The alarm bells that thundered throughout the academy were not a warning—they were a declaration of war.
The air, once cold and crisp, suddenly became dense, heavy as molten lead. Sultan and Illyana stood amid shattered emerald crystal and the black ash left behind by Ysenbert's puppet, as the reinforced doors of the chamber began to buckle under the relentless blows of Caesar's Polar Guard.
"Sultan—listen to me carefully!" Illyana shouted, gripping his shoulder with a force that nearly pierced flesh.
"Caesar isn't searching for the truth. He's searching for control. If he sees what you did to Sergei, he'll lock you in the Void Cage forever. You must look like a victim—not a predator."
Before Sultan could respond, the doors finally collapsed.
Emperor Caesar entered with slow, deliberate steps, surrounded by an aura of blue frost that froze blood in the veins. His ash-gray eyes swept the room with terrifying calm, lingering on the remaining motes of black dust that had once been Sergei.
"Emerald devastation… and the scent of annihilation," Caesar said, his voice like ice grinding beneath a mountain.
"Is this the control you promised me, Illyana? Or have you raised a monster in my backyard?"
Sultan stepped forward, silver hair catching the flickering light.
"It was an attack, Your Majesty," Sultan said, forcing the defiance from his voice.
"Something came through the walls… something that felt like death itself. If I hadn't acted, Illyana and I would be nothing but memories."
Caesar did not smile.
Instead, the pressure of his magic intensified, crushing the air until Sultan felt his ribs threaten to shatter.
"Death does not crawl from the walls of my academy," Caesar said coldly, his gaze shifting to Illyana with an unspoken accusation,
"unless someone opens the door from within."
He turned away, his decision already made.
"I will consider this an incident—for now. But the price will be high. Sultan, you are to be transferred immediately to Zero Point, at the edge of the Seal. If you claim you were defending your life, then go—defend the life of the entire continent."
Illyana went pale.
"Zero Point? That's suicide, Your Majesty! The Seal there is unstable—the demonic activity is at its peak!"
"Then let it be a final test," Caesar replied without turning back.
"And Illyana… you will lead the unit. If Sultan returns alive, I will believe your story. If he dies—then I will consider you complicit in this failure."
When Caesar departed, a killing silence filled the chamber.
Sultan sat on the edge of a broken table, staring at his hands, which refused to stop trembling.
"Zero Point…" he murmured.
"Why does it feel like we're not going to fight—but to be buried?"
Illyana approached and sat beside him. She didn't look at him; her eyes were fixed on the hole Sultan had torn through the wall.
"Because Ysenbert and Caesar are playing the same game, Sultan," she said, her voice fractured.
"Caesar wants you gone because he fears your power. Ysenbert wants you there because Zero Point is where he plans to break the Seal completely. We're walking into the lion's mouth by choice."
She rested her head on Sultan's shoulder for a brief moment—a rare, human gesture that stole his breath away. She smelled of gunpowder and dried jasmine.
"Sultan… that night in Baghdad—when your hair changed color—did it hurt?"
Sultan exhaled slowly, his mind drifting back to the moment that rewrote his fate.
"It wasn't physical pain," he said.
"It felt like I was losing the old Sultan. As if my soul migrated somewhere far away, leaving my body to be filled with lightning and emerald. I feel lonely, Illyana—even among millions."
She took his hand and laced her fingers with his.
"You are not alone. Your silver hair is a beacon in this darkness, and I will be the shadow that keeps you from burning. We'll go to Zero Point—and we'll show Caesar and Ysenbert that the Balancing Law cannot be buried beneath ice."
That night, as preparations were made to depart for the most dangerous place in the world, Sultan stood before a mirror.
He no longer saw a frightened young man.
He saw a warrior—hair like dawn, eyes carrying the storms of four continents.
They departed at dawn aboard a black aerial vessel, cutting through raging snowstorms toward the final frontier. On the horizon, the Great Seal appeared as a fractured thread of light, emitting a mournful cry—one heard only by those who carried the Supreme Law within their hearts.