The decision weighed heavier than any battle. My dream, my promise to the people… shattered by a truth I could not ignore.
With the Eternal Quill in hand, I wrote once more. Not invitations this time, but apologies.
"To the honored leaders of this continent,
With deep regret, I must announce that the Festival of Freedom will not take place. Circumstances beyond control threaten not only the Federation, but all nations alike. The safety of our people must come before celebration.
—Riureas."
The words bled into the parchment like wounds. One by one, the scrolls were sealed and sent away, each carried by swift riders under banners lowered in mourning.
When the last was gone, I stood at the window, staring at the city below. Banners still fluttered, food stalls still bustled, children still sang of the Festival that would never come.
"I'm sorry," I whispered to them. "I promised you peace, and all I've given is fear."
Behind me, Clara placed a hand on my shoulder, silent but warm. Even her presence could not soften the ache.
The Festival of Freedom was gone.
What remained now was survival.
The banners of the Festival were lowered, but in their place rose something far heavier,banners of war.
Anastasia stood beside me in the council chamber, her crimson eyes fixed on the map I had spread across the table. For once, she was not a guest, not a rival, but a partner.
"With the Plateau Golem awakened, the South Lands will fight at your side," she said, voice sharp, resolute. "We sealed it once before. Together, perhaps we can bring it down again."
I nodded slowly. "Then it's decided. From this day, the Federation and the South Kingdom are allies."
The words tasted strange,like ash and fire—but necessary.
Messengers carried the news across the continent: an alliance born not of trust, but of survival. The people whispered of a towering monster, taller than mountains, moving ever closer.
We had only ten days before it reached the Federation.
Ten days to forge armies.
Ten days to prepare defenses.
Ten days to find a way to stop the impossible.
I clenched the Eternal Quill, its weight heavier than ever. "Ten days… to decide whether this world lives or falls."
The council chamber was heavy with silence, every leader, captain, and advisor watching as Anastasia stood across from me. Her crimson eyes never wavered, her red-black dress flowing like fire and shadow in the light of the torches.
Before us lay a single parchment, unrolled on the long oak table. It was no ordinary treaty—it was the first alliance between the Federation and the South Lands.
I held the Eternal Quill of Shakespeare in my hand. The feather glimmered faintly, alive with the weight of history. When I dipped it into ink, the air itself seemed to tighten, as if the world was listening.
Anastasia spoke first, her tone calm but edged with power.
"Five centuries ago, my people sealed the Four Great Beasts beneath the bones of the continent. Now, one has awakened—the Plateau Golem. If it is not stopped, the others will surely follow. This is not just your Federation's battle, Riureas… it is the world's."
Her words sent a chill through me. Even Clara and Vellia shifted uncomfortably.
I placed the quill to parchment, hesitating only a moment.
"Then, let this mark be the proof that the Federation and the South stand as one. For peace… for survival."
The quill moved, and the treaty was signed.
When Anastasia took the quill next, her hand was steady, her crimson nails sharp against the paper as she wrote her name. The pact was sealed.
For the first time, she smiled,not the cold smile of a Demon Lord, but something almost human.
"Good. Now, let us prepare your world to withstand a god."
The chamber exhaled in relief, but in my chest, the weight only grew heavier.
The Plateau Golem was coming. And now, there was no turning back.
Dawn broke over the Federation like fire spilling across the horizon. The sky was crimson and gold, yet instead of filling me with peace, it reminded me of the Golem's looming presence—ten days away, and closing.
The city stirred with urgency. Bells rang, voices shouted, hammers echoed. The festival decorations that once adorned the streets were stripped away and replaced with fortifications—banners of joy turned into banners of war.
Anastasia stood beside me on the balcony of the municipal hall, overlooking the training grounds. Below us, hundreds of soldiers, mages, and volunteers had gathered. Her crimson eyes glinted as she whispered,
"They're afraid, Riureas. You must give them reason to believe."
I nodded, heart pounding. I stepped forward, raising my voice so it carried across the square.
"Citizens of the Federation! Allies of the South! Today we begin the march toward survival. The Plateau Golem is no mere beast—it is a walking mountain, a calamity reborn. But hear me now: we will not cower. We will not flee. Together, we will rise stronger than ever before!"
The crowd erupted with cheers, though the tremor of fear still lingered beneath their voices.
By midday, training had begun. Clara and Elra brewed enchanted provisions—rations laced with vitality magic. Vellia and Crystella worked with artisans to weave wards into the city walls, glowing faintly like threads of starlight. Yulleus oversaw every movement with sharp precision, recording progress with a strict eye.
