Chapter 87: The Fall of the Seraph

Chapter 87: Chapter 87: The Fall of the Seraph

The Astral Seraph had gathered the power of the entire Tenth Stratum into a massive column of gravity above the temple island.

Vulcan had four minutes to prepare.

And the Forge-Lord wasted none of them.

The enormous keel chains rose from deep within the island, one smoking link after another.

Vulcan reshaped his cannon barrels and forged harpoon heads as large as flagpoles.

He used the island’s keel-steel, then cooled the weapons in Thalassa’s water.

Orange light spread through the island as his forge burned.

TIK! TIK! TIK!

The sound of metal striking metal echoed across the bridge.

Sparks flew everywhere.

Thirty-seven students watched in disbelief as enormous weapons were forged beneath the night sky.

Above them, the Seraph finally completed its preparations.

Then it brought the entire column of gravity crashing down.

VMMMM!

The deep vibration became one continuous sound.

An unimaginable gravitational force descended upon the island.

The outer edges began crumbling into the endless void like falling sand.

The broken foundation compressed under the pressure, its cracks closing as the stone ground against itself.

Thalassa’s enormous formation of water lenses was torn apart, sending countless droplets flying upward.

But inside Joel’s fifty-meter Domain, gravity remained normal.

He maintained control over every section within his protection.

Outside the Domain, however, the island continued collapsing toward a single point.

And above it all, the blind Astral Seraph pressed down with the full weight of its gathered power.

[Ding!]

[Gravity well: catastrophic grade, in progress.]

[Advisory: the island’s keel will fail. The house’s paper fails with it.]

Joel deliberately stepped outside his Domain and into the full force of the gravitational attack.

He had been absorbing the Tenth Stratum’s attacks throughout the expedition, but nothing compared to this.

It wasn’t an ordinary beam or a narrow wave of gravity.

It was the entire sky’s power concentrated into one overwhelming attack.

Joel opened the Bastion and allowed the force to pour into him.

The ground beneath his boots turned to glass.

Then the glass crumbled into powder.

A massive crater began forming beneath his feet, growing deeper as the pressure increased.

But Joel remained perfectly still.

He continued absorbing the enormous force, storing every bit of kinetic energy the Seraph unleashed.

And the energy kept pouring into his reserves.

[Ding!]

[Charges banked: 60.]

[Charges banked: 140.]

[Charges banked: 300.]

[Note: the account has never held this much of anything. The Bastion recommends spending quickly. The Bastion was not built for savings.]

Joel’s body glowed with the enormous amount of energy he had absorbed.

Every bit of force the Seraph released went straight into his reserves.

And Joel held it all.

For one long moment, he stood like an immovable object, carrying more stored power than anything else in the Shattered Heavens.

The blind Seraph could sense what was happening.

Its entire reserve of gravitational power was being absorbed by a first-year student.

But it couldn’t stop.

It had committed everything to this final attack, and Joel had simply refused to fall.

The gravitational assault lasted forty seconds.

Forty seconds of overwhelming force pouring into Joel’s body.

Then, at last, the enormous column began to weaken.

The pressure faded.

The surrounding sky slowly settled.

And when the attack finally ended, Joel was still standing at the bottom of the crater.

His body glowed from within, filled with the energy he had collected.

The crater had stopped growing deeper.

There was nowhere farther down for it to go.

Joel looked toward his Forge-Lord.

"Now, Vulcan."

THUMP! THUMP! THUMP!

•••

Three enormous harpoons shot from Vulcan’s cannon barrels at incredible speed.

The keel-steel weapons crossed the gravitational well and pierced through the Seraph’s glowing feathers, striking the solid mass beneath.

TCHAK! TCHAK! TCHAK!

All three harpoons buried themselves deep in the Seraph’s shoulder.

Thick chains stretched behind them, connecting the weapons to the island’s anchors.

The chains suddenly tightened.

And the island caught the enormous creature in place.

One after another, the chains pulled against their anchors, producing loud metallic groans.

But the reinforced bolts held firm.

The Seraph jerked violently.

Its massive body dropped three hundred feet in one long movement.

The entire island tilted under the strain.

The bridge of light bent dangerously.

But it held.

On the far side, thirty-seven students grabbed the bridge planks and one another to avoid falling.

Above the ruined temple, the enormous Seraph now hung much lower, restrained by three massive chains.

"The premises," Vulcan rumbled as he supported the enormous weight, "now hold one star."

His furnace seams glowed.

"The renovation is complete."

"Architect."

Nyx stood on one of the tightened chains, balancing effortlessly above the open sky.

"The wings. Just as I reported. Six primary support lines per wing."

She smiled.

"I brought six blades and my manners."

Joel looked toward the Seraph.

"Cut."

SHHSH!

Nyx immediately moved.

Her body became a streak of darkness racing along the chain.

She shadow-stepped from one link to another, climbing toward the trapped Seraph.

She passed the floating stones surrounding its halo and slipped beneath one of its enormous wings.

There, the feathered light was held together by thick tendons, arranged like the ropes supporting a massive sail.

Nyx raised her blades.

SHNK!

The first support tendon snapped.

SHNK! SHNK! SHNK!

More tendons were severed.

SHNK! SHNK!

The sixth was cut.

The Seraph’s wings suddenly buckled.

