"What's going on outside?"
Inside the castle's conference hall, many of the Revolutionary Army officers looked toward the suddenly blinding sky with confusion. "Did something catch fire...?"
"Hm?" The Commander, seated on the throne at the far end of the hall, suddenly froze mid-motion.
"Why... do I feel this sudden sense of dread?"
"Something... something's coming to destroy everything!" the Divination Teigu user gasped. Having just completed the ritual, his expression turned pale. His temples throbbed violently—his body trembling as if warning him of an imminent, catastrophic threat.
"Something's coming... it's terrifying!"
The moment seemed to stretch endlessly. Timothy's heart began pounding wildly. As head of intelligence, his instincts were razor-sharp—and this feeling...
He'd only ever felt it once before—back in the Capital, when he had faced Great General Budo and narrowly escaped death.
An overwhelming sense of danger seized him. Finally, he shouted at the top of his lungs:
"Enemy attack!!"
The words had barely left his mouth—
"Under the Light · Defender!"
Clatter—!
At Timothy's command, the metal gauntlets on his forearms suddenly expanded and detached, the pieces unfolding and reassembling midair into a massive barrier that enveloped the entire conference hall.
The very next instant—
BOOM—!
An indescribably intense violet light swallowed the world. The sky, the ground—everything was consumed in a blinding brilliance.
In that instant, all matter, sound, sight—even space and time—seemed to vanish.
RUMBLE—!!
Only after that unbearable flash did the earth-shaking roar erupt, ripping through the air like a divine thunderclap. The ensuing shockwave, carrying unbearable heat and gale-force winds, slammed into the ancient fortress. The upper levels were obliterated in an instant.
The central courtyard collapsed entirely. Shattered walls, pulverized stone, and shredded flesh were indistinguishable from one another. The once-grand stronghold was reduced to a wasteland of ash and ruin.
Standing high above in the heavens, Selene exhaled softly, dispersing the heat lingering at her fingertips. "Hmm... not bad."
Shaking her head, she looked down at the survivors writhing on the edges of the blast zone. Slowly, she began to descend. "The power of the Strong Nuclear Force—scaled down, of course—has a smaller kill range, but far fewer restrictions. And besides..."
She smiled faintly. "Even small sparks have their charm."
The smoke and dust began to settle.
Trees, buildings, soil, and flesh—all were scattered chaotically across the ruins. Severed limbs, crushed skulls, and charred organs blended into the scorched earth, forming a grotesque mosaic of death.
All except—
A single obsidian-black barrier.
"Heh... to think you vermin could survive this long against the Empire. I'll give you that much—you've got some bite left."
Her crimson eyes narrowed. "A turtle shell... so there's a Teigu user down there, huh? Fine. Let's have some fun."
Floating above the ground, Selene raised her right hand and clenched her fist, the air cracking with explosive force. The very atmosphere rumbled as her power surged.
"Imaginary Manipulation—Honkai Arrow!"
With a flick of her wrist, four prism-shaped crystals of compressed imaginary energy materialized and fired in rapid succession, each one slamming into the black barrier with an ear-splitting explosion, piercing through its metal surface.
"Still not coming out? Planning to dig your way out like a rat?"
Drawing her right arm back, Selene mimed the motion of pulling a bowstring, conjuring three glowing energy frames formed from interlocked crystalline prisms. The frames decreased in size the closer they were to her hand, with the foremost construct twisting into a spiral of dual tetrahedrons.
BOOM!
She released the shot.
Like a stone dropped into still water, the prism streaked through the air at supersonic speed, leaving a thunderous sonic boom in its wake.
CLANG—!
The projectile struck the buried black barrier dead center. The moment it pierced through, the contained Honkai energy destabilized—
BOOOOOOM—!!
A deafening explosion engulfed what remained of the courtyard. The blast wave surged outward, scorching everything in its path as blinding light devoured the night.
With a flick of her finger, Selene brushed aside the debris hurtling toward her from the explosion's shockwave. Her expression remained cold as her crimson eyes fixed on the epicenter of the blast.
Though the courtyard of the ancient fortress had been utterly leveled, she could still sense faint traces of life energy below.
"Tch... so even with the lighter blasts, they still refuse to die?" she murmured to herself.
Clack—
Her high-heeled boots pressed against the carbonized stone, the faint crackling echoing through the ruins as she landed with effortless poise. Despite their several-inch heels, each step carried a natural elegance, the sharp click of stilettos against rock stirring something deep beneath the earth.
ROOOOOAAAR—!!
The ground beneath her shuddered violently. The shattered courtyard walls trembled as deep fissures spidered outward from the center, spreading rapidly like the roots of a great tree burrowing through soil.
CRACK—!!
With an explosive rumble, the ground split open. Stone slabs that once formed the castle's foundation shattered and slid aside.
From the darkness of the widening chasm, a deafening roar tore through the air.
A massive claw emerged—its talons like spears of obsidian—slamming into the ground with earth-shaking force. Then, rising from the abyss, came the monstrous head of a titanic Danger Beast.
The creature's shadow blotted out the moonlight. Its massive form stretched over a hundred meters tall, its scales gleaming like dark steel as its eyes flared with murderous light.
Atop its head stood a Revolutionary Army Teigu user, gripping a staff that pulsed with unnatural energy. His voice thundered across the ruins.
"Imperial dog! The Revolutionary Army will never bow to tyranny!"
Selene, however, looked utterly unfazed. To her, the towering beast before her might as well have been a pet.
"A staff-type Teigu that summons terrestrial Danger Beasts, huh?" she mused calmly.
The creature, enraged by its master's fury, drew back its head and roared again—
Until the world exploded.
BOOM—!!
"Imaginary Claw."
From Selene's right arm, waves of crimson-violet energy burst forth, coalescing into a gargantuan spectral claw that expanded to hundreds of meters wide within a heartbeat.
"What—?! How is she this strong?!" the Teigu wielder cried out in disbelief.
Before he could react, the massive claw descended—grasping both the beast and its master as though plucking chicks from the ground.
The sound of shattering bone echoed through the ruins, followed by a spray of blood and gore. Within seconds, both the summoner and his monstrous creation were crushed into a single heap of twisted flesh.
"Pathetic," Selene said flatly, her voice as cold as the night air.