The Extra's Rise

The Iron Dominion crashed into the canyon floor with the sound of a dying god.

Maxwell von Pontes pulled himself from the wreckage of his command center, red blood trickling from a gash across his forehead where a piece of shrapnel had found its mark. Around him, the mighty flagship's hull groaned and twisted, its once-pristine corridors now a maze of sparking electronics and buckled metal.

The crash that would have killed a dozen lesser men was merely an inconvenience to someone of his caliber, though the humiliation burned far worse than any physical wound.

"Status report," he growled, activating his emergency communication device as he stumbled through the debris.

Static answered him initially, then broken voices began filtering through the chaos.

"...eastern squad completely eliminated..."

"...ice blossoms everywhere, can't advance..."

"...shadows, they're coming from the shadows..."

Maxwell's jaw clenched as the true scope of the disaster became clear. His overwhelming force—three thousand of the finest adventurers—was being systematically dismantled by what appeared to be a handful of opponents.

Impossible. It was utterly impossible.

But as Maxwell emerged from the crashed flagship's emergency exit, the evidence of that impossibility lay scattered across the canyon floor. Bodies of Integration-rank fighters who should have been more than capable of handling any reasonable opposition were strewn about like broken dolls. Their expensive equipment, their years of training, their hard-earned experience—all rendered meaningless by an enemy that fought with surgical precision.

"Sir!" One of his surviving lieutenants rushed toward him, relief evident on the man's face at seeing Maxwell alive. "Thank the gods you're—"

"How many?" Maxwell cut him off sharply.

"Sir?"

"How many are still combat effective?"

The lieutenant's face paled as he consulted his tactical display. "Roughly... sixty percent casualties, sir. Most of the White-rank and Integration-rank forces are down. Some dead, most severely injured and unable to continue fighting."

Maxwell felt his blood pressure spike. Sixty percent casualties, and they hadn't even engaged Arthur himself yet. These weren't random thugs they were losing—these were seasoned professionals who had survived countless conflicts.

"The Ascendant-rank fighters?"

"Still operational, sir. Their enhanced constitutions allowed them to weather the initial assault better. But morale is..." the lieutenant hesitated. "Poor, sir. Very poor."

Maxwell surveyed the battlefield with his enhanced vision, picking out the forms of his stronger mercenaries as they regrouped among the canyon rocks. These were the elite, the cream of Ferraclysm's fighters. Men and women who had reached the same basic rank as Arthur himself, each one a walking weapon capable of devastating destruction.

They would have to be enough.

"Signal full retreat for all Integration-rank and below," Maxwell commanded. "This fight is beyond their capabilities. Ascendant-rank and above only from this point forward."

As his lieutenant relayed the orders, Maxwell took stock of his remaining assets. Twelve Ascendant-rank fighters, three approaching the threshold of Immortal-rank themselves. Plus Maxwell's own mid Immortal-rank power. Against a single high Ascendant-rank opponent, it should have been overwhelming.

Should have been.

But Arthur Nightingale had already proven that conventional tactical thinking meant nothing in this conflict.

Maxwell was preparing to advance toward the main battle when the air around them suddenly grew thick with mana. The atmosphere itself seemed to shimmer as massive amounts of magical energy coalesced into recognizable patterns.

Seven-circle spells. Multiple ones, all forming simultaneously.

"Defensive positions!" Maxwell roared, his own mana flaring to life around him like golden fire.

The spells materialized with devastating beauty—pillars of flame that could melt steel, lances of ice that could pierce mountain stone, bolts of pure lightning that turned night into day. Seven-circle magic, the domain of master mages and Ascendant-rank specialists, rained down on them with the fury of a magical apocalypse.

Maxwell's hands moved in complex patterns as he began weaving his counterspell. Eight-circle magic flowed from him like liquid starlight, his Immortal-rank mana reserves allowing him to reach heights of magical complexity that few beings on the continent could match.

"Aegis Imperialis Maxima," he intoned, his voice carrying the weight of absolute authority.

A dome of golden energy erupted around him and his surviving forces, its surface rippling like liquid metal as it intercepted the incoming seven-circle spells. Fire, ice, and lightning crashed against his barrier like waves against a cliff, each impact sending cascades of magical sparks across the canyon walls.

Maxwell's defense held firm. His eight-circle magic was simply superior—more complex, more powerful, more refined than anything a seven-circle caster could produce. The attacking spells dissipated harmlessly against his golden aegis, their energy absorbed and redirected into the canyon floor.

