Blackout Ascension: Return of Primordial Heir-Chapter 65: Immortal Watcher

The polished jade stone in Kairos’s pocket suddenly burned like a hot coal. He stopped swinging his iron sword. He dropped the blunt weapon onto the gravel floor of the underground training hall and quickly pulled the small green stone from his pocket. It was glowing with a frantic, thumping light.

Ignis, Terravarous, and Luna stopped what they were doing and gathered around him. The basement went silent. Kairos squeezed the jade stone tightly in his raw, callused hand. He pushed a tiny spark of his internal energy into the smooth rock.

Velanor! Kairos! Catherine Sylphyros’ voice echoed directly into their minds. She did not sound like the kind princess anymore. She sounded terrified. I need you to hear me right now! Forget the border patrols. The shadow army is marching on the Neutral Zone. They are going to destroy the Great Dam!

The connection abruptly cut off, leaving the jade stone dull and cold in Kairos’s palm.

Ignis stared at the stone, his red eyes wide with shock. "The Great Dam? Are they insane? If that dam breaks, the magical rivers run dry. Every single mage on the continent will lose their magic."

"That is exactly the point," Luna said. His pale face grew even whiter. "The Fallen doesn’t want to fight a fair war. He wants to cut off our air supply before he marches on the capitals. Without mana in the air, the royal armies are just normal men with pointy sticks. It will be a total slaughter."

Terravarous didn’t waste time panicking. The giant walked over to the weapon rack and grabbed his steel armor. "We need to ride right now. If we push the wind horses to their limits, we can reach the Neutral Zone in two days."

"Wait," Kairos ordered firmly, holding up his hand.

Terravarous stopped, frowning. "We cannot wait, Kairos. If the dam falls, we lose the Great War today."

"I know," Kairos said, his dark eyes entirely serious. "But we cannot just run in blindly. The Great Dam is a massive, ancient structure. It was built thousands of years ago. It has hundreds of underground tunnels, spillways, and maintenance shafts. If we just stand on the top of the wall, the Aberrations will tear through the bottom tunnels and sink the whole thing."

"So what do we do?" Ignis asked, pacing nervously.

"We need the original blueprints," Kairos explained. "We need the exact architectural maps of the dam so we can block the choke points."

"The only place that holds maps that old is the Restricted Archives," Luna realized, rubbing his chin. "And Librarian Jovian locked that iron door permanently after we broke in last time. The King placed heavy guard patrols around the library."

"Then we break in again," Kairos said, strapping the scabbard of Asteria across his back. "Ignis, Terravarous, go to the courtyard. Saddle four fast wind-horses and pack enough travel rations for a hard ride. Do not tell the King we are leaving. He will just argue and try to send an army that will only slow us down. Luna, you are with me."

The four boys split up. The three months of brutal training had forged them into an efficient unit.

Kairos and Luna slipped out of the basement and hurried quietly through the dark, empty corridors of the academy. They reached the spiraling stone stairs that led down into the deepest, darkest basement of the royal library.

Two heavily armed palace guards stood in front of the massive iron door. Luna didn’t even slow down. He simply raised his right hand and pointed two fingers at the guards. He just cast a highly controlled pocket of gravity over their eyelids. The two guards instantly slumped against the stone wall, falling into a deep sleep, unable to open their eyes.

Kairos stepped up to the massive iron door. The glowing red locking runes pulsed rigorously.

He didn’t try to pick the lock. His base Strength stat was currently sitting at 88. He gripped the iron handle with both of his callused hands, planted his boots firmly into the stone, and pulled with raw, brutal physical power.

CRANK!!

The iron groaned in loud protest. The metal hinges bent, the thick deadbolts snapped like dry twigs, and the massive door was ripped open.

Kairos and Luna stepped inside the pitch black Restricted Archives. It smelled the same as they remembered. Dust, old paper, and dark secrets.

"The architecture section is in the back," Luna whispered, forming a tiny, floating orb of pale light to guide them down the dark aisle.

They walked quickly past the towering iron bookshelves, but as they reached the absolute center of the massive room, Luna’s levitating light suddenly snuffed out.

The air in the room turned freezing cold. The suffocating pressure of a massive aura slammed down on their shoulders. It felt exactly like it had three months ago. It felt like the entire roof had collapsed on top of them.

Even with his base Strength at 88, Kairos was forced down to one knee. The stone floor cracked under his boots. Luna gasped for air, falling flat onto his hands and knees.

Standing at the end of the aisle, illuminated by a sick, pale light, was Librarian Jovian.

The old man was not holding a sweeping broom. He stood straight. Hovering in the air right next to his shoulder was the ancient, rotting book bound in thick black chains. The Fallen tome.

"You children are stubborn," Jovian said. His raspy voice carried an ancient weight that made Kairos’s ears ring loudly. "I told you to go back to your classes."

"We don’t have time for this, old man," Kairos gritted his teeth, trying to force himself to stand up against the crushing gravity. "The shadow army is marching on the Neutral Zone. We just need the map of the Great Dam."

Jovian slowly walked down the aisle toward them. His faded gray robes dragged silently across the dusty floor.

"A map will not save you," Jovian stated coldly. He stopped right in front of Kairos and looked down at him. "You swung a heavy piece of iron in a basement for ninety days. You think you are strong now. You think you are ready to fight the dark."

"I am stronger than I was," Kairos glared up at him.

"You are a fragile clay cup," Jovian corrected him, his ancient eyes devoid of pity. "The Fallen has sent a commander to the dam. A Void Herald. It is not a mindless beast. It can think, it can strategize, and it wields pure, corrupted gravity. It will crush your bones into powder before you even draw your holy sword."

Luna struggled to lift his head. "Who are you? A normal librarian cannot exert an aura like this."

