Titan King: Ascension of the Giant-Chapter 810: The Ultimate Sacrifice

With a sigh, Orion moved to Leonidas’s side, and together, they stood behind Arthas like disciplined soldiers.

A cold light flickered in Arthas’s eyes, a light that seemed capable of freezing the very soul. He reached out and gripped his greatsword of bone. The runes etched upon it flared, and a ball of ghostly green fire ignited along the blade, lending his already formidable presence a deeply sinister air.

"You. Die."

Arthas spoke the words calmly, but his voice carried the crushing weight of a thousand crypts. In that moment, Orion could almost hear the whispers and howls of countless undead spirits swirling around their king, an aura of infinite dread and darkness made manifest.

The sky above them filled with spectral, phantasmal shapes, all bowing in silent homage to the Skeleton King.

On the mountain battlefield below, the Silver-Eyed soldiers, who moments before had been prostrate in pious prayer, now began to tremble uncontrollably, as if they were witnessing a horror beyond their comprehension.

The arrival of Arthas, this newly ascended demigod, was like the coming of a fatal plague—a plague against which they had no defense, and from which there was no escape.

Arthas swung his blade.

A river of black light, so absolute it seemed to devour the very concept of color, shot forth. The demigod phantom, the same being that had effortlessly imprisoned Orion and Leonidas, was simply erased, vanishing into nothingness within the black sword-light.

The pillar of holy radiance that had descended from the heavens was instantly extinguished.

Such was a casual blow from a true demigod. A mere projection was a thing he could snuff out with a wave of his hand.

Orion and Leonidas exchanged a look, their eyes filled with a mixture of astonishment and a bitter, shared understanding.

Orion could accept it; he was a newly minted Archlord, with a long road ahead before he could even dream of demigod status. But in Leonidas’s eyes, Orion saw a distinct, painful sourness.

"Bloody hells," the dragon muttered under his breath. "The gap just keeps getting wider."

But after dispatching the phantom, Arthas did not relax. He lifted his gaze to the heavens, as if he could feel something there, watching him.

"Come, if you have the courage."

A tremor ran through Arthas’s body. With a groan of shifting bone, his armor transformed, locking into a combat configuration. A dense web of golden runes blazed to life across its surface, flowing down his right arm and into his greatsword, where they coalesced into a single, mysterious golden sigil.

He swung his sword again. Two beams of light, one of gold and one of black, shot upward like twin dragons, streaking toward the heavens to deliver their judgment. A few moments later, a faint, tearing sound, like immense canvases being ripped apart, echoed from the sky.

Three minutes later, the heavens were calm once more. All was as it had been. frёeωebɳovel.com

Arthas stood in the void, flanked by Orion and Leonidas. The three of them looked down upon the battlefield like gods. With just two swings of his sword, Arthas had completely reversed their fortunes.

"Arthas, when did you awaken?" Leonidas asked, his tone shifting from awe to urgency. "And the Deputy Commander—he’s trapped within a sealing formation. Can you do anything to help him?"

"I have already communicated with the Deputy Commander," Arthas’s dry voice replied. "He is unharmed. Merely contained. Their intention was only to restrict our key players, not to initiate open war."

Orion’s ears pricked up. Arthas had said our key players, plural. It was clear the natives of the Emerald Veil had targeted more than just the Deputy Commander.

"Hahahaha! Well, now that you’re here, it’s just like the old days!" Leonidas boomed, his good cheer returning. "You take command. We’ll all listen to you. You say jump, we ask how high."

With a demigod like Arthas leading them, the allied forces had never been in a stronger position.

But just then, the world changed.

In an instant, the Emerald Veil was plunged into absolute, perfect darkness. The sun, the moons, the stars—all vanished. Any source of light was extinguished. Even creatures that were naturally bioluminescent found their glow smothered, unable to penetrate the oppressive, ink-black shroud.

"Arthas, what’s happening?"

"Brother!"

Orion and Leonidas both cried out, their voices sharp with alarm as they turned to their friend for answers.

"Stay behind me. Do not move." Arthas’s voice was a steady anchor in the sudden chaos. "I do not know what this is. It feels as if the very rules of this realm are changing."

He waved his greatsword, and its ghostly green fire flared to life, pushing back the oppressive dark and casting the Ashenfang Traverse in its eerie, verdant glow.

"Annihilate them," Arthas commanded.

As if his words were a divine edict, the legions of undead on the mountain below roared as one. The stalled battle erupted anew, a fresh wave of slaughter unleashed in the sudden, terrifying night.

Orion and Leonidas asked no further questions. For Arthas to act so decisively, he must have seen or sensed something they could not.

In an unknown space within the Emerald Veil.

Here was the Source of All Things, the very heart of the world. At this moment, the world’s core pulsed within a defensive barrier of absolute light, a fortress against which the encroaching, infinite darkness could not prevail.

"What do you think you are doing?" an ancient, evil voice echoed from the dark. It had no source, no form, no location.

"What am I doing?" A majestic, unyielding voice answered from within the light. "Can you not see?"

"I intend to give the Emerald Veil hope. I intend to shatter your mad dream of devouring everything. I will bring light to the darkness, and grant this world a new birth."

If Orion had been there, he would have recognized the voice as that of the demigod Valthor. The voice from the darkness belonged to his eternal enemy, the fell demigod, Tusha.

"It is useless," Tusha’s voice was not filled with evil glee or insane rage, but with the calm, unassailable confidence of one who holds a winning hand. "Darkness will inevitably consume this world. The seeds of evil have already sprouted everywhere. This world’s fate is to be destroyed."

"No. You are wrong," Valthor declared from within his sanctuary of light, and the light flared, pushing the darkness back once more. "I will become the light of this world."

"I burn my body!"

"I sacrifice my soul!"

"I merge my will!"

"With faith as the medium, and spirit as the guide, I shall become one with this world! Fuse!"

Valthor’s fearless, defiant invocation thundered through the void. And in that moment, the evil demigod Tusha finally understood.

"You are insane!" Tusha shrieked, his composure finally shattering. "You would sacrifice yourself? Merge your own being into the fundamental rules of the world, all to empower those insignificant mortals? Your consciousness will be obliterated! You gain nothing from this! Don’t you understand that?"

Tusha was panicking.

When Orion had taken the Spring of Life from this realm, he had inadvertently created a deficiency in its fundamental rules. Valthor, in his desperation, had seized upon this flaw. He had devised a plan to save the Emerald Veil through the ultimate sacrifice—a plan Tusha had never, ever conceived of.