The battlefield was a burning graveyard of ten thousand monsters. The smell of sulfur and charred flesh hung thick in the air, but Kairos did not notice it. As he walked back onto the jagged, ash-covered volcanic rocks, the world around him seemed to slow down. Behind him, a quarter of a mile away, his father lay critically wounded in the dirt. The frantic shouts of Ignis and Daemon echoed through the smoke, calling for the medics. Soltheia’s voice pierced the chaos, crying out as she rushed to the old general’s side, her hands shining with a desperate green light.

Kairos didn’t look back. If he turned around to watch his father bleed, his mortal heart would break. He could not afford to be human right now. He gripped the sturdy, blackened hilt of Asteria. The shimmering silver light burning in his irises solidified into a terrifying coldness. The fury in his chest was absolute, but the Primordial Law demanded rigid discipline. He locked his gaze on the bottom of the ridge, where the final two warlords stood, but before Kairos could reach Azravel, the gray-robed master of silence, his path was blocked by a roaring ocean of thick, boiling red liquid.

Kaelmorath, The Blood Crescent, was turning the center of the valley into a slaughterhouse.

The tall, elegant demon warlord wore sleek, polished blood-red armor. He held a wickedly curved, sharp scimitar forged from hardened, blackened blood. The cursed blade was named Sythrael, the Fang of the Moon.

With every elegant flick of his wrist, Kaelmorath commanded the blood of the dead demons lying on the battlefield. The Warlord ripped the dark blood out of the corpses, gathering it into a massive, swirling red river that hovered fifty feet in the air. The liquid shifted and churned, defying gravity under the demon’s sinister control.

Terravarous was trapped in the center of the bloody maelstrom. The giant Solaris royal had coated his massive body in thick, unbreakable diamond armor. Kaelmorath had repeatedly tried to forcefully rip the blood out of Terravarous’ veins, aiming to boil his heart from the inside out. But the Warlord’s dark magic bounced off the flawless diamond skin. The physical barrier severed the magical connection, leaving Terravarous immune to internal manipulation.

"You are nothing but a stubborn rock!" Kaelmorath laughed, his voice smooth and laced with cruel arrogance. "But even the hardest stones eventually erode under the tide."

SLASH!!

The elegant demon swung Sythrael gracefully through the air. The massive, levitating red river of demon blood instantly hardened. Thousands of sharp, crystalline blood spears rained down on Terravarous like a deadly, crimson meteor shower. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

Terravarous crossed his massive diamond arms over his face and lunged forward, right through the storm.

SHATTER!!

The hardened blood spears shattered against his diamond skin, exploding into red mist upon impact. But the sheer, continuous physical force of thousands of heavy projectiles bogged the giant down. Terravarous was incredibly strong, but he was simply too slow to catch the elegant Warlord. He swung his diamond fists, trying to crush the demon, but he only hit empty air.

Kaelmorath effortlessly back-flipped over a massive diamond punch, landing gracefully on the tip of a jagged volcanic boulder. He swung his scimitar again, forming a massive chain of hardened blood. The crimson chain whipped vehemently through the smoke, wrapping around Terravarous’s legs and pulling the giant to his knees.

"I cannot boil your blood, giant," Kaelmorath smiled coldly, raising Sythrael into the red sky. "So I will simply drown you in theirs."

The red river vehemently shifted. The massive sphere of liquid blood plummeted downward, preparing to crash down and suffocate Terravarous. The giant gritted his teeth, bracing for the suffocating weight.

CLANG!!

The sharp, ear-piercing sound of iron striking a hardened blood chain echoed across the rocks.

Kaelmorath frowned, looking down. Kairos Vedaryan stood beside the kneeling giant. The Conqueror of Time had crossed the battlefield in a fraction of a second. The dull, blackened blade of Asteria rested against the shattered remains of the blood chain that had trapped Terravarous. The severed crimson links dissolved into liquid and splashed into the ash.

