Chapter 61: The Titan Beyond the Wall

Beyond the fractured perimeter of the capital, the tide of flesh broke against the stone.

The two-meter purple abominations surged forward, their clawed limbs scraping over the shattered white ramparts with a sickening, rhythmic crunch. They moved not as mindless beasts, but with an unsettling, synchronized purpose, their burning crimson eyes locking onto the helpless columns of surviving civilians. Long, jagged fangs glistened with acidic drool as their vast maws peeled open, hungry to paint the ruins in fresh blood.

CLANG!

A massive, multi-jointed claw slammed onto a mound of broken granite, crushing the stone to dust. A pair of the foul creatures vaulted over the breach, their muscular torsos glistening under the dim red light of the dying sky, their throats vibrating with a guttural, terrifying hiss.

"Arghhhh!"

Panicked screams tore through the air. The surviving commoners, those who had miraculously escaped the meteor’s kinetic blast without broken limbs, scrambled over the debris in utter disarray. Parents dragged children, merchants abandoned their bloodied packs, and the wounded crawled through the dirt, all driven by a singular, primal urge to flee toward the southern district—where the road to Lumiria lay open.

Evelyn’s blue eyes dilated as she witnessed the line collapse.

Without hesitation, she broke into a fast, low sprint, bypassing the crumbling residential blocks. Her feet kicked up clouds of hot ash as she moved toward the rear avenues where the remaining royal guards and heroes were desperately bottlenecking the refugee flow toward Ren’s domain.

"Sister! Where are you going?!" Elysia shouted, her voice laced with sudden panic as she saw Evelyn sprint straight toward the breach. She gave chase, her boots skidding across the loose rubble.

Further back, near the secondary inner gates, the surviving council ministers were huddled together like frightened livestock. Their expensive silk robes were torn, their faces pale, slick with cold sweat, their eyes darting wildly across the burning horizon.

"Hurry up! We have to save ourselves!" one senior minister stammered, his lips trembling so violently he could barely articulate the words. His hands clutched a small leather pouch of high-grade mana crystals he had managed to scavenge from his office.

The surrounding nobles nodded frantically, their eyes hollow with fear.

"But where can we even go?!" another official shrieked, wringing his hands as the ground shuddered beneath another wave of distant roars. "The entire capital is surrounded! The main gates are obliterated!"

Verion stood near the center of the group, his jaw tight, his knuckles white as he clenched his fists. The arrogant smirk that usually defined his face had vanished entirely, replaced by a grim, desperate grimace. He lowered his head, forcing down the remnant of his aristocratic pride.

"We go to Lumiria," Verion spat through gritted teeth, his tone bitter yet decisive. "There’s no other choice. Move!"

Without waiting for a formal command, Verion turned and sprinted down the southern thoroughfare, taking the bypass route that led toward the borderlands. The ministers let out collective gasps of relief and scrambled after him, abandoning all royal decorum as they shoved past injured commoners to secure their own escape.

Elysia, looking back for a split second, caught sight of the fleeing council members.

"Dammit... Those cowardly leeches!" Elysia hissed, her teeth grinding together in white-hot anger. "The second the kingdom falls, they show their true colors!"

She spat into the ash and redoubled her speed, her eyes locked onto her sister’s retreating back.

Evelyn moved like a phantom through the destruction. She utilized her innate wind element, casting subtle drafts beneath the soles of her boots to boost her momentum. She leaped effortlessly over two-meter fissures tearing through the central plaza, vaulted past smoldering stone columns, and glided over a massive, yawning crater formed by the initial impact shockwave.

All around her, the air was filled with chaos. Royal guards were shouting at the tops of their lungs, hoisting fallen beams off trapped citizens, while heroes used basic elemental barriers to buy seconds for fleeing families.

As Evelyn glided past a collapsed residential archway, her heart seized.

A young boy, no older than six, sat kneeling in a pool of dark blood, clutching the motionless hand of a woman crushed beneath a massive granite pillar. Tears washed clean lines through the soot on his cheeks as he sobbed hysterically, calling for his mother. A tired royal guard stepped in, grabbed the boy around the waist, and hoisted him up, dragging him away from the corpse while the child kicked and screamed in utter heartbreak.

Evelyn’s breath hitched. A sharp, physical ache tightened in her chest.

’So many... So many families torn apart in an instant...’

She forced her gaze forward, burying the rising sorrow beneath a wall of absolute resolve. She couldn’t break now.

She accelerated, using a sudden burst of pressurized air to propel herself over the final ridge of debris, landing squarely at the ruined front gates of the Starlight Kingdom.

