SSS-Rank Harem Sword: My Lustful Life With Legendary Maidens
Chapter 201: Breaking World Kingpins
Three days later.
In the hidden valley of the Southern landmass, the grand strike array was complete. Massive pillars of carved volcanic rock rose toward the clouds, channeled with the liquid fire of Chieftain Balthazar’s ancestral magma veins. Intersecting these pillars were silver ley-line conductors brought by Empress Lin Chu’s elite shadow-force weavers, all of them routing back into a central altar where King Gunnar’s massive ice-mana mechanical cores hummed with terrifying intensity.
Holy Cardinal Malachai stood before the central altar, holding the ancient parchment scroll. His robes were stained with sweat and ritual oils. His eyes were wide, bloodshot, and burning with a feverish desperation.
"The alignment is perfect," Malachai whispered, "The ancestral flows of the East, the mechanical energy of the North, and the primal fires of the South are locked onto a single target coordinate. The Dragon Emperor’s palace."
Chieftain Balthazar stepped forward, his heavy boots crushing the scorched earth.
"My drakes have been breathing their life-force into the lower channels for forty-eight hours, Priest. If this ancient curse does not pierce his heart on the first strike, my people will have empty chests when his shadow vanguard crosses the sea."
"It will not fail, Chieftain. This is the original balance seal. It does not attack his armor. It does not attack his walls. It targets the very essence of his bond with his sword spirit. Once that connection is shattered, his wives will lose their source of energy. The entire empire will collapse into a heap of unguided stone."
King Gunnar stood by his mechanical cores, his hand resting tightly on a massive iron lever. His face was entirely expressionless.
"The arrays have reached maximum threshold, Malachai. If we do not release the energy within the next three minutes, the feedback loop will detonate the entire valley. Make your choice."
Empress Lin Chu watched from a raised stone platform, surrounded by her weavers. Her fingers clutched her jade sceptre so tightly that her knuckles were white.
"May the spirits of our ancestors guide the arrow. Initiate the strike."
"In the name of the old laws, strike down the tyrant!" Malachai roared.
Gunnar slammed the iron lever down.
The valley erupted.
Rumble!
A blinding column of combined elemental force shot straight up into the sky. It wasn’t a standard blast of magic; it was a swirling vortex of emerald jade energy, roaring orange fire, and piercing white frost, all bound together by the black, corrupting ink of the ancient curse.
The force of the launch cracked the mountains for miles around, tearing the clouds apart as the weapon sped across the ocean toward the Central Imperial City.
"We did it. The strike is true. The connection should be breaking right now."
But the sky did not clear.
Instead, the air inside the hidden valley grew completely quiet. The roaring fires in the volcanic pillars froze mid-flicker, turning into rigid statues of solid orange crystal.
The wind also died instantly.
Suddenly a soft, melodic chime echoed from the center of the altar.
"Oh, that was such a magnificent attempt!"
From the shadow of the central altar, a tiny translucent fairy woven from violet light materialized. It fluttered its wings, casting a shower of geometric purple sparks onto the stone.
The fairy expanded rapidly, its light stretching outward until it formed a massive, circular mirror floating above the sovereigns.
Inside the mirror, the scene did not show a destroyed palace or a weakened emperor.
Adonis Kingsbane sat comfortably upon his obsidian throne in the Central Imperial City. He was dressed in his black imperial robes, his left hand casually resting on the hilt of his great sword. Mariana was seated on the armrest beside him, her pink hair brushing his shoulder as she fed him a dark grape from a golden bowl. Sapphira and his other wives stood behind the throne, their expressions filled with deep, mocking amusement.
Floating right beside Adonis was the primary form of Vexa, her small hands holding a massive glowing parchment that mirrored the exact text of the ancient scroll Malachai had just cast.
"Hehe, Master, look at them!" Vexa laughed, "They actually thought the ancient scroll was a weapon left behind by the creators to protect them. They didn’t even realize it was just an old garbage disposal script!"
The world leaders froze.
Cardinal Malachai crawled toward the floating mirror, his hands shaking violently as he stared at the image of the Emperor.
"No... no, this is an illusion! The curse was perfect! It was locked onto your spirit!"
Adonis did not look angry. He looked entirely bored, his violet eyes resting on the Cardinal with the cold detachment of a scholar looking at a minor insect.
"You spent three days assembling your treasures, your armies, and your primary energy sources into a single valley, Malachai. Did you truly believe your secret summit was hidden from me? My little assistant here told me every word of your little pact before the ink on your treaty could even dry."
Empress Lin Chu stepped forward in panic, "If you knew, why did you let us launch the strike? Why did you let us release the ancestral pool?"
