Prologue

The moonlight illuminated what seemed like a peaceful night, something only people who now sleep peacefully in their homes where civilization reigns would think.

In the depths of the Valley of the Cursed Ashes, however, the geography itself seemed to have been designed for desolation and death. 

Thousands of kilometers away from the plant and technological safety of the floating Sakura Island, this corner of the world was nothing more than a scar of volcanic rock and perpetual ash. 

Here, the atmosphere was saturated with chaotic magical energy; so dense that breathing felt unnatural, as if oxygen had weight; all thanks to the miasma of demonic beasts that disrupted the flow.

It was no place for the weak; it was a hunting ground for entities that had transcended common biology through the malevolent influence of underworld demons... And it was currently filled with monstrous corpses of those same entities; blood saturating the area and a metallic, burnt aroma assaulting the senses.

In the center of this wasteland, two figures faced each other. The air between them vibrated with a violent static, and the stones on the ground disintegrated into dust before colliding from the sheer atmospheric pressure.

The first of these was a ten-meter-high architectural nightmare: the Ebon Scale Abyssal Monarch.

He stood like a monument to terror itself, a King of his kind. 

Its body, covered in plates of polished obsidian armor, already showed signs of a prolonged battle. Several of its scales were chipped, and a trail of thick, black blood dripped from its left flank, steaming as it touched the ground.

From its back sprouted six membranous wings that extended like scythes, and its six crimson eyes shone with a wounded but lethal fury.

The Monarch did not roar; his mere presence emitted such a suffocating Aura pressure that the ground beneath his claws sank into a perfect crater. 

It was a force that denied the right to exist to anyone who did not have an equivalent density of spirit.

Facing this titan of flesh, bone, and scales, a deceptively mundane-looking young human (if you ignored the bloodstains that did not belong to him) stood. 

Her dark brown hair was whipped by the soot-laden wind, and her eyes, a deep gold like molten gold, held a playful gleam that was insulting given the circumstances. 

He wore a gray t-shirt and black combat pants, both torn to shreds, revealing skin that showed no cuts, but a slight redness where the beast's previous impacts had struck.

Every muscle in his body was taut like a steel cable. There was no fear in him; only the absolute calm of one who knows his own weight.

Despite having fought against an army of crazed demonic beasts and having faced their King, he was unusually unharmed.

"Is that all you've got, big guy?" the young man asked, his clear voice cutting through the whirring of the pressure. "I was hoping a specimen of your caliber would make me sweat a little more before lunch."

The Abyssal Monarch, furious at his constant challenge, responded with a move that defied his mass. 

It moved at a speed that broke the sound barrier, leaving behind a shockwave that pulverized the nearby rocks. Its right claw, charged with violet energy, descended like a hammer toward the human's head.

The young man did not back down at all. 

Instead, he took a step forward...sinking his feet into the solid rock, as Ki flowed through his channels unleashing an Aura—a spiritual pressure—that burst outwards. 

It was not an explosion of light, but a visual distortion; the space around him became denser, more solid...The shock was cataclysmic, making the earth itself tremble.

The young man's bare fist intercepted the five-meter claw. There was no metallic sound, but a dry thunderclap that displaced the ash clouds for three kilometers around with its sheer, inhuman power.

The ground gave way, chunks of rock flew, but the boy didn't move an inch. His knuckles, protected by the saturation of his own internal energy flowing through his keirakus, were pressed against the bone of the demonic dragon.

"My turn," he said, with a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

With a hip twist that engaged every fiber of his being, the young man threw a second punch. It was a whiplash of pure power. His fist sank into the Monarch's chest, piercing the impenetrable scales. 

The shock wave pierced through flesh and bone, exiting through the beast's back and projecting a column of black blood toward the horizon.

The ten-meter monster shot out, bouncing off the mountainsides like a broken toy, passing over the corpses of those it once controlled, and even sending them flying with it.

In the distance, observing the epic battle amidst that carnage, from a high cliff, two figures remained impassive. 

The first was a man with a thick beard, broad shoulders, and calloused hands; whose posture resembled a pillar that has supported the sky for millennia, and strange eyes that seemed to lack pupils.

His unique aura was reminiscent of both a martial master who is not afraid to face legions of warriors and a storm about to break upon the earth; the air around him charged with static and filled with an almost suffocating pressure.

He wore what appeared to be a white tattsuke-hakama that did nothing to conceal his intimidating musculature. From any angle, he seemed to be the very embodiment of "Martial."

Beside him, quite naturally, stood a beautiful woman with blonde hair and icy elegance who observed every detail of the battle with her fox-like eyes and yellow pupils. 

Her figure, covered by a silk kimono with gold and silver embroidery, was extremely seductive; her bearing, as dignified as that of a goddess.

She had the aura of a high-class lady from the Edo period, full of noble grace with that white silk fan that hid her tender lips.