What had once been an impenetrable wall of gleaming white stone was now nothing more than a jagged pile of rubble. The front perimeter was completely exposed. The royal guards had not yet established a defensive line here, leaving the forward avenue entirely unprotected.

Gathered near the base of the broken wall were dozens of elderly citizens, mothers holding infants, and injured laborers who had lacked the strength to run toward the southern gate. They cowered behind overturned wagons and cracked stone blocks, staring in paralyzed horror at the ocean of purple beasts sweeping across the outer plain.

"My daughter... Has anyone seen my little girl?!" a mother wept, her voice lost in the roaring wind as she clutched a torn piece of a child’s cloak.

An elderly merchant sat against a shattered stone pillar, staring blankly at the burning remnants of his storefront, his hands trembling violently. "Everything... Decades of work... Gone in a second..."

Beside them, a young orphaned boy held his weeping little sister close, wrapping his bruised arms around her shoulders. He stared out at the approaching horde, his eyes wide, hollow, and devoid of hope. He didn’t scream. He didn’t run. He simply drew his sister tighter against his chest, as if accepting that their lives were about to end right here in the ash.

The absolute resignation in their eyes struck Evelyn harder than any physical blow.

Her right hand squeezed into a tight fist, her nails digging into her palm until her skin turned pale.

’I won’t let them die here.’

Evelyn stepped forward, taking a deep, controlled breath. Her sapphire eyes snapped shut for a brief second.

When she opened them, her pupils glowed with an incandescent, brilliant azure light.

Slowly, her body drifted upward, defying gravity as a dense, high-frequency aura of wind mana erupted from her core. The hem of her dark blue off-shoulder gown whipped wildly in the violent draft, her dark hair, tipped with blue gradients, billowing around her face like a storm veil.

The fleeing citizens below looked up in awe, their tear-streaked faces illuminated by the harsh blue light radiating from the hovering princess.

Evelyn raised her right hand, extending two fingers toward the sky.

’Skyblade Technique: Dominion of the Sovereign.’

The atmospheric pressure directly above her exploded. Spatial ripples distorted the dim red sky as hundreds—then thousands—of radiant blue etheric blades materialized out of thin air. The glowing swords lined up in dense, military formations behind her back, their edges humming with high-frequency wind pressure and crackling blue lightning.

Evelyn brought her two fingers down in a swift, decisive slashing motion.

"Fall!"

SWOOSH! SWOOSH! SWOOSH!

The sky rained steel and lightning.

The vast array of etheric blades plummeted with terrifying velocity, driven by compressed air currents. The blue constructs slammed directly into the forward ranks of the advancing Aberrant horde, skewering the two-meter purple beasts to the scorched earth.

Blade after blade plunged into torsos, limbs, and shoulders. The sheer kinetic force tore the front ranks into pieces, severing limbs and pulverizing purple hide into sickening, violet gore.

Yet, the horrors of the ancient strain immediately manifested.

The mutilated flesh wriggled. Severed limbs sprouted fine black filaments, pulling themselves back toward the main bodies. Decapitated torsos regenerated their heads in seconds, their glowing red eyes reopening with unholy vitality. The beasts instinctively raised their thick, armored forearms to guard their lower throats, deflecting the etheric blades that targeted their core nexus.

They roared, their razor-sharp fangs snapping as they continued their relentless advance over the corpses of their own regenerated kin.

Evelyn’s brow pinched.

’They’re guarding their cores... Their survival instincts are far sharper than modern Aberrants. Mutilation won’t stop them.’

She knew that attempting to obliterate this endless horde single-handedly would drain her mana reserves within minutes, leaving her completely helpless. She didn’t need to eradicate them all—she just needed to buy time.

She looked back over her shoulder. The royal guards and heroes were moving fast, carrying the remaining wounded out of the forward district.

’Just a little longer... I need to hold the line until the evacuation reaches Lumiria.’

Evelyn drew another ragged breath, raising both hands into the air, her two fingers pointed directly toward the zenith.

"Skyblade Barrier: Seven Pillars of the Firmament!"

THOOM! THOOM! THOOM!

Seven colossal blue broadswords—each thirty meters tall and forged from super-compressed wind mana—pierced through the low-hanging cloud cover. They slammed into the earth in a precise arc right along the ruined perimeter of the front gate, embedding deep into the bedrock.

Instantly, arc-lighting flared between the massive hilts. A dense wall of pressurized wind currents and high-voltage blue electricity spanned the gaps between the giant blades, creating an impenetrable spatial fence across the breach.

The leading waves of purple abominations slammed directly into the barrier.

ZAPPPP!

The high-frequency wind shear shredded their outer hides, while the lightning currents blasted their bodies backward, launching them into the air like broken dolls.

