Finale

"Red dragon! What brazen insolence! Are you threatening us? Threatening three true deities?" A thunderclap detonated out of a clear sky. A dreadful divine pressure surged around Tyr's avatar, blue veins bulging along the single arm gripping his steel-gray warhammer. Facing this seemingly enraged divine avatar, Cassius showed not the slightest fear. Shifting his massive dragon claws, he took another stride forward, withstanding the crushing pressure with the power of his Imperial Domain. The red dragon raised his head, twitching the scaled brow-horns above his eyes, and said softly to Tyr's avatar in the sky, "Lord Tyr, this is hardly a threat. It is merely... a well-meaning reminder." *Boom!* Fierce winds howled and clouds roiled as the two auras collided, sending rolling shockwaves through the sky like surging tides. Ilmater narrowed his eyes slightly and lowered his head, his expression still full of sorrow and compassion, giving no clue as to his thoughts. Bahamut, meanwhile, slowly flapped his wings amid the clouds, looking down from on high at the red dragon coiled atop the mountain summit. His weathered, ancient draconic visage showed neither grief nor joy, seemingly lost in silent thought. After a long silence, the Platinum Dragon God spoke slowly: "Cassius... take heed of your path." *Roar—* Bahamut raised his head, and a long, distant cry resonated across the heavens. The platinum dragon's scales shimmered with a faint azure glow. His slender, sinuous serpentine body gradually grew translucent, ultimately melting into the sky. "Farewell, Lord Bahamut!" "Praise be to the Platinum Dragon God." "Praise be to the Lord of the North Wind." In the distance, gold dragons, silver dragons, and brass dragons bowed their heads respectfully, saluting in the direction of Bahamut's departure. "Jerlazax is dead, the mortal realm requires rest, and it is time for this war to end..." Ilmater slowly straightened up, his well-tested throat producing a raspy, weeping voice. "The skies collapse, the earth shatters, mortals weep, and boundless suffering falls upon the world... Transfer all scars and agony unto me..." Humming sorrowful verses, he limped across the cratered, battered earth. Finally, amid a gentle, warm breeze, that scarred and battered figure dissolved away. "Praise the Crying God..." "The Rack-Bound Lord..." The deep, reverent chants of metallic dragons and celestials echoed across the mountain ruins. Even the most loyal imperial subjects could not bring themselves to utter harsh words against the Crying God who bore suffering on behalf of mortals; they merely watched him leave in silence. High in the sky, amid the churning layers of clouds, the avatar of Tyr—clad in light armor and wielding the steel-gray warhammer—also began to flicker, his figure steadily fading. Gazing in Cassius's direction, white light welling within his hollow eye sockets, Tyr's avatar gave a cold snort. "I hope you are truly as mighty as you boast, rather than becoming a slave to power." *Boom!* A magnificent rumble shook heaven and earth. Astral brilliance washed across the sky, countless bolts of thunder crashed down in unison, and blinding white light enveloped all living beings. Tyr's avatar at last dispersed completely, leaving behind only the lingering traces of immense divine pressure. "Farewell, Your Excellencies. I will not see you off." Gazing quietly up at the clouds that still churned above, Cassius finally revealed a smile of relief. It had succeeded. Everything had unfolded according to the plan he had laid years ago. The invasion from the Abyss had been halted by the Empire; Jerlazax had been slain by his own claws; and the intact body of Garyx was now firmly within his grasp. *Roar—* Standing atop the pinnacle of Dragonblood Mountain, Cassius threw back his head, stretched his neck, and let loose a mighty roar, proclaiming to the world the red dragon's supreme dominion over the Great Anzetta Waste. "Ye gods..." "Cassius above..." "Long live the Cinder Empire! Long live His Majesty Cassius!" The hundreds of thousands present raised their heads together. Whether angels, metallic dragons, or red dragon scions, all looked toward the peak, countless gazes converging on the mountain summit. The red dragon hovered sinuously high in the air, his pale-gold draconic eyes bright and piercing, radiating majesty and power. Sunlight poured over his forty-meter-long, mountain-like dragon frame, cloaking it in a faint halo as his crimson scales shimmered brilliantly. Fierce winds howled and mist swirled. Below him, Dragonblood Mountain, shaped like a ferocious dragon, seemed to prostrate itself in worship before him. For some inexplicable reason, the onlookers felt a peculiar power radiating from him—divinity. Cassius calmly looked down upon the myriad living beings