Silence.
The lone noise across the cracked flatlands? Just breeze skimming burnt soil - ground that'd held endless soldiers long ago. Smell of iron-rich gore mixed with sharp static, both stuck heavy in the breath.
Jade stayed right there, still as stone - black rock smeared with red mess. Blood from Korgath ran off his gear slow and heavy, splattering the dirt below. His pale strands clung to face and throat, soaked through with bright, fresh-looking red.
Next, a sound - soft but whiny - slid through the private corners of his thoughts.
Lilith murmured, low and sharp, eyes narrow. It felt sloppy... dull. You let him twitch around like a snack before dinner - why? Sun-forged skewer barely worth the effort. Stomach growled, sure. Time dragged too. One blink, his skull splits. Not just him - one look from me, whole pack howls till their throats tear. But you left me waiting. Empty chair. Silent leash.
Jade stared at the last few barbarians running away. That knife meant something, he remembered, his mind quiet even with all the blood around. Belonged to the Sun-King - cut down a rebel with it. Proves a point. Your strength? Only comes into play once words have failed.
Lilith's mind hummed with a moody warmth - yet somewhere beneath it, he sensed her reluctant okay. Show mattered to her.
A fresh noise started to grow - coming not from the foe, yet from his back.
A soft hum rose from the twenty thousand troops of the Solar Legion.
He spun around easy-like. His crew's mugs weren't lit up with hoots or glory. Skin like chalk, eyes stretched open from deep-down fear that locked their limbs stiff. Gawking at their ruler - the shadow thing who'd just sliced off a mountain-sized neck with a blade, then wiped out stacks of soldiers using nothing but one syllable.
The murmurs crept between people, almost too quiet to catch.
"By the Sun… what is he?"
"Was the King… was he always this strong?"
"That wasn't a blessing… that was a curse…"
"He didn't just win… he… he erased them."
Lord-General Valerius faced his soldiers, frozen like he'd just witnessed something impossible. Sure, he'd known about Jade's icy logic - but this? This felt like standing near a storm thrown by some vengeful deity. Not just any wrath - something deeper, shadowed. Their eyes locked, and against every instinct, the battle-worn commander twitched, barely holding back a step.
Jade's crazy smile had vanished completely. Now his face looked cold, totally still. He noticed how scared they were. It hit him like a wave, something real you could almost touch. Yet surprisingly, he didn't mind at all.
This wasn't about taking territory - more like bending wills. One didn't follow the other; this time, it was soul over soil.
He moved ahead one pace toward his troops. As he did, twenty thousand soldiers - Realmshold's finest - shifted backward without thinking, all at once.
The note got through.
He wasn't the one they looked up to like a blazing star.
He ruled them as the Void King - yet chaos only started now.
The quiet across the Sunken Plains breathed like something awake, heavy with fear and smoke-stung air. Jade remained soaked in gore, while shaky murmurs from his soldiers rang out - proof of who now held power.
Miles off, up in the tallest tower of Realmshold, hawks - touched by magic that lets them see across distances - soared into the air. Heading for the trio of warring realms they flew.
In the icy fortress of Frosthome, Kiara Frostweaver - kicked out by Jade not long ago - gazed into a glowing ball, her skin as white as the frozen walls around her. She saw it again: the shadowed ruler driving the blade home, then unleashing a surge that wiped everything away.
"The entire horde… half of it… just… gone," a trembling advisor stammered.
kiara's hands clutched the icy seat, fingers tight till they went pale. She spoke low - "It wasn't bragging," - her voice flat, bitter on her tongue. "That was a warning." Her breath caught. "We're his target now."
In the Spire of Whispers, the air buzzed - thick with secrets snatched from silence. Through a shimmering pool made of frozen light, Archmage Theron stared at what unfolded; he'd lived ages yet now his calm peeled away - not slowly but like old paint cracking under flame. What remained wasn't cold wonder anymore, instead something raw clutched at him, older than spells or names.
"That was not magic as we know it," one of his apprentices breathed. "It was… an un-making."
Theron closed his eyes, the image of the blood-soaked, white-haired king burning behind his eyelids. "He does not seek our knowledge. He will simply break down the door. Fortify the wards. Fortify everything. He is coming for us next."
In the moving desert town of sun-baked stones, clan leaders huddled near a dream-shaper. While images flashed, they watched raiders vanish into nothing. Though shadows danced, they caught terror flickering across the Legion's faces. Since tough choices ruled their lives, staying alive was what mattered most.
"The wind has changed," the eldest Chief rasped, his voice like grinding stones. "It no longer carries the scent of sand and gold. It carries blood and ozone. We cannot fight this. We cannot hide from this. He is coming for us next."
Inside Jade's head, where the throne sat, the huge icy space started humming with something different.
Claps that drag, one by one, bouncing off walls.
Alter Jade sprawled across his seat made of dark frost, grinning wildly - just like the madness Jade showed when fighting. His expression matched it exactly.
Now that," Alter-Jade murmured, tone thick with quiet pride, "felt like a real greeting." His gaze drifted across the inner world, almost as though he sensed fear crawling from city to city. "Let 'em talk. Let their bones shake. At last… you're starting to recall who we really are
In real life, planted on the gore-drenched field, just one icy grin crept onto Jade's face. Almost like he caught the sound of clapping.