Chapter 161: Blood Crimson Apocalypse

Chapter 161: Chapter 161: Blood Crimson Apocalypse

Leon hit the dirt hard, the sharp gravel biting into his skin as his face twisted in a blur of pain, shock, and mounting frustration. "How do you know that?" he rasped, his voice strained as he pushed himself up just enough to glare at the intruder.

The Being didn’t so much as cast a glance in his direction. To the entity, he was nothing more than an insignificant speck on the periphery. "I didn’t come here for you, boy. Stay out of this." Its attention remained locked entirely on the young girl pinned before it. Its glare snapped back to Lazaria with terrifying focus. "I came for the daughter of the Demon King of Pride."

Slowly, Lazaria’s fingers tightened around the worn leather grip of the broadsword still buried deep within her own flesh. Her knuckles turned stark white under the pressure, but she made no sound, her jaw set in a hard, stubborn line.

The Undead Emperor leaned in closer, bringing its ghastly face near her cheek. Its voice dropped into a low, rasping whisper that sounded like dry leaves scraping over cold headstones, thick with decades of bitter, unyielding malice. "Your father turned me into this creature. I was once his most loyal subject. I served him faithfully, without question, without hesitation... and he discarded everything. He abandoned the entire Demon Realm, turned his back on his people, just to protect you and your mother. And when I came to claim what was rightfully mine, he slaughtered me. He bound my lingering soul to this rotten, dead flesh."

Its clawed grip on the cold steel tightened, callously twisting the blade slightly within the wound. A sharp gasp tore from Lazaria’s throat, but she bit her lip until it bled, refusing to give the monster the satisfaction of a full scream.

"Now I will have my vengeance," the creature whispered, its stagnant breath smelling foully of copper, dried blood, and old ash. "By gutting his precious daughter."

The creature leaned further still, until its cracked, gray lips almost grazed the shell of her ear. "Don’t worry, little one. Once you’re dead, I’ll send your father to join you in the dark."

Silence fell over the clearing like a heavy blanket.

For a long, agonizing heartbeat, Lazaria didn’t move. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t even seem to draw air into her lungs.

Then, deep within her eyes, something shifted.

The dark iris bled into a brilliant, luminous crimson, glowing with an internal fire that defied natural light. Instantly, the air around the two of them plunged into a subterranean chill so severe that the moisture in the atmosphere froze where it hung. Frost flashed across the dirt in rapid, jagged spikes, creeping over stone, grass, and broken wood like a crawling wave of white needles. The temperature plummeted so fast and so violently that the entire battlefield seemed to hold its breath, caught in the grip of an sudden, unnatural winter.

The Undead Emperor noticed the change—a fraction of a second too late.

Above them, the sky seemed to crack open. The warm afternoon sun vanished in an instant behind an unnatural, ink-black eclipse, replaced by a massive, blood-red moon that took over the heavens, bathing the academy grounds in a haunting, crimson glare.

In the staging area a short distance away, Theon looked up sharply as a translucent blue interface flickered directly into his line of sight, its text glowing with urgent priority.

> [WORLD ARCHIVE]

> Anomaly Detected.

> Protocol Activated: Blood Crimson Apocalypse

> WARNING: Extreme atmospheric distortion detected. Immediate evacuation advised for all entities within the affected radius.

>

Theon whipped his head toward Ifrith, his voice laced with panic. "What is happening to her?!"

Ifrith’s mouth curved into a slow, knowing smile that carried no fear, only deep reverence. "He woke it up."

Back in the center of the crater, Lazaria’s body began to lift off the uneven ground, floating upward into the air. The sheer, suffocating density of her emerging aura seized the heavy broadsword lodged in her shoulder, forcing the metal backward. With a sickening sound of rending metal and flesh, the aura ripped the steel clean out of her shoulder, launching it spinning across the field where it buried itself deep into a distant boulder.

A massive pressure wave blasted outward from her center. The Undead Emperor was thrown backward by the sheer force of her energy, its heavy iron boots gouging deep, torn trenches into the solid earth as it fought desperately to keep its footing.

Lazaria opened her eyes completely.

They burned with a pure, terrifying red—so vibrant and intense that they seemed to actively drink the crimson light pouring down from the blood moon above.

The creature stared up at the transformed sky, then looked back at the girl hovering in the middle of the storm. "You actually inherited it..." Disbelief twisted its ruined, decayed features, quickly hardening into raw, unadulterated horror. "You inherited your mother’s lineage... You abomination!"

Lazaria offered no reply. She didn’t need to speak.

She simply raised her right hand toward the blood-soaked heavens—and brought it down toward the earth with absolute, crushing force.

