The sky above the city split open.Blinding streams of golden light poured down,and from that rift descended thousands of holy knights and priests.
They were not mere soldiers.They were the army of Erion—the vanguard of the gods,their blades gleaming with consecrated steel and their banners heavy with divine radiance.
At their head stood Erion Carseus.
He was no ordinary paladin.He was a vessel for divine power,the chosen agent of the God of War—a warrior whose very presence set the hearts of his knights ablaze with zeal.
"Outsiders."
His voice thundered across the city,resonating as though the heavens themselves had spoken.
"You seized a temple.You polluted the sacred order.You dared to challenge the authority of the gods."
His cold eyes narrowed.
"For those sins… your bodies will bear the judgment."
He raised his hand.
Thousands of holy knights drew their swords in unison.
The sky turned to light.Shields forged from pure sanctity floated into the air,layer upon layer, an unbreachable wall of faith and steel.
This was no mere army.This was a host sanctified by the gods themselves.
Within the city's bastion, Reyna's followers wavered.
Two choices loomed in their hearts:Would they kneel to the gods?Or stand with Reyna?
But Reyna did not waver.
Her voice cut through the trembling air:
"Are gods truly so fragile…that they must send this to maintain their power?"
The atmosphere froze.
Even Erion's brow furrowed,but his reply was unflinching.
"It is not for you to question the will of the gods."
Reyna smiled—a sharp, dangerous smile.
She extended her hand.Her sword rose,gleaming like a shard of starlight.
A signal.A declaration.
She would meet their challenge.
As Reyna shifted her stance, Lee Dohyeon quietly drew his own blade.
The Ego Sword.
And for the first time in what felt like an age,the sword woke.
Finally. Finally, I can fight again!Wield me harder. Strike fiercer. Let me taste blood!
Dohyeon's grip faltered for the briefest moment.Then, a smirk crossed his face.
"You sound excited."
The Ego Sword thrummed with a low, eager hum—
—And the battle began.
The holy knights surged forward,their blades wrapped in radiant power.Each strike carried the weight of annihilation.
Dohyeon swung his sword,clashing steel against sanctified steel,sparks and streaks of holy light scattering in every direction.
Reyna moved like a storm,her Seven-Blade Dance cutting through the ranks,each stroke a spear of killing intent.
Knights fell—but the host did not falter.
Then, Erion stepped forward.
He lifted his hand,and from the heavens a pillar of light descended,a blazing column like the wrath of the divine itself.
"Kneel before holy light!"
Reyna leapt straight into it.
Her blade tore into the radiance,meeting it head-on,light and shadow clashing in an explosion that shook the sky.
Pain seared through her flesh—burning, suffocating pain—but she did not yield.
Dohyeon moved.
He read the flow.He felt the current of divine power,and let it wash past him,turning his body just enough to slip between its strikes.
His sword swung for Erion—
And—
CLANG!
The blade struck a divine shield.
Erion's cold smile cut through the blinding light.
"You cannot defy the gods."
His sword ignited with holy brilliance.The air itself shook.
From that brilliance,a colossal angelic figure materialized above the city—a manifestation of the host's combined faith.
Dohyeon and Reyna both looked up.
This was no longer a battle of blades.It was a clash of wills.
And as the fight dragged on,Reyna grew stronger.
At first, she couldn't place the feeling.
Not merely mana replenishing,not simply her inner energy reviving.
What is this…?
She felt it.
The belief of those behind her.Not worship—not yet—but belief.
"We follow Reyna."
That conviction flowed into her,turning into strength,feeding her like a hidden river.
The laws of Elysium wrapped around her.She understood it instinctively:
Gods did not stand on their own power.They stood because of the faith given to them.
Her blade rose higher.
That belief condensed,gathering,swelling—
When she struck,her Seven-Blade Dance erupted,far more immense than ever before,a hurricane of blades and killing intent.
For the first time,the divine host hesitated.
Erion's jaw clenched.
"Impossible…"
He gathered the last of his power,his body blazing with holy light,and charged—one final, desperate strike.
Dohyeon moved with him.
He raised the Ego Sword—
and the blade screamed in delight.
More! More! Cut deeper! Strike harder!
Dohyeon swung.
The sword lashed out like a black dragon,a torrent of will and steel,ripping toward Erion.
At the same moment—
Reyna launched the final stroke of her Seven-Blade Dance.
Two blades.Two wills.
Both struck as one.
BOOM.
Light and shadow collided.Order and chaos clashed.
