The screams echoing through the subterranean execution chamber of the Imperial Palace had long since lost their humanity.

They were reduced to the wet, ragged gasps of the dying, drowning in the smell of scorched ozone and vaporized blood.

Emperor Aurelius stood in the center of the carnage. The Ruler of the Central Empire, a 7th-Order Grand Mage whose very name usually demanded absolute reverence, looked nothing like a sovereign.

His pristine white-and-gold robes were stained a horrific, chaotic crimson.

A dwarven merchant, his beard singed and his heavy iron chains rattling against the blood-slicked stone, tried to crawl toward the heavy iron doors.

Aurelius snapped his fingers.

A concentrated beam of solar mana erupted from the Emperor’s hand, instantly piercing the dwarf’s chest.

The intense heat cauterized the wound a fraction of a second after blowing a hole straight through his heart.

The dwarf collapsed, joining the towering pile of corpses that littered the dungeon floor.

"More," Aurelius commanded, his voice a low, terrifying rumble that shook the bedrock.

The Imperial Guards stationed at the edges of the room trembled, their armor clanking together as they shoved another line of prisoners forward.

Elven refugees captured near the borders.

Dwarven mechanics dragged from their workshops.

Slaves bearing the branding marks of the Outer Districts.

Anyone even remotely associated with the non-human alliance or the slums that worshipped the terrorist known as Zero had been rounded up and thrown into the Emperor’s personal slaughterhouse.

An elven ranger, her green chainmail stripped away, glared defiantly at the Emperor. She spat a mouthful of blood at his boots.

Aurelius didn’t blink. The air around him shimmered as his 7th-Order aura flared. The atmospheric pressure in the room multiplied exponentially, crushing downward with the weight of a falling mountain.

The elven woman was forced to her knees, her bones snapping under the invisible force, before her skull caved in against the floorboards.

Blood splashed upward, striking Aurelius across his cheek.

He didn’t wipe it away. He stood amidst the butchery, breathing heavily, letting the warm, sticky crimson run down his jawline.

Above the execution pit, suspended by golden magical chains, a massive magitech screen hovered in the dim, torch-lit air. It was currently hijacking the Imperial broadcast network, overriding the usual propaganda with a live feed from the Eastern continent.

On the screen, a figure wearing a tattered black combat coat stood on an obsidian platform. The white porcelain mask with the jagged ’0’ stared out at the world.

Aurelius’s eyes locked onto the broadcast. His hands curled into fists so tight his fingernails drew blood from his own palms.

Every time he looked at that mask, his mind violently pulled him back to the arena. He saw the golden light of the Academy’s tournament.

He saw his son, Prince Nero, the pride of his lineage and the flawless heir to the Central Empire, standing proudly in the dirt. And then he saw that masked monster snap his son’s neck like a dry twig, holding the broken corpse up to the cameras for the entire world to witness.

The grief inside Aurelius had long ago curdled into a black, festering poison. It was a rage that demanded the world burn to ash.

On the screen, the masked terrorist raised his gloved hands. He gripped the edges of the porcelain mask.

"But I did not come here today just to save this world," the metallic, distorted voice dropped, revealing a smooth, youthful human tone. "I came to take back what belongs to me."

Aurelius stepped closer to the screen, walking over the shattered bodies of the slaves without looking down.

The mask came off.

Silver-white hair fluttered in the projected wind. A pair of terrifying, heterochromatic eyes, one an abyssal void of pitch black, the other a blazing sun of dragon gold, stared down the continent.

"I am Damien Voss."

The declaration echoed through the bloody dungeon.

"Son of Theron and Elizabeth Voss. Heir to the Voss family. The Dragon Empire is dead. From this day forward, the Voss family rules this empire."

Aurelius stopped breathing.

The silence in the dungeon became absolute. Even the whimpering slaves pressed against the far wall clamped their hands over their mouths, sensing the apocalyptic shift in the Emperor’s aura.

Damien Voss.

The son of the King of Darkness. The heir to the traitors the Empire had hunted for sixteen years. The boy was the monster who had murdered his son. The boy was the architect of the economic collapse that had starved the capital. And now, that same boy had seized an entire empire, crowning himself king on a throne of ashes.

Aurelius’s teeth ground together with a sickening crunch. The muscles in his jaw bulged. The blood splattered across his face seemed to boil, hissing as his skin temperature spiked with the raw, uncontrolled output of his magic.

"Voss," Aurelius whispered.

The word carried a century of hatred.

"You take my son. You take my pride. And now you dare to parade your face to the heavens and claim a throne?"

Aurelius turned away from the screen. The golden light of his solar mana erupted from his body, blinding the guards and illuminating the cavernous execution chamber like a dying star.

