I Died and Became a Noble's Heir-Chapter 273: The Throne
And above it all.... Dragons flew.
Not all of them were physical.
Some seemed made of the same ethereal substance as the spirits, translucent forms that caught light and bent it into rainbow patterns.
Others were solid, scales gleaming, wings beating with force that should have created downdrafts but somehow didn’t disturb the spirits below.
Blues and reds, greens and blacks, one massive creature that looked like it was made entirely of magma, yet no magma leaked from its body as it spiraled through the impossible sky.
"What..." Jack’s voice came out barely above a whisper. "What is this place?"
"Floor 25," S answered from behind him, the demon having followed through the portal with the rest of their group. "The Soul Warden’s domain. Though I must admit, I’ve never seen it quite like this. Usually, it’s dormant when unclaimed."
Jack took a step forward, then another, his eyes unable to settle on any single detail because every detail demanded attention.
The pathway beneath his feet was smooth stone, leading straight toward the castle gates.
He walked, taking in every detail.
And as he walked, creatures emerged.
They came from everywhere.
From behind rocks and trees, from the glowing grass, from the air itself as spirits materialized into more solid forms. They came to see him, to witness the figure walking their path.
Dragons first.
Three of them landed along the pathway ahead, their massive forms creating impacts that should have shaken the ground but somehow didn’t.
One red, one blue, one that seemed to be made of crystals that refracted light into thousands of colors.
Their eyes tracked Jack’s approach with intelligence that transcended animal awareness.
Phoenixes descended in gouts of flame, their bodies wreathed in fire that didn’t burn the grass where they landed.
Golden and crimson, their calls echoed across the landscape like music.
Demons materialized, various ranks and classes, their forms ranging from humanoid to monstrous.
They stood along the pathway, some kneeling as Jack passed, others simply observing with expressions that ranged from curiosity to reverence.
Fairies no larger than Jack’s hand flitted through the air, their wings creating trails of colored light. They circled his head briefly before darting away, giggling with voices like wind chimes.
Celestial beasts walked on hooves that clicked against stone despite looking like they were made of starlight itself.
Four-legged creatures with antlers and what looked like tattoos covered their bodies. Their eyes were glowing with fire as Jack walked by.
Leviathans moved through the air like they were swimming through water, their massive serpentine bodies undulating with grace despite their size.
Scales that looked like the ocean itself covered their forms, blues and greens shifting across them like light reflecting off glass.
Wisps bobbed along the pathway, balls of light that pulsed with different colors, leaving trails of illumination wherever they floated.
They seemed curious, approaching close enough to touch before darting away again.
A skywhale drifted overhead, its body perhaps a hundred feet long, swimming through air like the sky was an ocean.
Its call echoed like a whale song despite no water being present.
Sandworms erupted from the glowing grass despite there being no sand, their segmented bodies rising perhaps thirty feet before diving back down. The grass closed behind them as if they’d never disturbed the ground.
Sprites danced along tree branches, their tiny forms leaving sparkles of light wherever they touched.
They laughed and chased each other, playing games only they understood.
Salamanders made of living flame crawled along rocks, their bodies burning without consuming the stone they walked on.
Jack walked through them all, his group following behind, every type of creature imaginable gathering to witness.
They didn’t attack.
They just watched, observed, and waited to see what the Soul Warden would do.
The castle gates loomed ahead, massive doors of white wood bound with gold, standing perhaps fifty feet tall.
As Jack approached, they began to open. Smoothly and silently, they swung open inward to reveal darkness beyond that gradually resolved into torchlit corridors.
Jack didn’t hesitate. He walked through without wasting a second.
The interior matched the exterior’s grandeur. Classical architecture with columns supporting vaulted ceilings and marble floors polished to mirror perfection.
Torches burned in sconces along the walls, their flames steady despite no visible fuel source.
The corridor stretched ahead, and along both walls hung portraits.
Dozens of them. Perhaps hundreds.
Each one showed a figure in various poses, various clothing styles spanning what looked like millennia of fashion.
Some were fully human, standing proud with weapons or nothing but their hands.
Others were hybrids, half-human and half-something else, their features mixing mortal and monster in ways that should have been horrifying but instead looked natural.
Soul Wardens, Jack realized.
Past Soul Wardens, each one who’d claimed this floor before him. Their faces stared out from frames of gold and silver, their eyes seeming to follow his passage even though they were just painted on a canvas.
One portrait caught his eye briefly. He didn’t stop to examine it, but something about it pulled his attention for just a moment before he continued forward.
’I’ll come back to it later. Maybe.’
The corridor ended in double doors.
They were made of dark wood, their surfaces carved with more symbols, some were in English, and others were in different languages.
Jack counted the different symbols. There were at least 7 different languages.
The doors opened as Jack approached, swinging inward to reveal what lay beyond.
The throne room.
It was massive. Perhaps a hundred feet from door to far wall, the ceiling lost in shadows sixty feet above, columns supporting the vast space at regular intervals.
Windows lined the walls, showing the glowing landscape outside, casting colored light across marble floors that reflected everything like still water.
At the room’s center, raised on a platform perhaps ten feet high, accessed by steps covered in red carpet, sat a throne.
It was bigger than Jack. Perhaps eight feet tall, its back rising in ornate curves that looked like wings without depicting them directly.
The material was unknown, black but not quite black, catching light in ways that made it seem to shift between solid and liquid.
Gold traced patterns across its surface, flowing designs that might have been script in some language Jack didn’t recognize.
Armrests wide enough to hold a giant’s hands, cushioned in red velvet that looked pristine despite the obvious aging.
A throne for a king.
For someone meant to rule and to sit above all others and pass judgment.
Jack walked toward it without thinking.
His feet carried him up the red carpet, up the steps, toward the throne that seemed to pull him forward like a magnet.
He reached the throne and just stood there for a moment.
The throne loomed above him, its presence somehow both inviting and intimidating.
Jack took his seat on the throne.
The moment his body touched the throne, everything changed.
The floor shook like an earthquake, a giant tremor that ran through stone and air like a tear in reality itself.
A pulse that originated from where Jack sat, spreading outward in waves that reached the walls, and kept going to encompass the entire floor.
Then Jack heard a voice ring out.
