Chapter 513: Shackles VI
The Fifth Pulse howled.
Fracture Requiem spread through the chamber like a spiderweb of breaking glass. Every chain it touched warped, twisted, then split apart—not fully destroyed, but fractured, left jagged and unstable. Their weight faltered. Their commands stuttered.
Leon staggered forward, blood pouring from his mouth, each step leaving cracks in the polished floor. The strain was ripping him apart from the inside, but he forced his Shell to keep resonating.
The team saw the opening.
"Now!" Naval roared, hurling his trident. It spun like a spear of the sea itself, piercing through three faltering chains, pinning them to the ground.
Milim streaked upward, wings flashing as she blasted a swarm of broken links apart in an eruption of pink-white light.
Roselia’s golden barrier surged outward, catching what fragments still rained down, while Liliana’s voice rose in a chant, amplifying Leon’s resonance into the fractured storm.
Roman charged, fists blazing, smashing through the nearest chains like battering rams, clearing the way.
For the first time, Kar’veth’s decree bent—not broken yet, but bent. His chains lashed erratically, no longer flawless in their rhythm. The Sovereign’s helm tilted, and a low growl echoed through the chamber.
"...You dare weaken law itself?" His voice shook the air, reverberating like the strike of a gavel. The throne behind him cracked, spilling more chains into the void. "Then I will cast aside restraint."
The chains convulsed, snapping back into the Throne. The Sovereign’s body began to shift. His faceless helm split with a sound like tearing stone, his form rising higher, broader, until he towered over the chamber like a giant. The chains no longer moved as separate weapons—they fused into his body, threading through his limbs, wrapping around him like living armor.
The true form of the Shackled Sovereign stood revealed: a colossus bound in iron, each step quaking the chamber. His voice was no longer layered judgment—it was raw, unbound law.
"If you would fracture my law, shard-bearer... then face it in its whole."
The final stage had begun.
Leon’s knees nearly buckled under the sudden return of pressure. His Shell shivered dangerously, the Requiem still gnawing at his insides. But his eyes burned with refusal.
"...Then I’ll shatter all of you."
He raised his gauntlet again, Shell layers flaring in unstable harmony.
The chamber groaned as Kar’veth’s true form loomed, chains woven into every limb like veins of iron. His presence filled the air so completely it felt as if the world itself had shrunk to contain only him.
Leon staggered, blood soaking his gauntlet, but his gaze never wavered. His Shell pulsed with violent rhythm, unstable, tearing at his veins—but alive.
Kar’veth lifted one colossal arm. The chains threaded through it rattled like war drums. When he brought it down, the floor shattered. Waves of force tore outward, splitting the chamber’s walls into collapsing fragments.
The world itself seemed to bow.
Leon braced, Shell flaring. Tripart Echo multiplied his strike as he met the crashing limb head-on. The impact cracked reality, sound vanishing into white silence before exploding back in a deafening roar.
The ground gave way beneath them, the polished stone splintering into floating shards of platform. The chamber could no longer hold their clash—space fractured into pieces, leaving Leon and Kar’veth fighting in a storm of debris suspended in void.
Naval, Roselia, Milim, Liliana, and Roman scrambled onto the drifting fragments, shields and barriers raised, but it was clear: this was no longer a battlefield for them. The fight had narrowed.
A duel of laws.
Kar’veth’s voice boomed, no longer bound by throne or chain:
"I am binding. I am decree. I am inevitability. You cannot fracture me, shard-bearer—you will only break yourself."
Chains shot from his body like spears, lancing through the void. They carried not just weight, but finality. Each strike was a verdict.
Leon’s Shell convulsed. Karmic Loop bent the assaults backward, forcing chains to recoil against their own beginnings. Absolute Return snapped the decree back on itself, staggering Kar’veth for the briefest of moments.
But the pressure was unbearable. Every movement tore his muscles further, blood trailing behind him in ribbons. His fractures deepened—he was becoming as splintered as the world around him.
And yet—
Through the agony, Leon’s voice rose, ragged but unyielding:
"...You say inevitability... but inevitability is just another echo."
The Fifth Pulse writhed. Fracture Requiem surged outward again, not only shattering chains but cracking Kar’veth’s colossal frame. For the first time, the Sovereign’s voice faltered into something closer to a roar of pain than command.
The void trembled. Shards of stone spun wildly, lightning arcing between them as law and fracture ripped against one another.
Kar’veth steadied, his form towering, cracks glowing like molten seams. His helm tilted downward at Leon, and for the first time his voice carried something more than decree.
"...Then prove it. Prove your echo is stronger than law itself."
Leon raised his gauntlet, fractures spreading through his body like fire in glass. His Shell sang at the edge of collapse.
The final clash was inevitable.
The void storm howled around them, every shard of stone spinning like razors, lightning and law crackling in arcs. Leon’s breathing was ragged, each exhale flecked with blood. His body was breaking apart, fractures spreading across his skin like glowing cracks in glass. Yet his Shell still pulsed.
Kar’veth stood colossal, molten lines spreading where Leon’s Fracture Requiem had torn through his frame. His chains writhed like serpents, desperate to hold his form together. His voice rolled across the void, half-command, half-defiance:
"You should already be dust, boy. Yet you still stand."
Leon’s gauntlet shook violently. The Fifth Pulse screamed within him, unstable, threatening to tear apart not just his foe, but himself. He clenched his teeth, forcing the words out through blood and fire.
"...Because I don’t stand alone. I stand on every echo. Every return. Every fracture. I am the resonance of all of it."
He thrust his hand forward. The Fifth Pulse – Fracture Requiem erupted in full.
The void split.
Not just stone or chain—law itself fractured. The decree of inevitability that Kar’veth embodied cracked, splintered, and scattered like glass under hammer strike. The Sovereign’s roar shook eternity, chains snapping one by one as the fractures spread through his towering body.
Leon screamed, every fiber of him burning, his Shell tearing open. Blood streamed into the void, but he did not stop. His gauntlet blazed brighter than the storm around them.
Kar’veth staggered, his colossal form collapsing piece by piece, until what stood before Leon was not a god of chains, but a broken titan kneeling on one knee. His helm hung low. His molten cracks dimmed.
For a long moment, silence reigned.
Then Kar’veth’s voice, no longer a decree but a deep rumble, broke through:
"...You did not destroy me, shard-bearer. You destroyed inevitability itself."
One massive hand pressed against the fractured ground, steadying his collapsing form. He raised his helm just enough to meet Leon’s gaze.
"Then I recognize you. You are no challenger... You are Sovereign."
The chains binding him dissolved, not broken but released, their verdict undone. His form shattered into fragments of light, dissolving into the void, leaving behind only an echo—a throne, unbound.
Leon fell to one knee, his Shell dimming, fractures crawling across his body. He had won—but at a cost that left him trembling on the edge of ruin. His friends rushed across the collapsing platforms to reach him, their cries echoing through the fading void.
And above the dying storm, the throne awaited.
The Throne War had begun.