The golden flagship barge descended through the sea of clouds like an angry gilded mountain.
It was two hundred feet long, plated in pure imperial sun-gold, and carved from three-hundred-year-old ironwood timbers. Along both port and starboard railings, twelve massive lift-rotors churned the morning mist into white whirlpools, kicking up a gale that flattened the tall grass across the Seventh Spire.
At the prow stood Grand Inquisitor Drake.
He wore the triple-layered ceremonial vestments of the Sol-Aethel Imperial Inquisition. Heavy gold epaulets rested on his shoulders, lined with white ermine fur, and a crimson cape billowed behind him in the rotor wash.
In his right gauntlet, Drake gripped the Sun-Piercing Lance, an eighth-tier imperial relic tipped with refined star-iron.
Behind him, eighty elite imperial censors stood in four rigid ranks of twenty.
Every censor wore full-plate gilded armor etched with anti-demon wards. Their golden helmets completely concealed their faces, leaving only slits of cold blue light where their eyes focused forward with mechanical discipline. They held heavy suppression banners and twin-bladed halberds, ready to execute an entire sect at a single word from their commander.
Drake peered down through the thinning cloud bank, his sharp grey eyes scanning the terrain.
He had expected a fortress.
He had prepared for an ancient forbidden domain bristling with jagged bone towers, blood-red protective barriers, and legions of chained soul-beasts howling at the heavens. After all, the astronomical disturbance recorded last midnight had shattered seventy-two divination mirrors in the imperial capital and bathed three provinces in noon-day sunlight. Only an ancient, primordial terror could generate such realm-bending power.
Instead, the gilded flagship cleared the treeline to reveal... a crooked wooden cottage.
A weather-beaten timber shack with moss growing between the cedar roof shingles.
A small vegetable patch fenced with crooked pine branches, where a dozen plump, cabbage-like plants pulsed with faint emerald warmth.
A stone well with a rusty iron bucket dangling from frayed hemp rope.
And sitting right in the middle of the dandelion lawn was a young man in a strange black-and-silver reclining chair.
Drake’s golden eyebrows knit together in deep suspicion.
"Is that the entity?" Drake muttered, his voice rumbling beneath his gilded visor. "A mortal hermit squatting in the weeds?"
Beside him, Censor-Captain Vane adjusted an enchanted brass looking-glass, focusing the magnification runes on the porch.
"My Lord Inquisitor," Vane whispered, his breath catching in his throat. "Look closer at the garden perimeter."
Drake adjusted his spiritual vision, letting the golden Qi of the imperial court wash over his retinas.
His breath caught.
Lying in the clover beside the cabbage patch was a colossal golden beast. It possessed the razor-sharp talons of an imperial eagle and the muscular hindquarters of an apex lion. Its gilded feathers crackled with blue lightning sparks that danced across the grass, grounding harmlessly into the soil.
"A Thunder Gryphon..." Drake breathed, his knuckles whitening against the haft of his lance. "A mature ninth-tier apex predator. It sleeps in the dirt like a stray farm dog."
"And look to the left, my Lord," Vane said, his voice trembling now. "By the fence."
Kneeling in the dandelion greens was a hunched figure draped in blackened, charred rags.
The figure’s skeletal grey claws were gently plucking weeds from around an emerald cabbage. On its bony head sat a frayed straw sun hat, tied under its chin with a bit of dirty string. Every few seconds, the creature dropped a fistful of chickweed into a small wooden bucket, humming a hollow, ghostly tune.
Drake’s pupils contracted to pinpricks.
"The Nether-Bane Sovereign..." Drake hissed, pure horror striking his spine like an ice pick. "The Ghost King who terrorized the northern frontiers for three centuries! The demon who swallowed an imperial legion in the Abyssal Wars! He is... he is pulling crabgrass?!"
"And look upon the tea table beside the porch," Vane stammered, his looking-glass shaking violently in his armored hands. "The black sphere holding down those yellow papers..."
Drake focused his gaze on the low table beside the reclining chair.
A stack of faded paper slips—which looked suspiciously like greasy receipts from an ordinary town bakery—fluttered in the mountain breeze. Resting casually on top of them, serving as a paperweight, was a swirling, ink-black orb the size of a melon.
