Eight long, slow days passed, weighted with a suffocating tension like eight complete ages inside the Chamber of Stillness, severed from the world. During this period, time inside this dark vault seemed to move at an entirely different rhythm from the turbulent city of Seiron above. Outside, political and meteorological storms were battering the palace walls, while inside, a silent process of reconstruction was underway for one of the continent's greatest warriors.
Dex did not leave his father's side except in cases of absolute necessity, specifically to plant his messages among the old guard's ranks, and would return swiftly to spend his nights crouching in the vault's corner, his exhausted eyes tracking the subtle biological and magical transformations that had come over the body lying before him. Thanks to the two previous drops of the World Tree's Nectar and the blue phoenix flames Dex had used as a protective shield, a biological miracle had occurred that surpassed every limit of human alchemical medicine.
The pale, sagging skin that had resembled ancient papyrus on the verge of tearing had reclaimed its elasticity and its warm, vital color. The muscles that had eroded until they were fused to bone under the assault of Beelzebub's Tear had begun to swell gradually, acquiring a terrifying density and strength, taking clear shape across Marcus's body as though an invisible divine sculptor were reshaping the statue of history's greatest hero using clay mixed with the water of life. The swollen black veins that had portended death had vanished completely without trace, replaced by a faint, pulsing blue glow beneath the skin, indicating the flow of blood that was pure, cleansed, and saturated with an immense density of mana beginning to accumulate in preparation for something great. Lord Marcus's body had not merely healed, it had returned to the peak of the physical youth and strength he had possessed twenty years ago.
Dex stood, shadows dancing across his young face carrying a harsh wisdom. He looked at the sensing crystals that Lumia had ceased to manipulate, since Marcus's readings now matched perfectly those of a man in a natural coma, though stable.
"The time has come," Dex whispered, his voice echoing through the vault like the echo of an ancient incantation. "The body has been fully prepared and purified. The core has stabilized and its fractures have been repaired. The solid foundation has been built, and now comes the ascent to the sky."
He slipped his hand into his jacket and drew out the crystal vial for the last time. Only a single drop remained. But this drop was unlike the two that had preceded it. Having settled at the very bottom of the vial, it had concentrated within it the heaviest and densest spiritual essences of the tree's nectar. It glimmered in the darkness with a liquid golden light blending with a blazing silver radiance, as though it contained the pure distillation of midday sunlight and harvest moonlight simultaneously, imprisoned within a space no larger than a few cubic millimeters. This drop weighed a soul, and carried enough energy to detonate a mountain or revive a desert.
Lumia drew close, her silver eyes gleaming with absolute gravity. "Be careful, Dex. The previous two drops were for repair. This drop, is for evolution. His body will attempt to absorb raw cosmic energy. The reaction will be so violent that even my void barriers may not suffice to contain it."
Dex nodded with sternness and did not hesitate. He leaned over his father, parted his mouth with extreme care, then tilted the vial. The golden drop detached with agonizing slowness, as though defying the laws of gravity, filled with the weight of destiny. And in the moment it touched Marcus's tongue and disappeared into him, something terrifying occurred.
A total and absolute stillness descended on the room. The buzzing of the mechanical mana instruments stopped suddenly as though their souls had been seized. The rustle of air seeping through the door's cracks ceased. Even Dex's and Lumia's breathing appeared to stop. This was no mere silence, it was a sonic and spiritual void: a terrifying quiet that strangled the breath, the cosmic calm that precedes a great explosion or the birth of stars.
Then, the tempest began.
It was no sonic explosion shaking the eardrums, it was an explosion in the atmospheric and spiritual pressure of the entire room. In a fraction of a second, Marcus Williams's body transformed into a small black hole, a terrifying vortex absorbing every mana particle and every energy molecule in its surroundings. The large gray crystals hanging on the walls, designed to absorb mana slowly, could not withstand the force of the reverse pull. They crackled, cracked, then shattered and scattered, reduced to fine dust, because Marcus's body had absorbed every last trace of energy within them in the blink of an eye.
"Dex! Fall back immediately!" Lumia cried in warning, abandoning all attempts at concealment. She raised her hands and wove a dense void barrier around herself and Dex, forming a transparent dome isolating them from the center of the catastrophe.
The rock vault shuddered with violence, as though a devastating earthquake were striking the foundations of Williams Palace from the roots. Dust rained from the stone ceiling, and cracks began crawling like serpents across the walls. And in the midst of this chaos, Lord Marcus's body began to float slowly above the marble bed, half of which had shattered under the force of the pressure.
His body was now enveloped by a dense, viscous, blazing golden aura, so intensely luminous it appeared as molten liquid encasing him like a divine shield. Through his Phoenix Sight, Dex could see what was happening within. The bones were cracking and producing sounds like shattering rocks as they rearranged their internal structure, increasing their density to become stronger than steel, to bear the new power surging through them.
Marcus's mana core, previously of rank SS, a rank considered the absolute pinnacle of human power and the dream of every warrior, had begun to transcend its own physical limits. The core pulsed at a frantic speed, expanding and contracting, attempting to absorb the nectar's sea. And here came the role of Dex's flames. The Blue Phoenix Mana that Dex had planted in his father's body the previous night had not extinguished, it reacted with the golden nectar. The blue flames were functioning as a chemical catalyst and magical filter, burning the impurities from the tree's energy and violently widening Marcus's energy pathways so they would not rupture, making the fusion of the human body with cosmic energy possible.
And suddenly, in the midst of the golden tempest and the tremors that nearly brought the vault crashing down upon their heads, Lord Marcus Williams opened his eyes.
Dex's gaze met his father's, but those eyes in that singular moment were no longer human eyes. His pupils had vanished entirely, replaced by a pure golden light blazing like two small suns in his stern face. There were no emotions, only pure power, an absolute concentration of life's essence.
The moment he opened his eyes, the suppressed aura detonated. The SS rank barrier that had constrained Marcus for years shattered like fragile glass. The room's walls, built from black Manalit Stone, that costly material specifically designed to absorb and resist magical shockwaves, began to crack and groan under the weight of the pressure.
But the aura did not stop there. It continued rising and boiling, breaching the SS threshold to arrive at SS+. At this moment, the spiritual pressure inside the room grew so heavy that gravity itself was disrupted, scattered stone fragments, shards of shattered vials, and even dried droplets of blood began floating through the air, drifting toward the ceiling.
Dex stood behind Lumia's barrier, gasping for breath, his chest heaving, watching the golden aura continue expanding, breaching the SS+ threshold, approaching slowly and inexorably, in a scene that tore the human mind apart, that forbidden zone. The zone that the greatest mages whispered of in their legends with fear and reverence, the zone named in the ancient manuscripts as "The Divine Boundary."
Lord Marcus, returned from the depths of death, stood with his feet touching the threshold of the absolute legendary rank: SSS.
The Golden Tempest had been born.