below, slowly beating his wings. Feeling the myriad gazes—fervent, pious, or fearful—he narrowed his eyes slightly. His long-unseen status panel manifested before him, displaying messages he had previously lacked the leisure to examine. [You have slain a demon lord. You have obtained the legendary achievement: Demon Slayer.] ... Following the battle between Cassius and Jerlazax, Anstica, once blanketed in snow-capped mountains, had been reduced to a battered ruin. Everywhere lay collapsed peaks, running meltwater, and scalding lava bubbling up through fissures in the fractured strata. Only the newly formed Dragonblood Mountain stood towering between heaven and earth, as if it had existed there for tens of thousands of years, demonstrating Cassius's feats and might. After the departure of the Triad, despite some minor friction and clashes, the Empire still paid out a sum of gold coins as compensation to the reinforcements who had traveled from afar. Having watched their deities leave and sensing the less-than-friendly stares of the imperial vassals, the celestials cast mass Plane Shifts one after another, departing the Material Plane. The metallic dragons also conjured portals, carrying away gold dinars stamped with Cassius's likeness as they departed Anzeta for their respective lairs. These beings from across the multiverse had witnessed with their own eyes the showdown between Cassius and Jerlazax, and they would undoubtedly spread word of this earth-shattering battle destined for the history books. A demon lord had been slain—news that would utterly shake the multiverse. Predictably, the name of Cassius would echo ever louder throughout the multiverse. And countless gazes from Mount Celestia, Ysgard, the Hells, the Abyss, and even the depths of the Astral Plane would converge upon this desolate land of Anzeta. ... Dragonblood Mountain. "Master, the wyrm silver dragon of Clan Melvold seeks an audience, as do the blue dragons of Faria and envoys from the Kingdom of Thrace..." "Tell them all to wait on the side. Within ten days, none are to disturb me." Cassius was coiled atop the peak formed from Garyx's skull. Exhaling sulfurous white smoke, he let out an impatient growl. "Yes, Master." The ogre mage nodded repeatedly, waved his staff, and hurriedly vanished from the spot. Cassius clicked his tongue in exasperation. "Tsk, what a nuisance. The moment the battle is over, factions from every corner scramble to crowd in." With that, he lowered his head and carefully reviewed the report submitted by Trump. "In this war, under the leadership of His Majesty Cassius, the Empire..." In this war against the Abyssal invasion, the Cinder Empire had achieved a tragic yet glorious victory. Although the Empire had long established defensive lines and subjected the demons to dense artillery bombardments, the subsequent positional warfare saw those formidable fiends deal severe blows to the imperial front. Twenty-one southern cities were leveled by demon assaults; tens of thousands of civilians lost their lives in the catastrophe; and a total of one hundred and forty thousand imperial soldiers and vassals fell on the southern battlefields. Countless players had also perished during the war. All told, the Abyssal invasion inflicted losses of tens of millions of gold dinars upon the Empire. In truth, Cassius could have flown straight to Anstica, the first area invaded, and used overwhelming strength to slaughter all the demons alone before dealing with Jerlazax, entirely preventing these losses. Yet he had chosen otherwise. On one hand, a protracted war against demons would temper the imperial army, testing and refining tactical doctrines while putting the Cinder Empire through a baptism of blood and fire. On the other hand, in Cassius's eyes, demons were not merely monsters that brought chaos and death—they were pure, glistening experience points! Throughout the months of fighting, according to Trump's statistics, the Empire had slain over thirty million demons in total, a substantial portion of which was credited to the Starfallen. On Cassius's faction panel, following this war against the Abyssal invasion, the three million players affiliated with the Cinder Empire faction had seen their average level rise by a full five levels! Most of those three million players were newcomers who had jumped in with the "Clash of Kings" update, hovering around level one or two before the war. This conflict had provided them with immense pools of experience; some novices had even reached level seven by slaughtering demons. As for the veteran players who had followed the Cinder Nest since the closed beta, they had broken through the level ten threshold, advancing into true extraordinary beings. Through this ordeal, the Empire's intermediate strength had been vastly reinforced, with