"Emma's getting careless," the Master grumbled, crossing his muscular arms in a gesture of annoyance that revealed his gums. "He fought hundreds of beasts as weak as that Inugami scum, but he let that huge, pathetic lizard rip his shirt? He's going to have to sew it himself."

"Ara~? You're being unnecessarily strict this time, Goro-chan~" the woman replied with a subtle smile that faintly peeked out from behind her fan. "You yourself are seeing how he's toying with a King-Grade Beast like it's some street tengu without even needing to use Ars Ego; right after slaughtering his small army of wild packs. His control of Dou and Sei is nearly perfect...though he lacks the seriousness you demand of him."

"If her control isn't perfect, she'll die outside our island," Futsu Goro retorted, his voice thundering like a blow against steel. "The world out there has shadows with claws longer than that fake dragon's, Aoi, you know that... Emma needs to understand that strength without precision is just inefficiency that wears you down. She can't expect to rely on that strange technique of hers (Ars Ego) to defend herself against the true powers of this era... much less fight against her inevitable fate as a soul that has broken free from the cycle!"

—Certainly....— The woman, Futsu Aoi, nodded with a serious expression while narrowing her cunning and seductive eyes, thinking to herself. 

'It's certainly an impressive technique,' Aoi thought as she snapped her fan shut. 'But its use against divine beings is questionable at best, especially considering its shortcomings... Emma, ​​that's something you'll have to work on improving yourself.'

In the center of the valley, the Abyssal Monarch, enraged by the mortal wound inflicted upon him by the young man named Emma, ​​gathered all his magical energy in his throat. The air around his mouth collapsed, forming a sphere of absolute power and concentrated energy. It was an attack capable of disintegrating matter.

Emma saw the projectile coming. She didn't brace herself. She simply exhaled, relaxing every muscle. Just as the sphere was fired, the young man extended his right hand. He didn't strike; he simply caught the attack.

The impact created an absolute silence that lasted three seconds. Then, the world erupted with overwhelming forces; a trail of light shooting into the sky like a pillar.

Another perplexing phenomenon occurred; at one point, cracks began to appear in the dark sky through which the mass of magical energy passed, quickly spreading like a spider's web before, finally, the sky "broke" to reveal...the same sky as before?

It was a scene as confusing as the "pieces of sky" that fell slowly like petals before vanishing into white light; quite beautiful and mystical in the middle of that full moon night.

"Our fool broke through your illusory barrier..." Goro muttered through gritted teeth, and Aoi just remained silent while waving her fan.

When the dust finally settled, Emma stood with her hand still outstretched. The sphere of energy had been deflected completely into the sky, leaving a circular hole in the clouds. 

The Abyssal Monarch lay on the ground, his eyes extinguished and his body collapsing under the weight of final defeat.

"It's over," Emma sighed, running a hand through her hair with a proud smile as she turned to face the two old men. "Grandpa, did you see that?! I deflected it with excellent control of my Sei Ki's flesh and bone reinforcement!"

The old men descended from the cliff as if they were flying....if someone from the United Chinese Empire saw them, they would believe they were immortals from some of the most powerful families in their country....Especially because of their almost divine aura.

"You took too long!" Goro's hand slammed into the back of the boy's neck with the force of a war mace, so heavy it bent his upper torso forward. "You got distracted! If that fake dragon had had a second core... you'd be missing an arm now!"

"Ow! But grandpa, I just killed a Demon Beast King, didn't I?!" the boy complained, rubbing the impact zone after nearly falling.

—You didn't even kill him! The idiot just got desperate and used up all his power to try and eliminate you! He died of exhaustion!

Goro exclaimed with a disdainful expression.

"I could have killed him soon enough anyway, you could admit that..." Emma grumbled, rubbing her aching back and looking away. "It's not like the wings of a fake dragon like those would have helped him escape me."

"The world will recognize you once you survive your first week in Academy City, Emma-chan," the "grandmother" interjected, wiping some ash from her forehead. "You have seven days before you leave for Atlantis with Keiko-chan and Hanako-chan. Especially with that poor child... No, child."

Aoi gently shook her head, her sadness barely concealed. "Anyway... Hanako-chan sent a classic programmer message that said something like 'the outside world is a programming error'... She's still the same, even after her awakening as a Therian changed her life forever."

Emma smiled bitterly to himself, remembering the conceited face of his young friend whom he would never see again...at least not as before.

"With changes in race or gender, Hanako is always the same, no doubt about it. But Atlantis... No matter how you think about it, it sounds like trouble, doesn't it?"

"It is," Goro declared, gazing at the horizon. "But it's the only place where an idiot like you can learn that strength is useless if you have nothing to protect. Now move it. We need to clean up this mess before the Solomon Foundation detects the trail of magical energy because you broke the barrier... and take a bath; Hanako would die from the stench of blood if she ever smelled you."

