"A common misconception shared by most is that Rifts magically create monsters. An unbalance of Mana, or in some cases Divinity, creates a distortion where common animals are transformed into monstrous beasts. At least, that is what everyone believes."

A man wearing a regal suit with golden filigranes clasped his hands behind his back as he stood before an empty, majestic throne. He had long, flowing golden hair, and eyes as blue as the sky. His skin was perfect, with no blemishes or freckles. A crown of gold and silver rested on the top of his head, crested with jewels. A setting sun, the Twilight, was embroidered on the back of his suit.

"In reality, Rifts are one-way passages. Some are from the Beyond, others from the space beyond the Limbo, and some from some mysterious, crumbling dimensions. They're all pale copies of the Moon Rift we just watched."

The man turned back and grabbed the shoulder of a younger, less perfect version of himself, kneeling respectfully with his head bowed, uncrowned.

"The world is changing, as our ancestors foretold. His friend took flight, and hell has been set loose. And you know as well as I do that this Rift isn't a one-way passage."

The King returned to the throne, sitting on it casually. The young man took a deep breath, his hands tightly clenched. He wore a tense, yet excited smile, his Mana swirling with majestic power.

"In consequence, I, Alaric Magnus the Second, command you, the Prince, to show the might of the Throne once more to the world, and protect Munirp from this threat."

Alaric's Mana exploded, showering the entirety of the King's Tower in indigo and orange Mana. Citizens of King's Rise, be they from the Fringe, the Bourgeoisie, or the Court, all looked at the tower, their mouths agape and their hearts racing. After countless years of mysterious silence, the Throne had finally decided to act again.

The Prince looked up with the same grin as his father's.

"I, Lucian Magnus, accept my duty."

The Prince stood up and bowed to the waist, before leaving the room. Alaric watched him, before turning to the knight standing in a corner.

"Harriet...Make sure Lucian is safe."

The knight bowed his head slightly before leaving in the Prince's footsteps. The King leaned back into his throne, his knuckles rapping against the solid gold.

Today, the world shall see the might of the Royal Magnus family.

***

Under the soft touch of two beautiful white moons was another young man, dressed in a similarly white suit. He had raven-black hair tied in a ponytail, and his eyes were purple. His left arm was of that same color, glimmering with a strange hue.

For a moment, Glenn could only think to himself that, maybe, he should become a farmer or something. A tapestry merchant, a blacksmith, or even a cook. He could open the first fast-food in Limbo. Maybe—no, that would certainly be preferable to staring death in the eyes as a literal tsunami of monsters rushed at you.

And yet, here he was, his Mana swirling and the corner of his lips curved upward. There was a peaceful feeling to slaying simple, unthinking monsters who just rushed at you with chins dripping in saliva and sharp claws. It was a welcome change to the ungodly beings Glenn was getting used to facing.

"Glenn, I don't want to worry you, but there are a lot of monsters. W- What should I do?" asked Nelg after flying next to him, the Soul weapon who had recently unlocked the ability to change shape to the armored version of his user, Glenn. Despite the thick armor he was wearing, his face was distorted with anxiousness.

"Can you fight by yourself?" Glenn inquired as he kept his eyes on the incoming wave of monsters. Half of them had gone to the other side, to the Ink Dunes and other countries that were once hidden behind the Dark Wall. Dark Wall who literally took flight after revealing itself to be a mountain-sized dragon.

Glenn still had some difficulty wrapping that fact around his head.

"Uhh, I can imitate you to some extent, but I don't have magic or the like—" Nelg flinched as Glenn grabbed his shoulder.

"Now that you have a human form, feel free to do what you want. If you want me to keep using you as a weapon, I can do that. If you want to fight alongside us with your own skills, you can do that too. And if you don't want to fight, well..." Glenn winced, "I don't think you have much of a choice right now."

Nelg gulped. Without another word, he joined up with Liara and Milena, who were still staring at the twin moons in the sky, where the impossible sight of a Moon Rift forcefully occurring previously appeared. Sahro was already gone, a red lightning bolt crackling with power, charging head-first into the monster wave.

Many powers had gathered in anticipation of this disaster. The Church of Onnea, the Cleaner's Workshop, the Magi Brotherhood, several Orders of the Munirp army, not to mention the mechanical guard protecting the Bourgeoisie. Glenn could even feel the power of mages and fighters on a higher level than his own, the Saints and Archmagis.

"Hah! Even if you're only a Fifth Circle, I'm sure you could ruin them now!" Diamanes cackled. The entity living in his left, purple arm was also finally past the shock of witnessing Sevirox's flight and back to its usual antics. Glenn wanted to refute him, but in truth, he couldn't bring himself to do it. The insights he unlocked after training for a month under Gundam's guidance back in the Core had brought him to another level of power, strong enough to punch well above his weight.

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Doyle Malory, the Lightbringer, once called his improved spells 'True Draconic magic'.

"The world hasn't heard from the Devil's Hand in a while..." muttered Glenn as his Mana swirled around him.

"After all I endured, I think I deserve to show off a little." The corner of his lips curved upward and shot through the sky using Gravity Manipulation. True flight had become as easy as breathing now and was much more efficient than just dashing through the battlefield. Pebble, the cat-sized, one-eyed dragon suddenly appeared on his shoulder, hissing softly. Glenn grinned as he felt the presence of his pet, and stopped a respectable distance away from the monster waves. Spells, arrows, and Aura blades were already hacking through the beasts' advance, but there were simply too many. The more they slaughtered, the more appeared out of the countless Rifts resting at the bed of where the Dark Wall once was.