Evelyn descended back to the ground, her boots touching the ash. Her chest heaved violently as sweat trickled down her neck. Her lungs burned from the mana strain.

"Ha... Ha... Ha..."

Her knees buckled slightly, but she forced herself to stand upright, leaning heavily on her willpower.

"Sister!"

Elysia dropped to her knees beside her, catching Evelyn’s shoulder to support her weight. Kael, the Hero Commander, arrived a second later, his longsword drawn, his body covered in soot.

"Princess Evelyn! Are you alright?!" Kael asked anxiously, her eyes checking her princess for injuries.

Evelyn shook her head weakly. "I’m fine... Just a burst of mana strain."

Kael looked out through the gaps between the giant blue blades, watching dozens of purple beasts bounce off the lightning fence in a shower of sparks and black blood. His face was grim, his jaw tight.

"Damn it... Where did this many Aberrants even come from?!" Kael hissed, his voice laced with suppressed desperation. "They’ve completely encircled the kingdom, Princess! We’re trapped in a localized siege!"

"I know," Evelyn rasped, her voice tight. "That’s why we can’t stop moving. Focus entirely on guiding the civilians through the southern passage. Clear the road to Lumiria!"

Kael struck his chest armor with his right fist, his eyes burning with grim devotion. "Understood! The Hero Corps will hold the perimeter until the last citizen crosses the border!"

Suddenly, the ground beneath their feet didn’t just shake—it violently lurched.

RUMBLEEEEE!

The shockwave was so severe that several royal guards were thrown off their feet, tumbling across the stone debris. Elysia stumbled, grabbing Evelyn’s arm to keep them both from falling, while Kael pitched forward, digging the tip of his longsword into a granite fissure to anchor himself.

"What now?!" Elysia shouted, struggling to maintain her balance.

DUM. DUM. DUM.

A slow, rhythmic pounding echoed from beyond the barrier—a sound so heavy that each thud compressed the air in their lungs, rattling their teeth.

Out beyond the perimeter, the vast sea of two-meter purple beasts suddenly halted their assault. Like obedient cattle yielding to a apex predator, the endless horde parted down the middle, creating a massive, hundred-meter-wide lane through their ranks.

From the dark depths of the outer plain, a monstrosity stepped into the dim crimson light.

It stood eighteen meters tall—its terrifying frame easily towering over the thirty-meter giant blades of Evelyn’s barrier.

The creature was a grotesque, abhorrent fusion of mutated flesh and decaying bone. Its skin was a sickly, bruised purple, covered in oozing, black pustules that dripped corrosive bile onto the earth, dissolving the stone with a loud hiss. Its head was a elongated, nightmare skull with no nose or ears—only four massive, burning crimson eyes arranged in a vertical stack down its snout.

When it peeled its jaws open, its mouth split into four distinct mandibles, revealing thousands of needle-like teeth coated in foul, black sludge. A nauseating, rotten stench swept over the wall, instanting causing several guards to gag.

It was a walking biological horror—a Titan-class Aberrant from the primordial era.

Evelyn, Elysia, and Kael froze. The air in their lungs turned to ice.

"What... What is that thing...?" Kael whispered, his voice trembling uncontrollably as he stared up at the towering shadow.

Elysia took a involuntary step back, her knuckles white around the hilt of her dagger. "It’s... It’s huge..."

Evelyn’s pupils shuddered. Her heart hammered violently against her ribs, a cold, instinctual terror gripping her soul.

In all her years of fighting monsters, in all the dark fantasy chronicles preserved in the royal vault, she had never seen an Aberrant so deeply repulsive, so inherently unnatural. Its sheer presence didn’t just threaten their lives—it crushed the faint spark of hope they had just managed to ignite.

GRAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

The eighteen-meter Titan threw its head back and emitted an apocalyptic roar.

The soundwave shattered the remaining glass panes in the distant palace spires miles away. The sheer acoustic force slammed into the survivors like a physical wall, causing hundreds of civilians to clap their hands over their bleeding ears, weeping in sheer agony.

The Titan settled its four burning red eyes onto the giant blue blades blocking its path.

It bent its massive, muscular legs, its heavy claws digging deep into the earth as it assumed a terrifying charging stance.

Evelyn’s breath caught in her throat. Her blood ran cold.

"No... It can’t be..." she whispered, stepping back into the ash.

Her barrier was built to repel low-to-mid-tier swarms—it was never designed to absorb the full kinetic impact of an eighteen-meter Siege-type nightmare. If that thing struck the line, the barrier wouldn’t just break; the resulting mana feedback would tear her soul apart.