"What is a king without his throne? What am I without one?" Max muttered to himself, his body no longer able to move as lightning continued to pound him from above. His flesh was almost fully charred from the constant torment, smoke rising from his skin as every breath scraped through his throat like ash.

He tried to remember exactly what his journey had felt like, how he had risen, how he had claimed the title of king in the first place.

As far as he could remember, he did not even own an official throne yet. For all the time he had been called king, he had only used Agnia’s throne. But did that mean he was not truly a ruler?

No.

A throne had never determined whether he was king or not. The throne never meant anything to him.

People followed him because he had power. Because he had a voice. Because when he stood before them, they believed he could drag them somewhere higher, or crush them if they refused.

Not because he sat on a useless piece of wood.

Not because he wore a crown.

"People," he said, barely audible beneath the fading crackle of lightning.

And in that moment, the lightning stopped. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

"They are what make a king," Max continued, his voice rough, almost broken, yet growing clearer with every word. "Without people willing to follow him, even a throne cannot make a man into a king. Whether he has a throne or not, whether he wears a crown or stands in the dirt, he is still a king as long as others choose to follow his voice."

His fingers twitched, and his burned body trembled as he tried to push himself up.

"But a throne without people is just wood."

The throne shook, its white surface visibly shifting as if something trapped deep beneath it was trying to break free, and Max watched through the pain as thin cracks spread across that pale color, not shattering the throne itself, but peeling away the false layer that had been covering it all this time.

Piece by piece, the white shell began to fall apart like old paint, revealing something underneath that looked almost brown at first, then richer, deeper, alive, until the throne surrounded by vines no longer looked like white marble at all, but ancient wood that had been hidden beneath a mask for millions of years.

The wood was beautiful, perhaps the most beautiful thing Max had ever seen that was not a woman or a weapon.

Deep brown lines ran through it like veins, carrying faint golden-green light inside the grain, while the vines wrapped around it tightened slightly, no longer looking like simple decoration but like living roots that had grown together with the throne since the beginning.

It did not look carved by hands, nor built by craftsmen, nor shaped by tools. It looked as if nature itself had once decided to grow a throne, and after countless ages of silence, it was finally revealing its true form again.

The back of the throne stretched high like the trunk of a sacred tree, branches curling near the top while small leaves bloomed along its sides, glowing faintly in the pure white void around them.

The seat itself remained the size of a human, almost humble compared to the height and presence of the rest, but the aura it carried was enormous, far greater than any ruler who might sit on it.

Max could feel it now, not as pressure trying to crush him, but as something watching him, waiting to see if he would crawl, run, lie, or continue standing with the same blood-soaked heart he had always carried.

When Max finally forced himself up, barely able to stand on his feet, something appeared on the throne.

At first, it was only a small wisp of light floating above the seat, soft and harmless-looking, almost like a firefly lost inside this endless white space. But then it grew, slowly stretching upward as more light gathered around it.

Shoulders formed first, then arms, then a head without a face, until the wisp became the shape of a person sitting upon the throne as if it had always been there, only waiting for Max to answer correctly before showing itself.

It was made fully from light, with no features to tell whether it was a man or a woman. There were no eyes, no mouth, no expression, only a bright figure wrapped in large armor of pure radiance, its plates shining like sunlight passing through leaves while thin streams of white and gold flowed between the gaps like living mana.

The armor covered everything, hiding whatever shape might have existed underneath, and yet the presence sitting there felt ancient enough to make even Max’s burned body stiffen slightly.

The light creature lowered its head toward him, and from within that shining figure, the same ancient voice spoke again, deep and heavy, as if the throne itself had finally decided to answer.

"Correct."

The light creature extended its hand, one glowing finger pointing straight at Max, and for a moment, the white void around them seemed to grow even quieter, as if the throne, the light, and the entire spirit realm were waiting for those final words.

"Worthy."

It spoke in the same ancient tone, deep and heavy, carrying no praise, no warmth, only the simple judgment of something that had watched countless beings fail before him.

Then a beam of light shot straight between Max’s brows.

His body fell backward, his burned limbs losing all strength at once, and his eyes rolled all the way to the top of their sockets as the white world before him stretched, cracked, and began to twist into something else entirely.

It was not like being pulled through the pond, nor like the current of mana that had dragged him through the spirit realm.

This felt older. He could feel it in the air, taste it on his tongue, smell it in every breath, as if the image before him carried the scent of a time long buried beneath the roots of the world.

A world he had never witnessed before appeared in front of his eyes.