"I will unite this continent," Aurelius vowed to the empty air, his voice rising into a roar of pure, unadulterated madness. "I will grind the Silver Woods into sawdust. I will melt the Iron Mountains into slag. I will march the entire might of the Central Empire across the borders, and I will slaughter every man, woman, and child who stands in my path!"

He raised his hands toward the cowering prisoners. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

"I will tear the Voss bloodline out by the roots. I will mount his silver head on the highest spire of my palace, and I will feed his soul to the deepest pits of hell to avenge my son!"

The Emperor unleashed his wrath.

Bolts of concentrated solar fire rained down on the remaining slaves. There was no interrogation. There was no mock trial. There was only the need to destroy.

Dwarves were incinerated where they stood, their heavy armor offering no protection against the 7th-Order flames. Elves screamed as their life force was forcibly evaporated by the overwhelming heat. Human slaves, trapped in their chains, scrambled desperately against the stone walls before the explosive blasts turned them to dust and shadow.

The Royal Guards stationed at the doors flinched, holding their shields up to protect themselves from the sheer collateral damage of their sovereign’s fury. The smell of burning hair and roasted meat became thick enough to choke on.

Aurelius moved through the chamber like a god of destruction. He grabbed a massive beast-kin by the throat, hoisting the terrified creature into the air, and poured raw plasma directly into its chest until the body fell limp and hollow. He shattered the stone floor, burying a dozen weeping refugees under tons of falling debris.

He killed until there was nothing left to kill.

He killed until the walls were painted black with soot and red with ruin.

Eventually, the screams stopped. The echoing blasts of solar mana faded into the low, crackling hum of dying fires.

Aurelius stood alone in the center of the graveyard he had created. His chest heaved. The golden light surrounding him flickered, leaving him bathed in the dim, flickering torchlight. Blood coated his hands, his face, and his ruined royal robes.

He stared at the pile of ash at his feet, his mind entirely consumed by the singular, driving need to march his armies east and crush the newly crowned Greedy King.

Clap. Clap. Clap.

The slow, rhythmic sound of applause echoed from the darkest corner of the dungeon.

Aurelius spun around, his hand instantly raising, a sphere of lethal, blinding solar energy gathering in his palm.

"Who goes there?!" Aurelius barked, his eyes scanning the shadows. "Show yourself, or I will turn you to ash!"

The shadows shifted.

A heavy, deliberate footstep echoed against the stone floor. The pressure in the room immediately changed. It wasn’t the sharp, burning heat of the Emperor’s solar magic. It was a suffocating, physical weight, the gravitational density of a man whose pure physical strength rivaled the greatest magic in the world.

A figure stepped out of the gloom.

He was a massive man, wearing a simple, tattered martial arts gi that left his heavily scarred chest and arms exposed. His hair was white and wild, his beard thick and unkempt. He stood with his hands casually stuffed into his pockets, completely unbothered by the carnage surrounding him or the 7th-Order spell currently aimed at his face.

Garrick. The King of Fists.

The former Guild Head of the Silverwood Adventurer’s Guild, and the man who had once fought the Emperor for three days and three nights to a standstill decades ago.

Aurelius narrowed his eyes, recognizing the brute instantly. The solar sphere in his hand pulsed dangerously, illuminating Garrick’s scarred, mocking face.

"You," Aurelius growled, his voice laced with venom. "You dare to infiltrate my palace? You, who ran with Theron Voss? I should kill you where you stand."

Garrick chuckled, a deep, rumbling sound that seemed to vibrate in the bloody puddles on the floor. He ignored the threat, casually stepping over the charred remains of an elven ranger.

"You look terrible, Aurelius," Garrick said, picking a speck of ash from his ear with a pinky finger. "You’re wasting a lot of energy throwing tantrums in basements."

"I am cleansing my empire of filth," Aurelius sneered, refusing to lower his hand. "And I am preparing for war. If you came here to protect the boy, you will die before you can draw a breath."

"Protect the boy?" Garrick laughed out loud, throwing his head back. "You think I care about Theron’s brat? I couldn’t care less if you snap his neck."

Garrick stopped a few paces away from the Emperor. The playful demeanor vanished from his face, replaced by a cold, calculating ambition. The King of Fists looked at the bloody monarch, his eyes gleaming with the dangerous light of a man who loved power more than loyalty.

He looked at the floating screen, where the broadcast had frozen on the image of Damien Voss standing victorious on the obsidian platform.

"You want to crush the Voss family," Garrick said softly, his voice dropping into a deadly serious register. "You want to unite the continent. You want to march your armies across Elias and tear down everything that boy has built."

Garrick pulled his hands from his pockets and crossed his massive, scarred arms over his chest. A terrifying, predatory smile spread across his face.

"Emperor," Garrick whispered, his gaze locking onto Aurelius. "I have a plan to achieve your goals."