"Kairos," Terravarous breathed profusely, pushing himself back to his feet. The giant’s diamond skin was covered in deep, jagged scratches from the blood spears. "You need to rest. You took down the Beast. This one is fast."

"Go to the backline, Terra," Kairos commanded. His voice was stripped of any human warmth. It was the dead tone of the Primordial Law. "Protect my father. Keep the medics safe. I will butcher this one also."

Terravarous looked at the silver light burning in Kairos’s eyes. The giant nodded once, respecting the warlord-killer’s authority, and sprinted back toward the Solaris lines. Kaelmorath watched the giant leave. The elegant demon turned his cold, dark eyes toward the mortal boy.

"You killed Dyrroth," Kaelmorath noted, his smooth voice dropping its amused tone. "The Rumbling Beast was a mindless brute. He relied on iron and raw strength. I do not."

"I don’t care what you rely on," Kairos whispered, raising his dull silver sword. "You are in my way."

Kaelmorath’s eyes narrowed. The Warlord rigidly swung Sythrael directly at Kairos.

SWOOSH!!

The rising red river of demon blood instantly transformed into a barrage of thousands of sharp blood needles. They shot toward Kairos at insane speeds, covering every single inch of the sky. There was no physical space to dodge. It was a wall of inescapable death.

Kairos didn’t even blink. He didn’t cast a protective gravity dome like Luna, and he didn’t raise a diamond shield like Terravarous. He triggered his timeline. To Kaelmorath, the human boy flickered. Kairos became a visual blur of dark afterimages. He walked into the storm of blood needles. To Kairos, the world slowed to a crawl. The lethal projectiles hung in the air like suspended raindrops. He threaded the needle, accelerating and decelerating his own physical timeline to step through the gaps in the Warlord’s massive attack.

"Impossible!" Kaelmorath hissed, swinging his scimitar again to redirect the blood.

But Kairos was already there. He appeared right in front of the elegant demon. He swung Asteria in a brutal, lightning-fast upward arc.

Kaelmorath panicked. He brought the cursed scimitar, Sythrael, down to block.

SCREECH!!

The dull silver sword crashed against the Fang of the Moon. The impact didn’t create a massive, explosive shockwave. Instead, it created a sickening, high-pitched screech. The temporal distortion wrapping Asteria ruthlessly ground against the dark blood magic of the Warlord’s blade. Sparks of silver and crimson magic sprayed across the rocks.

Kaelmorath’s eyes widened in shock. The human boy was physically overpowering him. The sheer weight of the Primordial Law forced the Warlord to slowly buckle to one knee. The demon’s boots cracked the bedrock beneath him as he struggled to hold the block.

"You are fast, mortal," Kaelmorath gritted his teeth, pushing his dark magic to the limit. "But you are forgetting one thing. You do not have hard skin."

Kaelmorath suddenly stopped trying to push Kairos away. The Warlord let go of his elegant sword technique. He evaded Asteria entirely, pushing his raw dark magic outward and plunging it straight into Kairos’ chest.

Kairos gasped. Kaelmorath had successfully established a magical connection with the blood flowing inside Kairos’ veins. The demon’s sinister magic slipped past the mortal flesh, hooking into the boy’s circulatory system.

"I can feel it," Kaelmorath grinned wickedly, his dark eyes glowing with triumph. "Your blood is laced with divine holy light. It is heavy. It is powerful, but it is still liquid, and I command the blood!"

The Warlord twisted his empty left hand. He tried to forcefully boil the divine blood inside Kairos’ heart. He intended to tear the boy’s veins apart from the inside out, turning his greatest strength into a fatal weakness. The Warlord’s magic flared, sending a spike of agony through Kairos’ chest.

Kairos felt the massive tug on his internal core. He felt his blood attempt to reverse its flow. The pressure in his skull spiked. If he had still been relying on the blue digital screen, the system would have crashed from the internal magical interference, and his heart would have ruptured. But Kairos had shattered the screen. He was the Law.