Above the thick storm clouds, an enormous hand composed entirely of condensed, swirling crimson energy manifested. It spanned the length of the arena, solidifying in a fraction of a second before descending like a falling mountain.

Theon’s voice cut through the roaring localized gale. "Everyone, pull back! Evacuate now!" He grabbed Ifrith’s shoulder, yanked him around, and pointed toward the fleeing crowds. "Get them into the air! Protect the students!"

Ifrith snapped his fingers without hesitation. Instantly, the surrounding instructors and terrified students drifted upward into the sky, wrapped in shimmering kinetic barriers that shielded their bodies from the crushing gravitational wave expanding across the ground.

The Undead Emperor looked up at the looming astral strike coming down upon its head. In that moment since the battle had begun, its glowing eyes held no arrogance, no spite, no malice—only a hollow, terrifying emptiness.

The hand struck.

The impact shuddered through the bedrock of the entire continent. The ground gave way in a catastrophic collapse, and the Undead Emperor’s physical vessel was obliterated instantly upon contact, crushed out of existence before it could even register the pain. Its dark, ancient soul was torn free from its anchor and unraveled into absolute nothingness, dissipated before a scream could form in its throat.

Where the monster had stood moments before, nothing remained but a smooth, glassy crater, its edges glowing faint red from the sheer heat of the strike.

Lazaria hovered motionless in the quiet air above the destruction, her crimson eyes staring blankly at the empty space where her tormentor had been.

When she spoke, the voice that came out was not entirely her own—it was layered with ancient authority, resonant, and ice-cold.

"Anyone who dares speak of my father that way... I will erase them."

Slowly, the towering energy surrounding her began to dissipate into the sky. She drifted downward inch by inch, until her boots lightly touched the cracked, scorched earth at the edge of the pit.

Theon watched her every move with careful, anxious eyes. Ifrith released his grip on his shoulder, stepping back to give him room.

Without a moment of hesitation, Theon sprinted toward her—only to slam directly into the violent, swirling wall of her remaining aura. High-velocity winds whipped in a continuous vortex around her, lashing at his skin, cutting small lines into his face, and threatening to hurl him backward across the crater. ℴ

He planted his feet deep into the dirt, grit his teeth against the sting of the gales, and pushed forward anyway. One painful step. Then another. The sheer pressure tore at the fabric of his uniform and threatened to crush the breath from his lungs, but he refused to yield a single inch.

"Lazaria..."

He reached her side at last. Reaching through the static electricity humming in the air, his warm hand gently closed around her freezing, trembling fingers.

Inside Lazaria’s mind, a thousand chaotic, overlapping voices were still screaming in a violent chorus.

Kill.

Destroy them all.

Rip them apart.

Kill.

A suffocating darkness swam through her consciousness like black ink dropped into clear water, drowning every rational thought, every soft memory, every last shred of who she was beneath an ocean of rage.

Then, a sudden warmth broke through the cold storm in her head. Warm, firm fingers wrapped securely around her own.

The screaming inside her head stopped instantly.

The chaotic voices shattered like thin glass, and the invading dark receded as quickly as it had arrived, pulled back into the depths of her mind.

Lazaria slowly lifted her heavy head. Glowing crimson eyes met a clear, steady, icy blue.

The harsh red light in her eyes softened, bleeding away and returning to her natural color as heavy tears welled against her dark lashes.

Her legs gave out, and she collapsed forward, throwing her arms around his neck and leaning her entire weight against him.

The exact moment her weight hit his chest, the blood moon dissolved from the sky above, fading away like a bad dream. Warm, natural sunlight flooded back over the ruined grounds. The howling gales died in a single breath, the freezing temperature leveled back out to a gentle warmth, and the crushing gravity that had flattened the earth vanished completely into the afternoon air.

Lazaria clung to him with everything she had left, her slender body trembling violently against his, her voice tiny, broken, and filled with horror. "I didn’t mean to... I’m sorry. Theon, did I hurt anyone?"

Theon wrapped his arms tightly around her back, burying his face into her shoulder as he held her steady against the shaking of her knees. "It’s okay. It’s over now. You didn’t hurt anyone. You’re okay."

She hid her face deep against his chest, sobbing quietly as the adrenaline left her body. He didn’t let go, standing firm in the middle of the ruined earth, holding her tightly until the very last trace of that terrifying, volatile aura faded away into the soft afternoon breeze.

Only then did he finally raise his head to look around at the landscape.

The battlefield was entirely wiped clean, leaving behind nothing but silence and shattered stone.

Then.....