The air above Mount Voss thrummed with the raw pulse of mana, a cacophony of power that shook the soul clan's fortress to its jade foundations. Towers, their surfaces etched with ancient soul runes that glowed like captured starlight, cracked under relentless barrages—fireballs roaring like primal beasts, ice lances piercing the heavens, and lightning claws tearing the sky apart. This was no mere skirmish; it was the first true magic world war, a revolution born of greed and desperation, uniting the Knights Table and Magic Tower against the soul clan's sacred path. They sought the final key to transcendence: the soul circle, guarded by a mere two hundred souls who refused to share their gift.
Lian Voss, the clan's young heir at twenty, stood atop the highest battlement, his black robes snapping in the gale of unleashed power. His soul circle, carved deep into his true soul and honed to rank 8, pulsed with prideful certainty. The alien technique, bestowed by the Soul Immortal to their ancestor, was their salvation—a path to conceptual mastery that surpassed the rigid heart and body circles of the world below. The clan's small size, barely two hundred strong, was their strength; they refined the technique in isolation, fearing its dilution in unworthy hands. To share it risked chaos—amateurs carving unstable runes, minds fraying under concepts too vast for mortal will.
Lian's spectral eyes glowed white, the hallmark of true soul magic, as he manifested his ethereal first-rank rune—a semi-physical sigil, ghostly and shimmering in his mind's eye, forged through meditation to channel intent. He spread his will, a wave of suppression that dulled the senses of a dozen advancing knights. Their swords faltered, movements sluggish as if wading through tar. But the world had birthed counters in this war, innovations crafted to smother the soul clan's elusive arts.
Golems, hulking constructs of enchanted stone and steel, lumbered from the Magic Tower's ranks, their empty cores immune to intent-spreading or telekinetic pulls. A clan mage beside Lian, her spectral eyes blazing, pushed her anima—soul energy—to manifest a conceptual severance, her rune flickering like a dying flame. She aimed to "cut" the golem's animation, but Blacksmith-forged strings, a new art born for this war, redirected the force. The mage screamed as her own anima recoiled, shattering her focus in a burst of jade shrapnel.
Puppeteers, a faction risen from the Tower's desperation, commanded swarms of wooden and crystal dolls, their strings woven with anti-soul wards. "No mind to twist, no soul to break!" one puppeteer bellowed, his creations swarming a clan defender. The soul mage spread his intent wide, anima draining rapidly to form telekinetic blasts that shattered puppets into splinters. But they reformed, their wards capping his intent threads, forcing him to conserve anima or collapse. The uniformity of soul basics—intent-spreading shared by all, like fire mages wielding flames—made them predictable, exploitable.
Poison Users, allied with Alchemists, unleashed "Soul Venom," a mist that corroded anima in the air, tainting intent threads before they could spread. Lian watched a clansman push his rune, spectral eyes glowing, only to choke as the venom frayed his sigil. His anima burned out, unable to sustain the basic projection, and he fell, mind unraveling into self-inflicted illusions. The poison capped their strength, preventing wanton sense-spreading to find escape routes—every probe drained anima faster than they could recover.
Knights Table warriors, their bodies carved with qi circles for raw physicality, led the charge. Their weakness was clear: immense strength and speed, but senses too slow to match. They countered with "burst techniques"—rigid, pre-set sequences etched into muscle memory. A knight charged Lian, his rank 6 qi hardening his skin like steel. "Burst: Void Cleave!" he roared, slashing space to shatter Lian's intent before it landed. The move was inflexible, a straight-line assault, but devastating in chaos. Lian's eyes glowed white, his chrono weave concept—time's subtle manipulation—slowing his perception to predict the burst's path. He sidestepped, redirecting the knight into a golem with a telekinetic nudge, the collision erupting in sparks.
Mages from the Tower fought with condensed power, their frailty offset by control. A fire mage, rank 7, wove a secondary body circle for "Heat Dispersion," diffusing his flames' recoil to push beyond safe limits. His lance of fire pierced a soul barrier, exploding in a blaze that "burned" illusions to ash. But without soul enhancement, his senses lagged. Lian slipped an intent thread into his mind, amplifying the dispersion until the flames turned inward, consuming him in a fiery scream. In this era, mages honed such control from necessity; Lian noted their precision, a lesson he'd carry forward.
The Imperial Clan loomed as the greatest threat, their golden auras—a proto-soul path rooted in subconscious will—minimizing illusions and repelling suppression like oil on water. An Imperial elder advanced, his aura blade gripping space itself. Lian's chrono weave slowed the elder's perception, but the aura's will countered, weakening the effect. "Your tricks are nothing," the elder sneered, his blade slashing through Lian's telekinetic shield.
This war had birthed a new age: guilds like Puppeteers and Alchemists, the unity of Knights and Tower, the Imperial Clan's might. All driven by the dream of three-circle harmony—body, energy, soul—to transcend rank 8's limits and defy world suppression. But the soul clan, holed in their mountain, refused to share. "We are the guardians," Clan Leader Voss had declared. "The world isn't ready for our purity."
From the enemy lines, the Emperor's voice boomed, amplified by golden aura. "Soul mages of Voss! Your power is unmatched, yet you chose isolation in your mountain. While knights forged bodies, mages wove energy, and guilds rose, you focused inward, hoarding your gift. Now we enter an age of unity—three circles as one—and you won't witness it. Share the soul path, or be erased!"
Clan Leader Voss laughed from the central spire, his rank 9 circle radiating conceptual dominion, his spectral eyes blazing like twin stars. "The whole world to crush two hundred souls? Pathetic! You'll never have our circle!" He turned to Lian, voice low. "Only your time concept can survive the ritual, heir. Rebuild us when the world learns humility."
The fortress crumbled, golems breaching walls, venom clouds choking the air, aura blades carving jade. The leader shattered his own circle in a blinding blaze, activating the Immortal's engraved safeguard—a soul preservation ritual etched into the original technique to ensure its survival. Lian's soul circle, rank 8 and tied to chrono weave, fractured deliberately, compressing his essence into a timeless seed. Pain seared as his body dissolved, anima surging to fuel the ritual. The other clansmen, their circles lesser, could not endure the time-river's pull.
"You'll rise again," the leader whispered, his form fading. "But not for us—for the path."
Lian's soul tore free, flung into the river of time—a vast, starry void where centuries blurred. Pride burned in his core: the soul circle was their legacy, and he'd restore it. As Mount Voss fell to ash, his essence drifted, waiting for an unknown dawn.