The morning sun hung high over the central square, casting long, harsh shadows across the cobblestones in front of the mayor's elevated estate. A dense, agitated mob had gathered at the base of the stone steps, brandishing rusted pitchforks, iron cleavers, and heavy wooden clubs. They were fueled by the sermon they had just heard at the chapel, their eyes wide with fear and fanatical fervor.
At the head of the crowd stood Father Cassian, in luxurious ivory robes, his sunken eyes burning with absolute conviction.
"Hold! Everyone, hold your ground!" the mayor bellowed, shoving his way through the outer edge of the crowd with Samuel, George, and Harold clearing a narrow path behind him. "Cassian, have you lost your mind?! What is the meaning of this madness?!"
"Madness, Elias?" Cassian turned, pointing a trembling, ink-stained finger toward the estate. "No... it is enlightenment! Divine clarity!"
"Can't you see it, Mayor?!" a man near the front yelled, shaking his iron rake.
"They are demons!" a woman shouted, clutching her holy medallion.
"Don't get yourself fooled!"
"Listen to the priest, sir!" several voices chimed in together.
"Listen, all of you!" Cassian's voice echoed off the wooden facades of the surrounding homes, rising to a piercing pitch. "The trail of ruin is clear! This 'Lord Vance' appeared out of nowhere; a man with no lineage, no history, possessing powers no ordinary man can comprehend! Everyone knows he killed the Elder of Silver Harbor... that hideous horror that devoured all those innocents! But ask yourselves: What kind of mortal man slays a beast like that alone?!"
The crowd rumbled, nodding in terrifying unison.
"And by his side..." Cassian spat onto the stones, his face twisting in disgust. "...that woman! Lilith! Do you not recognize the truth?! Years ago, our late King was a decent, just ruler! But he suddenly abandoned his throne and turned into a hedonistic hermit who cared for nothing, locked away in his chambers to indulge the whims of an unknown, intoxicating beauty! That nameless woman was the sole reason the King lost his mind, leading directly to the bloody rebellion of Vortigen where both ended slain!"
The mayor froze, his brow furrowing as the words settled in and a cold prickle of doubt ran down his spine.
"Lilith is that woman!" Cassian pressed, his voice dropping into a venomous hiss that carried over the silent crowd. "She flaunts that exact, impossible beauty! She drove our King to his ruin, and now she uses her dark arts alongside this newly appeared 'Lord Vance' to save us! What a joke! He killed Vortigen, yes, but only to place the traumatized Princess Aria on the throne as a hollow puppet! It's a scheme! They rule the kingdom from the shadows!" His tone became a sob and continued, "They murdered a creature of ultimate goodness!"
"Cassian, stop this!" the mayor barked, trying to regain control. "You speak of dark arts and evil, yet it is common knowledge that Lord Vance and Lady Lilith killed that Angel in the capital because the creature attacked them first! It was self-defense! Dozens of soldiers witnessed it!"
"Creature?! You dare! Self-defense against a messenger of the Sun Lords?!" Cassian scoffed, his eyes wild with zealotry. "If an Angel of the heavens strikes you down, it is not because of your good deeds!"
"He's right!"
"They killed an Angel!"
"Drive them out!" the crowd roared, surging forward.
"Cassian... wait!" the mayor yelled, raising his hands. "Lord Vance has not harmed a single soul in this town! He stood on the freezing shore all night to protect us! We cannot rush into bloodshed on assumptions—"
"Seize him!" Cassian ordered coldly. "The Mayor has been blinded by their glamour! Seize him and his men before they corrupt the rest of us!"
Before Samuel, George, or Harold could draw their steel, a dozen heavy hands lunged from the mob, grabbing the mayor by his collar and pinning his arms behind his back.
Suddenly, the roaring mob instantly fell dead silent. Vance stepped out onto the elevated balcony. He hadn't looked at the mob holding the mayor hostage as men don't normally look at the ants. He stepped onto the wooden railing, paused for a fraction of a second, and jumped straight up. Mid-leap, Vance vanished into thin air, erased from existence between one heartbeat and the next, leaving the air where he had been empty.
Right behind where Vance had stood, Lilith and Aria stepped out onto the balcony. Neither woman uttered a word. Their eyes ignored the angry mob below entirely, focusing on a single, distant point far out on the horizon of Silver Lake.
The crowd, confused and unsettled, followed the direction of their gaze.
The lake in the day was a vast expanse of deep water fed by surrounding mountain rivers, so massive that five commercial fleets currently had rights to fish its waters without ever crossing paths.
Lilith, Aria, and all the others... They saw it.
