Beastforged Bond

B4 Chapter 50

The realization did not strike me as much as I thought it would. I had never been truly close to Merlin, but his obsession with the Ruler of Fire caught my attention. He was desperate, and that resonated with me, even though our reasons were different.The Solar Orb embedded in the Ruler of Fire’s chest cracked when it was pierced. As obvious as it was, I had no idea what would happen next. Merlin Zerog never shared how he’d planned to kill Raffael Torch. All he said was to believe in him. He sounded genuine, which might not have been enough to put my life on the line for him, but what other choice did I have? The Ruler of Fire had to die before he could catch me.

Energy seeped out of the Solar Orb the instant it cracked. The power of the Magma Dragon, which had been separated from him ever since the battle started, oozed from the Solar Orb, but there was more to it. More energy, a lifesource much greater than that of the Magma Dragon, emerged from the cracked Solar Orb.

How did they seal that in the Solar Orb?

The Elemental Phoenix asked, yet he did not respond when I asked what he was talking about.

My attention was pulled back to the energy seeping out of the cracked orb. It was potent and swirled around as if it were alive, which, according to Lifesight, it was. It surged toward the perpetrator, burned the draconic lance’s tip to cinders in a moment, and wreathed the rest of the soulfused amalgamation. Merlin could have pulled back, but he did not bother. His lifesource weakened drastically as he erupted in newfound power. Then he attacked the Ruler of Fire anew.

In response, the Ruler of Fire erupted in fire once more. His lifesource was still unstable from the loss of his oldest Soulkin. Decades, if not centuries, of power and traits had been ripped out of Raffael’s very being the moment the Hellhound died. Nobody could ignore changes - - of such magnitude easily, and Merlin had made use of that.

But Raffael responded quickly nonetheless. Slower than he would have under normal circumstances, he still unleashed his own power. A blazing construct of an arm erupted from his arm stump, replacing the missing arm. As he blocked several incoming attacks, the Ruler of Fire smiled at Merlin, who… smiled back even as the flames of a Monarch wreathed him.

Even when his draconic scales burned to cinders and his body ignited, his skin peeling from his flesh before falling apart, Merlin smiled.

Raffael let out a guttural roar. His blazing hand shot forward, fingers coiling around Merlin’s neck. Yet long before he could clutch his fingers and snap Merlin’s neck, the Ruler of Fire’s blazing arm faltered. It destabilized, and the flames used to conjure the arm were torn apart. They split apart from a force beyond the Ruler of Fire’s control and were forcefully sucked into the Solar Orb.

Raffael tried to fight the suctioning force, but it appeared stronger than before. So did the energy flowing out of the cracked orb. It never stopped absorbing the surrounding flames, yet it kept leaking energy like my Ether Gates. It was just that the power contained within the leaked energy was of a greater magnitude.

Raffael’s expression fell momentarily, and he did something I didn’t even know he could do. He summoned his World, and it was everything I had been told about.

For one, it was massive. The Ruler of Fire’s World was a testament of centuries of painstaking effort. It was truly ginormous and worthy of a Ruler, maybe even Emperor. But it felt unstable, like it was never meant to settle into something livable.

The ground wasn’t truly solid. A thin, brittle crust stretched over something restless and violent that unraveled beneath. Occasionally, the surface would split and burst into a fountain of liquid fire.

The terrain was more liquid than solid, but even the parts that felt physical were jagged, uneven, and broken in every direction. It looked like the World was more fragmented than everything.

It was a World of fire, magma, and a crimson energy that could only be soul energy. But it was hot, and it drastically increased the surrounding temperature.

The moment I saw the World, I knew that the entire region would cease to exist today. It would burn to cinders. So would I if nothing was about to change.

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How did I know that? Honestly, I didn’t. All I could tell for sure was that the Ruler’s World was unlike mine. Broken, it was still much greater. It carried a physical weight.

It feels almost like another dimension. Weaker than Volca, but powerful nonetheless.

Volix commented, a trace of worry seeping into his voice. Clearly, the turn of events was not something the Elemental Phoenix had accounted for.

The Ruler of Fire is even stronger than we thought–was.