The boy, Futsu Emma, ​​nodded with a grimace, starting to walk alongside his grandparents. 

It was best not to attract the attention of the Solomon Foundation of the 72 Pillars, the "kind admirers of King Solomon," if possible.

Despite having fought against a ten-meter creature for hours, his step was light and his mind was already flying towards Sakura Island, where his loved ones were. 

Of course, while some walked the world peacefully, able to withstand storms with their naked bodies, others faced hardships....

♦♦♦♦

In a vast expanse of trees and plants mixed with some iron structures protruding from the ground, a girl was running at an inhuman speed, fleeing from something.

Behind them, a gigantic mass of flesh and metal destroyed everything in its path, pursuing her with an almost animalistic fury that would instill fear in any normal human being who happened to cross its path.

The girl moved nimbly through the trees, bushes, and clearly artificial metal fragments with a naturalness that made it clear she was completely familiar with the environment, trying to use it in turn to mislead the blood-red monster.

However, it was completely useless. 

No matter what she did...it was as if that being could smell her scent, or even perceive the location of her soul. Even with every trick she devised or hiding place she found, it always followed her, and the reinforcement she used on herself wasn't going to last as long as her hunter's seemingly endless energy.

—Well, that being was once a guardian of his world, now corrupted by the dark arts of traitors to the great order of Machina.

She clenched her teeth in frustration, letting out a groan filled with irritation as she increased her pace.

Under the immaculate light of the Great Orb that illuminated the whole earth, the world knew no rest. 

In this sacred forest, where the roots of the trees intertwine with the iron ribs that emerge from the ground, the air does not move at the whim of the heavens, but by the rhythmic breath of the Great Conduits. 

Gigantic spirals of ancient metal, buried in the heart of the earth, spin with an eternal hum that keeps life alive in this sanctuary of greenery and steel.

The blue-haired girl ran with a determination to survive, and with each stride, the cyan-colored tattoos on her skin throbbed with a rhythmic intensity, responding to the heartbeat of the earth. 

Her pupils, a deep electric blue, devoured the road, charged with an ancestral force that belied her youthful appearance.

Far behind her, the aberration of flesh and metal—a blood-red mass that seemed a mockery of creation—advanced with animal fury as it kept pace with her. 

Each step of the monster crushed the sacred vegetation and made the iron foundations creak beneath its feet. 

He was determined to capture her.

He reached a clearing where a huge vent of the Conduits exhaled a warm wind toward the zenith. The path ended in an abyss of clouds that obscured the rocky skies. 

He turned, panting, as the red mass surged from among the metal trees, smashing everything in its path with a roar reminiscent of metal clashing against bone.

The girl had no weapons... She didn't need them. 

She concentrated; her tattoos began to glow with such a blinding light that the electric blue of her eyes seemed to melt into the air...and then, gently joining her hands and singing, she released pulses of cyan light that expanded with her as she focused, illuminating the leaves of the trees.

With a melodic voice that stirs the soul and cyan light particles that filled the space around her with each luminous pulse, she sang without fear and anxiety affecting her rhythm and tone. 

The sound of his voice resonated through the forest of trees and steel like a sacred melody that calms hearts, seeming to increase the vitality of the trees with magical energy rising in the surroundings.

She looked utterly sacred, almost capable of making anyone kneel before her in worship. Her mere singing made the area a blessed land, at least visually.

While doing this, the monster finally caught up with her and leaped, a tide of corrupted flesh and jagged limbs ready to close in on her. 

At that moment, with her eyes closed, the young woman delicately extended her hands back on both sides—beautiful sparks following them—and after finishing her song, the magical energy of her tribal markings burst forth with a final divine pulse.

It was not an attack; it was an activation of a Gift bestowed by a higher being.

Space and time around her distorted, the cyan blue turned white, and with a sound similar to lightning tearing through a drum, her body seemed to dissolve into sparks before the beast's claws could touch her.

He launched himself randomly, surrendering his being to the flow of the spiritual currents of destiny that connected everything in this world, the particles slowly fading into the air.

The red monster landed heavily on the hot metal amidst those ephemeral white and blue particles, its claws falling uselessly on the duct grate. 

His prey had vanished into thin air, leaving only a trail of flowers and the echo of a power he could not comprehend.

He let out a roar of utter frustration towards the Great Orb, an unnatural sound that made the leaves of nearby trees tremble. 

The prey he was ordered to capture had slipped through his fingers, leaving the colossal beast alone under the sacred light, scraping the steel floor in a dance of impotent hatred.

—Far away from there, far from the land where the wildness of nature and the coldness of iron existed in harmony, a cyan light flickered violently before the young woman collapsed onto the grass, far from immediate danger, but lost in the vastness of a world that would soon demand much more of her than a simple escape.