Mystic Calling：Stone of Glory-Chapter 808: No More Bargains
Ethan looked down at him, expression calm—almost indifferent.
He raised his hand.
An Energy Greatsword formed in his palm, the blade angled low, but already locked onto its target.
"Calrakk," Ethan said, his voice devoid of anger—just a cold, measured conclusion.
"You made such a big show. I expected more."
"But this... is all you’ve got?"
Malrakk’s throat bobbed violently.
He wanted to argue, to rage—but even that fire was gone.
And then—
His gaze drifted past Ethan, toward the battlefield in the distance.
His heart sank.
Calrakk’s army was collapsing.
The lines had broken. Soldiers were scattering in panic.
The elite force he’d brought personally—more than half were already dead.
The rest were just buying time for a defeat that couldn’t be stopped.
This wasn’t a war with a chance to turn the tide.
This was—
Total failure.
Ethan raised the greatsword.
No hesitation. No emotion.
Like this ending had been written long ago.
"W-Wait—!"
Malrakk’s voice cracked, a desperate scream torn from the last scraps of his strength.
"Don’t kill me!"
"I know a place!"
"A place even you people haven’t heard of!"
Ethan didn’t strike.
But he didn’t lower the blade either.
The edge still hovered at a fatal angle.
Malrakk seized the moment, words tumbling out in a frantic rush:
"There’s a mine there—no, not just a mine! It produces a kind of crystal—pure energy, directly absorbable by living beings!"
"If you consume enough of it—"
"Even the weakest wild creature can be forced into becoming a regional lord!"
The air went still for a beat.
Ethan’s eyes locked onto Malrakk’s face.
No trust.
Only calculation.
"Sounds convenient," Ethan said flatly.
"And exactly like the kind of thing someone makes up when they’re about to die."
The greatsword in his hand flared again, power surging.
Malrakk panicked.
"I’m not lying!"
His hand trembled as he yanked a scroll from his storage space and threw it to the ground.
"Coordinates, access routes, guardian structures—it’s all there!"
Ethan crouched, picked up the map.
Glanced at it once.
Then nodded.
"Good."
A flicker of hope lit in Malrakk’s eyes—just for a second.
The next—
A flash of cold light.
The Energy Greatsword severed his final breath.
His body hit the ground with barely a sound.
Ethan sheathed the weapon and turned toward the battlefield.
"Send the order," he said, voice clear and composed.
"Wipe out the remaining enemy."
"Don’t waste time."
"Our next destination—"
He looked to the horizon.
"Calrakk."
Emerald Castle’s army surged forward with renewed fury.
The last of the enemy was swept away in moments.
When the battlefield finally fell silent, and the sky settled once more—
Ethan was already leading his forces out.
One war had ended.
But the next—
A far greater one—
Had only just begun.
...
On the way to Calrakk, Ethan kept revisiting the system’s data panel.
The more he looked, the deeper his frown became.
From a purely numerical standpoint, the individual stats of Calrakk’s inhabitants weren’t impressive—strength, endurance, energy capacity... all far below what they’d shown in actual combat.
And yet, these physically fragile beings could wield powers like destruction, death, and darkness—forces that should’ve torn them apart from the inside.
It didn’t add up.
Unless—
"Their bodies were modified," Ethan muttered.
Not just enhanced.
Rebuilt. Reforged from the root—flesh, meridians, everything.
His gaze drifted to the map he’d taken from Malrakk.
Now it made sense.
The only explanation that fit was that mineral—the one Malrakk had begged for his life over.
Only something like that could explain the grotesque evolution of Calrakk’s power system.
...
With the Sky Fortress under their command, the very concept of a "campaign" had changed.
No more long marches.
No more inch-by-inch border pushes.
Once the fortress’s energy core hit a certain threshold, distance stopped mattering.
A brief pulse of spatial distortion—
And the sky changed color.
Calrakk appeared in full view.
Below, the kingdom looked ancient and densely packed. Buildings were crammed together like no one had ever considered the possibility of an attack from above.
As the Sky Fortress’s shadow slowly descended, the people in the streets froze.
Then chaos erupted.
They had never seen anything like this.
Some dropped to their knees.
Some screamed.
A few, driven mad by fear, grabbed stones from the ground and hurled them skyward.
The rocks fell uselessly back down, never even reaching the fortress’s shielding layer.
Ethan stood at the control platform, face unreadable.
He felt no hatred watching this.
Only the weight of disparity.
He pressed the weapon trigger.
A single beam of light shot down from the belly of the Sky Fortress.
No explosion. No shockwave.
Just a city block, erased in an instant.
The world held its breath.
Then it shattered.
Malrakk had taken nearly all of Calrakk’s elite forces with him.
What remained were civilians—beings who had never known real war.
In the face of the Sky Fortress, they didn’t even understand what "resistance" meant.
The fortress carved a path straight through the kingdom.
Until it reached—
The royal capital.
The true Castle.
It stood in stark contrast to the rest of the city—gilded, pristine, almost gaudy.
But what drew the eye most were the blood-red gemstones embedded in its walls, floors, and ceiling.
They didn’t glow.
But they pulsed—like they were breathing.
Energy seeped from them in a steady, unnatural flow.
Ethan frowned and reached out, brushing his fingers against one of the gems.
In the next instant—
A surge of raw, almost feral power slammed into his body.
It wasn’t elemental.
It wasn’t just energy.
It tore through his meridians, flooded his limbs, and punched straight into his mind, leaving his thoughts blank for a heartbeat.
Before he could stabilize it—
"Auri!"
He spun around.
The small figure was already pressed against another blood-red gem.
Her palm was flat against its surface.
She wasn’t channeling it.
She was absorbing it.
Devouring it, like it was instinct.
A moment later, a completely different kind of power exploded inside her.
The air trembled.
Tables, broken pillars, shattered ornaments—everything around her began to rise, floating weightlessly in midair, as if held by an invisible hand.
...
