The period following Earl's duel had passed in a relentless cycle of learning and construction. That public humiliation of the nobility had been the perfect, arrogant distraction. From the moment Daemon walked out of that interrogation room, his focus had been singular: the Exodus. The Archangel Sanctum, paid for by the Chancellor, was merely the launch platform. With the full force of the fifty-member Order, he had successfully completed the monumental task of engineering and fabrication. They had built six two-stroke internal combustion engines, fueled by a meticulously synthesized mix of biodiesel and alcohol, which now powered three rigid airships. The ships were hastily assembled, with some materials substituted out of necessity for a quick exit, but they were a marvel of physics and engineering—lacking the sleek finish and protective warding of Imperial magic, but possessing raw, mechanical power.
The Exodus Night arrived—a night of nervous anticipation and finality. There were no detailed instructions, only synchronized movement born of a year of discipline. All fifty members knew their tasks: dismantling the Sanctum, securing the intellectual property, and cutting their ties to the Empire forever.
"Mikael, confirm the steam engines are offline and ready for transit," Daemon instructed, his voice low and calm over the ambient sounds of the forest. "Jonas, final check on the packed gunpowder and chemical stockpile. Nothing is left that can be analyzed."
"Confirmed, Daemon. The last centrifuge is secure. I hate leaving this forge behind," Jonas replied, his voice tinged with regret for the marvelous equipment they'd built.
Helga, stationed at the loading bay, called out, "The Eichorst twins have sealed the Earth wards on the tunnels. All personnel accounted for at the main deck."
From the moment they had accepted Daemon's ring, they had accepted the cost: they would abandon family, risk death, and burn their bridges to change the status quo and build a better world. There was no turning back.
Daemon, however, had a farewell gift for the Academy. Over the past year, the money secured from the Chancellor and the income from supplying Duke Steiner with the B-1 canisters had funded this entire escape. Daemon had used that money to finance a spectacular distraction: The Cleansing Fire.
He had created a highly volatile explosive device housed in a large barrel. Inside, four separate canisters were filled with liquid hydrogen, alcohol, chlorine, and oxygen, all packed around a core of standard gunpowder mixed with finely ground magnesium. Over the preceding months, he had strategically placed almost one hundred of these volatile barrels throughout the lab complex, the forge, and the surrounding compound.
Daemon watched the last crates being secured onto the deck of the lead airship. He checked the manifest one last time. "All members aboard. All blueprints and notes secured. Hans, confirm no lingering magical signature from the Sanctum."
Hans Grubber's voice crackled slightly as he confirmed through a rune-linked communication device, "Nothing, Daemon. The wards are collapsing naturally. We're clean."
Daemon lit the fuse on the final barrel placed directly beneath the Sanctum's main floor. He didn't wait; he climbed aboard the largest airship, taking his place at the controls.
One by one, the three crude airships lifted off the forest floor. The internal combustion engines roared to life, a completely alien sound in the Aether-dominated world. The airships vibrated violently, the hastily built frames groaning under the strain. They were slow, achieving a maximum ground speed of only about sixty kilometers per hour, but they were ascending.
"It's slow, Daemon," Helga observed, gripping the rail tightly, watching the forest shrink below them.
"It is a prototype, Helga," Daemon replied, his eyes fixed on the altimeter. "There will be time to make it better. For now, it is transportation."
They climbed steadily, the airships shaking and rattling their way through the night sky. They reached an altitude of almost eight hundred meters—well above the dense cloud cover—when the barrels in the abandoned Sanctum exploded.
The first explosion was the gunpowder-magnesium core, which triggered the sympathetic detonation of the surrounding volatile canisters. The reaction was not a simple blast, but a cascade of chemical fury. The liquid hydrogen and oxygen provided the immediate, raw energy, while the chlorine and alcohol added volume and toxic expansion.
The explosion's radius was catastrophic at ground zero. The entire 120-square-meter Sanctum and the surrounding hundred meters of forest were instantly vaporized. The explosion unleashed a blinding, white-hot flash. The light was so bright—intensified by the magnesium—that it momentarily eclipsed the stars and the full moon. It was a thermal pulse of incredible magnitude, far surpassing any localized Fire magic spell known to the Academy.
The sound was immense. It was not a magical boom, but a physical, devastating shockwave that ripped through the quiet night air, audible for tens of miles around the Academy. Even at 800 meters, the three airships were rocked violently by the expanding pressure wave.
"By the Void!" Jonas shouted, clutching a strut as the ship pitched. "That wasn't just an explosion, that was—that was a judgment!"
Mikael, usually the most reserved, looked down at the site of the former lab. All they could see was a massive, angry sphere of expanding, multi-hued fire—brilliant white at the core, fading to red and yellow, topped by an expanding cloud of toxic, greenish-yellow smoke. "They won't know what hit them. They'll think it's a divine strike."
On the lead ship, Helga turned to Daemon, her face illuminated by the inferno below. Her eyes reflected a mixture of awe and cold realization. "You planned this. This was always the ending, wasn't it?"
Daemon watched the explosion form a vast, ominous column of smoke stretching toward the atmosphere. A subtle, cold satisfaction settled over him. "It is the start, Helga. We are not leaving a mess for them to clean. We are leaving them a legacy of terror and impossibility. Let them analyze that fire. Let them waste years trying to determine what kind of magic can do that."
He adjusted the controls, turning the airship away from the spectacular, burning dawn he had created. "The Academy will now realize the commoners they scorned have transcended their petty feudal war games. They may have the Aether, but we have physics. We have logic. And we have wings."
The three crude, vibrating airships, silhouetted against the colossal, fiery pillar of smoke, vanished into the vast, indifferent night sky, carrying the future of the Order of the Archangel toward an unknown horizon.