rasped.
"Agent Zero," the King said. "We have a Timeline Deviation in Sector 9. A student named Rudra Ye. He exhibits signs of Acausality."
The Agent paused.
"Acausality is a Type-1 Sin. The punishment is Erasure."
"He is currently in the Divine Sky Academy," the King said. "We cannot act openly. But... there is the Dungeon of the Ancients."
The King smiled cruelly.
"The Academy Tradition states that the Top Rankers must explore the Ancient Dungeon to retrieve a relic. Force him to enter. And once he is inside... ensure he never comes out."
"Understood," the Agent replied. "The Shadows will claim him."
The hologram faded.
Aethelred smirked. "The Ancient Dungeon? That place is a labyrinth of madness! Even Demigods get lost in there!"
"Exactly," the King sat back down. "Let the ghosts eat him."
Fortress Eternity: The War Room.
We sat around a massive table made of polished platinum (recycled from Golem chests).
"We have a problem," Old Mo said, laying a map on the table.
Mo looked better. I had given him a pill made from the Whale Core, and his dantian was slowly knitting itself back together. He was no longer a cripple; he was back to Core Formation.
"The Aethelgards won't attack directly," Mo explained. "They are afraid of Seraphina. But they control the curriculum."
He pointed to a red circle on the map.
"The Dungeon of the Ancients. It is located beneath the Academy. It is the ruins of the Previous World that existed here before the Floating Continents."
"Previous World?" I asked, eating a sandwich.
"The Middle World has been destroyed and rebuilt seven times," Mo revealed. "Every time the population gets too strong, the Arbiters reset it. The ruins below are the graves of the civilizations that failed."
"And let me guess," I wiped crumbs from my mouth. "Aethelred is going to send us there."
"It is mandatory for Rank 1 students," Mo nodded. "But usually, students only go to the First Layer. I suspect they will sabotage the portal and drop you into the Abyssal Layer."
"What's in the Abyssal Layer?" Lyra asked, trembling.
"Ghosts," Mo whispered. "Remnants of True Gods who died fighting the Arbiters. Their hate is so strong it warps reality. If you go down there, you fight history itself."
I stopped chewing.
Remnants of True Gods who fought the Arbiters?
That didn't sound like a trap. That sounded like a Recruitment Drive.
"Interesting," I smiled.
I stood up.
"Ria. Prepare the expedition gear."
"We are going?" Valerian gasped. "Into a death trap?"
"We are going into a treasure vault," I corrected. "If there are Dead Gods down there, they probably left their wallets."
I looked at the Ouroboros Ring.
Chronos had finished analyzing the loot from the ships. He was hungry for something new.
Dead God Remnants? That was pure Soul Energy.
"We leave at dawn," I declared. "Before Aethelred can even issue the order."
I walked to the balcony of my new fortress and looked down into the abyss below District 9.
Somewhere down there, buried in the dark, were the secrets of the previous cycles.
"The Arbiters reset this world seven times?" I whispered to the wind.
"Well, number eight is going to be their unlucky number."