Chapter 312: Legend of Taranis El Thunderbane

“W-what was that monstrous roar?” Rhaegar muttered, stepping in front of Kharos to shield him.

“A… att… Attack! Kill him this instant!” the emperor commanded, fear unmistakable in his voice.

Heeding the order, fifty Royal Knights, each at the peak of the True Sage Realm, along with six representatives of the empire at the early stage of the Eternal Sage Realm, rushed toward Taranis. At that moment, he no longer resembled a human, but rather a divine being, a force of nature incarnate.

Before they could even reach him, Taranis reached them.

He vanished from his position, leaving a trail of crackling lightning behind.

It was not teleportation. His speed had become so overwhelming that the empire’s warriors could not even perceive his movement.

He appeared before them in an instant. His jagged claw thrust forward in a stabbing motion, lightning crackling wildly around his hand.

The moment his hand halted, a terrifyingly massive surge of golden lightning erupted forward, as if a dam restraining an ocean had suddenly shattered.

Gritting their teeth, the warriors summoned massive metallic shields from their spatial rings and interlocked them together, forming a towering barrier before the incoming wave of lightning.

The wave struck the barrier.

And something absurd happened.

Reality fractured!

A phenomenon that should only occur when High-Tier Cultivators clashed was unleashed by Taranis with a mere wave of his hand.

The shields held for barely a fraction of a second before shattering apart, opening the path for the tsunami of pure lightning Soulforce to surge forward.

The instant the attack landed, a violent eruption followed. Debris and dust were hurled in every direction as the massive wall of the Sentinel Line trembled violently, its cracks spreading faster and wider.

As the dust settled, the scene revealed True Sages missing limbs or suffering horrific burns from the lightning’s scorch, while even the Eternal Sages bore visible injuries.

“I-it was a mistake,” one of the knights muttered, his arm severed, his face twisted in utter terror. “W-we have angered a god and unleashed the wrath of the heavens upon ourselves.”

“Stop spouting nonsense and attack him!” another shouted, gritting his teeth through the pain. “He is only one man!”

The Eternal Sages understood then.

The being before them was not a young god.

He was a catastrophe walking upon the earth.

Though it was humiliating to face a child barely five years old, and even worse to attack him as a group, they swallowed their pride and stopped holding back.

The Sentinel Line once again became a battlefield, far crueler and far more merciless than the war against demons. The strongest warriors of the Azure Sun Empire ganged up on a single child.

Yet that same child dominated them through sheer brute force.

Every strike he delivered carried the power of a High-Tier Cultivator, each blow capable of gravely injuring even an Eternal Sage.

His golden slit pupils darted across the battlefield, and their gaze alone sent waves of terror through the empire’s warriors.

His roars carried raw, unfiltered fury, while tears of agony streamed down his cheeks.

The heavens roared when Taranis roared.

The heavens wept when his tears struck the ground.

Lightning descended whenever his body was wounded.

His heart pounded like war drums. His vision dulled. His hearing grew distant. Every muscle in his body screamed for rest.

Yet the child of the heavens did not stop fighting. Not until he kill the bastard who had dared taken his mother from him.

His terrifying gaze was fixed on Emperor Kharos as he fought his way through the army, every movement forcing him closer to his target.

The Emperor of the Azure Sun Empire, a man who had always stood above all others, who had never bowed to anyone, never feared anyone, and never lost his composure, now felt his hands tremble uncontrollably as the half-dead child carved through his strongest warriors and fixed him with a deathly stare.

It did not take long for the fury-driven Taranis to break through the encirclement of the empire’s forces and arrive before him.

The Emperor, despite the alien sensation of fear gripping his heart, tightened his hold on his sword and prepared himself to fight.

As Taranis closed the distance, a sharp bolt of unrestrained golden lightning materialized in his hand, bending the air around it.

With terrifying speed, Taranis began swinging the bolt, each motion accompanied by ear-deafening thunder.

The Emperor’s amber eyes began to glow as he wrapped his sword in Soulforce and moved to defend himself against Taranis’s life-threatening assault.

Each clash sent violent jolts of shock and electricity through the Emperor’s arm, and he quickly found himself being overwhelmed.

At the same time, several of the empire’s warriors attacked Taranis from behind in desperation, hoping to divert his attention away from their Emperor.

Taranis paid them no heed and continued his merciless barrage.

Blood poured uncontrollably from Taranis’s mouth. His sharp claws began reverting to normal, and the pupils in his eyes struggled to return to their original form.

This was inevitable.

Taranis had expended every last fragment of his Soulforce, along with the very Tree of Divinity, to temporarily suppress the shackles and summon this bizarre, unknown power.

Yet he gritted his teeth and, with one final strike, shattered the Emperor’s blade.