It was the Ten-Thousand-Year Primordial Soul-Pearl.
An artifact of absolute ruin, containing the condensed necrotic essence of a hundred thousand vengeful ghosts. Any mortal who touched it should have had their flesh melted to bone in three seconds.
Yet there it sat, stopping pastry receipts from blowing into the dirt.
【Target: Ten-Thousand-Year Primordial Soul-Pearl】 【Weight: 14.2 kg (Dense Ballast Grade)】 【Function: High-Efficiency Porch Paperweight】 【Inspector Note: Dense necrotic core provides optimal wind resistance. Prevents local bakery delivery menus from blowing into cabbage patch. Highly effective domestic utility.】
Drake swallowed hard, a cold bead of sweat rolling down his temple into his trimmed grey beard.
"He subdued the Ghost King," Drake whispered, the weight of the realization pressing down upon his chest. "He took the soul-source of an ancient calamity and turned it into an office knickknack. This recluse is not a mere mortal. He is a demon of incomprehensible depths."
Drake straightened his spine, drawing upon the absolute authority of the Sol-Aethel Empire to steady his racing heart.
"It matters not," Drake said coldly, raising his lance toward the clouds. "He stands within the territory of the Son of Heaven. No sovereign, no matter how ancient, is above the Imperial Law. Helmsman, ground the vessel!"
*THUD-CRUNCH!*
The two-hundred-foot flagship barge dropped out of the sky, its heavy adamantine landing skids slamming directly into the clearing seventy paces from the cottage.
The impact gouged two deep trenches into the moist turf, sending clumps of rich black earth and crushed buttercups flying through the air. The massive lift-rotors sputtered to a halt, letting out a long, wheezing hiss of pressurized steam that blanketed the yard in white vapor.
The brass gangplank dropped with a deafening crash: *CLANG!*
Eighty gold-armored censors marched down the ramp in four synchronized columns.
*CLACK. CLACK. CLACK.*
Their heavy boots struck the stone path with bone-jarring precision. They fanned out across the clover, planting their suppression banners into the soil, creating an unbroken wall of polished gold shields and gleaming halberd blades.
The banners began to hum, projecting a shimmering golden boundary field that sealed the mountain peak against all escape routes.
Drake strode down the center aisle, his white ermine cape sweeping across the crushed grass.
He came to a halt twenty paces from the porch steps, planting the butt of his Sun-Piercing Lance deep into the earth.
He drew a long breath, channeling his Tier 6 Grand Inquisitor core into his vocal cords.
When he spoke, his voice boomed across Solitude Spire like rolling thunder, shaking the wooden eaves of the cottage and rustling the crooked pine branches:
"HERMIT OF SOLITUDE SPIRE! HEAR THE SOVEREIGN DECREE OF THE SOL-AETHEL EMPIRE!"
Drake unrolled an imperial scroll of crimson silk, its golden embroidery gleaming under the morning sun.
"BY ORDER OF EMPEROR AURELIUS THE THIRD, YOU ARE HEREBY COMMANDED TO PRESENT YOURSELF FOR IMPERIAL REGISTRATION! EXPLAIN THE UNLICENSED SOLAR IGNITION OF LAST MIDNIGHT, SURRENDER ALL CELESTIAL CONTRABAND, AND SUBMIT TO THE JURISDICTION OF THE HIGH COURT!"
Drake paused, his chest heaving, his sharp eyes fixed upon the reclining chair.
The mountain air fell dead silent.
The eighty censors stood frozen, holding their breath, their fingers white against their halberds.
Even the wind seemed to die down, waiting for the wrath of an ancient cosmic entity to shatter the sky.
On the porch, Lyra Ashford stepped forward.
She had already drawn her ancestral silver rapier an inch from its scabbard. Her knuckles were white, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped sparrow. Her amber eyes darted from Drake’s eighth-tier lance to the eighty censors, then back to the quiet figure in the chair.