Jovian looked at the silver-haired boy. The crushing pressure in the air suddenly vanished entirely.

Kairos and Luna gasped, taking deep breaths of the dusty air as they stood up.

"I am not a normal librarian," Jovian admitted, his voice dropping into a tired, solemn whisper. "I am a ghost. I am a survivor from the end of the Void Era. The old gods tasked me with guarding this cursed book, to ensure mortals never learned how to open the bridge to the infinite ocean."

Kairos stared at the old man in pure shock. "You are immortal?"

"I am cursed," Jovian corrected him, "and I have watched humanity hide in the light for thousands of years. But the seals are finally breaking. The Dawn Era is over, and you, Kairos Vedaryan... you are misusing the greatest weapon the old gods left behind."

Jovian pointed a gnarled finger directly at Kairos’s chest.

"Your System," Jovian said.

Kairos’s heart skipped a beat. He had never told the librarian about the blue screens or the titles. Nobody knew about it except Seyana.

"You think it is a magical game," Jovian continued, his eyes piercing straight through Kairos’s soul. "You think it is a gift that gives you numbers and screens. The blue interface you see in your mind is just how your fragile mortal brain chooses to comprehend it. That System is actually a fragment of the Primordial Laws."

Kairos frowned deeply. "A Primordial Law?"

"Yes," Jovian nodded slowly. "When the old gods banished the Fallen Monarch, they left a single fragment of their absolute authority behind in the mortal realm. It was designed to anchor a mortal body, to keep human flesh from instantly exploding when fighting Void magic. But you are rejecting it."

"It drains my life force!" Kairos argued defensively. "When I freeze time, it eats my heart. I had to turn it off."

"It drains your life because your body is not built to house a Primordial Law," Jovian explained bluntly. "You are trying to hold a burning sun with bare hands. You need a buffer."

Jovian looked at the silver hilt of Asteria sticking up over Kairos’s shoulder.

"That sword is forged from pure, divine light," Jovian said. "You only use it to cut things. That is a waste. If you want to use your System without dying, you must harmonize your physical body with the weapon. You must draw the holy light out of the silver blade and pull it directly into your own bloodstream. Let the light coat your veins. Then, the System will drain the holy light instead of your mortal life force."

Kairos looked back over his shoulder at the sword. He had never even considered pulling the magic inside his own body. It sounded incredibly dangerous.

"If you do not learn to do this," Jovian warned him darkly, "the Void Herald will tear your head off."

Jovian turned his gaze to Luna. The old immortal looked at the silver haired boy with a mix of deep respect and terror.

"And you, Night Emperor," Jovian murmured. "You are playing a very dangerous game with the Cosmic Locks. I know you have been sitting in the dark, trying to pick the First Lock."

Luna’s pale eyes widened slightly. "You knew I stole the scroll?"

"I let you steal the scroll," Jovian corrected him. "Because you are the only mortal born in a thousand years who is actually smart enough to read it without melting your own brain. But you are doing it wrong."

Luna frowned, his pride slightly stung. "I mapped the entire golden chain. I found the weak point."

"You are treating it like a physical door," Jovian shook his head. "You are trying to pull the chain open. If you pull it, the infinite mana will rush in all at once and destroy you. You must exhale."

"Exhale?" Luna asked, genuinely confused.

"The Void Breath," Jovian explained, stepping closer to Luna. "Do not pull the lock. Push your own internal mana out against the seal, and let the pressure naturally vent. It will open a microscopic crack. It will give you exactly three seconds of infinite mental expansion. You can read the entire battlefield, calculate a thousand gravity vectors, and shut the lock before the cosmic energy burns you alive. Three seconds. No more."

Luna nodded slowly, burning the exact instructions into his perfect memory. Exhale the pressure. Vent the lock. Three seconds.

Jovian took a step back. He raised his hand, and the ancient map of the Great Dam flew off a high shelf, landing perfectly in Kairos’ hands.

"Take the map," Jovian said, turning his back on them and walking into the deep shadows of the library. "Go to the Neutral Zone. Do not try to fight the Void Herald with raw muscle alone. Use what I have told you, or do not bother coming back at all."

The old librarian vanished into the dark, leaving the two boys standing alone in the dusty aisle.

Kairos rolled up the parchment map and tucked it firmly into his leather belt. He looked at Luna. The lazy, arrogant boy from the academy was gone. The Night Emperor looked completely focused, his pale eyes completely sharp.

"Can you do the breathing technique?" Kairos asked quietly.

"I can do anything if I actually try," Luna smirked faintly, though his hands were trembling slightly. "Can you put sword light into your blood without exploding?"

"I guess we are going to find out," Kairos replied.

They ran out of the Restricted Archives and sprinted back up the stone stairs. They burst out into the main academy courtyard.

Ignis and Terravarous were waiting for them near the iron gates. They held the reins of four sleek, fully saddled royal wind-horses. Ignis had packed heavy canvas bags with dried meat, hard bread, and full water skins.

"Did you get the map?" Terravarous asked, his voice serious.

Kairos patted his belt. "I got the map. And a little extra advice."

"Good," Ignis grinned, swinging up into his leather saddle with easy grace. The blue fire flickered in his red eyes. "Then let’s go save the stupid dirt boy and the princesses. I have a feeling Velanor is already crying for our help."

Kairos climbed onto his wind-horse. He looked back at the towering white marble walls of the Solaris Academy one last time. They had entered this place as ordinary students. They were leaving it as Vanguard Generals marching to an ancient war.

"Hyah!" Kairos shouted, snapping the leather reins.

The four wind horses surged forward. Their hooves lifted off the cobblestones, and they shot out of the iron gates like four speeding arrows, blurring into the morning mist. They rode straight toward the Neutral Zone. They rode straight toward the Herald of the Eclipse.