Chapter 847: The Final Confrontation
Southwestern Seleucus, Sunset City.
This ancient city, scarred by millennia of time, stood with its walls cracked and weathered, its surface etched with the scars of forgotten wars. Beyond its crumbling ramparts stretched an endless expanse of the Ashen Wasteland—a land once buried beneath a tidal wave of magma unleashed by Kazul. Now, however, new footsteps echoed across the desolation: the arrival of the Allied Forces’ Main Army.
The ground trembled. From the horizon came the distant, muffled thunder of marching boots, the piercing blast of horns. On the city walls, the Dragon Worship Cult soldiers froze in panic, their eyes snapping upward. A flood of warriors in full battle formation marched toward them, stretching across the sky until they swallowed the horizon. Battleships and Two-Headed Dragons weaved through the clouds like schools of fish in a stormy sea—spectacular, terrifying, overwhelming.
In no time, the Allied Forces had encircled the City of Dusk. Before the might of millions of soldiers, countless tanks, warships, and armored behemoths, the thousand-year-old fortress stood like a lone island adrift in a sea of war—soon to be devoured by a storm of annihilation.
“That’s… the Allied Forces’ Main Army!”
“By Tiamat, it’s those damned Empire bastards!”
“How could they arrive so fast?! Kazul had sealed the outer realm with a forbidden zone! Even we couldn’t pass—how did they get through?!”
“God—”
“Could it be… the Emperor of the Ashen Flame intervened?”
Inside Sunset City, the Dragon Worship Cult soldiers erupted into chaos, whispering in terror. They knew full well this army had already obliterated the Green Dragon Sect and the Blue Dragon Sect. Now, the Red Dragon Sect was the last remnant of the Dragon Worship Church—the final hope for the Queen of Monsters to descend upon Earth. There was no retreat. Only surrender or death.
On the city wall, a human-dragon hybrid officer raised the Red Dragon Sect’s banner high, his voice thundering across the ramparts to rally his troops:
“Fear not! They are but traitors who stole the Dragon Queen’s strength! We are the true, pure-blooded offspring of Tiamat!”
“Exactly! They are thieves—cowards who dare to challenge the Five-Colored Dragon Queen’s might! They are helpless before her power!”
At that moment, a man clad in a dragon-faced mask and a heavy, multi-colored robe ascended the apex of the heretical Dragon Altar within the city. Towering over the gathered cultists, he surveyed them with an expression of devout ecstasy.
“Brothers and sisters… this is the great trial bestowed upon us by the Five-Colored Dragon Queen! When this test ends, we shall rule the world!”
His voice shook—not with fear, but with something deeper, more unnatural, like a sob caught in a throat, a wail trapped between breath and silence.
“It’s Philippe, Your Majesty!”
“No… not Your Majesty. He is now Pope. He has shed his mortal flesh, bathed in the Bloodline of the Mother God, and ascended to divinity!”
The cultists stared up at him with eyes burning with envy, longing, and reverence. All knew the fate of a Gedyn Divine Offspring—once favored by the Mother of Monsters, anointed with sacred dragon blood, transformed into a noble, powerful humanoid dragon. In the Dragon Worship Church, this was the ultimate divine favor.
But the faithful did not know the truth: Philippe’s soul screamed in agony within his body, begging for death again and again—yet he could not die. Tiamat was slowly transforming him into a half-dragon vessel, erasing his spirit piece by piece. His eyes brimmed with tears. His mind was a storm of thoughts he could not voice. He wanted to die—but could not. He could only watch, helpless, as he became a tool of the monster he once served.
Under the gaze of thousands, Philippe spread his arms wide, chin raised, and began to chant in a voice wild with fervor:
“When lava covers the earth, when ash swallows the sky, the Mother of Monsters shall descend! She will destroy the old era… and birth a new one!”
“To Tiamat!”
“Praise the great Mother of Monsters!”
Their voices split the air, frenzied, deafening. But just then, a deep, resonant voice boomed from afar—mighty and unyielding.
“Dragon Worship Cultists! Your crimes against morality, law, and civilization have reached their peak. This is an open provocation to all that is sacred!”
“In the name of civilization. In the name of order. We, the Allied Forces, shall utterly destroy your Dragon Worship Church. We will restore Seleucus to radiance and enlightenment! We will free this land and its people!”
“Long live the Empire!”
