The sanctum of Emperor Typhon was an altar of stolen eternity.
Around the perimeter of the circular hall, thirty glass sarcophagi stood upright, filled with clear, glowing aether-oil. Inside each cylinder floated the petrified body of an ancient sorcerer from the First Era, their withered veins tapped with golden filigree that funneled their slumbering life-force directly into the kraken-skull throne upon the dais.
Hovering above Typhon’s brow, the Seventh Shard burned with a blinding, golden-amber luminescence.
It was the Keystone of the Primordial Hearth—the long-lost origin of elemental fire, the spark that had ignited the First Sun before the Veil was torn. The moment Aurelia crossed the threshold, the Six Shards beneath her breastplate screamed in violent resonance. The silver-violet light beneath her skin flared outward, illuminating the gilded rafters of the sanctum in an aurora of warring cosmic colors.
"You speak of mongrels, Typhon," Aurelia said, her boots clicking with measured, merciless cadence on the blood-spattered mosaic floor. Her ancestral blade remained angled toward the flagstones, dripping with the dark blood of his Sovereign Guard. "Yet you have spent eight centuries floating in a coffin of dragon-iron, draining the marrow of your own ancestors just to keep the breath in your lungs."
Typhon’s pale lips curled into a cold, superior smile. He did not rise from his kraken-bone seat; he merely rested his long, claw-tipped fingers upon the black star metal broadsword resting across his knees.
"They sleep in honor, girl," Typhon replied, his voice a smooth, hypnotic purr that vibrated directly against the lining of her skull. "They sleep knowing that their blood fuels the rightful lord of the world. You have assembled the remaining fragments of the Great Crown with commendable savagery. But you are a mortal vessel. Your fragile organs are already boiling from the strain of carrying six divine sparks. One hour more, and your chest will tear itself open from the inside."
"Her chest will remain intact," a savage, gravelly voice snarled from her flank.
Malakor stepped forward, his great sword held ready in a low, two-handed grip.
His armor was coated in black gore, his left vambrace scorched to the iron, but his amber eyes burned with unvarnished, predatory fury. He circled to the left, forcing Typhon’s gaze to split between them, his shadow-fire hissing like angry vipers around his boots.
"And your head," Malakor added, the muscles in his scarred neck tightening with lethal intent, "will be mounted on the bowsprit of this very ship before the sun breaks the horizon."
Typhon’s slit-pupiled eyes flickered to Malakor with mild, amused disdain. "A loyal mastiff. Ferocious, but utterly irrelevant."
Typhon rose.
He moved with the terrifying, liquid speed of an ancient dragon striking from the clouds. In a fraction of a heartbeat, the Emperor cleared the twenty paces from the dais to the center of the hall, the black star metal broadsword descending in a blinding arc of liquid golden fire aimed straight for Aurelia’s throat.
The clash of blades was deafening.
Aurelia brought her ancestral sword up in a two-handed parry, channeling the Fifth and Sixth Shards into the steel.
The collision of primal hearth-fire and void-gravity detonated in a concussive shockwave that shattered the glass sarcophagi along the walls, sending a deluge of glowing oil and ancient corpses crashing across the mosaic floor. Aurelia’s boots skidded backward ten feet, the searing heat of Typhon’s blade blistering the skin of her wrists through her leather vambraces.
Before Typhon could press his advantage, Malakor struck like an avalanche.
His two-handed great sword cleaved through the empty air where Typhon had stood a fraction of a second prior, the black shadow-flame shearing clean through the armrest of the kraken throne. Malakor pivoted on his heel without losing momentum, his left elbow driving forward to catch Typhon in the side of his jaw with a bone-jarring impact that drew a spray of golden blood from the Emperor’s lip.
Typhon hissed, a sound that was purely reptilian, stumbling half a step before bringing the pommel of his star metal blade up into Malakor’s ribs with enough force to crack the dark-iron plate.
Malakor grunted, spitting a mouthful of dark crimson onto the floor, but his grip on his weapon never loosened. His scarred face split into a wild, terrifying grin.
"You bleed gold, lizard," Malakor growled, his great sword spinning back into guard. "Let's see if your guts look the same."
"Insolent worm!" Typhon roared, his composure finally breaking into divine, wounded arrogance.
Above the Emperor's head, the Seventh Shard flared into an incandescent sun, filling the sanctum with a blinding, roaring tempest of primordial flame that threatened to incinerate them all where they stood.