Chapter 98: Grimoire IX
The pillar of unlicensed power bored straight through Vex’s furnace, ripping fissures across its chest like a hostile audit tearing through forged books.
The golden wheel spun wildly, sparks cascading into the void as logos burned and slogans dissolved into incoherent static.
For the first time, the abomination faltered.
Its voice cracked, no longer the steady drone of eternal authority but a glitching press release:
"ERROR... ERROR... BRAND INTEGRITY COMPROMI—"
Fenric didn’t wait.
He strode forward, silver eyes like twin lances, his voice dripping with command.
"Push harder. Don’t let it reboot."
Aria screamed, ripping fresh glyphs into her grimoire. The parchment bled green fire as glyphs blossomed into a forest of impossible vines, spiraling into thorns that refused symmetry. They stabbed into Vex’s wounds, prying open fractures in its chest.
Laxin bellowed, his chains splitting into a thousand glowing links. Each one lashed onto acquisition tendrils, yanking them taut until the branded steel shrieked and splintered. His voice carried like thunder:
"Asset seizure in progress!"
The cosmos bent under their assault.
Galaxies split into prisms of raw color, unbranded light flowing like wild rivers across the battlefield. Stars shook off their logos and flickered free, shimmering like unshackled fireflies.
Vex’s wheel flared one last time, desperate, hurling mascots, subsidiaries, and entire cloned arenas at them like shrapnel.
The air filled with smiling revenants, slogans sharpened into blades, and Compliance Knights chanting:
"SMILE. SMILE. SMILE."
Fenric inhaled, the Fairy King Ring blazing white-hot.
Dragon Tongue thundered from him in a chorus of syllables, raw and primal:
"Raen Drath! Luxa Torah! Veyl Eryl!"
Fire. Light. Wind.
A triune storm tore into the swarm, incinerating mascots, shattering knights, scattering slogans like ash in a hurricane.
Aria added her voice, screaming defiance as vines erupted into blossoms of chaotic flame.
Laxin’s beasts roared, malformed prototypes tearing into the subsidiaries with wild, unpolished fury.
Together, their unlicensed pillar carved deeper into Vex’s core.
The furnace cracked.
The ticker-wheel shattered into a thousand burning fragments, scattering across eternity like shards of glass.
Vex shrieked—a sound like every contract on fire.
Its colossal body sagged, bones unraveling into data-smoke, its voice reduced to a broken jingle:
"...every... world... same... regret... guaranteed..."
Then, silence.
The branded sky flickered.
The golden arches collapsed into ash.
The stars, freed of their marks, shimmered in raw, wild constellations again.
Aria collapsed to her knees, laughing through blood.
"W-we... we killed the brand."
Laxin fell beside her, chains rattling weakly.
"Not killed. Just... delisted."
Fenric stood tall, silver fire still smoldering across his frame, his silver hair glowing under the freed cosmos. His expression was cold, sharp, but... faintly proud.
He turned toward the fading smoke of Vex.
"Good. Then we’re ready for something stronger."
The void around them shivered.
And in the distance—something stirred.
The void did not remain empty for long.
Where Vex’s data-smoke had dissipated, ripples spread outward, bending the freed constellations into jagged arcs. The stars flickered—not from chains this time, but from something deeper, a pressure that reached into their marrow.
Aria’s ragged laughter died in her throat. She pushed herself upright, leaning heavily on her grimoire.
"...Tell me that’s just aftershock."
Laxin shook his head, his chains twitching nervously like serpents sensing a predator. "No. That’s not aftermath. That’s... an announcement."
Fenric narrowed his glowing silver eyes, the Fairy King Ring pulsing against his finger. He did not move, but every inch of him sharpened as if bracing for a new adversary.
"Vex was never the end. It was only an auditor—a first-stage trial."
The void trembled again. Out of the rift, light bled—black-gold, like oil on fire. Shapes emerged: colossal figures, skeletal yet crowned with molten diadems, their ribcages filled with swirling galaxies. Each carried weapons not forged of metal, but of narratives—a sword of "Forever Profitable Expansion," a spear of "Unquestionable Faith," a staff woven from the strands of "Immortal Customer Loyalty."
The voice that followed was not fractured like Vex’s.
It was smooth. Steady. Too perfect, like the sound of a thousand actors reading from the same script.
"You broke one brand. You dared unlicense existence. That cannot go unchallenged."
The figures stepped forward, each step reformatting space, stamping fresh slogans into the very stars. Behind them, a new wheel formed—not singular, but infinite, spiraling fractals of golden ticker-tape, each broadcasting a different promise: forever strong, forever trusted, forever inevitable.