“Long live Emperor Kai Xiusu!”
“Victory to the Allied Forces!”
The Allied Forces’ main army roared back in unison—cheers, battle cries, thunderous war chants that surged forward like a storm, drowning out every sound from within Sunset City.
Then came the artillery.
Shells screamed through the sky, trailing thick smoke in sweeping arcs. The air filled with a vast, overlapping net of fire—dozens of trajectories converging, forming a deadly veil across the heavens. The firepower was unprecedented. For this war, the Empire had deployed nearly 100,000 heavy cannons, hundreds of Aether Armors, and over a thousand Steam Tanks. This force could reduce the entire city to dust.
Boom!
The ancient city wall shook violently under the barrage. Cracks spiderwebbed across its surface. Stone shattered. The ramparts groaned, crumbling into ruin. The defenders panicked—on the brink of total collapse.
Yet amidst the chaos, Philippe stood unmoved, arms still raised, Scepter of Woe held high. Even as shells rained down from above, he did not flinch. His body trembled violently—not from fear, but from inner torment—as he cried out:
“Everything is illusion! Only the Great Mother of Monsters endures!”
Ancient, twisting glyphs—dragon tongues from forgotten ages—etched themselves into the stone like living things, forming a complex, dizzying Desecration Ritual Array. Deep grooves snaked from the five roots of the Dragon Pillars, converging at the center of the altar—a bottomless well.
A stench of sulfur and decay rose from below, seeping upward in thin, ghostly wisps.
This was the polluted energy of the Earth Vein, forcibly channeled—drawn from the rage and resentment of countless buried followers. It was foul, ancient, and powerfully cursed.
Around the altar, a black sea of people stood motionless—no anger, no fear, only obedience.
The outermost ring: two hundred ragged, wounded men, women, and children, their hands bound behind their backs with coarse ropes. They were the last prisoners of Sunset City—its final captives. Their bodies reeked of sweat, blood, and filth. They moved like cattle, eyes hollow, faces frozen in numb terror, driven into position as the first flesh ring.
Inside, five fanatical devotees in shimmering, iridescent scales knelt before the five stone pillars. Their bodies pressed tightly against the stone, their expressions ecstatic, vacant. Their scales shimmered in the hues of white, black, green, blue, and red—symbols of the five dragon heads.
They gazed into the center of the altar, mouths moving silently, as if chewing sacred words. Their devotion was absolute.
At the heart of the five-arched pillar, a human-dragon hybrid elder was bound to a cross. His face, lined with wrinkles and scales, bore a look of profound piety—and a flicker of something deeper, something lost. His fingers traced the Five-Headed Dragon Emblem on his chest. In his dull eyes, the dying red sun bled across the sky.
Gregory Rost. Once Duke of the Divine Noble House of Seleucus. Now reduced to this monstrous form—Tiamat’s final sacrifice.
This oppressive order was upheld by the most loyal of the Church’s enforcers: the Serpent Guard Corps. Clad in heavy, dark dragon-scale armor, they stood like statues, their visors dark and depthless. Their long, poisoned blades hung at their sides. Their gaze—when it moved—was cold, alien, utterly devoid of humanity.
Closer to the altar stood the Heretical Dragon Knights—elite guardians. Their armor bore jagged, dragon-tooth-like spines. Their swords were forged with dragon-headed pommels. Any attempt to break formation would be met with silent, instant death.
Around them, a dozen young and adult Red Dragons stood, heads raised, roaring in unison—imposing, terrifying, their presence a living wall of power.
Philippe’s face remained hidden beneath the shadow of his five-headed cowl. Only his jawline—hard and unyielding—and his tightly pressed lips were visible.
He raised the Scepter of Woe.
The dragon-head eyes flared with two points of malevolent red light.
A voice—dry, cold, and eerily piercing—slithered through the air like a thousand serpents crawling over sand. It drowned out the horns, the artillery, the very wind.
“Everything is illusion. Only Tiamat endures!”
“The hour has come, Children of Dark Scales!”
His voice vibrated in resonance with the Dragon Vein Node Energy. Every soul on the altar felt it deep in their bones—a shiver from the marrow. The Allied Forces’ cannons? They were mere toys. The Empire’s pride? A fleeting spark.
“Today, we shall offer iron and blood. We shall feed the Mother of Monsters with the bones and wails of these wretched insects!”
