The Nether Realm did not wait for the wounded.
It hunted them.
The ground beneath Caelum's boots trembled again, pebbles skittering across cracked obsidian as something vast moved beyond the ruined pillars. The golden-black flame coiled tighter around his arm, flickering unevenly like a newborn heart learning to beat.
His ribs ground painfully when he inhaled.
Two broken. Maybe three.
His left shoulder hung lower than it should.
His celestial core remained mostly sealed—only a hairline fracture allowing that strange hybrid flame to leak through.
And yet—
He was smiling.
Not from joy.
From clarity.
In the Celestial Empire, he had been the heir, protected by ranks of guardians and ancient arrays. Even his training had been monitored, structured, calculated.
Here, there were no rules.
Only survival.
A shadow detached itself from the crimson haze ahead.
Then another.
The remaining Netherborn did not retreat after their kin burned. Instead, they circled. Their limbs bent wrong. Their mouths split too wide. The miasma clinging to them thickened as if reacting to the flame in Caelum's palm.
They were not mindless.
They were assessing.
"Good," Caelum muttered.
He shifted his stance, ignoring the stabbing pain in his side. In the empire, he had mastered three primary disciplines:
Radiant Blade Forms.
Solar Meridian Cultivation.
And Imperial Flame Harmonization.
All three required stable celestial energy.
He had none.
But he still had instinct.
The first Netherborn lunged low.
Caelum stepped forward instead of back.
He let the creature's claws rake across his already torn sleeve and drove his burning hand directly into its chest cavity.
The golden-black flame reacted violently upon contact.
Instead of purifying the corruption, it consumed it.
The creature convulsed as the miasma drained into the fire. Veins of darkness snaked up Caelum's arm, but instead of corroding him, they fused into the flame.
It grew denser.
He yanked his arm free and pivoted, grabbing a fallen spear embedded in the ruins.
The second Netherborn leapt.
He thrust upward.
The spear pierced its abdomen, but the creature grabbed the shaft and pulled him closer, jaws opening wide enough to swallow his face.
Caelum released the weapon.
His burning hand shot forward.
Flame exploded outward.
The creature's head disintegrated into black ash.
Silence fell.
The remaining Netherborn hesitated.
They could sense something had shifted.
Caelum felt it too.
The flame was no longer flickering randomly. It pulsed in rhythm with his heartbeat.
He inhaled slowly.
The air tasted foul—iron and rot—but beneath it, he sensed currents.
Energy.
Different from celestial qi.
Denser. More chaotic.
Nether essence.
In the Upper Realm, cultivators absorbed purified celestial energy refined by the Origin Flame. It was stable, structured, obedient.
This—
This was wild.
Untamed.
It clawed at his senses like an ocean during a storm.
The suppression seal embedded in his core still blocked full circulation. But the crack had widened.
Just slightly.
A memory surfaced.
Lucerius's voice.
"True sovereignty is not about purity, Your Highness. It is about control."
At the time, Caelum thought he meant political control.
Now he understood differently.
If the flame within him could devour corruption—
Then perhaps corruption could strengthen him.
The last Netherborn charged together in a desperate frenzy.
Caelum stepped forward into them.
He let one claw rake across his thigh.
Pain sharpened his focus.
He seized the creature's arm and channeled the flame deliberately this time—not outward, but inward.
The golden-black fire surged through his meridians like molten metal.
Agony detonated behind his eyes.
But he did not scream.
He forced the invading miasma to circulate through the cracked pathways of his core.
The suppression seal reacted violently, trying to reject the foreign energy.
The crack widened.
A second fracture formed.
Light burst from his chest.
Not pure gold.
Not full black.
Something between.
The Netherborn disintegrated as the surge exploded outward in a shockwave.
When the dust settled, only ash remained.
Caelum dropped to one knee.
His vision swam.
His veins burned as if filled with acid.
But—
He could feel his core again.
Weak.
Fragmented.
Yet alive.
He exhaled a shaky breath and looked at his trembling hand.
"I see," he whispered.
The Origin Flame fragment inside him was adapting.
It was not rejecting Nether essence.
It was integrating it.
Footsteps—heavier than before—echoed from the deeper ruins.
The earlier tremor returned, stronger.
The air pressure shifted.
This was not a scavenger.
This was a predator.
Caelum forced himself upright.
He scanned his surroundings properly for the first time.
The ruins around him were not random debris.
They were architectural.
Massive broken archways carved with unfamiliar symbols. Fractured statues depicting winged figures chained to the ground. A collapsed tower with spiral etchings similar—disturbingly similar—to Celestial Empire design.
His breath stilled.
This place had once been connected to the Upper Realm.
Perhaps long ago.
Before recorded history.
The predator emerged.
It stood nearly three times his height.
Humanoid in shape but armored in jagged bone plating. A horn curved from its skull like a crescent blade. Its eyes burned deep crimson.
A Nether Warden.
An apex enforcer of territorial zones.
Even at full power, Caelum would have considered this a serious opponent.
Now?
He was half-broken.
The Warden inhaled sharply.
It smelled the divine spark inside him.
Its lips peeled back in something almost like anticipation.
Then it vanished.
Too fast.
Caelum barely twisted aside as a bone-clad fist smashed into the ground where he had stood. The impact shattered stone.
Shockwaves rattled his injured ribs.
He countered instinctively, driving flame toward its flank.
The Warden caught his wrist mid-strike.
Crushed.
Bones in his hand cracked audibly.
Pain flared white.
