Titan King: Ascension of the Giant

Chapter 1580: Fractured Reunion

Inside the Horde Hall of Stoneheart City, Lilith occupied the throne. Beside her sat a heavy oak desk overflowing with administrative ledgers and military dispatches.

Ever since taking over the heavy burden from her older sister, Delilah, Lilith had worked tirelessly, rarely stepping foot outside the palace. Suddenly, pausing her paperwork, she looked up, her brow furrowing at the sky visible through the windows. After a moment of hesitation, she stood and headed outside.

The weather had twisted into something unnatural. The sky turned a sickly, oppressive gray in the blink of an eye. This wasn’t a spell, nor was it a natural weather phenomenon.

"What is that?" Lilith murmured, her lips parted in confusion as she stared at the firmament.

Across Stoneheart City, a chorus of startled gasps and panicked shouts echoed through the streets, thickening the tension. An inexplicable dread seized Lilith’s heart. It felt as if the world was standing on the brink of the apocalypse.

"Don’t panic!" a voice rang out. "This isn’t the end. A champion is fighting our enemies!"

Seraphina materialized beside Lilith, her presence acting like a grounding anchor against the rising panic. Compared to Lilith’s unease, Seraphina possessed an ancient, unshakeable calm. She stood resolute, an immovable mountain against the twisting storm.

"Seraphina." Lilith offered a half-bow. Though she was Orion’s wife, that title meant little in the face of a demigod’s weight. The bow was a pure mark of respect to Seraphina’s power.

Seraphina kept her gaze fixed on the void overhead, offering only a soft hum in acknowledgment.

"Seraphina, what’s happening to the Titanion Realm? Has the swarm launched their final assault?" Lilith asked, voicing her deepest fear. If anyone knew the truth, it was a demigod like her or Orion.

"It’s not an invasion. It’s Kairon," Seraphina said, shaking her head.

Right on cue, the silhouette of a massive, tentacled leviathan formed in the gray sky. Towering over it was an even more colossal insectoid shadow.

"What are those?" Lilith asked.

Seraphina didn’t answer. Her brow creased as she locked her eyes onto the spectral dogfight in the clouds.

"Kairon is going to lose," a voice said. Orion stepped seamlessly into the space between the two women.

He draped his arms around Lilith and Seraphina, joining their vigil over the celestial pursuit.

"You once told me it’s better to live to fight another day," Seraphina said, leaning her head onto Orion’s shoulder. "Is this worth it for him?"

Though phrased as a question, her melancholic eyes betrayed the fact that she already knew the answer. Unlike a newly ascended demigod like Orion, she and Kairon had watched over the Titanion Realm for eons. They were bound to this world by centuries of memories and blood. Watching Kairon fall felt like peering into the mirror of her own inevitable end.

"I’m standing right here. What’s with the funeral gaze?" Orion squeezed Seraphina’s waist, feigning jealousy.

The dramatic pout cracked her somber expression, drawing a reluctant smile from the ancient being. Seraphina turned and wrapped her arms around his waist, blatantly ignoring Lilith’s presence.

"Kairon’s death isn’t entirely meaningless," Orion added, his eyes locked on the fading leviathan phantom. "At the very least, he’s paving a path for us to defeat the swarm."

The demigod of the seas was taking his final breath.

Within the Realm of Rules, the currents surged faster, the conceptual ocean expanding. By assimilating into the rules, Kairon was inadvertently fortifying the world’s origin power.

Unfortunately, Insect Queen Moriphara currently controlled that origin.

"Ignorance and fearlessness. The hallmark traits of a pathetic wretch." Moriphara stared at Kairon’s crumbling form, her faceless visage impassive. "I sincerely hope the remaining ones are exactly like you. It will make my job significantly easier."

Kairon had no strength left to retort. He literally couldn’t speak. In this realm, the collapse of his conceptual rules was erasing him from existence. Uttering a word, or even leaving behind a microscopic trace of his legacy, was an impossible task.