Kargass roared.
Instantly, several Heretical Dragon Knights stepped forward and heaved a massive treasure chest onto the altar’s edge, pouring its contents into designated grooves.
Gold coins. Gemstones. Exquisite vessels. Sacred relics adorned with pearls—scattered like trash into the glyph trenches.
Their light flickered weakly against the dark, ancient dragon runes—glistening, yet cheap, grotesque.
The clinking of gold on stone sounded like funeral bells.
“Praise Tiamat!” Kargass chanted, his voice distorted, desperate.
As he spoke, the treasure began to burn—not with fire, but with something darker. It blackened, melted, and flowed into a thick, viscous, metallic-black liquid that oozed into the trenches, racing toward the central well.
A stench of sulfur and corruption rose, thick and suffocating—like the earth itself digesting greed.
The cultists were feeding their last wealth, their final spoils, to the capricious Dragon Queen—bargaining for protection.
When the last golden gleam faded from the trench, Kargass turned to the two hundred bound prisoners.
His scepter pointed at them.
“Ritual begins!”
“Yes, Your Eminence!”
The Serpent Guard moved in silence—precise, swift, merciless. Like reapers mowing wheat, they surged into the line of victims.
Their poisoned blades didn’t strike vital organs. They cut wrists—clean, cold, clinical.
Thwip! Thwip! Thwip!
The sound of flesh parting echoed again and again. Screams tore from throats—raw, agonized, heart-wrenching.
“No! I don’t want to die!”
“Mercy! Spare me!”
All resistance was futile. Blood—hot, fresh, pulsing with life, fear, and pain—spurted from two hundred wounds, spraying across the altar stone. The blood flowed like rivers, following pre-set channels, converging at the five points of a pentagram, then surging through wider conduits toward the center well.
The well no longer exhaled sulfur.
It erupted with a thick, choking wave of blood—so dense it seemed to choke the air.
The altar lived. It gnawed. It breathed. Dark red bloodlight pulsed through the runes and trenches, growing brighter, brighter—illuminating the altar like the inner wall of a hellish furnace.
The air warped, heated, distorted. The stench of blood mixed with sulfur and the ancient, primordial reek of dragon—foul, thick, suffocating.
The sky darkened—not from sunset.
Churning clouds gathered above the altar, spiraling into a vast, bottomless vortex. At its core, a chaotic, five-colored light pulsed—wild, untamed.
A presence descended—ancient, brutal, greedy, consuming. An aura of pure intimidation, like a physical hammer striking the soul.
Every living thing in the land—snakes, prisoners, fanatics, even the distant Allied Forces’ frontline—felt their hearts seized by an icy claw. Knees buckled. The instinct to kneel was overwhelming.
Even the enemy lines trembled.
At the heart of the crimson vortex, a colossal phantom image coalesced—so vast it blotted out stars and moon.
Five monstrous dragon heads swirled in the storm:
A white head spewing frost.
A black head vomiting acid.
A green head wreathed in poison mist.
A blue head crackling with lightning spines.
And a red head blazing with purgatory fire.
Tiamat’s Will Projection had arrived.
Five pairs of vertically slit pupils—each a different color—gazed down upon the tiny Pope and his sacrificial offering.
Then came the roar.
A sound so deep it pierced the soul—shattering every window in the city in an instant.
It was dragon’s breath. Divine pressure. The brief, terrifying presence of a true monster god.
The Red Dragons rejoiced, raising their heads in ecstatic howls. The cultists fell to their knees, chanting in dragon tongue. The five scaled fanatics pulled daggers from their belts—spines forward—and without hesitation, plunged them into their own chests, tearing out their hearts. With their last breath, they pressed the still-warm organs onto the five dragon pillars.
“Dragon Queen’s grace!”
Philippe’s voice cracked with ecstasy—and unbearable pressure.
Yet at the altar’s center, Gregory Rost trembled. His hands shook as he gripped the dagger. He hesitated.
Philippe whirled around, Scepter of Woe raised.
“The time has come! It is time to offer your heart to the Great Five-Colored Dragon Queen! Why do you hesitate?”
“I…”
Gregory’s voice trembled—confused, torn.
Though the evil dragon’s will had consumed his spirit, the soul of a Legendary-Level Holy Knight—the former Marshal of Seleucus—still screamed in defiance.
(End of Chapter)
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