The Warden lifted him and hurled him through a fractured column.
Stone exploded around him.
His back hit hard enough to knock breath from his lungs.
The Warden advanced slowly this time.
Confident.
Enjoying the hunt.
Caelum coughed blood.
He tried to push himself up.
His left leg buckled.
The flame around his arm flickered weakly.
He was reaching his limit.
The Warden raised its arm for the killing blow.
And in that suspended second—
Caelum stopped resisting.
Not physically.
Internally.
He let go of control.
The fragment of the Origin Flame inside him reacted instantly.
Instead of a controlled stream—
It erupted.
The golden-black fire exploded from his chest in a spiraling vortex.
Not outward alone—
But downward.
Into the ground.
The ancient symbols etched across the ruins ignited.
The Warden froze mid-strike.
Crimson eyes widened.
Because the ground beneath them was no longer inert stone.
It was an array.
An ancient formation.
Older than the Empire.
Older than the Nether Wardens.
The vortex intensified.
The flame latched onto the formation and fed it.
Symbols flared brighter and brighter until the entire ruin glowed like a buried constellation.
The Warden roared and attempted to retreat—
Too late.
Chains of molten script erupted from the ground and wrapped around its limbs.
It thrashed violently, bone armor cracking under pressure.
Caelum staggered to his feet, swaying.
He hadn't planned this.
The formation was responding to the flame instinctively.
Recognizing it.
Recognizing him.
The Warden screamed as the golden-black fire surged up the chains and into its body.
Instead of burning externally—
It ignited from within.
The bone armor split.
Light burst from its chest.
Then—
Silence.
The massive body collapsed into ash.
The formation dimmed slowly.
Leaving Caelum alone once more.
He stood there, chest heaving, staring at the place where the Warden had fallen.
Then he looked down at the glowing symbols fading beneath his boots.
Recognition.
These were not Nether scripts.
They were celestial.
Ancient Celestial.
Older than modern imperial glyphs.
He knelt carefully and brushed dust away from one partially intact sigil.
The design resembled the crest of the Sovereign Dynasty from before recorded lineage.
Impossible.
The Empire's history claimed the Nether Realm had always been separate.
Corrupted.
Unreachable.
But this ruin told a different story.
A connection had existed.
A bridge.
And whatever this place once was—
It had been important enough to embed a formation that responded to the Origin Flame.
Which meant—
Lucerius did not fully understand what he had done.
Caelum laughed weakly.
Then winced from the pain.
"You sent me to die," he murmured. "But you may have sent me home."
A rumble echoed again—distant this time.
Not one creature.
Many.
The earlier explosion of power had not gone unnoticed.
His condition was critical.
His core unstable.
His hand fractured.
His ribs broken.
If another Warden arrived—
He would not survive.
He scanned the ruins quickly.
There.
At the center of the formation's faded glow—
A staircase descending underground.
Previously hidden by debris.
Now revealed.
Without hesitation, Caelum moved.
Each step sent jolts of pain through his body, but adrenaline drowned it.
He reached the stairwell and descended into darkness.
The temperature dropped sharply.
The air became thicker—but cleaner.
Less chaotic.
The stairs spiraled downward for what felt like hundreds of meters.
Finally, they opened into a vast subterranean chamber.
Caelum stopped at the threshold.
The chamber ceiling arched high overhead, embedded with crystalline veins glowing faintly gold.
At the center stood a massive circular platform.
And upon it—
A throne.
Not ornamental.
Not decorative.
Functional.
Carved from black stone veined with gold.
Behind it, etched into the wall, was a sigil he recognized from forbidden imperial archives.
The Mark of the First Sovereign.
A title erased from official history.
His pulse quickened.
As he stepped forward, the fragment inside his chest reacted again.
The throne began to glow.
Lines of energy extended outward across the chamber floor.
The air hummed.
A whisper brushed his mind.
Not a voice.
Not words.
Recognition.
His knees nearly gave out.
He caught himself against the edge of the platform.
The suppression seal in his core trembled violently.
Cracks spread further.
The fragment pulsed in rhythm with the throne's glow.
Then—
Images flooded his mind.
A war.
Heaven and Nether not separate—but unified.
A Sovereign wielding a flame both gold and black.
A betrayal.
A fracture between realms.
History rewritten.
The vision ended abruptly.
Caelum collapsed onto one knee again, gasping.
Sweat drenched his skin.
His body was at its absolute limit.
But one truth had become undeniable.
The Nether Realm was not merely exile.
It was origin.
And the power inside him—
Was not corruption.
It was restoration.
A low vibration trembled through the chamber.
Not from outside.
From the throne itself.
Responding.
Waiting.
Caelum lifted his head slowly.
"If this is a trial," he said hoarsely, "then I will claim it."
He pushed himself upright despite everything screaming in protest.
Step by step, he ascended the platform.
The closer he drew, the heavier the air became.
His fractured core throbbed painfully.
When he reached the throne, he hesitated only a moment.
Then—
He sat.
The chamber exploded with light.
Golden-black energy surged upward like a pillar piercing the earth.
Far above, in the crimson sky of the Nether Realm, clouds spiraled violently.
In the Celestial Empire, far beyond dimensional layers, the cracked heavens trembled once more.
And deep within the Imperial Sanctum—
Archon Lucerius slowly turned his head toward the horizon.
Because something he thought extinguished—
Had just ignited far brighter than before.
And this time—
It was no longer a prince.
It was something older.
Something sovereign.
And it had begun to awaken.