. That did not sound too bad, but the emotions rolling out of Volix’s soulshare kept me on my toes.

I felt a sense of unease bloom in my chest, which faded as soon as I saw Merlin. His body was burned, and he no longer looked human at this point. All that remained of him was a mass of flesh that somewhat resembled a humanoid figure. Even that was entwined in thick flames that continued to consume him. But he was still smiling, or so I felt.

Merlin unleashed his World as well. It did not spread far and wide across the sky like Raffael’s, but his World was not weak either. It retained the same semi-translucent nature most Worlds had, yet it shrank.

Merlin’s lifesource weakened even further as he sealed everyone’s traits once more. Then they clashed. Raffael’s World was heavy and unmoving. On the other hand, Merlin’s was smaller and more malleable. He compressed right before it collided with the Ruler of Fire’s blazing World.

Merlin’s World stood no chance. It went up in flames with a deafening explosion, but the smile on his lips only grew wider. Raffael’s blazing World cracked.

It was a minuscule, truly insignificant crack, or so I would have guessed. But Raffael’s World was already broken and unstable. A crack, no matter how insignificant it may appear, was dangerous.

I wanted to scream, but I kept it in, knowing no one would answer.

Staring at the scene unfolding high up in the sky, watching Worlds collide and Rulers clash, I barely noticed Volix return to my side. As for what the Elemental Phoenix said, I understood nothing.

The Solar Orb crumbled to even smaller fragments. It fell out of the cold magma scales it had been embedded in, but the orb was not yet done. The energy pressure coming from the orb intensified as its suctioning force increased. The force didn’t spread far, but it seemed to latch on to the Ruler of Fire, consuming him tirelessly.

But instead of retaining the absorbed flames, it leaked them again, compressed, highly volatile, and… alive.

Traces of life unraveled before Lifesight, only to fade from existence as the energy seeped into Raffael’s blazing World. But the World failed to contain the energy. The thin crust covering its surface split open as soon as it came into contact with the Solar Orb’s energy. The crack expanded, and energy not unlike the Solar Orb’s flowed out of the blazing World.

But the Ruler of Fire didn’t seem to notice the crack, or he simply didn’t care. He stared Merlin dead in the eyes and pierced his chest with his draconic tail. The life in Merlin’s eyes faded, but I couldn’t even scream, let alone digest all that had just happened, when Raffael Torch spun around in my direction to look past me and at the Elemental Phoenix.

“It’s time. Come here and become mine!” Raffael thundered across the battlefield, all the anger and frustration replaced by satisfaction. Gratification, because no one could stop him any longer.

Merlin was dead, his heart pierced by the draconic tail, and I–…

Honestly, there was nothing I could do. I was already weak as I was. Fighting the Hellhound had already been too much for me. How was I supposed to fight one of the strongest Rulers of mankind now that Merlin was no more?

Turned out, nobody expected me to fight Raffael.

The satisfaction died on his lips before he made a move as a resounding crack echoed through the entire region.

A look of panic crossed Raffael’s features as he glanced back at the cracks spreading throughout his World. A trace of hope bloomed in my chest when I saw the crack as well. They spread rapidly, and the process only accelerated as more and more of the Solar Orb’s energy flowed into the broken World.

Merlin may be dead, but he did land the finishing blow on the Ruler of Fire. No matter what was about to happen now, Raffael was finished. Whatever it was that Merlin did, he did an excellent job.

Then, just as hope bloomed and filled me, Raffael calmed down. He turned back to face the Elemental Phoenix once more, acting like his World was not just about to fall apart.

A moment later, before a single thought formed in my head, Volix burst into action. The Elemental Phoenix expanded rapidly and shot toward the Ruler of Fire, whose lips curled into a wide snarl.

Protect him.

Volix’s voice rumbled in my head, but it was not directed at me. He spoke to my other Soulkins. In the next moment, he appeared before Raffael, his bright orange flames turning azure, then white.

I am sorry. I have to borrow your Insignia for this.

The Elemental Phoenix spoke again, his voice carrying across the world.

And please don’t worry about me. My kind never really dies.

Then the world around me went up in pristine flames, and so did Raffael’s.