"Because an empire requires a unified foundation, Empress," Adonis replied calmly, taking a slow sip from a silver chalice held by one of his attendants.
"If I had sent my vanguard to conquer your lands piece by piece, you would have hidden your wealth. You would have buried your mechanical cores, Gunnar. You would have scattered your drakes, Balthazar. I needed you to package everything you owned into a single, neat delivery."
"A delivery?" King Gunnar muttered, his sapphire eyes widening as a sudden, horrific realization struck him. He whipped his head around to look at his mechanical cores.
The white frost inside the cores was rapidly turning purple. The silver ley-lines provided by the East were glowing with violet fire, and the volcanic pillars were pulsing with the unmistakable aura of the Dragon Emperor’s authority.
"Look at the sky above your kingdoms, mongrels," Adonis commanded softly.
Inside the mirror, the view split into three distinct screens.
In the East, the grand jade palaces of the Infinite Jade Empire were surrounded by massive, towering spires of violet stone that had just erupted from the ground. The spiritual dragon-lines were no longer flowing into the ancestral shrines; they were being forcefully redirected into the imperial vanguard network.
In the North, the grand factories and magitech defense grids of the Frost-Reach were resetting themselves, their iron gates locking automatically as the imperial insignia burned itself into every mechanical device.
In the South, the ash valleys were completely surrounded by millions of faceless shadow entities, their dark claws keeping the world-eating drakes pinned to the earth without shedding a single drop of blood. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦
"The strike you launched did not hit my palace, Malachai. The curse script you used was originally designed to recycle spent energy back into the world’s main core. I simply changed the destination address. The energy of your three continents did not harm my sword spirit; it provided the exact amount of power required to finalize the absolute integration of your lands into my territory."
"You used our own attack to conquer us," Lin Chu whispered in despair as she collapsed onto the stone platform.
"Without a single soldier... you took everything."
Chieftain Balthazar let out a guttural roar of pure despair, slamming his fists against the frozen volcanic rock.
"Fight us, Adonis! Come down here and face my fire like a true warrior! Do not hide behind your invisible walls and your wives! Let us die with blood on our hands!"
"You do not possess the right to dictate how your story ends, mongrel," Adonis said domineeringly. "A warrior fights when there is an equal choice. You are no longer characters with free will. You are just assets within my territory."
Cardinal Malachai gripped his head, screaming as the remnants of his holy power began to burn his own veins.
"The gods... the gods of the upper world will punish you for this! You have stolen the authority of the sky! You cannot rewrite the laws of the universe!"
"The gods you speak of are nothing more than lazy observers sitting outside the boundary," Adonis said, standing up from his throne.
BUZZZZZ!
The moment his boots touched the palace floor, the ground beneath the world leaders in the southern valley began to sink, the volcanic rocks dissolving into liquid purple light.
"They watched your ancestors suffer for generations because it made for an interesting spectacle. They watched Clementine ruin my family because it served their amusement. And now, I am removing their hands from the pages."
Adonis stepped closer to the mirror.
"Your kingdoms no longer exist. As of this moment, the East is designated as Sector 18. The North is Sector 19. The South is Sector 20. You will retain your lives because your administrative knowledge is still useful for local management. But if a single whisper of rebellion is detected within your sectors, Vexa will simply remove your entire population from the census list."
"We submit," King Gunnar said as he dropped to both knees before the mirror. "The Frost-Reach accepts the integration. We will provide the full assistance immediately. Please, spare the citizens."
"Gunnar! You crawling before him like a beaten dog!" Balthazar roared, glaring at the northern king.
"I look at the numbers, Balthazar," Gunnar replied, his eyes fixed on the floorboards. "There is no army to fight. The very air we breathe belongs to his whim now. To resist is simply an error in calculation."
Empress Lin Chu looked up at the image of Adonis, her tears smudging the traditional white powder on her face.
"And what of our traditions? Our shrines? Our heritage?"
"Your heritage will be preserved in the imperial archives as a historical note," Mariana answered from the screen,
"The Emperor does not destroy beauty, Empress. He simply refines it so that it serves the grand design."
Adonis turned his back to the mirror, walking back toward his desk where the global maps were already being updated with the new sector numbers.
"The preparation is complete, Vexa. The five continents are fully integrated. The world is mine now."
"Yes, Master! The total energy level of the global matrix has reached maximum capacity! We have enough power to activate the grand ladder!"
"Excellent! Tell the vanguard to prepare the arrays. The next target is not a kingdom. We are going to break the sky and pay a visit to the ones who held the pen before me."