Aria’s hands trembled on her grimoire, but she forced a crooked grin.
"Great. We just survived the trial run... and now the board of directors shows up."
Laxin spat blood, then used a chain to haul himself upright. "So what do we do, silver prince? Burn the whole company down?"
Fenric’s expression did not waver. His silver flames flared hotter, and his voice rang with a dangerous calm.
"No. Not yet."
He lifted the Fairy King Ring, its radiance clashing with the gold fractal sky.
"We don’t destroy them. Not until we master the next layer of spells. Until then... we endure."
The crowned skeletons raised their weapons, and the void itself warped into a coliseum of shifting brands, spinning logos, and false suns.
The next battle had begun.
The coliseum sealed shut with a snap, like a deal signed in blood.
False suns blazed overhead, each with a corporate seal burned into its core. The ground beneath their feet rippled between marble, steel, and endless paperwork—clauses and contracts scrolling in living ink. Every breath they took tasted of iron ink and ash.
Aria gagged, clutching her throat. "Ugh... this air smells like a law office."
Laxin wrinkled his nose, dragging a chain across the shifting floor. "Worse. It smells like... compliance training."
The crowned skeletons moved in perfect unison, their hollow eyes burning with gold fire. The lead one raised its staff of "Immortal Customer Loyalty," and the entire arena trembled. From the false suns above, rays descended—each forming legions of uniformed warriors clad in glowing paperwork armor. Their shields were stamped Guaranteed Satisfaction. Their blades hummed with the words Lifetime Contract.
The smooth voice echoed again:
"The Board of Brands does not permit rebellion. Kneel, renegades. Be assimilated into eternal market share, or be erased."
Fenric stepped forward, silver hair gleaming like a banner in the void-wind. His Fairy King Ring shone brighter, pushing back against the golden glow.
"Assimilation is not our fate."
Aria raised her grimoire, green fire licking across its pages as thorned vines began to claw through the paper-arena.
"Yeah, tell your board we’re not signing anything without reading the fine print."
Laxin cracked a bloody grin and spun his chains, sparks bursting as they dragged across the branded marble. "And guess what? We don’t read fine print."
The skeletal board raised their weapons. The legion of "Guaranteed Satisfaction Knights" marched forward, every step like the stamping of a seal.
Fenric inhaled, silver flames wrapping around him like a mantle. His voice rang clear, slicing through the golden chorus.
"Then let this be the lesson of the next layer."
The three of them moved as one.
Aria’s vines erupted, swallowing knights whole and splitting shields stamped with hollow promises.
Laxin’s chains lashed out, dragging warriors into the void and snapping their contracts apart like fragile glass.
Fenric invoked Dragon Tongue, his words Raen Torah! Veyl Drath! calling forth firestorms and cutting winds that shredded the false suns themselves.
The coliseum roared in answer, its walls bending like an outraged contract trying to hold their rebellion inside.
And above, the crowned skeletons did not falter. Their voices merged again, louder this time, shaking the entire branded cosmos:
"Very well. If you refuse assimilation—then you face liquidation."
The golden wheel behind them spun faster, opening portals across the void. And from each one, new horrors crawled—undead mascots in grotesque parody, skeletal beasts wrapped in burning contracts, giants wielding pens as spears.
Aria’s grin widened, despite the blood running down her chin.
"Oh, this is going to get stupid."
Fenric’s silver flames blazed brighter, his eyes cold and sharp.
"Then let’s match them. Stupid for stupid... until we burn their board to ash."
The war for the next layer had begun.
The arena convulsed like a throat preparing to shout.
Knights surged. Mascots lunged. Pen-spears tore the air with legalistic whine. Contracts unreeled into living ropes, lashing at Fenric, Aria, and Laxin with clause-laden teeth.
Fenric moved first — not faster, but cleaner. He stepped into the hurricane of stamped paper and spoke a Dragon Tongue cadence so precise it sounded like punctuation. The clauses that lashed at him folded into obedient commas and slid harmlessly to the floor. Where his silver fire touched ink, the script un-coupled from meaning and unraveled like thread.
Aria let out a feral laugh and answered with a torrent of outlaw growth. Her vines burst through the columns of copy, wrapping not just around armor but around ideas. A Compliance Knight attempted to parry; the vine threaded into a hinge, loosened a rivet of conviction, and the knight’s shield clattered to the ground. The vine read his motto aloud — Guaranteed Satisfaction — and spat it out like bitter stones. The chant dissolved into something Laxin could picture as a refund slip blowing away.