The gold-purple void vibrated to its foundations as the rhythmic clapping of the gods swelled into a pulsating beat. Silarias stood motionless in the center. The raw spiritual pressure of the figures around him was felt like a lead weight on his chest.
The massive figure of the Bansaday Flying Lion stepped forward. His golden mane flared up, not with scorching heat, but with a clear, razor-sharp intensity that swept the astral mist away in a single blow. The lion extended his enormous claw, grabbed Silarias’ hand, and lifted the young warrior with a smooth motion from the mirror-smooth floor.
“Haha! Little vessels grow up,” the lion rumbled, the sound waves pulling visible ripples through the purple sky. “You figured it out.”
Silarias wanted to answer, but before he had the chance, his vision was blocked on both sides by heavy, rune-covered cloaks. Odr and Frey stood on either side of him and threw their arms around his shoulders with a dull thud. Their gazes were undeniably full of respect.
Silarias looked confused from one to the other, while the gold-purple glow around them began to flicker brighter. “I still do not get what Hydras see, or what normal looks like… but wait. Where is…”
The Bansaday Flying Lion interrupted him with a calm nod and pointed with his claw upward, where the sky tore open to reveal a deeper, star-studded darkness. “He is above. They are waiting for you.”
Silarias followed the direction of the claw and only now noticed a monumental, stone spiral staircase silently rising from the mirror floor, twisting into the infinite nothingness. With a slight hesitation, he set himself in motion. He strolled up the steps, one by one, while the figures below slowly dissolved into a sea of golden light.
At the top of the stairs, the void opened into a long stone corridor, illuminated by the wild, flickering light of torches meters high. At the end of the hall was an open chamber where the walls pulsated with shadow magic. Silarias walked through and held his breath when he saw the two figures standing there.
Faustus and Lucifer.
The fallen angel stood with his pitch-black wings spread wide, the dense darkness of his feathers completely absorbing the torchlight. “So the bloodline held up,” Lucifer spoke, his stem like cracking ice cutting through the room. “The direct descendants still carry the blueprint of the beginning. I am slowly starting to understand, Faustus.”
Silarias stepped into the room, his boots tapping heavily on the stones. The conversation stopped immediately. Faustus turned around with a jerk, his purple, mystical eyes glowing brightly in the dusk as he looked at the entity beside him and then set his gaze on Silarias.
“How… and where did you get him?” Faustus asked, his voice soft but loaded with a deep, trembling unrest. “Do you even know who he is, Sil?”
Lucifer turned his gaze to the young warrior. There was no hostility in his eyes, only a cold, royal grace. “He pushed the boundaries of his mortality, Faustus. What you achieved in such a short time in the arena demands respect, kid.” The angel took a step closer, causing the shadows in the room to crawl across the walls like possessed things. “But remember this: the arena was merely a threshold. I hope you possess the strength to one day bear the full potential of my curse. It will demand more of you than blood and sweat.”
Silarias looked the entity straight in the eyes, fully accepting the weight of the words. “I am not running away. Not now, never again.”
Lucifer nodded slowly, after which the entire astral room broke apart in a bright, black flash.
With a heavy shock, Silarias shot upright.
He gasped for air, his shirt sticking with sweat to his chest. The gold-purple void had vanished; he sat in the royal bed of the ward. Beside him, Nyx was still breathing quietly, undisturbed by his sudden awakening. Silarias placed a hand on his forehead, his heart pounding in his throat, but the confusion in his head had made way for a sharp, crystal-clear focus. He knew what he had to do.
A few hours later, the ward had fully come to life. In the central meeting room hung the familiar smell of strong coffee and parchment. Nicola stood at the head of the robust wooden table, the blue crystals Beat had brought last night shining in a glass dish in front of him. The stones emitted pulsating, blue flashes of light that cast patterns onto the ceiling.
The core members sat around the table. Aurelius leaned with his arms crossed against the backrest, while Jane rested her head on her hand with a tired but satisfied smile. Nyx looked attentively at the maps Nicola had spread out.
Nicola adjusted his glasses and looked around the group. “The energy in these crystals is usable for the defense mechanisms of the laboratory. It gives us a massive lead.” He set his quill down and looked specifically at Silarias and Aurelius. “Now that we are on the topic… did you two happen to bring anything usable back from the race? Souvenirs, artifacts, scrap wood from the barriers?”
Silarias and Aurelius looked at each other. An awkward silence fell over the table. The memory of the chaos, the fight, and the adrenaline flashed through their minds, but loot or tactical material? Not a single thought had been spent on that.
“Ehh… did not really think about that, actually,” Silarias scratched behind his ear, somewhat embarrassed. “Sorry, Nic.”
Nicola looked at them with a completely expressionless, dry face.
Instantly, everyone at the table turned their heads to the duo in unison. In perfect chorus, with the exact same dry tone, it echoed through the room:
“Does not surprise me.”
Silarias was just about to mount a defense when the walls of the ward trembled.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
The massive outer gate of the bastion was being pounded with an unheard-of, thundering force. The sound echoed so loudly through the stone corridors that dust trickled down from the ceiling. Aurelius stood up within a fraction of a second, his hand resting directly on the hilt of his sword. Silarias’ eyes narrowed and the tension in the room shot straight to boiling point.
