Chapter 198: Great Power of Destruction

"It is done. Truly... it is staggering."

Kevin, the former captain of the Sighing Gorge outpost—now a territory occupied by the Seventans—stood within the Alastair frontline encampment. Alongside his fellow soldiers, he gazed at the colossal meteorite descending through the night sky, his voice heavy with awe.

"Such raw power, it is beyond imagination. Is this truly the pinnacle of what magic has become?"

Standing beside him was Lady Jenny, director of the frontline infirmary. Her face mirrored his shock, though it was laced with a subtle, creeping dread.

Even from tens of kilometers away, the burning star was clearly visible, plummeting through the night at a measured pace, pregnant with a destructive force beyond measure.

It was at least the size of a small mountain range, and this was a magical miracle wrought by the hands of the Alastair people.

An art of annihilation, a pseudo-eighth-tier spell born solely for the purpose of destruction. By compensating for its limitations with vast reserves of mana, precious materials, and meticulously prepared arrays, they had forcibly manifested a power that eclipsed even standard eighth-tier sorcery.

If this star were to fall upon the Alastair royal capital, would the Aegis of Intemis—hailed as the kingdom's greatest defensive spell—be enough to hold back a celestial body forged for ruin?

Not one of the Alastair soldiers watching the star slowly descend could offer a certain answer.

"All soldiers, hear me! Wait for the impact, then advance. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to purge these damned Seventan invaders from our soil."

"We cannot fail the mages who sacrificed their lives to light our path with this star. Seize this moment and drive these Seventans to extinction!"

The fierce roar, brimming with indomitable spirit, jolted the soldiers from the stupor induced by the sight of the pseudo-eighth-tier spell, the Meteor of Ruin.

"Understood! Ready!"

"For Alastair!"

"For our home!"

The ragged, fervent shouts rose from the ranks. Black Burn, the Fire-Wielding Officer commanding the operation, felt the corners of his mouth curl upward.

Excellent. This was the morale he needed; only such fervor could bridge the gap in strength between his men and the Seventans.

He turned his gaze toward the crimson star, now burning with an increasingly blinding radiance. His internal battle energy seemed to sense the scorching heat and the wild, rampant flames that would follow the impact. His latent ability, "Inferno City-Burner," was stirring.

"Old friend, you've been waiting for this, haven't you? Don't be impatient. Soon, we shall burn these damned Seventans to ash together."

Wisps of flame danced around his body. Black Burn licked his lips, revealing a bloodthirsty grin.

Ruthlessness toward the enemy—this was justice, as seen through the eyes of Black Burn.

...

"Sizzle, crackle, pop..." A strange sound echoed around the massive meteorite, a construct of fire and earth elements.

It was the sound of the mana barrier being pierced. Pure mana had bypassed the stage of elemental enrichment, beginning to exert direct influence upon the physical world.

The mana contained within the consumed magic crystals was too vast to quantify. Aided by the mana channels forged by the mages who had burned their very lives, this energy was poured without reservation into the base of the magic array, cast from Cordite metal.

The magic circuits inscribed within were a modified version of the seventh-tier spell, "Flame Meteor."

Multiple identical circuits were layered in an intricate, overlapping configuration, allowing the spell’s potency to compound. By taking this unconventional path, the array’s power was forced to the threshold of the eighth tier.

The Cordite metal served to contain the mana, which was a thousand times greater than what a standard seventh-tier spell required.

Even Cordite, a metal with extreme mana-bearing capacity, began to melt and disintegrate under the overload. This array, pushed beyond all known limits, ultimately birthed the miracle in the sky: the Meteor of Ruin.

This was magic born of sheer accumulation—sufficient technology combined with an indescribable, brute-force application of power.

The colossal sphere of rock, which effectively blanketed the entire Seventan frontline camp, was in reality a composite of over a hundred seventh-tier flame meteors compressed together.

The blinding flames on the surface were the result of the fire elements within those compressed meteors becoming hyper-concentrated. At such a density, the fire elements generated temperatures beyond comprehension.

Perhaps only the core of the Mountain Forge at the Stevenson Academy of Magic could briefly rival such heat, yet now, the entire surface of the meteorite reached this extreme.

The star fell slowly, almost sluggishly, because its power had already breached the boundary between mana and the physical world.

Magic usually requires elements to manifest, but when mana concentration crosses a critical threshold, it no longer needs them; pure mana alone can alter the material world.

Conversely, a force sufficiently powerful—even if unrelated to magic—can directly influence mana once it crosses a certain limit.

Such was this mortal-wrought power, a majestic star descending with the momentum to crush all in its path.

This pure physical force pierced the mana barrier, creating a zone of high-density mana accumulation beneath the meteorite.

The mana, originally suspended in the air, was influenced by the physical mass of the star, compressed and pushed downward, gathering and accumulating until it, too, crossed a critical threshold.

The hyper-concentrated mana beneath the meteorite took on a physical form, appearing like a translucent colloid—the embryonic state of magic crystals. If the concentration were to rise further, this mana would solidify.

And, as the meteorite fell, this process was unfolding.

The materialized mana created a counter-force against the star, preventing it from accelerating due to gravity, instead causing it to descend with a slow, unstoppable, and thunderous momentum.

"Boom, boom, boom..." A low, fracturing sound echoed. Before the meteorite even touched the ground, the earth, scoured by the wind pressure, began to crack and shatter.

The materialized mana, touching the ground first, pulverized the earth under the star's immense weight, crushing everything it contacted into debris. This included everything within the Seventan frontline camp.

