Parallel Memory

Chapter 654: The Breaking Point.

The clash at the gates had reached its breaking point.

Kaelion stood amidst a battlefield swallowed by fire and smoke. The very air quivered with heat, thick with the stench of iron and ash. His twin blades, once gleaming with disciplined calm, now glowed faintly blue—cracked and trembling under the weight of his mana. His chest rose and fell heavily; every breath dragged pain through his lungs, but his eyes still burned with the kind of resolve that refused surrender.

Across the scarred field, the devil general Bael stood unmoving—a monstrous silhouette wreathed in molten red and crawling shadow. Though deep cracks marred his black armor, his aura pulsed with terrifying consistency. Each breath he took seemed to draw the darkness closer, feeding on the despair of the fallen. The battlefield itself bent toward him, as if gravity favored his existence.

The Saintess knelt several paces behind Kaelion, her knees sinking into the blood-soaked dirt. A faint trail of crimson ran down her chin from a split lip. Her divine aura flickered, wavering like a candle in a storm. But she held her staff tight, her trembling fingers refusing to release it. The halo of light above her dimmed, then brightened again as she whispered a prayer—soundless, desperate, but steady.

Kaelion's voice cut through the storm like a blade.

"Saintess. On my mark."

She looked up, her face pale but resolute, and nodded weakly. Her hands lifted her staff, and her halo expanded outward, forming a ring of radiance that bathed the gates in sacred light. The devils hissed as the illumination touched them, their skin sizzling under the divine glow. Smoke rose in twisted spirals from their flesh, the scent of burning corruption filling the air.

But Bael didn't flinch. His lips curved into a cruel grin.

"Still trying to hold me back with borrowed divinity?" His deep, resonant voice carried through the battlefield. "Your god's blessings won't reach you when the skies themselves belong to us."

Kaelion didn't reply. He simply exhaled—a sharp, controlled breath that condensed in the air despite the heat. His mana flared, spiraling up his blades in streams of blue and white. The resonance of his aura distorted the very sound around him.

"You talk too much," he said quietly.

Bael's grin faltered. The tone wasn't anger—it was finality.

Then the atmosphere shifted. The resonance Kaelion had prepared earlier didn't fade with time—it deepened. The energy embedded itself into the mana veins of the battlefield, linking light and shadow in a dangerous harmony. The ground hummed with layered frequencies—divine gold clashing against demonic scarlet, fusing in rhythm, pulsing like a heartbeat.

Kaelion's boots dug into the scorched earth. "Resonance Field—Second Phase: Collapse."

The ground exploded outward. From beneath the field erupted beams of azure and gold, slicing through devil ranks in sweeping arcs. The air screamed as mana tore it apart. Dozens of devils were shredded before they could react, their forms scattering into black mist.

Bael snarled, throwing up a wall of shadow to block the wave. "You would sacrifice your army just to—"

Kaelion's roar drowned him out. "I told you—the price of command is blood!"

He surged forward, vanishing into motion. His twin blades ignited, not with simple mana but with the chaotic balance between divine and mortal essence. Blue fire clashed with golden sparks as he swung—each strike detonating the air in bursts of heat and thunder.

Bael countered with clawed hands that sparked with red lightning. Every impact between them shook the world. Shockwaves flattened soldiers on both sides. The resonance field pulsed faster with every strike, its rhythm now synced to Kaelion's heartbeats.

Behind him, the Saintess chanted feverishly, her voice cracking but determined. Each word of her prayer summoned new arcs of light that mended Kaelion's wounds in flashes before fading again. Her halo grew blinding, her robes whipping in the gusts from the battle.

"Kaelion—" her voice broke, "—when I release this, you must strike true!"

Kaelion didn't turn back. He parried another claw strike that gouged a crater in the ground, then twisted, his swords crossing before him. "I intend to."

The Saintess lifted her staff high. "Then let our faith decide!"

The heavens above them cracked. Clouds parted, torn away by the radiance bursting from her staff. A searing pillar of light descended from the torn sky, pure and absolute, ripping through the red gloom of the devil's domain. The air stilled for one suspended heartbeat—then everything screamed.

The devils' shadows burned away. The soldiers' armor melted into nothing. Even Bael's barrier buckled as the divine strike pierced through, blinding and merciless.

Kaelion disappeared into the brilliance—only to reappear a blink later above Bael, his form framed by that same descending light. Both blades glowed white-hot, their edges wailing from the energy contained within.

"Final Resonance—Heavenfall!"

The words struck like a verdict.

The world detonated into white. Sound vanished, light devoured everything, and the gates of the battlefield trembled under the weight of the impact.

***************************************************

Inside the Palace

The marble floors had long since lost their shine. Now they were cratered and fractured, dust and debris suspended in the air like ash in a dying fire. The once-grand hall was unrecognizable—columns reduced to rubble, chandeliers melted into glassy heaps.

Every clash between Hiro and Aaron was a calamity in miniature. Sparks burst with each collision of their weapons, each blow carrying enough force to send tremors across the structure. Hiro's golden aura flared wildly around him, his sword streaking arcs of light as he blocked another of Aaron's spear thrusts.

The devil's movements were deceptively calm, almost lazy, yet every strike tore gouges into the ground. His armor gleamed a dark violet-black, cracks glowing faintly with magma-like heat.

Mia stood several meters behind Hiro, her breathing shallow. Blood seeped from a gash along her arm, dripping onto the frost-slick ground. Despite the injury, she kept her stance low and steady. Frost coiled from her fists, the air around her freezing into tiny shards.

At the edges of the battlefield, Lisa, Sylvia, Zion, and Misha watched in frustrated silence. Their faces were lit by the flickering red-orange glow of the battle, shadows dancing across their strained expressions.

"Dammit," Zion muttered, striking the cracked wall with his fist hard enough to draw blood. "We're useless here. Every spell just bounces off him!"

Lisa's brows furrowed, mana flickering faintly at her fingertips before dying out. "If we rush in, we'll just get in their way again. He's adapting to everything we throw at him."

Sylvia gripped her bow tighter, her arrows trembling. "Then what do we do? Just watch?" Her voice cracked under the weight of helplessness.

A sharp explosion threw all of them off balance. Hiro was hurled backward, his body slamming through a pillar