And Anastasia… she revealed something none of us expected.
With a flick of her wrist, she summoned five colossal demons—knights clad in blackened armor, their forms bound in crimson chains. They knelt before her like statues of death.
"My personal guard," she explained, her voice smooth. "They will serve under your command until the Golem falls. Let this prove the South's loyalty."
The soldiers gasped. Even I felt a shiver—yet also a strange, burning hope.
As the sun set, the first day of preparation ended with the air thick in determination.
But in the back of my mind, I could not shake one thought:
If the Plateau Golem is only the first… then what waits for us after it?
Days blurred into nights, and nights into days. Training, planning, building—every heartbeat carried us closer to this moment.
And now… the final day had come.
The Federation stood braced for war. Soldiers lined the battlements, mages raised their staves toward the sky, siege weapons were aimed at the horizon. Every station was manned, every torch lit, every breath sharp with tension.
I stood at the vanguard, my cloak snapping in the cold wind. Clara, Elra, Yulleus, Vellia, Crystella, Makoto, and Anastasia,each stood in their place, prepared for what was to come. This was no longer preparation. This was destiny.
Then the ground began to tremble.
The horizon shifted. What I first thought was a mountain… moved.
There it was.
The Plateau Golem.
Its colossal body rose higher than the clouds, its stone skin ridged with forests, rivers, and entire cliff faces carved across its frame. Its eyes burned like suns, molten gold in a face of unyielding stone. With every step, the world itself shook, the earth splitting beneath its weight.
The soldiers gasped. Some prayed. Others clutched their weapons tighter.
I gripped the Eternal Quill of Shakespeare in my hand, my knuckles white. For the first time in years, I felt small,smaller than I ever had before.
But I raised my voice, louder than the quake beneath our feet.
"This is the enemy before us! A monster of legend, a trial of fate! But remember this,no mountain, no calamity, no god of stone will erase our will to live! We fight not for glory, not for conquest, but for tomorrow itself!"
The roar of my people answered me.
And before us, the Plateau Golem lifted its arm, an arm the size of an entire kingdom,and let out a sound that was not a roar, not a growl, but the grinding of mountains themselves.
The battle for the Federation had begun.
"Fire!!"
At my command, the sky lit up.
Lines of mages unleashed torrents of flame, lightning, and ice. Arrows streaked upward like swarms of silver stars, enchanted bolts leaving trails of light behind them. The battlefield shook with the force of thousands striking at once.
The target—its colossal feet.
The Plateau Golem's steps carved canyons into the land. Each time its foot descended, forests crumbled and boulders shattered beneath its weight. If we could wound it there—if we could even slow it down—we might buy enough time to find its core.
Explosions rippled across its stony ankles, shards of rock raining down like meteor showers. Dust and smoke veiled the horizon.
"Did we—?" one soldier gasped.
Then the dust cleared.
The Golem hadn't even flinched.
It moved again, each step shaking the earth as if the world itself was groaning under its burden.
Clara raised her staff, chanting a spell of amplification. "Concentrate your fire! Break the same spot!"
The army obeyed. Blast after blast slammed into one single fissure along its right foot. Cracks began to form, glowing faintly with molten light seeping through.
My heart pounded. It's working.
Then, the Golem finally reacted.
It lifted its leg—and stomped.
The shockwave tore across the battlefield like a tidal wave. Walls shattered, soldiers were thrown into the air, and the very earth rolled beneath us. I barely held my footing, Shakespeare's quill glowing faintly in my grip as I summoned barriers of light to shield those around me.
"Hold the line!" I roared, my voice cutting through the chaos. "Do not break!"
The war had begun in full force.
And this was only its first step.
The battlefield burned.
Arrows, fireballs, lances of light and shadow—all of it hammered the Golem's body in a storm of destruction. Cracks spread along its stony frame, and finally, the first real damage appeared: molten veins glowing at its foot, the mountain of a leg trembling under the weight of our combined might.
Cheers erupted from the soldiers. "We're hurting it! It's working!"
But then… silence.
The Golem stopped moving. Its massive head tilted slightly, as if finally acknowledging the swarm of mortals beneath it. The air grew heavy—too heavy. Even breathing felt like drowning.
"Why did it stop…?" Yulleus muttered, eyes narrowing.
I felt it before I saw it. A surge of energy, vast and ancient, coiling like a storm inside the Golem's core. My chest tightened. No. It's not stopping—it's preparing.
