Chapter 28 — A Kingdom Without Light

The once-proud kingdom of Sol'dara now stood as a graveyard of stone and silence. Its towers, once gilded in sunlight, had collapsed into broken monuments. The people were gone—either fled, enslaved, or consumed by the war Shinsuke had sparked in his rise.

He stood at the gates of its shattered capital, the wind brushing through his tattered cloak. His eyes, now glimmering with the residue of the Black Oath, scanned the ruins not with grief… but purpose.

"So this is the legacy of the gods," he murmured. "Glass palaces built on bones."

Beside him stood Kael, the last of the exiled royal guard, now bound to Shinsuke not by loyalty—but debt.

"What will you do with this place?" Kael asked, stepping over scorched sigils and cracked marble.

"Raise it," Shinsuke said. "Not in their image… but in defiance of it."

In the heart of the city stood a collapsed statue of the Sun God. Shinsuke approached it, placing his hand on the broken face. The corrupted energy within him surged—rejecting divinity, reshaping reality.

And then, the statue began to rebuild—not as a god, but as a warrior clad in ash-black armor… with eyes like Shinsuke's.

A new symbol. A new kingdom. A throne not given, but taken.

"From this ruin, I will forge a dominion not of faith… but fear."

The sky darkened, as if mourning the world’s turning point. Somewhere in the heavens, an ancient deity stirred—watching the boy who dared defy fate, reality, and divinity.

And feared what came next.