Koramor sank into chaos like torn banners in a storm. The Demon King Army didn't target mortals; purging each rebellious group would be a mountain to move.
After the oppressed rose like brushfire, the Demon King Army seemed to grasp something, and they supported mortals resisting the gods.
The Demon King Army struck only at divine-level beings like lightning at peaks. Mortals were handled by the Demon King Army's henchmen, rebels with smoke in their eyes. War-smoke rose across the land, and the age marched toward a new horizon like a river changing course.
Following Ed's counsel, Alfred chose to wade into the mortal fray like a wolf into a fold. His god-tier power could redraw the mortal map like ink over parchment. He slipped into a resistance band like shadow at dusk, rose as their leader, and preached the Void Church like embers fanning.
In a blink, Alfred's band became the strongest among the Demon King Army's henchmen, a blade among knives.
He did it on Ed's advice, planting roots in the soil he hoped to rule. One day he'd manage this world, so he needed the people's voices like wind through bamboo.
It's like you're living steady as a field under rain; a stranger arrives claiming to be city lord, asking you to follow his banner. First thought: what clown of a lord—why meddle with my life when my days run smooth like water?
But if Alfred rides the war's tide as a poor rebel and leads the people to overturn the old, he'll be a hero like dawn. Then, when he governs, people can accept it, because the hero who toppled the old sits like a banner on the wind.
Plainly, Alfred is living among them, one of their own, like a stone in the same river. We shared hardship and battlefield dust; when I manage the world, brothers, give me face and flow with me like reeds.
That's the gist, a plan drawn like lines in sand.
Elsewhere, the Demon King Army loomed mysterious and strong, and a month ago fire burned the sky like a scar.
Alfred raised the banner of joining them, drawing restless souls like sparks who wanted a new order over old ash. They were called the Demon King Army's henchmen, but Alfred named them Children of the Void like stars under a black sky.
"All who side with the Demon King Army are Children of the Void; the great Demon King will shelter you like night."
In a single month, Alfred became a zealot, a ringing bell that gathered birds to the same branch.
The City of Dawn was the largest hive of the Demon King Army's henchmen, a riot of groups rebelling in chaos. Its strongest faction was the Hall of the Demon King, a fortress like a mountain.
Members of the Hall called themselves Children of the Void, and the Demon King Army guarded them like iron ranks.
A month ago Alfred forged the City of Dawn with divine power like a smith hammering stars. He then persuaded the Expeditionary Corps to anchor the Hall like mountains to lend prestige. The war between the Divine Realm and the Underworld wouldn't end soon; he invited them to posture, and they agreed.
Now Alfred's enterprise was rising like flame. Topple the continental titan, and the small nations would fall like ripe fruit.
He glanced at the sun; it was noon, bright as a coin. Alfred donned his coat and stepped from the Hall, to meet people who could end the strongest empire like pulling a keystone.
He could summon the Expeditionary Corps and sweep the empire like a storm. But the glory would drift to them like smoke, and Alfred needs his people's trust like roots. The fall of the titan must be done without the Corps.
Outside the walls, a flock of gryphons cut the sky like arrows.
In Koramor's mortal realms, gryphons mark the elite like crests. Only the strongest empire—the Sea Empire—can field so many, a storm of wings.
As they dismounted, Alfred greeted the core, ringed by guards like steel petals.
"Lin, Leia, and Sami—welcome to the City of Dawn!"
The three shouted in unison, "Uncle Alfred!", their voices like birds bursting from a hedge.
Lin and Leia were girls, princesses of the Sea Empire, twin blossoms. Sami was a boy, a prince, a young hawk.
Of course, that was then. Years back, when Alfred came to Koramor, he bonded with the Sea Emperor, so the three knew him like kin.
This past year, the Divine Realm went mad like a sudden squall and stripped the Sea Emperor's throne, crowning his brother. The former emperor raged, but bowed, because a god's will falls like iron.
Hearing Alfred's name again, the fallen emperor reached out in secret like a hand through fog to reclaim his crown.
Behind the three stood a middle-aged man: Mandela, the former Sea Emperor. Stripped of his throne, he still held half the empire like a net full of fish. If he spoke, at least half the court would rise like waves.
"Alfred, who knew you'd climb to this height in a few years..."
Mandela felt a pang, a sigh like wind through reeds; he didn't know Alfred's true station, only his strength.
Alfred smiled and kept his blade sheathed, gesturing for them to follow like a current drawing leaves.
He led them into the Hall of the Demon King, footsteps drumming like rain.
The Hall was vast, the largest in the City of Dawn, with fifteen statues like pillars. Each face was blurred like mist. "You've heard of the Demon King Army. Do you know its Demon Kings?"
Alfred gazed up at the statues like cliffs and asked Mandela in a level tone.
"Uncle Alfred, aren't the Demon Kings just the army's leaders?" Lin's thought rose like a kite. Alfred shook his head like a tree shedding snow.
