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The Wear of Sparks Empire had begun.
Along the western border, where ancient stone met silent skies, stood a titanic wall — the Monster Wall.
Originally built by the first emperor of the Araclo Empire during the Crimson Unification Wars, it was meant to keep the wild and powerful beastmen tribes sealed beyond. For centuries, it served as a boundary between civilization and untamed savagery. But the tides of power had shifted.
After the Topis family led a rebellion with secret support from the Lexatric Kingdom, the wall had changed hands. The Topis, once a minor noble house, rose to become Counts during the infamous Pale Wars, fending off a siege with an impossible one-to-twenty force disparity — a feat still whispered about in military academies. Their reward was the founding of a new empire, a puppet state propped up by Lexatric's gold and strategy: the Sparks Empire.
The reason behind such heavy investment was strategic. With the Topis family holding the Monster Wall, the Lexatric Kingdom would no longer need to breach its impossible defenses during their recurrent wars with Araclo. The wall became a buffer — and a knife held close to the heart of Araclo.
At least that was the intention of lexatric kingdom, who would have thought that the new emperor of sparks empire was a man who looked simple and honest but was actually a devil, actually having the audacity to say that he didn't remember those puppet state terms and going back on his promise.
Now, the enemy was no longer beastmen.
The wall faced a greater threat.
Noid Undead.
Soulless, rotting creatures risen in mass, they had swarmed through corrupted lands and severed the Monster Wall from its closest kingdom, distorting territorial borders.
The full might of the Sparks Empire had been rallied.
Millions of troops lined the ramparts.
They were less refined than the beastmen armies of old, but numbers made up for quality. The formation was clear, almost mechanical in structure — a necessity, not an art.
At the front, archers stood tight in lines, condensing mana into arrows. With each volley, their flaming tips tore through the undead tide below, opening gaping holes that closed within seconds. For every hundred archers stood a Seed Mage — mages with 1 to 10 magic beads — commanding volleys and casting area spells that exploded bones and turned undead siege engines to black dust.
Beneath them, arranged like chess pieces, were 1,000 militia and 20 elite warriors per Seed Mage, tasked with executing any Noid who breached the walls.
Among the Seed Mages stood Leo and Arnold.
Leo's fists trembled slightly — not out of fear, but unease.
His flame attribute, though ordinary, had begun to evolve into something more — a manifestation now flickering with hints of golden brilliance: the Flames of Honour. But evolution brought visibility. And visibility meant danger.
He had never wanted to be here.
Who would want to fight the undead — beings immune to reason, immune to pain?
But Leo had no choice.
The Arcane Academy was under the empire's control, and all students were conscripted to gain "real combat experience." The mortality rate? A cheery 70%.
He could've refused.
But his grandfather, an old war hero who once fought in the Pale Wars alongside the Topis family, had signed the papers for him.
"You'll walk my path. You'll survive it like I did," he had said.
So Leo came.
And beside him was Arnold — exasperating, egotistical, and possibly insane.
Arnold, bearer of the Thought attribute, was once the rising leader of a cult. His ideas were "destabilizing," and destabilizers had no place behind the front lines. The Church had begun purging them, using the authority given by the empire during this extraordinary time to root out threats to the church's rule.
Arnold, being Arnold, fled.
"Where else but the frontlines?" he had laughed. "If I die, I'll be ressurect in my younger self, probably. If I live, I'll get a legacy. Someone important's going to die, and I'll inherit their secret martial art or legendary bead or something. I'm clearly the protagonist of this world!" (yes people, he likes reading novels).
The only good news?
The two had visited the Internet Café before their conscription.
The Boss, ever enigmatic, had assured them that as long as they had their Arc Phones, they could access the World of Honour of Blade. Their login fees would be deducted automatically, even from the battlefield.
A strange comfort.
But they barely had time to think.
The sky had turned ash gray.
And from the depths of the horizon came the enemy.
---
The Battle Begins
It started with silence.
Then came the bellows of horns from the Noid horde — war-cries made from broken throats and rotted lungs. Thousands of undead surged forth, a tide of claw and bone. Siege beasts — stitched-together corpses of monsters and men — crawled and rolled, pushing decayed towers that vomited corpses into the sky.
Arrows flew.
Spells burst.
The wall groaned under the weight of war.
Leo, sweat running down his brow, pointed toward the cluster of bone giants. "Right sector — formation shift! Rain the beadfire!"
The archers under his command loosed in perfect rhythm. His own flames roared from the tip of his condensed bead, spiraling through the air. The blast caught the giant in its center and exploded, scattering it into flaming fragments.
Arnold, a few platforms away, merely yawned. "Such brute methods," he muttered. He closed his eyes, and a Thought Lance — an invisible projection of his sharpened will — speared through three undead mages attempting to summon a plague mist.
And yet... they kept coming.
Wave after wave.
After six hours, the walls were drenched in ichor. Thousands had died already, and the ground below was a carpet of bones and twitching limbs.
Leo dropped to one knee, panting. His beads were running dry. He'd used more than half of them.
Arnold appeared beside him, covered in grime, still grinning.
"Looks like I won today's kill count," he said, raising his hand.
Leo didn't respond. His eyes were locked on the horizon.
Something massive moved beyond the enemy ranks.
Something... tall.
Something watching.
But the wall still stood.
They had held the line.
For today.
---
(Author's note, new release schedule)
( 1 chapter per two days, and extra per 5 powerstones in one day)
(On sunday, it will be none, if novel gains 2 collection in one day, one extra chapter will be rewarded)
(Yes readers, your author has effectively become a capitalist)