Before anyone moved, Phillip Ember Pearl raised a hand.
Not slow. Not desperate. Just deliberate enough to stop the fracture.
Simon watched him without blinking. Jana's aura didn't retract. Simar didn't shift his weight.
Only Phillip spoke.
"There's no need to let this spiral," he said.
No one replied.
Phillip stepped forward, concern still carved across his brow, but his voice now anchored in diplomacy. "We may not agree on methods, but I don't wish for a battlefield between Flare and Ember Pearl. This wasn't meant to be war—it was meant to be pressure. A regrettable miscalculation."
"You sanctioned us into collapse," Jana said flatly.
"You cornered us to take what you feared," Simar added.
Phillip didn't flinch. "I understand. And I accept that we pushed too far."
Simon's eyes narrowed. "Then speak plainly."
"I'll contact Stormveil, Verdant Fang, and Ironshore. Press them to lift the sanctions. We will return to previous trade terms. Restore sector permissions. The royal family will publicly acknowledge this… misunderstanding as a navigational error. No conflict. Just correction."
Simon said nothing.
Jana didn't move. Her suspicion was a flame still lit.
Simar studied Phillip's posture—not for sincerity, but for intent.
Phillip continued. "Your family is strong now. Clearly. And it would be foolish of us to pretend otherwise."
"But we're supposed to believe this reversal is goodwill?" Simon asked.
Phillip nodded once. "Believe it's strategic pause. You know the cost of continental instability as well as I do. And for now… it's in no one's interest."
A long silence stretched.
Then Simon stepped back.
"We accept the reversal," he said. "But if this is a pause—understand something."
His aura surged once.
"If you reach for the throat again, you won't get the fingers back."
Phillip exhaled slowly. "Understood."
With no bow, no ceremony, the three Flare cultivators turned and left.
No one stopped them.
And the throne room—silent once again—held not relief.
Only calculation.
Phillip folded his hands behind his back. "Three Imperial Realms… in months. That technique isn't just precious. It's dangerous."
Paul scoffed. "There hasn't been a serious threat to the throne in a thousand years. We can't allow them to grow any further."
"I'm sure the top three sects are taking advantage of Simon disappearance from Ember fall," Phillip said. Though he had miscalculated about what Simon would gravel at his feet, he's a man of many schemes.
Paul as if realizing what happening smile. Jak didn't remained he left the scene.
___
Minutes later, wind swept across the formation bridge as the Flare trio soared beneath sky-fire clouds.
Simon raised his pendant—a sealed-return glyph coded directly to Ember fall city.
It cracked.
Not with lightning. With intent.
The spatial formation spiraled once, then folded in on itself—fracturing mid-cycle, rendering the teleportation link inert.
A cold silence followed.
Jana's hand halted mid-seal.
Simar's expression didn't shift, but his aura thinned sharply.
"They've broken our tether," Simon said. His voice held no anger. Only clarity. "Something's happening."
Jana's eyes narrowed. "Those snakes what are they up to now."
"No need to think about it. Lets go now. We're taking the long way," Simon said. With their cultivation it should take them two hours at most to get back to Ember Fall city.
They streaked westward—silent, fast, leaving behind a royal city built on delay.
___
South of Ember Fall's flame-veined cliffs, the Flare Family estate—fortified in ridgelines of obsidian and red jade—erupted into chaos.
The Erupt Family, long resentful of Simon Flare's dominance, sent Peak Star Realm enforcers through terrain only Ember fall natives knew. Paired with Shadow Sect specialists, they mapped vulnerabilities days in advanceand triggered them with synchronized strikes.
The outer perimeter alarms turned blood-red. Vault seals trembled. Flame towers spat embers against the night sky.
Inside the obsidian wing, Ridge broke into motion—swordmarks already flickering across his palms. He intercepted the first intruder with a triple-slash flames sweep, his flaming blade ringing through the estate's fire-wrought halls.
It wasn't enough.
More came.
Peak Star Realm cultivators carved toward the inner sanctum. Shadow Sect silencers dragged suppression arrays behind them, nullifying defensive wards.
Flare elders gathered—guardians spanning Enlightened realm to low Star realm. They didn't speak. They activated flame formation glyphs and took position.
Below the central spire, disciples were moved in waves—spirit-sense masked, qi signatures smothered, ushered into escape vaults beneath the stone flame ring.
The estate wouldn't fall.
But it would bleed.
___
Ember Sect—same hour
The sky bent.
Above the northern cliffs, three intruders descended—one Peak Moon Realm elder from Stormveil, two Peak Star Realm cultivators from Verdant Fang and Ironshore, and one veiled strategist whose qi signature braided silence and frost.
Their aim was not war.
It was extraction.
Their target had earned it.
At the outer wardline, Riven stood alone.
Mid Moon Realm. Experienced. Stalwart. But surrounded by clan's mates, early enlightened realm to peak star realm.
He anchored three glyphs. Three defensive channels. Three final lines.
His aura surged once. Clear. Determined.
He wouldn't stop the invaders.
But he would make them sweat.
Behind him, Ember elders split—some rushing toward the outer clash, others guiding disciples toward vaultline escape glyphs. Some hesitated. Most didn't. The Sect's core was burning.
___
Inside the flame alcove near Ember Fall's volcanic basin.
Jalen sat cross-legged.
Five cultivators encircled him—Sion, Delra, Tian, Kaelin, and Rana—each aligned within a qi synchronization array built for cultivation, not conflict. The chamber pulsed with refined spirit lines—calm, bright, and dangerously exposed.
Then the seal ruptured.
Five figures descended through torn space.
Two carried Peak Moon Realm pressure, storm-forged and vicious. One of them, a lightning-specialist from Stormveil, bore condensed volt-glyphs across his robes—power thrumming like storms confined to flesh.
The other three—Peak Star Realm enforcers—moved in layered formation. Their arrival didn't shake the room.
It broke it.
The array snapped mid-pulse. Crystals cracked. Qi scattered. The chamber darkened.
And before a word was spoken, the Stormveil elder raised one hand.
Lightning roared.
Not artifact-based. Not formation-born. Raw, spirit-forged electrical might, charged to breach realms and cauterize resistance.
The bolt didn't aim for the formation.
It aimed for Jalen.
He reacted instantly—left palm drawn upward, right hand forming a compression seal. All of his qi surged at once, defensive glyphs flaring into fragmented shields.
The bolt hit.
Hard.
The blast shoved Jalen backward into the obsidian wall—his limbs locked, body seared, blood surging up through his throat. He coughed—scarlet streaking across his robe.
But he didn't fall.
He repelled it.
With everything he had—qi pool drained, meridians stretched to fracture—he twisted the remainder of his aura into a backlash surge. The bolt crackled mid-air, fractured, then spat out through the vault ceiling in a spiral of failed domination.
The Moon Realm elder frowned.
Jalen didn't wait.
His fingers stabbed toward the base of the chamber—triggering a glyph nestled deep beneath the formation. The emergency teleportation seal flared instantly, igniting with forced ignition runes.
Flame wrapped the six of them—Jalen, Rana, Sion, Delra, Tian, and Kaelin—and spun into spiral formation geometry.
Jalen didn't flinch.
Didn't hesitate.
Didn't shout.
He simply forced it active with absolute control.
And vanished.
Afterward, only silence remained.
Two Peak Moon Realm cultivators.
Three Peak Star Realm elites.
A force capable of erasing entire sects.
Denied a kill.
By one boy.