"Is that the best you can do, Nightingale?" Maxwell called out, his voice amplified by his magical aura. "Seven-circle spells against an Immortal-ranker? I expected better from the boy genius who thinks he can challenge Ferraclysm."

The magical bombardment ceased, leaving an eerie silence broken only by the crackling of residual energy. Maxwell maintained his defensive spell while scanning the surrounding terrain for signs of his opponents. His enhanced senses picked up traces of mana signatures moving through the canyon, but nothing concrete enough to target.

Then he saw it—a flicker of movement at the edge of his peripheral vision.

Maxwell spun toward the disturbance, his eight-circle barrier shifting to intercept whatever attack was coming. His golden dome of energy was impenetrable, a masterwork of defensive magic that had never been breached in all his years of—

The blade came through the barrier like it was made of mist.

Not around it. Not over it. Through it, as if the eight-circle magic simply didn't exist.

Maxwell's eyes widened in shock as he found himself staring at three feet of dark steel protruding through what should have been an impregnable defense. The sword moved with liquid grace, tracing a perfect arc that carved through his barrier like paper, leaving a trail of what looked like liquid shadow in its wake.

The magical dome collapsed instantly, its complex patterns unraveling as the blade's passage disrupted the fundamental structure of the spell. Eight-circle magic, the pride of Immortal-rank casters, fell apart like a child's toy.

Behind the sword stood a figure that seemed to emerge from the darkness itself.

Reika's violet hair flowed like silk in the canyon breeze, but it was her skin that drew Maxwell's stunned attention. Dark ink patterns covered her exposed arms and face—not tattoos, but something far more profound. The markings moved and shifted across her flesh like living things, pulsing with a rhythm that matched her heartbeat. They seemed to drink in the ambient light, creating an aura of absolute darkness around her form.

Her violet eyes held no mercy, no hesitation, only the cold certainty of someone who had found their target.

"I will kill you for my Master," she said simply, her voice carrying the quiet finality of a death sentence.

Maxwell stumbled backward, his mind struggling to process what he'd just witnessed. His eight-circle barrier had been one of his greatest achievements, a defensive spell that had taken him decades to perfect. For someone to simply cut through it with a sword...

She moved toward him with predatory grace, each step leaving brief impressions of absolute darkness on the stone beneath her feet. The ink patterns on her skin pulsed brighter, and Maxwell realized with growing horror that they weren't just decorative—they were conduits, channels for power that he couldn't even begin to comprehend.

"Sir!" one of his Ascendant-rank fighters called out, moving to intercept the approaching assassin. "I'll handle—"

The words died in the man's throat as darkness erupted around them like a living thing.

It wasn't normal shadow—this was darkness given substance, darkness with weight and presence that pressed against Maxwell's enhanced senses like a physical force. The very air seemed to thicken, becoming viscous and oppressive as reality itself began to warp.

Through the expanding darkness, Maxwell caught glimpses of architectural impossibilities—crumbling towers that reached toward a starless sky, ancient ruins carved from black stone, corridors that led to places that shouldn't exist. The canyon floor was transforming, overlaying itself with something far older and infinitely more terrible.

The Necropolis of Forgotten Wisdom.

Arthur Nightingale emerged from the heart of the darkness, but he was no longer entirely human.

Massive wings had unfurled from his back—not the feathered appendages of birds, but something far more magnificent and terrible. Each wing was easily twelve feet in span, covered in feathers so dark they seemed to absorb light itself. They moved with impossible grace, stirring air that carried the scent of ancient tombs and forgotten knowledge.

His azure eyes now held depths that seemed to contain entire universes of shadow and starlight. When he spoke, his voice carried harmonics that resonated in frequencies beyond human hearing, creating an almost hypnotic effect that made Maxwell's bones vibrate.

"Welcome to my domain," Arthur said, his transformed presence radiating power that made Maxwell's Immortal-rank aura seem pale by comparison. "Here, the rules are different. Here, death and knowledge are the same thing."

The darkness completed its transformation of the battlefield, revealing the true nature of Arthur's power. They were no longer standing in the Singing Caves of Pyrros—they were standing in a necropolis that existed somewhere beyond the normal boundaries of reality.

Ancient mausoleums rose from the transformed ground like silent sentinels, their surfaces covered in hieroglyphs that hurt to look at directly. Between them wandered shapes that might once have been human, their forms wrapped in shadows and carrying scrolls that whispered secrets in languages that predated civilization.

Arthur's dark wings stretched wider, each feather catching light that came from no visible source.