The sky above the burning world didn't look like a sky anymore. It looked like a dark, ugly bruise.
Humanity was finished. The great cities were ground to dust. The armies were gone. Hope was dead.
All that remained was a mountain of bodies, and the man standing on top of it.
He was the First Emperor of Mankind.
Or later known as the First Human Emperor.
"This is not how it is supposed to end."
He stood alone against the horizon. His golden armor was shattered, but the skin underneath looked even tougher than the metal. His breath rasped in his chest, loud and heavy. Blood dripped from his fingers, but it wasn't red. It was liquid gold.
"But I am not going down just like this."
Below him, the ground shook. It wasn't an earthquake. It was the march of the Beasts.
They were endless. Monsters with iron scales and jaws big enough to crush tanks. They rushed up the mountain like a living wave, driven by the madness of the massive and powerful beings floating in the sky above.
There were three of them. Three of the Architects of the Apocalypse.
A Celestial Elf God glowed with blinding starlight, looking down with disgust. A Void Demon God, a shadow that blocked out the sun, dripped darkness onto the ruins. And a Beast God, a dragon so huge its wings stretched across the entire horizon.
The Elf floated down. Her voice didn't speak to the ears, but echoed inside the mind.
"Look at you," she mocked. "A king of dirt. A ruler of graves."
She pointed at the destruction.
"Why do you keep fighting, Human? Your shields are broken. Your people are dead. You have nothing left to spend."
The First Emperor looked up. One eye burned with fire; the other swirled like a storm. He spat golden blood onto the rocks.
"Nothing left?"
He stepped forward, and the pile of bodies shifted under his feet.
"You Gods don't understand ownership," he rasped, his voice deep and rough like grinding stones. "You think you can just take this world because you are strong. But this dirt is mine. And I haven't given you permission to stand on it."
He squeezed his fist shut. The air grew so heavy that the monsters climbing the hill simply popped. Their lungs couldn't handle the pressure.
"I decide what this world is worth. And I say… the price hasn't been met."
[ WARNING: Health at 5% ][ WARNING: Mana at 7% ]
A see-through golden window flickered in front of his eyes. It was cracked and glitching from his own power.
"Quiet," he ordered.
He didn't use a spell. He didn't chant. He just wanted it to happen.
The ground exploded. Giant spikes of diamond and black stone shot up, stabbing thousands of monsters at once. He didn't ask the earth to move. He owned it.
The Dragon roared and breathed out a river of black fire.
"Burn!" the Beast God shouted.
The First Emperor didn't dodge. He raised a hand.
[ SKILL: ABSOLUTE DEFENSE ][ COST: HALF OF REMAINING LIFE ]
A wall of golden light appeared—solid and heavy. It wasn't magic. It was pure power. The remaining life of the Emperor turned into a shield. The black fire hit the gold and vanished.
"You think we are weak because we don't have natural affinity of your magic," the Emperor shouted. His voice shook the sky. "You are wrong."
He jumped.
He moved faster than a blink, a golden blur cutting through the air. He hit the Dragon's nose with the force of a falling meteor.
BOOM.
The Beast God's head snapped back. Scales shattered.
"What the hell happened?!" the Dragon panicked.
A shockwave cleared the clouds for ten miles.
The First Emperor landed on the Dragon's back.
"Get off me, you dirty creature!" the Dragon roared.
A sword appeared in the First Emperor's right hand—a blade made of fire, water, wind, and earth. They didn't fight each other; they combined and obeyed him perfectly.
"I am the Apex!"
He drove the blade down. The Dragon screamed as the elements tore it apart from the inside.
"I am the Nexus!"
The Void Demon God attacked with tentacles of shadow. The Emperor slapped them away with his bare left hand. His skin glowed, refusing to be cut or bruised.
"I am the Aurum!"
He was fighting three gods and a million monsters. And for a moment, he was winning.
But he was still human.
[ ALERT: Organ Failure Imminent. ][ ALERT: Source Depleted. ]
He could feel his heart stuttering. He could feel his body giving up. He was burning his own life to fuel this power, selling his soul to buy a few more seconds of fight.
He looked down at the ruins of humanity.
He saw the few survivors hiding in the cracks of the world. He saw the fear. He saw the weakness.
They are not ready, he realized. If I win today, they will fall tomorrow.
He needed a better plan for them.
The Celestial Elf God pulled back a bow made of pure light. She aimed at his heart. "Die with your failure, mongrel."
The Void Demon God gathered a ball of crushing darkness. "You don't even deserve to exist."
The First Emperor stopped fighting.
He stood on the dead Dragon, surrounded by enemies, and smiled. It was a terrifying, bloody smile.
"Failure?"
He looked the Celestial Elf in the eye.
"I am not trying to survive," he whispered. "I am kicking you out."
He turned his sword around.
He didn't hit the gods. He hit the air. He stabbed right into the empty space.
[ INITIATING PROTOCOL: LEGACY ]
[ CONVERTING: SOUL >>> DATA ]
[ CONVERTING: AUTHORITY >>> SYSTEM ]
The world screamed.
Golden energy poured out of him. It wasn't an attack; it was a broadcast. He tore apart his own soul—his strength, his magic, his wealth—and threw it into the wind.
It wasn't just light. It was a solid wall.
The shockwave hit the Elf and the Demon like a hammer.
"What is this?!" the Demon shrieked as its body started to fade. "This pressure… it rejects us!"
"He is locking the world!" the Elf screamed. Her skin started to burn under the golden light. "Retreat! Back to the Line!"
The energy expanded. It pushed the Gods back. It forced the monsters into the cracks of the earth. It rewrote the rules of the world so they couldn't come back.
He wasn't dying. He was uploading.
[ SYSTEM CREATED. ]
[ STATUS: LOCKED. ]
"I leave it all to them, the Candidates," he roared. His body turned into blinding light. "My throne. My power. My burden."
The light covered the monster army. It blinded the Gods. It burned a warning into the core of the planet.
"Cross the Line if you dare!"
FLASH.
When the light faded, the First Emperor was gone.
The Architects were gone, pushed out of the world. The beasts that remained howled in confusion, leaderless and weak.
Humanity had a second chance.
But deep inside human DNA, a clock started ticking. A lock was placed on the throne, waiting for the key.
It would wait through centuries of silence. It would wait through a thousand failures who burned trying to touch the flame.
Waiting for the one who could finally claim it.