Other Archmagis stood above the battlefield, preparing powerful war spells that would decimate legions of monsters. Saints stood at the vanguard, each of their attacks cleaving a hundred beasts. Glenn took a deep breath and stretched his right hand out. A miniature sun appeared from a spark, the size of a pearl. It looked like molten lava, shining with bright, burning light.

"I only held onto it for twenty-four hours, it should still retain some strength, right?" muttered Glenn as he watched the spell. The key to escaping Gundam's white training prison cell had been to understand and improve on Arcane Surge, the spell he previously took with Diamanes that allowed him to use half of his Mana to power up his next spell. As it stood, doing this operation manually was very, very hard, but that much more rewarding.

The moment he escaped, he prepared this one-off spell just in case, which appeared to have been a good idea. His entire Mana capacity had gone into it and made it powerful enough to carve through even Gundam's white indestructible walls. Glenn hadn't been able to test it out, but he was almost certain he would be able to hurt Doyle Malory severely with this spell. The sole defunct was that it lost power over time, and it took a lot of time to prepare.

But in this situation, it was perfect. This was one, incredibly powerful consumable that, at the moment, wouldn't cost Glenn any Mana.

He flicked the Sun off, throwing it into the center of the monster wave. The other archmagi also threw their spells in: whirlwinds that shredded the monsters to dust, waves of ice that created countless sculptures, or even dirt tsunamis that drowned the beasts.

"The Sun." Glenn's voice was almost ethereal as he watched his spell land.

For a moment, the vicinity was as bright as day.

When the light receded, the only thing left was a kilometer-wide calcinated crater, filled with ashes and smoldering bones. From the thousands of monsters, none remained. Glenn smiled with satisfaction, only for that smile to fade away. All the monsters he killed were replaced with stronger and bigger ones. Flying creatures the size of hills flew out of the Rifts, shrieking with eardrums-piercing cries.

"It's going to take a while, isn't it?" snickered Diamanes. "Not that I'm complaining, far from it! It's an excellent change of pace from the 'Trying to break through a wall' that I endured for the last month!"

Glenn glanced at the grinning mouth in his palm before turning back to the monsters.

"Let's make as much contribution as possible..." He thought back to the old man who taught him the Draconic School of magic and his expression darkened.

"Redan was the legendary Ice Wolf from the War of Fronts, and he still fell from grace because of Count Mortelli. If I want to look into the Count, I'll need to become so famous even he can't simply ban me out of the city."

"And the first step to that is a war," laughed Diamanes. "You can't even imagine how happy that makes me! Fighting and slaughter truly makes my blood boil!"

"Crazy fucker..." Glenn grinned as well. "But I can't say I disagree."

Pebble rubbed his head against Glenn's cheek. The latter absent-mindedly patted the dragon, before pausing. He looked at the creature, wondering.

"Say, Pebble...Can I still use you as a projectile, like for my old Shooting Star?"

The one-eyed dragon almost seemed to smile before curling into a perfect ball. He looked like a jade, football-sized, perfectly polished sphere. Glenn raised an eyebrow in pleased surprise.

"Huh. Well, let's try it out, shall we?"

Pebble rolled into Glenn's open palm, waiting patiently. His master's Mana ran through him, covering him with a fiery layer of blue flames, crackling under the moonlight. Glenn channeled his Gravity Manipulation with as much speed as he could, before aiming at the largest columns of monsters. A second later, Pebble flew off, shooting through the sky and towards the beast waves. Glenn's eyes widened as he watched the projectile grow in size, changing from a Shooting Star to an actual Meteor.

"Your pet dragon really is the perfect ammunition," remarked Diamanes. "I'm not sure that qualifies as animal cruelty, though, considering Pebble appears to be enjoying the ride. Oh well."

Glenn couldn't have said it better. The Meteor tore through the enemies' ranks, reducing them to ashes and carving a large gash into the ground. The young man couldn't help but feel pride as he watched the other Archmages fail to reach that level of destruction, despite their higher realms of power.

'Hah...so that's how it feels to use a cheat. Hmm...being privileged feels so good.'

Diamanes scoffed. "It's not exactly like true Draconic Magic was given to you for free."

Glenn shrugged. "Maybe. It's still so much more powerful than what the usual mage uses. I mean, look at that, this idiot probably used half of his entire Mana, and he only killed a few hundred. With that same Mana, I could decimate thousands. Isn't that crazy?"

"I guess it is." Diamanes brushed it off casually.

Glenn was about to gloat a little more when a large portal of indigo and orange opened right next to him. A young man wearing a regal suit with a setting sun embroidered on his back came out of it. He had golden, flowing hair and eyes as blue as the sky. He glanced to the side and his eyebrows raised when he met Glenn's eyes.

"Oh, hello. I'm Lucian. Just a moment." He stretched his hand out toward the monster wave. "Duskwave"

Glenn blinked. A second later, a wave of orange and indigo Mana flowed out of the regal young man, covering the battlefield in a shroud of semi-light and semi-darkness. The monsters burned before sinking into shadows, disappearing. As if to follow Lucian's appearance, a massive, mechanical Colossi the size of a mountain landed right in the middle of the monsters, wielding a long blade in one hand and a large rifle in another. It didn't take much for Glenn to recognize Exan's massive fighting machine that previously contended with the W.O.R.M. in the Ink Dunes.

Right after that, a similarly giant knight wearing dark steel armor appeared above the monsters, a brutish black club in his hands as he smashed through thousands of monsters with each swing. Glenn laughed in disbelief.

"The cavalry has arrived," Lucian muttered.