He looked at Mandela, face grave as stone. "Think hard before you worship the Demon King. You can side with the army without worship." "As a subject, you're a citizen; as a believer, you're a devotee bound like incense to the altar."
Mandela nodded, thoughts settling like stones. To reign steady, you need a patron, a mountain at your back. If he only becomes a subject under the Demon King Army, it’s the same old sky. Under the gods, all beings are subjects like grass under wind; believers can speak to their god like pilgrims at a shrine. When other gods' edicts cut against you, you can bargain for your share like traders at noon.
"Alright. These fifteen statues stand for fifteen Demon Kings like stars." "Touch one, and it whispers from stone, telling that king's temper." "Choose the one whose nature matches yours like a mirror."
"Fifteen Demon Kings?" Mandela stared at the blurred faces like clouded moons; he had expected one, not fifteen.
In Alfred's understanding, five of the fifteen had fallen like stars into the Underworld; ten remained. Yet the First Demon King kept all statues in the Void Church's halls like empty thrones. Affairs under those seats stayed managed by former Mystic Priestesses or appointed Demon Kings.
The First Demon King believes the lost will rise from the Underworld like winter seeds waking.
Mandela set his hand on a statue; in a blink, a stream of knowledge poured into his mind like cold water.
"Lich: vicious; fond of forbidden experiments..." The image of the Lich Glenza unfurled in his head like a scroll. No name, only a title like a mask; the info was simple, with no number given. Numbers sway choices like wind; better to keep the field even.
He touched another statue, fingers brushing stone like leaves to a stream.
"Fiend of Wishes: cool-blooded; fond of flowers and trees..."
Soon, Mandela and his three children had touched every statue like travelers counting mile-stones. They gained a rough sense of the fifteen Demon Kings, like sketches on paper.
"Choose, then. Each Demon King is a banner, a faction like a color."
Mandela conferred with his children for a while like murmurs in a grove, then chose. "I choose the Blood Noble Demon King!"
The Blood Noble is Devila. Mandela's choice had roots; Alfred is Blood Kin, and only Devila among the Demon Kings is Blood Kin.
By that trail, Alfred belongs to Devila's line like a river to the sea. Mandela's move was a sideways bow, honey to the tongue.
As expected, Alfred clapped, thunder under a roof, and cheered.
"Hahaha... Mandela, brother, no more polite snow between us. When you take the Sea Empire, let it worship Devila, the Blood Noble, an empire of believers." If Devila is pleased, we may be summoned like stars to court.
As Alfred basked in his boundless future like a ship on open seas, the sky bloomed with seven-colored light.
The wind fell silent; the world thrilled like strings plucked.
"That pressure rolls from the Divine Realm like a mountain. It's a Realm God!"
In the Divine Realm, as the Expeditionary Corps ravaged like wildfire and the end neared like dusk, a mutation erupted.
A Realm God. A Creator God—names like thunder-stamps.
Koramor harbored a sleeping Creator God; all realms felt that breath like a tide bell. It was far away, but the world's message was clear: a Creator God.
Like hearing a long howl and knowing in your bones: that's a dragon's cry.
Yet you've never seen a dragon nor heard its cry, only its shape like a shadow on a wall.
"A Creator God... a Creator God! Hahaha! The Demon King Army will be erased like chalk by the Creator God!"
Someone raved; when victory seemed settled, a Creator God rose like a comet, and the gods saw hope like dawn.
In the Hall, Mandela stared at the sky with a face pale as bone.
His backing was the Demon King Army; a Creator God leaped like a tiger. If they lost, his mountain crumbled like sand.
"Alfred, what do we do? Hide now and wait to rise again like spring?" It's a Creator God. Uncertain of the army's strength, Mandela felt the tide ebbing like cold water.
Alfred blinked, then laughed, a fire bursting from the hearth. "Hahaha, Mandela, you're still young." I'll admit, the Demon King's Expeditionary Corps, Thirteenth Legion, has no Creator-level force. But the three legion commanders—now that's another sky.
As his words fell, a spear of starlight punched through the world's wall like a comet through glass.
In a haze, the crowd glimpsed a being crowned with the Genesis Crown.
Its heart was skewered by that long spear, nailed to a mountain peak like a star on cold stone.
“Starlight’s power… it’s the Starlight Angel, a halo in the dark. Even His Majesty has come…”
Whispers rose like wind through pines, fear and awe pooling like mist.
Across the World of Crystal Radiance, starlight drifted like falling petals, the sky awash in silver.
Even Ouyang hadn’t expected Bai to appear now, like thunder from a clear sky.
The three were debating who would swat that Realm God with one palm; Bai arrived in a blink, then struck like lightning.
“Ouyang, the front-line folk have all returned; everyone’s waiting for you to come back for the meeting, gathered like clouds.”
Bai had come only to deliver that message, his presence a lamp in passing; the unlucky Realm God was handled en route, like dust flicked from a sleeve.
