The golden chamber burned with silence. Nameless stood, shadow stretching across the marble floor like a wound bleeding into eternity. His crimson eye glared against the brilliance of the Seven Thrones, and his voice rang like a cracked bell:
"Choose your graveyard."
The Seven stirred, their crowns flashing like broken suns.
"I will not run, nor skulk in shadows," Nameless declared. "I will not be your blade any longer. If you would chain me, then break me. If you would end me, then bring everything—your hosts, your legions, your crowns. Bring all your dominion, and I will end it in one stroke."
His hand pressed against his mask, and his voice thundered:
"One month from now. At Kar Seraphiel—the Plateau of Fallen Wings. The battlefield where Heaven's sky turned to ash. The place where angels died screaming, their feathers raining like snow."
The chamber itself shuddered. The name carried history; it was a wound in the fabric of creation. The place where once, long ago, gods themselves had faltered.
The Seven erupted in laughter.
"You challenge us?!" one bellowed, jeweled eyes shaking. "Alone, against eternity?" mocked another, draped in robes stitched from voidlight. "Madness," hissed the one in silver flame. "Even your defiance is borrowed—from her."
Their voices struck like hammers.
And then came the venom.
"She poisons you, weapon," sneered the eldest, his voice slow and heavy as molten iron. "The Keeper whispers in your ear, and you mistake it for your own will."
Another leaned forward, hunger burning in her eyes. "When you are shackled, when your flames are snuffed and your soul is bound to silence, she will be ours. We will drag her through every realm. We will teach her agony without reason, despair without end. She will suffer until even her curse begs for death."
Laughter returned, cruel and merciless.
Nameless did not flinch. His crimson eye narrowed, and his voice curved into something darker than fury—sarcasm sharpened into a blade.
"Ah," he whispered, mocking. "The mighty Seven. Gods so fragile they fear a woman's voice. So terrified of her whisper, they threaten her with horrors. How bold."
He turned his back to them, cloak dragging across gold like a wound across perfection.
At the gates of the chamber, he paused. His shadow swelled, vast as a storm.
"Threaten her again," Nameless said, voice low, venom dripping from every word. "And when your thrones crack, when your crowns crumble, when your names are forgotten someday, remember—your doom was not written by gods. It was written by cowards who laughed when they should have feared."
The galaxies in Tianlong's eyes pulsed with approval while he was letting nameless know all this.
Nameless walked out, and the last thing the Seven heard was his warning:
"Mock her. Hurt her. Chain her. Do it… and I will carve eternity itself until there is nowhere left for you to hide. That is the last thing you want from me."
Then comes the vault... corridors of the Vault stretched endlessly, frost clinging to stone like whispers that refused to die. Nameless found Elara where light refused to linger, her pale figure seated upon steps of obsidian.
She looked up, her immortal eyes weary, yet soft.
"You spoke to them," she said quietly. "And now, the world trembles."
Nameless dropped to one knee before her, his hand trembling as it touched hers. "I declared war. A month from now, at Kar Seraphiel."
Elara's fingers closed around his hand—not in passion, but like prayer. She pressed it between her palms, her forehead lowering as though he were altar and offering.
"What you do," she whispered, "is not for vengeance alone. It is salvation. Humanity will breathe through you, Nameless. The angels who fell, the demons who burned, the mortals who died nameless deaths—your rebellion is their only prayer. Cleanse your sins"
Her voice broke, soft as snow.
"But I… cannot join you. I am bound. Their curse chains my body, my mind, my will. I exist to keep balance, even as I break beneath it. I am theirs, no matter how much I wish otherwise."
Her hands tightened, trembling like leaves in storm. "So you must win. At any cost. You must carry what I cannot. Swear it to me."
Nameless' crimson eye dimmed, grief pressing against the edges of his soul. He squeezed her hands in return, as though the pressure itself could break her chains.
"I will."
And then, her gaze sharpened.
"There is one who may yet stand with you in that battlefield. One who knows the taste of rebellion, who once fought beside divine. Find him in the Abyss. Find Tianlong, the Thought-Dragon."
Nameless frowned. "He already speaks with me. He bleeds memory."
Elara shook her head. "Not Tianlong alone. In the Abyss, he dwells with two others—the remnants of the Three Primal Beasts. They will not welcome you. To claim Tianlong as your wing, you must prove yourself worthy, They must accept you."
Her hands trembled as she drew his closer. "Go, Nameless. And return with the storm."
The Abyss was not a place. It was absence.
Nameless descended through shadows that swallowed light, through echoes of screams that were never uttered, until even his own heartbeat sounded like an intruder. The air stank of iron and void.
And then—earth shuddered. Fire hissed. The Abyss opened like a wound, revealing a vast arena of ruin.
Three shapes stirred in the darkness.
The first was a serpent, its scales molten dawnlight, eyes searing with endless hunger—the Serpent of the Dawn.The second, wings blazing with living flame, feathers molten glass—the Phoenix of Eternal Flame.The third, colossal, each step breaking the ground as mountains crumbled—the Behemoth of Earth's Spine.
And beyond them, galaxies glimmered—Tianlong, the Thought-Dragon, coils vast as eternity, watching.
The Serpent hissed first, voice like rivers boiling."An intruder… hollow, yet familiar."
The Phoenix shrieked, firestorm bursting across the cavern."Empty! But the scent of blood clings to him!"
The Behemoth's voice was stone grinding on stone."Test him. Break him."
They struck.
The Serpent coiled, teeth like suns plunging toward Nameless. He twisted, mask cracking with strain as his crimson eye flared. His blade shrieked, cutting through scale and flame, but fire from the Phoenix's wings seared him, while the Behemoth's footfall shattered the earth beneath him.
Nameless bled. Ash choked his breath. Every heartbeat screamed too much.
But he did not yield.
His sword moved on instinct. He split the Serpent's coil, drove the Phoenix back in a storm of sparks, rolled beneath the Behemoth's crushing weight. His body screamed weakness, but his strikes carried a rhythm older than memory—like echoes of a war he could not recall.
The three faltered, confusion rippling through their forms.
The Serpent recoiled. "This strength… we have known it."The Phoenix shrieked, wavering flame. "But he knows nothing!"The Behemoth lowered its head, the ground trembling. "Then he is both… and neither."
Nameless staggered, blood running down his arm, and lifted his gaze to the vast coils in the dark.
The galaxies in Tianlong's eyes swirled, measuring him in silence.
Nameless's voice was raw, torn from his lungs."I can't fight forever. If you are of some use like elara said… then lend me your strength. Not as master and beast—only as one who refuses to fall."
The silence stretched, endless.
Then Tianlong's laughter rolled like storms across eternity."You ask not for chains, but for my choice. Interesting."
The Serpent writhed, the Phoenix wailed, the Behemoth rumbled low—but Tianlong's coils shifted, galaxies flaring.
"Very well," the Thought-Dragon said, voice like oceans splitting mountains. "I will follow. Not because you command me, but because I wish to see what you become. And because I know everything about you"
The three beasts withdrew, their forms dissolving into shadow and fire, leaving only the echo of their presence.
Nameless, scarred and breathless, stood tall. His crimson eye burned—not with memory, but with defiance.
And Tianlong's shadow stretched beside him, vast and unending.
"And that's how you have met me nameless." said Tianlong with a soft laugh.