The sky above Andrada was burning.
Cracks of crimson lightning split the heavens apart like jagged scars across flesh. Every few seconds the sky tore open again, spilling rivers of fire that crashed into the ruined cities below. Towers collapsed like brittle bones. Streets that once held markets and crowds were now oceans of ash.
The continent was ending.
And at the center of the shattered battlefield stood a man who had never been meant to fight in a war like this.
Professor Lucien Vale.
His academy coat, once pristine black with silver runic embroidery, hung in torn strips around his shoulders. Ash clung to the fabric. Blood had dried across one sleeve. The elegant runes that once glowed with controlled mana now flickered faintly, exhausted after hours of relentless spellcasting.
Lucien slowly exhaled. His mana reserves were nearly empty. His hands trembled slightly as he forced another spell structure into place.
"Hold the barrier!" someone shouted behind him.
Lucien didn't look back. He already knew the voice.
Aiden Stormfall. The Future Lightning Archmage, or at least… that was what the prophecy used to say.
Right now, Aiden stood twenty meters behind Lucien, barely able to remain upright. Lightning flickered weakly across his arms like dying sparks. Blood ran down from a cut on his forehead, dripping onto the shattered stone beneath his boots.
Around him stood several others. His former students.
Legends that history books were supposed to praise for centuries but right now they looked like survivors of a massacre.
Cecilia Ravenhart knelt beside a collapsed barrier formation, clutching what remained of her shattered staff. Frost gathered weakly around her fingertips, but the ice magic sputtered out before it could fully form.
A few steps away, Marcus Ironwall leaned heavily against a broken shield, his heavy armor cracked in several places. The so-called future "Shield of the Empire" looked like he could barely lift his weapon anymore.
These were the heroes history was supposed to remember but right now they could barely stand.
Lucien raised his hand slowly.
Blue mana gathered around his fingers as he began tracing a complex geometric pattern in the air. Thin glowing lines intersected and rotated, forming a floating lattice above the battlefield.
A spell circle but not a normal one. Lucien Vale never used normal spells.
"Arcane Synthesis…" he murmured quietly. The lattice then trembled. Wind mana flowed into the structure first, spinning into tight spirals within the rotating lines, then lightning.
Crackling strands of electricity fused into the framework, creating unstable arcs that danced across the spell matrix.
'Still not enough' Lucien narrowed his eyes
He reached outward with his senses, grabbing fragments of abandoned magic lingering across the battlefield.
A shattered earth barrier nearby, a half-destroyed fire bombardment spell from a fallen battle mage. Even a fragment of holy magic leaking from a broken priest formation.
All of it was dragged into the lattice, the structure groaned.
Different mana attributes violently rejected each other, twisting and grinding against incompatible formulas.
Anyone else attempting something like this would have detonated themselves instantly, but Lucien simply adjusted the equations.
He rewrote the spell faster than most mages could even understand it. The lattice stabilized.
"Arcane Magic: Heavenfall Cataclysm" Lucien's voice fell like a quiet verdict.
For a heartbeat, the battlefield froze.
Then the sky broke.
The massive spell circle blazing above the battlefield detonated with blinding light, its runes spinning violently as if the heavens themselves had been torn open.
The earth roared, a storm of destruction descended.
Blades of compressed wind screamed through the air while pillars of lightning crashed down like the wrath of a furious god. Each strike carved deep scars across the battlefield, tearing through advancing demon ranks and shredding armored bodies as if they were made of paper.
Demons didn't even have time to scream. Lightning vaporized them where they stood.
Hurricane winds ripped others from the ground, flinging broken corpses across the ruined plains. Armor shattered. Flesh burned. Black blood sprayed across the scorched earth.
The army that had marched forward moments ago simply vanished beneath the storm. Thousands of demons died in seconds .
But the battlefield beyond the storm told a different story.
More demons. Endless.
'So even this isn't enough' Lucien exhaled slowly.
There were still thousands more.
The horizon was black with them.
An endless tide of demons marching across the broken earth.
"Professor…" someone whispered.
Lucien glanced sideways.
Cecilia Ravenhart stared up at him, her pale face streaked with soot and tears. She looked nothing like the legendary Ice Queen the northern kingdoms would someday fear.
Right now she was just like everyone, a delicate girl.
Her hands trembling, her staff snapped in half beside her.
"Are we going to die?" she asked quietly.
Lucien didn't answer. Because the answer was obvious.
The demon army advanced slowly across the plains, their monstrous silhouettes illuminated by burning cities behind them. Massive creatures lumbered forward beside smaller, faster hunters that crawled across the ground like insects.
But the true horror wasn't the army, it was what stood behind them.
Lucien lifted his gaze.
Far above the battlefield, towering beyond the burning sky, reality itself had been torn open.
A demon summoning gate the size of a mountain.
