Kardok let out a low snarl, his voice ringing with a metallic resonance that scraped the air.
Then the last trace of restraint vanished from his face, drowned beneath a flood of killing intent.
He raised both arms.
The black-gold armor gleamed coldly under the fractured light, and rings of energy pulsed outward from his feet, rippling across the ground.
"You filthy insects," he roared, voice rising like a blade through thunder.
BOOM—
Before the words had even finished leaving his mouth, the sky split open behind him.
A colossal shadow rose from the rift—slow, deliberate, and suffocating.
This wasn't some illusion.
It was a hybrid colossus, a monstrous fusion of bloodlines: dragon scales, demonic wings, the skeletal remains of an angel. Six bloodlines twisted together into a spine of horror, each vertebra pulsing with raw, ancient power.
As the phantom fully unfurled, the entire twentieth layer began to warp.
The air cracked like shattering glass.