Without their main supports, the enormous wings could no longer hold their shape.

The creature lost its balance and fell from its own glowing light.

BOOM!

The chains tightened violently, catching its enormous body before it could fall farther.

A thousand tons of dying starlight hung above the shattered temple, held in place by Vulcan’s reinforced anchors.

The Seraph was blind, its wings damaged, and its movements restricted.

Below it, Joel stood with the entire force of the gravitational attack stored within him.

He looked up at the chained creature.

And finally, he saw a way to reach it.

[Ding!]

[Skill in use: Void Step. Nominal range: 30 meters.]

[Note: local space is curved by the counterparty’s own mass. The road out is longer than the road looks.]

[Effective displacement: 300 meters, straight up.]

[Momentum: declined on arrival, at the operator’s request.]

Joel stepped forward.

In an instant, his body shot upward through the sky.

He passed the floating stones surrounding the Seraph’s halo, following the path created by the creature’s own gravity.

When he stopped, he was three hundred meters above the chained monster.

For a moment, he hung motionless in the freezing air at the highest point of the Shattered Heavens.

Then he released his control over gravity. And made his fall absolute.

WHOOSH!

Joel began plummeting toward the Seraph.

This time, he didn’t stop the wind rushing against him.

He allowed himself to accelerate, falling faster and faster.

Below, his legion watched him descend.

Across the bridge, the thirty-seven students stared at the brilliant figure falling from the sky.

The entire battlefield seemed to narrow around him.

One figure.

One falling streak of light.

And directly beneath it, the blind Seraph remained suspended by Vulcan’s chains.

Its halo slowly turned toward the approaching sound.

For a brief moment, the Tenth Stratum seemed to fall silent.

As Joel continued falling, the enormous amount of kinetic energy stored inside his Bastion began flowing into his hands.

Every attack he had absorbed throughout the week.

Every bit of energy saved within his Domain.

And the overwhelming gravitational force he had taken from the Seraph.

All of it gathered together.

The power compressed into a brilliant lance forming between his hands.

Thirty tons of concentrated starlight and stored force gathered along its shaft.

And Joel continued falling straight toward the Seraph.

[Ding!]

[[Meteor Piercer]: full-bank discharge.]

[The instrument has never held this much of anything. Neither has the stratum.]

The blind Seraph sensed its own power returning toward it and raised its halo toward the darkness above.

Joel’s lance came crashing down.

It pierced straight through the halo and drove deep into the Seraph’s spine.

KRAKOOM!

•••

A wave of darkness swept across the Shattered Heavens as the starlight suddenly faded.

Joel’s final attack had pierced through the Seraph’s spine and emerged from the other side.

The enormous creature began dying.

Its halo slowly stopped rotating.

The stones orbiting around it scattered, returning to their natural paths.

The glowing feathers covering its wings faded one after another.

Then the Seraph’s control over gravity disappeared.

A final wave of weightlessness spread across the island as all the gravitational force it had gathered was released.

For the first time in ages, the Tenth Stratum was free from its control.

But that freedom came with a problem.

Normal gravity returned.

And the island was still holding the enormous weight of the dead Seraph.

It couldn’t support it.

KRUNCH!

The island’s foundation suddenly cracked along the damage left by the earlier explosions.

The enormous floating landmass split into two.

Both halves began pulling apart, grinding against each other as the dead Seraph hung between them, still trapped by Vulcan’s chains.

The ruined temple collapsed.

Its remaining walls, broken foundations, and forty meters of ancient stone fell into the widening gap.

On the distant island, the bridge of light bent under the sudden movement.

But it held.

All thirty-seven students stood beside the railings, watching the destruction unfold.

Before their eyes, the most powerful being in the Tenth Stratum had finally fallen.

And now, the island beneath it was breaking apart.

[Ding!]

[Boss eliminated: The Astral Seraph, Level 65. The Tenth Stratum’s apex: settled.]

[Assists logged: one Sovereign (the fall), one Forge-Lord (the chains), one Shadow-Blade General (the rigging), one Oracle (the mail).]

[Experience credited. Level 34 → 35.]

The level-up notification appeared immediately, displaying the results without any celebration.

Joel had entered the Tenth Stratum at Level 34.

Now, after defeating the Astral Seraph, his level had finally changed.

The golden light surrounding his body gradually faded until only a faint glow remained.

Joel stood on one half of the shattered island as the darkness settled around him.

His legion gathered nearby.

Vulcan continued holding the chains attached to the dead Seraph, refusing to release them before the job was finished.

Nyx sat on a fallen feather of light, riding it across the rubble.

Thalassa slowly dissolved her enormous water lenses, allowing them to fall as rain.

Across the gap, the thirty-seven students remained silent.

They had witnessed the full difference between their strength and Joel’s.

And it was far greater than anything they had imagined.

Every survivor would remember what happened that night.

Some would spend the rest of their lives trying to reach his level.

Then, within the ruins of the shattered vault, something began glowing again.

On the half of the island where its original setting remained, a fist-sized object slowly regained its light.

The Apex Tear.

Its strange glow spread across the broken chamber, just as it had once illuminated forty meters of clean temple floor.

It had waited since the Fall.

And despite everything that had happened, it was still there.

Only its location had changed.

[Ding!]

[The Apex Tear has resumed burning. Verification: standing by.]

[The mint is still open.]