Mystic Calling：Stone of Glory

Ethan stared at the corroding ground, stunned, and instinctively touched his chest.

The black fog had been cleared.

The wound itself wasn’t serious.

But that power clearly wasn’t a "normal" attack.

The earth suddenly bulged.

A skeleton—looking kind of stupid, honestly—climbed out of the black sludge.

First it shoved out an arm, then struggled to wrench free its skull and torso, and finally hauled up a battered longsword, wobbling on its feet as it faced Ethan and Seraphina.

This entire island was smothered in death.

The dead couldn’t leave.

Souls couldn’t enter reincarnation.

The black sludge drilled into the skeleton’s frame like it was playing with whatever was left of the soul inside. The flame in its eye sockets blinked out, then was forcibly lit again, over and over, while its whole body trembled out of control.

It raised the sword and hacked at Seraphina.

Ethan already had an energy sphere formed—

but before the blade could fall, a streak of golden holy light shot from Seraphina’s fingertips.

It pierced straight through the skeleton’s chest.

The black sludge was peeled out of the bones, and the entire body turned translucent in the sacred glow.

Then Seraphina raised a separate light cage, sealing the mutated skeleton inside.

With the sludge’s control severed, the skeleton stopped attacking.

It clutched its empty skull with both hands, mouth stretched wide in a silent scream. Then, as its body began to crumble, it dropped to its knees in front of Seraphina.

Watching that, Ethan’s mood turned... complicated.

It was release.

And it was one last stretch of suffering right before death.

Still better than being trapped in Mournreach forever, having your soul toyed with again and again.

On the other side, Feylora had already carried Auri to the rear.

Phoenix Queen Ignara’s blazing barrier wrapped around them, isolating the rushing branches, the black fog, and the battlefield’s spillover.

Ataneya stayed on the front line, fighting Morvane head-on.

All twenty-four fox tails lashed in from different angles.

Some targeted his arms. Some looped toward his waist. A few skimmed along the ground to seal off his retreat.

Every time a tail managed to bind him, Morvane vanished from where he stood.

In the next instant, he’d appear beside the tails again.

No obvious spatial裂.

No movement trail.

Ataneya tightened again and again, and every time she caught only leftover black smoke.

Morvane rested the broad sword on his shoulder and looked at them with something like tired annoyance.

The eyes that had seemed almost normal began to stain red.

A blood-colored force erupted from him and shot straight into the sky.

Boom!

A pillar of blood speared into the clouds.

The fog above the island was dyed the color of fresh gore. The already-dim light turned red, and the forest, the skeletons, and every face were washed in an ominous crimson glow.

Another massive crash sounded overhead.

Andona fell from the sky.

The angel phantoms behind her winked out one after another. She slammed into the ground and skidded a long distance, only stopping when the greatsword stabbed into the mud and dragged her to a halt.

Gravehook swung his chain and strode down from the air, step by step, to Morvane.

He reached the king’s side, dropped to one knee, and presented the result of driving off Andona like an offering.

Morvane looked toward the people gathering inside the flame barrier.

"I already told you to leave," he said, gripping the sword on his shoulder.

"You refused to listen."

His blood-red gaze slipped through the shield, pinning each of them in turn.

"Then I’ll have to let your bodies leave... without you."

Everyone pulled back inside the flame barrier.

Emerald Castle’s army tightened formation outside, weapons leveled toward the enemy mass gathering ahead.

Morvane.

Gravehook.

And the treant—dragged back under darkness.

They braced.

From somewhere far off came a laugh that made your scalp crawl.

A sound like thread scraping over thread drifted down from above the forest.

Lopsy descended slowly.

Every tear in her clothes had been stitched shut. The head Andona had severed was neatly reattached. The scissors rested on her back, the blades clicking softly as she dropped.

Lopsy stopped in front of Morvane.

She lifted a hand and pointed at the group, hate plain as day—clearly reporting every humiliation she’d just suffered.

After that, she returned to Morvane’s side.

Morvane gave a small nod.

The broad sword on his shoulder pointed up to the sky—then lowered, slowly, until its tip indicated the people inside the flame barrier.

It began to rain.

The first drop of blood-red rain struck the barrier.

Sssss—

The instant flame met blood, a harsh white smoke hissed up, stinging the nose.

The rain thickened.

A curtain of red washed across the forest, hammering Ignara’s fire screen again and again. Outside the shield, dead trees began to grow wildly in the rain, multiplying until they filled the open ground.

A bony hand pushed up through the mud.

Then a second.

Blood-red skeletons climbed up in packs. A wet, bloodlike sheen flowed over their bones, and dark red fire burned in their hollow eyes.

Morvane’s war-host.

The army that followed him from conquest to conquest.

Seraphina flew up.

She passed through the flame barrier alone and placed herself between the two sides.

Pure Light Force burst from her.

The first ring of sacred light swept the sky, pushing the falling blood rain outward. The second ring closed along the barrier’s surface, wrapping Ignara’s flames in a layer of holy defense.

The blood rain weakened.

The whole barrier was sheathed in Light Force.

But Seraphina had to keep feeding it.

The second she stopped, the blood would fall again—and Ignara’s fire shield would get eaten away until it failed.

Seraphina shifted back into human form.

Inside the barrier, she sat back-to-back with Andona—who was running low—while Feylora replenished both of them at once.

Ethan glanced at them.

The four little ones inside him had already begun releasing their power, energy gathering through his flesh and consciousness.

Morvane led his army into a charge.

Blood-red skeletons thundered across the mud and slammed into Emerald Castle’s front line.

But Morvane’s target wasn’t the ground troops.

He looked up at Seraphina maintaining the Light Force.

Daring to block the blood rain.

Brave.

The sword on his shoulder snapped into motion, shooting up into the sky.

Morvane bent his knees. The ground collapsed inward under his feet. When he launched upward, a few skeleton soldiers near him were shattered into loose bones by the burst.

Midair, he’d already caught the sword again.

The blade aimed at Seraphina, chopping down from above.

Ethan saw it.

A white energy sphere flew off his palm along a rising diagonal, slamming straight into Morvane’s side.

Morvane was forced to pull his strike back.

His blade shifted, cutting apart the incoming energy, and the flow of his attack broke.

White lightning exploded under Ethan’s feet.

He accelerated to the limit.

A sonic boom burst behind him, the shockwave flinging sheets of blood rain outward. Ethan crossed over the battlefield and arrived directly in front of Morvane.

"Your enemy is me."

He blocked Morvane’s line of sight to Seraphina.

"Fixating on the little rats over there isn’t a great habit."

Morvane looked Ethan over with open disdain.

He lowered his head and exhaled lightly.

Blood-colored mist spread from his lips.

Then he stepped onto invisible footholds in the air and walked toward Ethan, one slow step at a time.

"Now anyone thinks they can climb on my head?"

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