Far out in the sunlit middle of the lake, a massive merchant vessel, the first ship arriving from Silver Harbor, was leaning sharply to its side, snapping into pieces. Above the wreck, the massive bird, the beast, had revealed itself in plain daylight.
It was of a translucent, pale sky-blue and white color, the bright noon sunlight passed right through its completely outstretched wings, but it was not flapping them to stay aloft. It hovered above the sinking ship in utter defiance of gravity, drifting through the air as if it were the very air itself.
Below on the steps, Father Cassian and the mob stood paralyzed, their weapons lowering inch by inch as they stared at the impossible, majestic phantom looming over the distant waters.
Nothing... Just calm and peace...
Just a few minutes ago, Vance had been admiring the lake through the open windows and doors that led to the balcony of the estate's grandest room, the best accommodation the mayor could offer. Lilith and Aria were there, too; the first reading a book and the second cleaning his Akasha blade. Vance hadn't slept. In fact, he wondered if he would ever need to sleep again. The answer escaped his grasp... as many other things did... including the creature that lurked in the depths of the lake.
The calm waters under the soft morning breeze offered a display of solace and peace. In the distance, a large merchant vessel coursed through the blue surface, arriving from Silver Harbor—the first of many ships carrying the duty to breathe new life into trade between the two regions.
Then, he saw it.
Shapeless, raw essence; a dense, invisible cloud of it rapidly gathered around the ship like a phantom mist that only those sensitive to power could perceive. It solidified in an instant, striking in plain sight before anyone could react.
He moved on pure instinct. There, finally, it was: his meal had finally appeared.
He stepped out onto the railing and jumped. Space obeyed his absolute will; in a blink far too fast for the mortal eye to track, a spatial tear swallowed him and placed him directly above the creature so he could get a glance at it.
It looked like a bird, but it was no bird. It didn't matter. The first second, Vance focused his mind and unleashed his will.
He aimed [Reality's Blades] directly at the creature's neck and the thick appendages that, from a distance, resembled legs and winged plumage. He wanted a clean and fast execution. The limbs, in truth, were all long, writhing tentacles. What looked like a bird's head and beak was a hard, protective shell, and its true eyes were situated along the sides of its chest. Yet, despite its alien anatomy, there was a strange grace and majesty to its form. It reminded him of a colossal jellyfish, a divine, floating leviathan whose every movement carried deliberate purpose, and there was no otherworldly hum of the Abyss on it. It was a creature made elegantly by evolution, born and evolved in this very world, and most exciting of all was the sheer volume of essence radiating from it. If Vance devoured it, he felt he would grow significantly stronger, drawing far closer to Level 7.
His dark eyes widened.
His [Reality's Blades] didn't work, none of them. The spatial cuts passed right through the creature's form without leaving a mark.
The twentieth second, Vance landed lightly on a floating section of the wrecked ship's wooden hull. Behind him, terrified sailors clung desperately to whatever debris was left afloat, staring wide-eyed at a battle that would one day be immortalized in paintings, songs, and myths.
Identifying the true threat, the beast lunged at Vance, driving four of its largest tentacles and its massive central body straight toward him.
Space tore apart once more. A massive black fissure opened in the air between Vance and the charging horror. Propelled by its own massive momentum, the beast plunged headfirst into the tear, and the void closed instantly behind it.
Vance had cast it onto a barren, toxic world devoid of oxygen. The environment was going to kill it, and he could pay a visit to harvest it in two hours.
How did it...?
Vance forced himself to step through a portal a fraction of a second before a massive, solid limb slammed into the exact spot where he had just been standing.
The beast had appeared again.
Does it use portals, too? Even better than me? He studied the giant cloud that presented itself as a bird to the eye, but could lie to his perception. It would take Vance a considerable amount of time to navigate his way back if he were ever banished to an unknown realm.
Yet this creature had returned instantly... almost as if...
Did it truly fall in the portal? he pondered, dodging another sweeping strike.
As the limb solidified for its next attack, Vance executed [Reality's Blade] at the precise instant of physical contact.
Success.
The limb was severed cleanly. But there was no blood. The severed appendage dissolved into a thick mist, flowing straight back into the creature's main body. He couldn't waste more power. He decided to end it right there.
He focused and unleashed his will once more, summoning [Reality's Gate], and forced the massive portal over the creature, swallowing the leviathan whole before snapping the gateway shut.
"What are you?" he muttered with his eyes wide as he turned to block a fraction of a second too slow, and the heavy limb struck him with catastrophic power, shattering his footing and launching him high into the sky.
Lilith's frantic, worried voice resonated directly in his mind: Vance, it's not real!