the Cinder Legion now boasting mid- and high-level classed individuals in the five figures. Compared to these tangible gains, the losses in the Empire's south seemed trivial. Furthermore, the large-scale expenditure of ordnance during the war had driven the domestic arms industry into boom, pumping robust vitality into an economy that had previously stagnated. "Growing stronger through warfare" was no empty slogan for this colossal war machine known as the Cinder Empire; it was an undeniable reality. Naturally, for Cassius himself, the greatest harvest was the increase in personal power, along with... the precious corpse of the progenitor dragon beneath him. "Scheming for years was all for this moment..." The red dragon narrowed his eyes, the corners of his mouth curling upward as his ferocious visage beamed with the joy of a bumper harvest. The panel hovered before his eyes. [Achievement: Demon Slayer] ["It is said that only a demon can kill a demon, for even the gods can merely seal away these beings of frantic madness. To truly slay a demon lord, one must be more vicious and cruel than they—a feat deemed nearly impossible." —The War of the Black Thorn, as recounted in the Dark Tome of Amu] [Obtained passive trait: Demon Slayer] [Constitution +1, Charisma +1] [With an unshakeable thirst for order, you personally slew a demon lord and received an answer from the world.] [You have obtained additional traits: Chaos-Resistant Body, Breath of Ordering.] [Chaos-Resistant Body: Henceforth, you possess resistance against all powers originating from the Abyss, and you are difficult to bewitch by the will of the Abyss.] [Breath of Ordering: Expending immense energy, your breath weapon gains miraculous power to right chaos and restore order.] On the panel, the black-and-gold trophy glowed faintly before melting into the red dragon's colossal frame. Cassius closed his eyes, letting the invisible power remake his flesh. With each rise and fall of his breath, the muscles in his body grew denser, and the scorching heart within his chest beat with newfound vigor; the red dragon's constitution had surged tremendously. Following that, howling winds surged about him, and countless elemental particles danced in the air as Cassius's charisma ascended to a new plateau. *Hiss...* Plumes of steam hissed from between his scales, nostrils, and fangs. *Rumble—* The red dragon let out an involuntary low hum. He spread his wings and stretched his limbs, overcome with profound invigoration. Cassius had grown intimately familiar with the sensation of rising base attributes, thoroughly relishing the process. Yet what interested him even more were the additional traits granted by Demon Slayer—those two abilities tailored against chaos. Suddenly, Cassius stared fixedly at the information displayed on the panel, muttering under his breath: "This is... entropy reduction." He uttered a term that had grown somewhat unfamiliar. What Jerlazax had told Cassius was not wrong. Even in the world of Elezerg, the natural progression of all things toward disorder and chaos remained the fundamental rule of existence—what people in his past life had called "entropy increase." And in this bizarre world populated by the Abyss and demons, that trend manifested as the Abyssal demons' invasion and devastation of reality. The power Cassius had obtained, however, could lower the system's disorder, utterly annihilating the demons that served as extensions of the will of the Abyss. *Hum—* In an instant, silence fell over the world in Cassius's perception. The universe seemed to whisper softly, and all things laid bare their secrets before his eyes. He could see the magma coursing beneath the crust, the conduits in space connecting to the Outer Planes, the Elemental Planes running parallel to the Material Plane... The Seven Heavens of Mount Celestia, Ysgard, Mechanus, the Chaos Sea, the Outlands... these planes appeared before Cassius like branches of a great tree. Finally, within Mechanus—shaped like a teardrop clockwork timepiece—countless enormous, interlocking gears spanning the endless void turned slowly with crisp clicks, casting forth a faint beam of light. *Click.* Cassius instantly felt a wondrous sensation as distinct silver motes of light manifested within his body, infusing him with newborn power. Eager to test it, he channeled this newborn strength, causing streaks of silver light to flash across his pale-gold pupils. Then he opened his maw and unleashed searing dragonfire toward the earth. *Boom!* [Breath of Ordering] A silver column of flame erupted. Instantly, the Weave surrounding the torrent of fire began to function in a meticulously structured, orderly manner, returning all things to absolute order. This was a power capable of obliterating chaos—the keen blade of the Demon Slayer!