"I was born in the Great Kigal Ocean... I ruled the tides... I chased the most beautiful across the seven seas..." His voice was a sub-vocal whisper, a scattering of fragmented memories right before he dissolved into nothingness. "I held coral... played the bone harp..."

The words never breached the void. Perhaps, even he couldn’t hear them anymore.

"It’s over."

Back in Stoneheart City, Orion sat on his throne, quietly watching the oppressive gray peel away from the sky.

However, to Orion’s god-touched eyes, the cosmic anomaly hadn’t fully faded. Amidst the endless void of conceptual rules, a towering silhouette reflected in his pupils. The figure seemed to sense his gaze, staring down at him from the Sea of Origins.

The figure didn’t move a muscle, but the challenge was sent loud and clear. An invitation to duel in the heavens.

Orion broke eye contact, staring down at the floor, silently rejecting the offer. Immediately, the metaphysical vision vanished.

"Next stop, Verdant Cloud Realm," Orion muttered to himself as his physical form melted away from the throne.

The Verdant Cloud Realm. The Mystic Woods.

It had been three years since Pallas arrived here. Right now, he was lounging on a massive boulder in the center of a lush meadow. Wildflowers bloomed in vibrant clusters, humming with the steady drone of bees and songbirds.

A white little fawn nestled against his side. The young Spirit-Deer stared up at Pallas with large, watery eyes overflowing with adoration and sheer bliss. It was Sylvie, his personal familiar.

Just as Pallas reached out to scratch the base of the little fawn’s antlers, a drawn-out wolf howl echoed from the depths of the woods. Both Pallas and the white deer snapped their heads up. It was a familiar cry—the signal from Wepwawet, his Gnoll guardian.

"Well, the vacation is over." Pallas looked down to meet the white deer’s nervous gaze. "Don’t panic. I gave you my word. I’ll protect the Spirit-Deer Tribe. As for the Hydra Race and the Forest Ghouls living in these woods? They’re strictly above my paygrade."

The white deer let out a series of anxious, chirping bleats.

Before Pallas could offer any more comfort, heavy footsteps crunched against the grass behind him.

"Your Highness. The syndicate has descended. We need to rendezvous." It was his guardian, Wepwawet—one of Dirtclaw’s strongest and luckiest pups.

Pallas glanced over his shoulder at the gnoll. After a beat, he scooped the white deer into his arms and stood up from the boulder.

"Let’s—"

Before he could finish the sentence, a familiar bloodline signature washed over him. It was a pure Stoneheart Horde aura. The unmistakable scent of a Stoneheart Titan.

What the hell? Why is there a trace of Dad’s bloodline here? It’s even thicker than mine... don’t tell me... While his mind raced with possibilities, a human silhouette blurred across the distant horizon. It looked like the figure was skipping like a stone—moving so fast it bordered on spatial teleportation. Actually, it was spatial teleportation.

Pallas tensed up, squinting at the rapidly approaching dot. Every survival instinct he had screamed danger.

The adrenaline vanished the moment a voice boomed out.

"Hahaha... Young Brother! Finally found you! How are you still this useless?"

Before Pallas could even blink, Caelus was standing right in front of him, hands already clapping down on his shoulders. It was a surreal sight. Two distinct voices overlapped from Caelus’s mouth, and both of his hands drummed simultaneously against Pallas’s shoulders. The white deer in Pallas’s arms stared, wide-eyed and totally bewildered.

"What, you don’t recognize your big brother anymore?"

The voices echoed in perfect, unnerving stereo. Pallas finally snapped out of his daze and reached up to block Caelus’s relentless pats.

It was no joke—one hand struck with gentle affection, while the other hammered down with bone-jarring force, the rhythm constantly switching back and forth. His shoulders were about to cave in.

Pallas didn’t even need to guess. The gentle pats came from his warm-hearted brother. The heavy strikes belonged entirely to the aloof, battle-crazed brother testing his limits.