Without the slightest hesitation, he raised the lightning bolt again, this time fully focused on the now-unarmed Emperor.

Visible dread and terror spread across the Emperor’s face as he saw his life flash before his eyes.

Just as the bolt was about to pierce him, a loud voice rang out from behind.

“Make another move and I will kill her!” Rhaegar shouted, holding Nymeria by the throat, his sword aimed at her chest.

For the first time since the battle began, Taranis hesitated.

“Just kill him, Taranis!” Nymeria screamed, her eyes blazing with fury. “Don’t worry about me! Avenge Mother and Father!”

“Shut your mouth, you damn woman!” Rhaegar snarled, tightening his grip around Nymeria’s neck.

Her pale face turned red as crimson veins spread through her beautiful, cream-colored eyes. Her legs trembled as she gasped desperately for air.

An icy storm, cold enough to freeze even fire, erupted across the Sentinel Line the instant Nymeria’s life was endangered.

At the same time, taking advantage of Taranis’s momentary distraction, the Eternal Sages rushed forward and drove their swords into his back.

A waterfall of blood erupted. Thunder roared, and this time lightning struck the Eternal Sages directly as the heavens themselves raged in fury.

“Taranis!!!!!!!” Nymeria screamed in horror and agony, clutching Rhaegar’s wrist that held her by the throat.

Rhaegar’s blood ran cold. His wrist turned a deep shade of purple from nothing more than Nymeria’s touch, even though she was only as strong as an Awakened Sage and not to mention, was poisoned as well.

“Her potential is as terrifying as Taranis’,” Rhaegar muttered inwardly as he loosened his grip around her neck. “If left alive, she will become just as dangerous as him, if not more.

She also must die.”

Having made his decision, Rhaegar thrust his sword toward her chest.

At the same instant, lightning crackled violently.

The blade pierced straight through a body.

Blood dripped onto Nymeria’s horrified face from the sword’s tip as she realized that the one whose heart had been pierced was none other than Taranis, who had stepped between her and Rhaegar.

His pupils returned to normal. His half-open eyes looked gently at Nymeria one final time, a faint smile forming on his lips as he preserved her heavenly beauty within his gaze.

The sword slipped out of Taranis’s chest, and he collapsed into Nymeria’s arms, his chin resting against her shoulder.

“Ta… Taranis…” Nymeria whispered, her trembling hand touching his back where the sword had pierced through.

Her eyes turned completely hollow, as if everything she had ever possessed had been stripped away in an instant.

A thunderclap, unlike anything ever recorded in the history of the Western Continent, erupted, as though the world itself had roared in fury.

At the same moment, a terrifying bolt of lightning descended upon Rhaegar, who had been preparing to swing his sword once more to kill Nymeria as well.

Instinctively, he raised his blade, one hand gripping the hilt and the other bracing the flat of the sword, attempting to defend himself against the wrath of the heavens.

The titanic wall of the Sentinel Line, strong enough to withstand countless Demi-God-level assaults, shattered as the lightning slammed Rhaegar down toward the land below.

“I… is this the price we pay for killing the child of the heavens?” Kharos muttered as he fell onto his back, watching bolt after bolt of lightning crash down upon the Sentinel Line, destroying it completely.

All that remained was a raised platform suspended in the sky, upon which lay the unconscious or lifeless bodies of Voltrex and Aestra, along with the dying Taranis and Nymeria, whose entire world was crumbling in her arms.

“Ny… Nymeria,” Taranis whispered weakly. “I… I h-have one… final request.”

“Don’t spout nonsense, Taranis!” Nymeria shouted, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Nothing will happen to yo—”

“Nymeria… please listen!” Taranis insisted, knowing his own body better than anyone.

Nymeria understood the cruel truth, yet it was far too painful to accept. Summoning every shred of her will, she suppressed her agony and forced a smile onto her face, wanting Taranis’s final moments to be filled with the bright smile he had always adored.

“Say it, Taranis,” she whispered, gently stroking his hair.

“Mo… mother is st-still alive,” Taranis revealed softly. “Pl-please save her.”

“D-don’t worry, Taranis,” Nymeria replied in a gentle voice, unable to fully conceal the crack trembling within it. “I will save both father and mother… and then join you soon.”

With that, she carefully laid Taranis on the ground and moved toward Voltrex and Aestra.

Through his fading vision, Taranis saw it.

Her hair began to glow unnaturally bright. Her Soulforce surged violently, far beyond its limits.

And then, the final words she whispered echoed within his mind.

“N… no… Nymeria…”

“Stop…”

“Don’t do it, Nymeria!”

“Nymeriaaaa!!!!!!”

Raj screamed as his tear-filled eyes flew open, his body jolting upright in a hospital bed.

[End of the fourth Arc: The Legend of the Thunderbanes]

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