The impact shattered Erion's divine shield.Cracks split across his blessed sword.
He staggered,fell to one knee.
His weapon slipped from his hand and shattered on the ground.
With his last breath,he raised his head and spat out a final warning:
"…The gods will never forgive you."
And then,Erion collapsed.
The chosen agent of the God of War—defeated.
For the first time,the holy host wavered.
Faith cracked.Doubt bled in.
The silence that followed was deep enough to shake the heavens themselves.
This was the moment the war truly began.
The line between gods and mortalswas no longer just blurred—
It was broken.
***
Chapter : The Fracturing Seal – Dawn of Chaos
The city still reeled from the aftermath of battle.But barely had Lee Dohyeon and Reyna, the Heavenly Sword Demon King, defeated Erion and the divine host when a new threat surfaced.
The seal of the Titan was weakening.
This was no longer a creeping suspicion.It was reality.
One day, an unnatural scream echoed from the city's outskirts.
When Dohyeon and the followers of Æthernion rushed to investigate,they found themselves face to face with beings that should not exist.
Massive creatures with hulking forms.Monstrosities unlike anything seen in nature.Beasts that refused to die, their flesh knitting back together no matter how much magic burned them.
They were the creations of the Titan—primal lifeforms from before the age of gods.
Even Dohyeon and Reyna struggled to comprehend what they faced.
"What… are these things?"
Dohyeon tightened his grip on his sword.
The creatures neither spoke nor reasoned.They simply moved with a terrifying intent—as if trying to rewrite the world itself.
They were not "monsters" in the simple sense.These were remnants of a world before the gods overthrew the Titan,returning to reclaim the soil and sky.
Worse, they were not alone.
In the forest beyond the walls, trees began to warp.Their roots writhed like living tentacles,spreading across the ground,exuding a strange energy that made the earth itself tremble.
Reyna knelt, pressing a hand to the soil.
Her senses told her this was no mere fluctuation of mana.
"Is this… the Titan's doing?" Dohyeon asked.
Reyna nodded, her voice edged with certainty.
"Most likely. This land…I doubt it looked anything like we know before the Titan was sealed."
Arknan, the bard, arrived late, his gaze fixed on the aberrant roots.
He muttered under his breath, voice heavy:
"It's as if… an older world is trying to be reborn."
Beneath their feet, the roots burrowed deeper, spreading like veins through the soil.
Then came the hunters, sprinting back from their patrols, breathless with fear.
"The beasts… they've changed!"
Dohyeon and Reyna followed them to the hunting grounds—and what they found was worse than they expected.
The animals were mutating.
Bears had doubled in size.Wolves tore into each other in savage frenzy.
But what struck them hardest were their eyes.
These were not the eyes of mere beasts.
Something deeper, alien, had taken root.
"Their primal aggression… it's being amplified," Reyna said, moving with a predator's grace as she studied them.
Dohyeon narrowed his eyes.
"This isn't just mana twisting them.They're… becoming something else."
Arknan's voice was grim.
"Even nature itself is reverting… to what it was under the Titan's dominion.This might mean the gods' world is collapsing—and the Titan's world is rising to take its place."
Dohyeon swung his sword, cleaving through a twisted beast.
But instead of blood,a black haze seeped from the wound.
The beast's flesh knit back together.
He clenched his jaw.
"So the seal weakens, and this is what we face already?"
Dohyeon and the followers of Æthernion scrambled to respond.
They summoned mages,etching protective wards and arcane seals around the city,trying desperately to halt the Titan's creeping influence.
The new barriers were frail compared to the original divine seal,but right now,they were the only hope the city had.
The mages whispered grimly as they carved runes into the earth:
"This isn't just sealing corruption…We're holding back something's will."
Then—
Dohyeon felt it.
A pulse behind him.A shadowed presence creeping like smoke into the air.
And a whisper slipped into his ears.
「Struggle as you wish… this world will return to what it was.」
「You are nothing but insects, flailing against the inevitable.」
「What you fight is not chaos. It is fate.」
Dohyeon's eyes snapped open.
The Ego Sword in his hand stirred.
「I hear it. I hear it. What a delicious sound.」
The blade's voice trembled with hunger.It wanted the chaos.
It thrived on it.
Dohyeon tightened his grip, teeth clenched.
He forced the whispers aside.
He would not be pulled under.
No matter how inevitable they claimed this "fate" to be—
If he had the power to cut fate itself—
He would never retreat.