The sky cracked.
The world bled.
And across the newly-forged Throneworld of Iden Varell, the first true Crownfall had begun.
The realm beneath his control expanded outward—an impossible, shifting plane half-anchored in reality and half-draped in sovereign logic. Floating spires. Rift-stitching veins. Armies of summonings, half-transparent and half-divine, pulsed like cells from a newly awakened god-organism.
[CROWNFALL ENGAGEMENT STAGE 01 – INITIATED]Deploying Battlefront Constructs… Summoning Legionary Phalanx… Syncing Mana Grid with Reality-Fused Bastions…
Iden stood upon a platform suspended above the world—his Throneworld's central command node. His body had changed subtly—less human, more conduit. Each motion of his hand rippled down the chain of command and materialized as a legion-wide action.
His voice echoed into the void.
"Begin planetary descent. Anchor three Bastions. Divide forces into sweep, hold, and echo-surge layers."
Thousands of skeletons responded—not in speech, but in synchronized movement. Tactical necrosworn, Crownbound Sovereigns, and Fractured Heralds leapt into war gates lined with radiant glyphs. Each of them bore upgrades from the throne's evolution—armor made of mana-condensed light, weapons forged from system-refined ore, and fragments of divine coding in their cores.
Once a mountain range.
Now, a gaping rift-crater, glowing like a mouth torn through the realm.
It was there that the first Omega-tier emergence had been predicted—a godseed-variant shaped by mana storms and corrupted intent.
Three major settlements had already fallen. Their surviving factions had gone silent.
Now, they would be taken back.
Or reclaimed by the Crown.
Kael rode at the vanguard, flanked by three Sovereign Warlords—each named after one of the old dead gods.
"Form Gravepress formation. Mages behind tanks. Reserve munitions until phase two."
Behind him, a swarm of artillery constructs flew low, guided by Rael, now acting as the battlefield harmonizer. She wore no helmet—her silver-white hair glowed, and the Echo still whispered inside her soul.
"Echowave routing complete," she announced. "I can nullify their corruption pulses for sixty seconds. You'll get one breach window."
Nyra, far above on her skeletal drake, opened her arms as shadow-mana wings bloomed behind her.
"They want gods? We'll show them the dead can command."
And from the Crownworld itself, Iden watched the layers descend.
Three million mana-bonded summons were already en route. The Leviathan Gate had opened only a sliver, but it was enough.
"All units: break the world just enough to reshape it."
The council chamber fractured into shouting.
"He's launched it!""That Crownfall—what kind of magic is that?!""You saw it. That wasn't conquest. That was reclamation by declaration."
A soft-spoken strategist stood.
"He's not just fighting to win. He's building his version of the world as he moves."
There was silence.
"We either stand with him or prepare to be overwritten."
Far to the south, Riftborne Commanders argued over screens flashing with red.
"He absorbed a sovereign-class echo. We confirmed it.""And now his summons don't just fight. They adapt. We can't keep up."
General Luro folded her arms.
"Issue the Writ of Submission. Begin diplomatic contact. No use dying proud."
The monarch gripped the railing of her floating fortress.
"You said he'd delay. That there were rules."
The priest beside her paled.
"He's not breaking rules, Your Grace. He's rewriting the source code."
A pause.
"Do we kneel?"
She didn't answer.
The first Omega-class beast emerged from the rift.
It was not a creature. It was a moving city of bone, hatred, and echo—a continent-sized serpent stitched from the corpses of thousands of old heroes, bound together by corruption threads.
The ground cracked.
Mana twisted.
And then—
"NOW!" Iden's voice roared from every link. "Echo Surge—phase breach!"
Ten Reality-Fused Bastions dropped at once, forming a perfect hex.
The world trembled as a million summons attacked in exact harmony.
Light became form.
Sound became impact.
Kael's blade drove forward like thunder. Nyra carved through the beast's tendons midair. Rael's nullfield exploded in waves.
Above them all, the Crown Engine pulsed inside Iden's spine, absorbing, learning, adapting.
[Fragment Absorption Potential: Confirmed]Omega Core detected. Initiate resonance capture.WARNING: This will accelerate the countdown.
Iden's eyes narrowed.
"Do it."
And the world tilted.