A massive circular fracture hanging in the air like a wound in the world, dark energy poured from it like smoke. The air around the gate screamed as reality struggled to hold itself together. The cult had succeeded.
Lucien watched the swirling darkness for several seconds.
Ten years since he had first begun teaching at the Imperial Magic Academy.
Guiding arrogant prodigies who believed talent alone would save the world.
Correcting their reckless spell structures.
Watching idiots slowly grow into legends.
And now the world was ending
"Professor!" Aiden suddenly shouted.
Lucien turned his head. A massive demon eight meters tall had broken through the storm formation, four thick arms ending in jagged claws. The creature towered over the battlefield. Black armor plates had grown directly from its flesh, forming a natural carapace stronger than enchanted steel.
"A high-rank war demon" he murmured
Even archmages struggled to kill creatures like this. Lucien studied it calmly, then he sighed.
"You're late," he muttered.
The demon roared, it charged forward, each step cracking the stone beneath its feet.
Lucien raised two fingers. Mana surged through his exhausted circuits.
"Storm Prison"
Lightning chains erupted from the ground.
They snapped around the demon's limbs like living serpents, tightening instantly. At the same time, compressed wind barriers slammed inward from every direction, forming an invisible cage.
For a brief moment he monster stopped moving. Its muscles strained against the chains. The air around it shrieked under the pressure of the wind prison.
Then it roared again, the chains shattered. Wind barriers exploded outward.
Lucien closed his eyes "Of course it did."
The demon raised one massive arm. Its claws came down like a falling guillotine, and before it could strike a blade pierced its chest.
Lucien blinked.
The demon froze. A young woman stood behind it.
A black cloak draped over her shoulders, daggers resting quietly at her waist.Silver eyes shimmered beneath the shadow of her hood, eyes so cold that a single glance felt like a blade against the throat.
"Elena Moonveil" he said softly
Leader of the continent's deadliest assassin organization. She twisted the dagger inside the demon's heart.
The creature convulsed violently. Then it collapsed, shaking the ground as its massive body crashed into the ruined battlefield.
Lucien stared at her.
"You're supposed to be dead," he said flatly.
Elena wiped black blood from her blade.
"I get that a lot." A faint smile curved across her lips.
Lucien rubbed his forehead.
"Wonderful. Even death schedules are being ignored today."
Before Elena could respond, the sky split open, and a pillar of black light descended from the demon gate.
The battlefield froze...every mage present felt it instantly.
An ancient pressure descended across the plains, suffocating the air itself. Mana trembled. Spell circles flickered and collapsed.
Something was coming through the gate, far worse than the army.
Cecilia gasped.
Aiden's lightning vanished completely.
Even Marcus dropped his shield as his knees buckled.
Lucien looked up. The black pillar expanded.
Within it, a colossal silhouette slowly emerged.
Horns.
Wings.
A body made from condensed darkness.
The pressure intensified, a demon lord. Not just a demon lord but one of the rulers of the Abyss.
It was arriving personally. Lucien watched the descending figure for several seconds, then he sighed again.
"...Ah, so this is the end." he said quietly.
The others stared at him.
"Professor…?" Cecilia whispered.
Lucien didn't respond immediately. Instead he looked at each of them.
Aiden, Cecilia, Marcus, then to Elena
Children he had spent a year teaching at the academy, preparing them for something just like this to happen and somehow… they had still arrived here too early.
Lucien chuckled softly "…What a disaster."
The demon lord's voice echoed across the sky.
"Mortals. You fought well" The word alone cracked the ground.
Lucien tilted his head.
"Oh god, It talks." " he muttered.
The demon lord extended one clawed hand. Dark mana gathered.
'Planetary-level destruction magic' Lucien felt the spell forming instantly.
Something that could erase the entire battlefield in seconds.
He glanced behind him. His students couldn't even stand anymore.
"Alright," Lucien sighed. His hands rose again. Mana that should not exist gathered around him. Not from within him but from everywhere.
Broken spells.
Shattered formations.
Residual battlefield mana.
All of it flowed toward Lucien like rivers returning to the ocean.
Elena's eyes widened. "Professor… what are you doing?"
"Correcting a mistake" Lucien smiled faintly.
The air trembled, above him, a massive spell circle slowly formed in the sky. At first there were only a few runes. Then more appeared. Dozens… hundreds… thousands. Ancient symbols spread across the air like a glowing map, each one turning in quiet harmony.
Layers of magic overlapped, forming rings within rings. No modern mage could read those runes, no one alive could even understand the spell being cast.
The sky dimmed as the magic gathered.
Across the battlefield, soldiers and demons alike fell silent. Even the wind seemed to stop.
The Demon Lord paused, for the first time since the battle began, his expression changed.
Lucien lifted his hand slightly, his voice calm but heavy with power. Lucien finished the final rune, then he whispered one last sentence.
"Arcane Magic… Astral Ruination"
The spell activated.
Light swallowed the battlefield.
And the world disappeared.