“An attack?” Nicola asked with a tense voice, holding his crystal screen at the ready.
“No idea. Stay behind me,” Aurelius commanded.
Together with Silarias and Nicola, he rushed to the heavy oak doors. They grabbed the massive bolts, put their shoulders under them, and pulled the gate open with a loud swing, completely ready to strike down the first intruder they saw.
Yet their weapons remained in their sheaths.
In front of them lay the large stone square of the underground city. And the entire city was gathered there. Thousands of beasthumans, the complete Pandava family, the monks from the mountains, the full Shinto dojo, and even Sergio with all his students behind him. Everyone, from the smallest citizen to the oldest master, was down on one knee. Their heads were respectfully bowed toward the gate of the bastion. The hypeman stood in front, his hat pressed tightly against his chest. A solemn silence hung over the square, as if the wind itself had died down.
Before Silarias could get a word out of his throat, the silence in the distance was broken by the roaring, mechanical noise of heavy engines. A series of explosive pops echoed against the deep crater walls, sending clouds of blue exhaust fumes creeping upward.
A convoy of roaring machines tore onto the square and braked with skidding tires, kicking up a wall of dust right in front of the kneeling crowd. It was the Speed Bandits and the Demons from the race. The engines sputtered in the silence, their headlights cutting through the darkness of the crater. Shrimpy stepped off his iron steed with a broad, proud grin and walked forward with his head held high.
“Haha! Do not be alarmed, we came to pay respect too!” Shrimpy shouted, his voice carrying across the entire square. He looked up at the bastion and yelled at the top of his lungs: “BEAT!!”
The name resonated against the stone walls and penetrated deep into the corridors of the ward.
Inside the bastion, Beat shot awake with a jerk. His eyes flew open, his instincts took over, and without thinking, he activated his powers. A bright lightning bolt cleaved through the hallway, leaving scorch marks on the walls as he passed. With a loud thunderclap, he flashed outside and landed with a dull thud that cracked the stone floor right next to Aurelius and Silarias. The blue sparks danced wild across his arms, making the hair of the bystanders stand on end.
Beat looked at the crowd, understood the atmosphere right away, and threw his fist into the air with a raw shout.
The effect was electric. Shrimpy and all the Speed Bandits raised their arms in unison, their leather jackets rustling. Silarias looked at the smiling faces of the city, felt the energy rising, and slowly raised his fist into the air as well. Like a rolling snowball, the movement spread across the square; row after row of beasthumans and warriors raised their fists. Within seconds, thousands of people stood with their fists in the air, and a deafening cheer erupted that physically shook the underground city.
In the middle of that ecstasy, the doors behind them flew open once more with a loud crash.
Miki, Jane, and Nyx, with Lila trailing behind, leaped outside with a wild jump. They had completely misread the situation inside and were convinced the ward was under siege. Jane and Nyx thrust their hands forward. A gold-red fireball erupted from their palms and shot into the sky with hissing heat, the wave of warmth striking the front rows directly in the face.
But the fireball did not reach its peak.
Suddenly, the world slowed down. The deafening cheer of the crowd turned into a slow, deep bass and then died away completely. The flames of the fireball, which had just been spinning around each other, froze mid-flight and turned into a still, shining sculpture of fire. Miki, Jane, and Nyx hung motionless in mid-air, their clothes and hair blown back by the jump, as if cast in glass. The raised dust cloud from the engines stood still like a grey wall on the square. Time had stopped.
In that frozen stillness, shining golden portals opened all across the square, making the stone floor light up with intricate runes. A clear, royal trumpet call echoed through the frozen space, the sounds vibrating without drifting away.
Out of the central portal, which hovered right in front of Silarias and Aurelius, stepped a man with an unmistakable, majestic presence and a glistening cloak that parted the still dust particles. The greatest king the Timekeepers had ever known.
King Solomon.
He walked with calm steps through the motionless crowd, an amused smile on his face as he passed the frozen fireball. “I arrived just in time, hahaha,” he spoke, his voice the only reality in the silence.
Nyx hung frozen in the air, her eyes wide with astonishment, her lips motionless in the shape of the word: “Dad?…”
Solomon looked up at his daughter and casually snapped his fingers.
The giant fireball instantly dissolved into thousands of sparkling, golden sparks that trickled down noiselessly. The girls settled down to the ground and landed on their feet, as if they had never jumped. In that same fraction of a second, time resumed with a loud thump. The square breathed again, but the cheering quieted down as everyone saw the figure of the king and his speakers. The shock was clear on their faces; they were suddenly face-to-face with the absolute pinnacle of the Timekeepers.
Solomon turned his gaze from his daughter to Silarias, and then to the rest of the core members. His smile faded and made way for a serious, commanding look that silenced the entire group.
“I believe we need to have a serious talk in private,” King Solomon spoke, his voice calm, carrying a weight that echoed to the bone. “You, and the entire group this time.”