The mages had long since perished from mana-vortex explosions when the concentration reached its peak. Only the physically robust knights remained, but perhaps their earlier deaths were a mercy, for the fate of those lingering in agony was already sealed.

The pressure from the materialized mana was omnipresent, intensifying with every inch of the star's descent.

The pervasive, materialized mana destroyed the fragile internal organs of the weaker soldiers first, snuffing out lives that were meaningless in the face of this star.

Apprentice knights and official knights were no different; within ten seconds of the materialized mana touching the ground, these Seventan soldiers, along with their armor and equipment, were crushed into an indistinguishable mass of metal and flesh.

Even the few Great Knights, gathered here as elites, found their formidable physical strength useless against the star. Under this earth-shattering impact, all was pulverized and destroyed.

"What... what is this? Crackle..." A Great Knight with a defensive latent ability gritted his teeth, making a final struggle before his life was extinguished.

His bones groaned under the omnidirectional pressure. His skin and organs, metallicized by his latent ability, twisted and deformed under the mounting weight. His power only delayed his death by a few dozen seconds.

"Crunch!" The pressure from the materialized mana exceeded the Great Knight's limit. His metallicized skin and organs burst and disintegrated in an instant.

A Great Knight died, no different from any other, under what could only be called the "aftermath" of the Meteor of Ruin.

"Why? What is this? Is it divine retribution? Is Seventan truly to perish here? I am not reconciled... Crack! Pfft!"

Desperate eyes peered through a cracked barrier at the slowly descending star. The blinding light of the flames, still rising in temperature, left nothing but darkness in eyes already scorched white.

The extreme heat radiation pierced the transparent barrier, striking the body of a Seventan priest who had survived until the final moment thanks to a protective artifact bestowed by his god.

The hair on his body ignited, his skin blistered and ruptured in an instant. Despair and incredulous questioning echoed within the barrier until the priest’s final breath.

Then, the barrier shattered under the infinite weight, ending the priest’s final moments of agonizing incineration.

"Boom..." The physical body of the meteorite finally made contact with the ground. At that moment, the surface heat and the hyper-concentrated fire elements collided with the impact from the earth, piercing the barrier between the Elemental Plane of Fire and this world.

A spatial rift flickered for a few moments before being forcibly destroyed by the sheer power of the meteorite itself.

A few Fire Elemental Lords, equivalent to the Great Knight stage, were released from within, but they didn't even have time to roar before they were reduced to scattered sparks and dissipating elemental energy.

The heat on the meteorite’s surface melted the earth. Then, the solid core—forged from earth elements compressed to unimaginable hardness—made contact with the ground after the relatively "soft" outer layer of rock shattered upon impact.

"Boom!" A continuous, earth-shaking roar echoed across the plains. Even the Alastair encampment, tens of kilometers away, could clearly hear the unrelenting thunder.

The core of the meteorite, possessing hardness beyond imagination, pulverized the "fragile" earth, using its own weight to bury itself deeper, sending tremors into the very depths of the world.

Countless invisible cracks spread underground, the vibrations radiating outward from the impact point.

Nearby mountain peaks swayed, and the ground closer to the site rose and fell like waves. A glimpse of that immense power was revealed.

"Clack, clack, clack! Bang!" In the Alastair camp, fragile items rattled on tables from the incoming tremors, falling and shattering.

The wooden frames of temporary buildings snapped and collapsed under the shaking.

"It’s shaking. I can feel the earth trembling. What terrifying power, and we are so far away!"

Fear filled the eyes of the Alastair soldiers. Under the influence of such an unrivaled force, the joy of destroying the Seventans faded, replaced by a subtle, creeping dread.

If they were the ones facing this falling star, what would the outcome be? It seemed equally hopeless; the only consolation at this moment was that it was their enemy, the Sevantans, who stood in its path.

Calming their startled warhorses, the soldiers of Alestle were fortunate enough to witness the final, unfolding majesty of the destructive meteor.

Most of the star had already embedded itself deep into the earth, yet the compressed fire elements and raw magic still demanded an outlet for their release.

The mutual crushing force between the meteor and the ground caused the concentration of these energies to rise to absurd levels, held back only by the dual pressure of the star and the soil itself.

Then, in the final moment, the accumulation of these substances breached a threshold, triggering a total eruption.

"Clang!" A blinding, radiant light bloomed where the star had fallen, and a shockwave frantically pushed and compressed the air and all other matter, radiating outward; the roar was no longer recognizable as a mere explosion, but rather an indescribable, otherworldly sound.

Trees and stones, already scattered by the tremors of the earth, were now swept up by the shockwave of the earth-shattering blast, rising into the sky amidst a shroud of dust.

The final explosion brought a delayed destruction to anything that had survived in the immediate vicinity of the impact site.

Dust clouds blocked out the sun, concealing everything where the star had fallen; no one could see the scene that remained after that brilliant radiance had burst forth.

Yet, the soldiers of Alestle knew that no life in that surrounding area could possibly have survived.

The Sevantan frontline camp had been utterly annihilated by this magical force, channeled through the artifact known as the Silent Forest; no one would dare doubt whether survivors remained beneath that suffocating veil of dust—it was impossible.

There was no great sense of joy; instead, the soldiers of Alestle felt a chilling, strange, and inexpressible sensation, as if born from the instinctive cowering and awe of mortals facing a vast, cosmic power.

The cruel smirk on Black Burn’s lips stiffened slightly, and after a long silence, his roar echoed once more throughout the camp.

"Ready the troops! The plan to strike the Sevantan camp in the wake of the impact is canceled. Get yourselves into peak condition and prepare to meet the desperate, dying counterattack of those damned Sevantans!"