Rebirth: Necromancer's Ascenscion-Chapter 138: City of Thrones

Esrad.

Crown of the Empire. Navel of the world.

A city not built—but declared. Cast from marble and mana by the will of the Immortal Founders, etched into existence by decree, not by hand.

Here, every stone bore the weight of centuries.

Every breath was sanctioned by power.

Every shadow belonged to someone important.

Its walls rose high, veined with gold and singing with enchantments so ancient that no living mage dared to claim mastery.

Wards hummed like sleeping gods in the mortar.

Scripts of binding and remembrance coiled around archways like ivy, each inscribed by long-dead emperors whose names were now spoken only in ritual.

Roads of blackglass wound like obsidian veins toward the city’s heart—toward the Senate Citadel.

Each brick was carved with scripture, and those who walked upon them walked over the very bones of history.

And at the center of it all, where the roads converged like fate-lines, stood the Citadel itself: a towering monolith of silence and stone.

Its white spires pierced the sky like accusatory fingers. Here, time moved slower.

Words were sharper. Nothing happened by accident.

This was not a city of crowds.

It was a city of forces.

Of powers cloaked in flesh.

Of bloodlines bred to rule, to kill, to endure.

Here, law was not written. It was spoken—and once spoken, carved into the marrow of the Empire.

And tonight, the powers gathered.

Tonight... they were afraid.

—

The Senate chamber flickered with firelight and secrets.

A vast, circular cavern of white stone, carved from the mountain’s bone, wrapped in silence as heavy as the Empire’s crown.

Its domed ceiling shimmered with artificial constellations—arcane stars replicating the night sky, rotating slowly in mimicry of the heavens.

Nine tiers of seating encircled the central dais.

Stone thrones were arranged in a perfect ring around a long, obsidian table, each one marked with the sigil of a ruling House.

Senators sat draped in gold-threaded robes, their necks heavy with chains of office, their faces carved from politics and old scars.

Jeweled sashes. Ceremonial blades.

Every gesture was weighed. Every silence, weaponized.

Power moved through the chamber like gravity.

Unseen. Unrelenting.

Few listened.

Fewer spoke.

Then—

A cough. Dry. Intentional.

Senator Caldrien Verin stepped forward, his heavy robes rustling like parchment. "I motion to suspend trade discussions. There is a matter far more urgent."

Murmurs stirred like waking crows.

Lady Maelis Norn narrowed her eyes.

A chain of deep sapphires wound her throat, humming faintly with protective wards. "What matter, Archduke? Has the weight of your ledgers grown unbearable?"

Dry chuckles. Thin smiles.

Caldrien ignored them.

He held up a crystal orb—cut smooth, filled with swirling shadow.

With a flick of his fingers, the orb ignited.

Above the table, a projection bloomed to life: a scorched valley, its soil cracked and steaming. Ruined spires jutted like broken teeth. Ash spun in the air like falling snow.

"The First Descent Tournament," Caldrien said. "Held within the first Reach of the Hellscape. Two hundred and forty-nine entered. Blooded champions. B-class adventurers. Inquisitors. A Warden-Knight of the Sanctum."

The image shifted. A crumbled fortress. Blackened gates. Mangled corpses strewn in poses no mortal fall could create.

"Only three emerged."

Gasps. A sharp intake of breath.

Even those who had read the classified reports now looked with new fear.

Tournaments in the Reach were known for brutality—but never devastation.

Never annihilation.

"A massacre," whispered Lord Veyr Durnas. "You said two hundred and forty-nine. Who killed them?"

Caldrien raised his eyes. "One man."

Silence stretched thin.

He gestured again. The image changed.

A figure stood in the ash. No armor. Bare-chested. Cloaked in shadow.

His skin inked with glyphs that moved of their own accord. Eyes like voids. In one hand, a black-flamed blade.

In the other—nothing. He needed nothing.

"Demon," someone hissed.

"No," said Maelis softly, leaning forward. "That... that is no demon."

"But no mortal could—"

"He silenced mages," Caldrien snapped. "Shattered cursed ground. Ruins older than the Third Era are now rubblr and nothingness because of him. He walked through the maw and was the only thing dangerous enough to remain breathing."

"You’re certain this isn’t illusion?"

"The tournament overseers confirmed. Diviners corroborated. They all speak of only one thing."

He paused.

"They called him the Prophet of Death."

Someone laughed bitterly. "Poetic nonsense."

"Perhaps," Caldrien said. "But nonsense does not leave ruins and destruction in its wake. This Prophet didn’t just win. He changed the shape of the Reach. The dead rose behind him. The cursed ground sang beneath his steps. We are dealing with something new."

Lady Maelis’s fingers curled into a steeple.

"Then we must ask the only question that matters..."

She turned to face the chamber. "Who is he?"

—

Beneath the Senate, in the sanctum reserved for empire-sanctioned orders, another gathering unfolded.

No less powerful. No less grim.

A long stone table stretched through the chamber, its surface inlaid with the sigils of the Twelve Great Orders.

Seated around it were representatives of each—high inquisitors, war-mages, archivists, generals, envoys of old blood.

Candles flickered, casting dancing shadows over faces both feared and forgotten.

"The convergence approaches," said Grand Archivist Hamen, his face veiled in scripture, voice like brittle parchment. "This... Prophet. He is a sign. A fracture in the pattern. A harbinger."

General Solen Varkos scoffed, his golden pauldrons scraping stone. "Harbinger or not, he bleeds. He can die."

"You’ve never seen him, you weren’t there," muttered a paladin, skin pale, hands steady.

"Then tell us. What is he?" Varkos slammed the table. "A man? A phantom? If he’s a threat, we burn him. Dragons still obey the chain."

"He’s not a weapon," came a quiet voice.

They turned.

At the table’s far end sat a man in gray. No sigils. No blades. No name spoken aloud.

Only his hands moved—calm, still, precise.

The Gods-Chosen.

A warrior of the Divine Factio.

Anointed by flame.

Unbound by mortal rules.

The last time he had spoken in this chamber, he’d been tasked with the fall of a Kingdom’s government within thirty-nine hours.

It had fallen in seven.

Now, even Varkos fell silent.

The room waited.

"What do you think?" someone whispered.

A pause. freёwebnoѵel.com

Then—

A breath.

The Gods-Chosen tilted his head, as if listening to something only he could hear.

Memory? Prophecy? Or simply a name that refused to die?

"...I think I may need to visit an old friend."

Silence. Tighter now.

Varkos paled.

Another voice—female, sharp—cut through the hush from the shadows.

"We share the same thought... Mark."

The name echoed like a bell toll. A blade drawn. A story restarted.

And the man in gray—Mark—smiled.

Not warmth.

Recognition.

Inevitability.