*They brought eighty gold-armored inquisitors,* Lyra thought, cold terror creeping along her collarbones. *They landed a war barge right on Senior Brother’s front lawn. They crushed the wild clover. They yelled at sixty decibels during his morning digestion period!*
She glanced toward Felix, bracing herself for the sky to fall.
*Senior Brother will disintegrate them,* she realized with absolute certainty. *He will wipe the entire imperial delegation from the face of reality with a single sigh!*
Yet Felix Vance didn't sigh.
He didn't draw a weapon.
He didn't even look up.
Felix was currently reclined at a comfortable forty-five-degree angle in his Zero-Gravity Recliner. He wore loose, faded hemp trousers and a rumpled grey tunic that looked suspiciously like a pair of oversized pajamas. His feet were crossed at the ankles, his frayed straw slippers dangling lazily from his toes.
In his hands, he held the obsidian slate of the AetherDeck.
Beside him, perched on the wide wooden armrest, was Barnaby the clockwork owl.
The brass automaton was completely silent, thanks to the thick black rubber stopper jammed securely between its polished mandibles. In its right brass talon, Barnaby clutched a shiny copper coin, its amber crystal lenses whirring in tiny, helpless circles as it watched the eighty golden soldiers.
Felix's thumbs were flying across the screen.
He hadn't heard one word of Drake’s grand imperial speech.
He hadn't noticed the eighty gold-armored censors stamping their boots.
He hadn't even noticed the two-hundred-foot warship that had just pulverized a ten-foot strip of his lawn.
Why?
Because three seconds ago, Felix had tapped the most sacred, adrenaline-pumping button known to modern gaming civilization:
`[CLAIM MILESTONE TICKET: HEAVENLY VAULT 10x SUMMON]`
On the obsidian display of the AetherDeck, the summoning animation had just begun.
A dark celestial void opened on the glass screen. Tiny pixelated shooting stars began to streak across the dark background in an escalating spiral of rainbow light.
An epic, high-octane 8-bit orchestral fanfare started blaring from the slate’s tiny speakers:
*DO-DO-DO-DAAAAH-DING!*
Felix’s breath hitched. His eyes widened, his face illuminated by the flashing pixel fireworks.
"Come on," Felix whispered under his breath, his thumbs hovering over the skip button. "Come on, gold glow. Don't give me purple. Give me the rainbow star burst."
The AetherDeck’s interface shifted into high-priority display mode:
Felix held his breath, completely locked into the gamer zone.
Down on the grass, Grand Inquisitor Drake stood in the morning breeze, still holding the crimson imperial scroll high above his head.
Five seconds passed.
Ten seconds passed.
Drake’s arms began to ache. His voice had echoed off the distant mountain crags and died into nothingness. The eighty censors were beginning to shift their weight, their boots creaking softly in the grass.
The young man on the porch hadn't twitched an eyelid.
He hadn't even glanced in their direction. He was staring at a flat black stone in his palms, tapping the glass with rhythmic, insolent taps.
Drake’s face flushed a deep, violent crimson beneath his gilded visor.
In seventy years of serving the Sol-Aethel Empire, Drake had arrested rebellious princes, executed rogue sect masters, and interrogated high elders. Every single one of them had trembled, pleaded for mercy, or launched into furious curses.
Never had anyone ignored him like an annoying summer gnat.
"Insolent dog!" Drake roared, his pride bursting through his veneer of discipline. "Did you not hear the Imperial Edict?! Stand and face the judgment of the Emperor, or I shall reduce this peak to ash!"
Drake raised his Sun-Piercing Lance, its tip crackling with blinding golden Qi.
Beside the porch, Lyra’s heart leaped into her throat.
"Senior Brother!" Lyra cried, her voice trembling. "The Imperial Inquisitor... he is drawing his weapon!"
Felix didn't even blink.
He merely leaned his head back against the padded headrest of the recliner, his thumb pressing down on the glass screen.
"Quiet, Lyra," Felix muttered in a flat, deadpan voice. "The animation is skipping. This is the moment of truth."
On the obsidian screen, the golden shooting star finally struck the center of the summoning circle.
A brilliant blue flash filled the display.
And Felix Vance's face instantly collapsed into the darkest, most bitter frown in human history.