Kairos didn’t scream. He didn’t drop his sword. He darted his eyes onto the grinning Warlord. The silver light burning in Kairos’ irises did not flicker.

"My blood," Kairos whispered coldly, the dual resonance reverberating the cursed scimitar between them, "is none of your business."

Kairos didn’t try to vehemently push the dark magic out of his body. He used his dominion internally. He locked the physical timeline of his own blood. He froze his circulatory system in a state of temporal stasis. His blood was no longer a liquid that could be manipulated by a demon Warlord. It was a fixed, immovable constant in the universe, cycling through his heart exactly as the Primordial Law dictated. The flow of his blood became a closed temporal loop, rejecting any outside influence.

Kaelmorath’s cruel grin vanished. The Warlord pulled on the magical connection again, pushing his dark magic to the maximum. He clenched his fist, trying to boil the boy’s heart.

Nothing happened. The blood inside Kairos was untouchable.

"What are you?!" Kaelmorath shrieked in terror, trying to pull his scimitar away and retreat. The elegance of the Blood Crescent melted into primal fear. He was fighting something that defied the fundamental rules of life and death.

"I am nothing," Kairos stated.

Kairos twisted his wrists. He didn’t swing at the Warlord’s elegant armor. He focused the crushing weight of the Primordial Law into the dull edge of Asteria, pressing it vehemently against the Warlord’s cursed blade.

CRACK!!

Sythrael, the Fang of the Moon, shattered into a thousand useless pieces of dried, black blood. The shards fell to the ground like dead leaves. Kaelmorath stumbled backward, his elegant red armor exposed. He raised his hands, trying to summon the raging red river of demon blood to protect him. The crimson liquid churned in the sky, rushing down to form a shield.

But the Conqueror of Time was faster. Kairos accelerated his physical timeline, crossing the remaining three feet in less than a second.

SLASH!!

He swung the dull, blackened silver blade in a clean, brutal horizontal arc across the Warlord’s waist. The blade passed flawlessly through the sleek, blood-red armor. It severed the elegant demon’s temporal connection to the physical world. The cut was so fast and clean that Kaelmorath didn’t even realize he had been struck.

Kairos stopped behind Kaelmorath, slowly lowering Asteria. The Warlord stood still for a single second. Above them, the massive, floating red river of demon blood lost its magical tether.

SPLASH!!

Millions of gallons of dark blood crashed vehemently back down to the volcanic rock, washing harmlessly over the gray ash like a broken dam. Kaelmorath’s eyes widened in shock. The elegant Warlord slowly slid in half. His torso fell backward, hitting the wet ash with a sickening thud. His legs collapsed a second later, the severed armor leaking black smoke.

The Blood Crescent was dead. Six of the ancient Nightmares had been successfully executed. The Colosseum Champions had proven that the mortal world was capable of bleeding the gods. The valley was littered with the colossal remains of the Warlords, their dark reign ended by human hands.

Kairos didn’t turn around to look at the fallen warlord. He didn’t sheath his blackened sword.

He slowly raised his head, looking at the bottom of the volcanic ridge. The chaotic, deafening noise of the massive battlefield, the cheering soldiers, the crackling fires of Pyrix and Ignis, the roaring wind of the Dracortis siblings began to fade. The sound was being erased from reality.

Standing alone on the edge of the ash, ignoring the massive corpses of his six dead equals, was the seventh and final Warlord. He wore simple, ancient gray robes. His face was hidden beneath a deep hood. Azravel, The Howling Silence.

The Warlord took a single, slow step forward. The moment his boot touched the ash, the silence of the ancient void washed over the southern valley. The roaring flames of the battlefield stopped making a sound. The breathing of the exhausted champions went dead. Even the howling wind ceased to exist. Kairos could not hear his own heartbeat. The air felt suffocatingly empty, stripped of all vibration and life. The final nightmare of the southern war had stepped onto the board, and the Conqueror of Time was alone in the silent dark.