Then, with an earth-splitting groan, the Golem raised both arms. Stone plates along its chest and shoulders cracked open, revealing glowing channels of molten light.
Clara's eyes widened. "Everyone, shields—NOW!"
The Golem's roar wasn't a sound—it was a quake that shattered bones and shook the sky itself. And then, it released it.
A beam of pure, concentrated energy burst forth—light and molten force fused into one. It tore across the land like a divine judgment, vaporizing forests, mountains, and everything in its path.
The beam was wide enough to swallow cities. And it was aimed straight at us.
I slammed Shakespeare's quill against the ground, calling forth a dome of blinding light. Anastasia stepped forward beside me, her crimson eyes flaring, summoning her chained knights to raise a wall of abyssal black flame.
The two forces—light and shadow—rose together, just as the world-ending beam crashed down.
The ground split. The sky screamed. And for a heartbeat, I thought the world itself was about to end.
The beam tore through the horizon, erasing everything in its path. My light barrier cracked, Anastasia's abyssal wall screamed under the pressure,stone split beneath our feet, air ripped from our lungs.
We can't hold it,!
Then, a voice cut through the chaos.
"Domain… of Eternal Winter!"
The world shifted.
A surge of frost exploded outward as Crystella raised both arms to the sky. The air itself froze solid, winds shrieking as an arctic storm devoured the battlefield. Snow whirled, jagged ice spires erupted from the earth, and a colossal dome of frozen light wrapped around us.
The Golem's molten beam slammed into the ice domain—then stopped. Frozen mid-stream, its destructive energy was locked in place, crystallized like a sculpture of fire trapped in glass.
For the first time, the Plateau Golem staggered.
Its mountain-like body groaned as frost spread across its colossal frame. Stone cracked under the pressure, fissures glowing with molten veins that hissed and hardened into brittle rock.
The soldiers gasped, awestruck.
"She… froze a mountain," someone whispered.
Crystella's face was pale, her body trembling as frost crawled up her own arms. Still, she held her ground, her voice firm despite the blood at her lips.
"I will not let this monster erase everything we've built!"
I stared at her in shock,then pride.
"Everyone, don't waste this chance! Focus your fire—NOW!"
Thousands of spells and arrows lit the battlefield again, striking the Golem while its body was slowed, its attack neutralized. Chunks of frozen stone shattered from its feet and legs, crashing down like falling mountains.
But even as victory surged in our hearts, defeated, deep beneath the frost, the Golem's molten veins pulsed brighter, hotter.
Crystella had bought us time. But the Plateau Golem was far from defeated.
The battlefield was chaos frozen in motion,ice still clinging to the Golem's frame, soldiers shouting, spells blazing. For a fleeting moment, I thought we had it… but I was wrong.
With a deafening crack, the Plateau Golem's body shuddered. The ice splintered, exploding outward in a storm of frozen shards. A shockwave of molten heat followed, melting everything within its reach.
"Fall back—!" I shouted, raising a barrier as soldiers were thrown to the ground.
The Golem moved again, slower than before but no less terrifying. Its molten veins burned brighter, seeping through its cracks like rivers of lava. Each step it took turned the earth into rivers of fire.
The Federation army rallied,mages launching arcane spears, archers raining down enchanted volleys, siege weapons firing in unison. Our magic pounded against the giant, scoring wounds that glowed like scars across its stone hide.
Anastasia leapt forward, her five chained knights charging with weapons of flame and shadow, carving deep gashes into its foot. Clara and Elra supported from the rear, waves of reinforced magic amplifying every strike. Yulleus barked orders like a general possessed, keeping the lines from breaking.
Still, the Golem pressed on.
It swung one massive arm, and the ground for miles around heaved upward, mountains tearing themselves apart under the sheer force. The shockwave crushed hundreds, swallowed battalions whole.
I clenched the Shakespeare quill, pouring light into my voice.
"Stand your ground! Do not falter,this monster bleeds, and we will make it fall!"
Makoto rushed to my side, her own spellbook glowing.
"Sensei, I'll help! Together,!"
We wove our magic as one, her words and my quill fusing into a radiant script that lanced across the battlefield. It struck the Golem's chest, carving a glowing mark that pulsed like a target.
"Aim for the mark!" I commanded.
Every soldier, every mage, every knight obeyed. The battlefield lit up brighter than the sun as everything we had rained into that single glowing scar.
The Plateau Golem staggered. For the first time, it let out a sound almost like pain.
But it did not fall.
Instead, its eyes blazed brighter, and the world trembled with a fury we had only just begun to understand.