Samuel_Mafua_7207

Jean Luther, the youngest daughter of the prestigious Luther Clan, is both a rising swordswoman and the Emissary of Light, chosen by the goddess Celeste. After graduating from the Luther Academy, she is required to undergo a two-year assessment as an Envoy Knight, an elite order of Transcendent Master swordsmen loyal to the clan.

Upon her return, Jean is thrust into a brutal succession war for the Patriarchy of the clan. She embarks on a perilous journey to become the strongest swordsman in the world, accompanied by her divine guardian—a powerful dire wolf named Whitney.

LIGHTBEARER: THE CHRONICLE OF JEAN LUTHER

Luxclade screamed as Jean struck, her blade cleaving the shadows the dark emissary conjured—but the void did not yield. His weapon wasn't steel, but a sliver of nothingness, shaped like a spear and brimming with divine hatred.

"You wield a prisoner," he snarled, his voice like hollow bells. "You carry a flame meant to die."

Jean met his blow and twisted, narrowly avoiding a strike that would have torn her aura apart. Whitney lunged through his blind side, jaws blazing, but the dark emissary vanished in a blink of black light, reappearing behind the altar.

"This war was never about your clan," he said, voice echoing as his body split into five shimmering after-images. "Not even about the dragons. It's about them—the gods themselves."

The figures converged, forming one body again, cloaked in the shifting aura of Vorokhal. "The gods warred long before humans were ever forged. Celeste, your patron, was one of the victors. Vorokhal was not. He was cast out—and sealed inside the abyss beyond the stars. But now... the seals are weakening."

"You're trying to bring him back."

"No," the emissary said, stepping down the shattered altar. "She is. The Iron Empress. Her immortality was bought with a shard of Severra's flame, but her soul was claimed long ago by Vorokhal. She is not merely a ruler."

He looked directly at Jean, eyes pale as moons.

Jean's hands trembled. Luxclade throbbed with Severra's rage.

"That's why I couldn't feel my flame," Severra hissed inside her mind. "She bound it… corrupted it…"

"She means to reunite the shards," Jean realized. "To become more than Empress. To become a god."

"And she needs you for that," the emissary said. "The last shard rests in you."

Then Jean said softly, "Then I'll burn before I let her take it."

Flame and light collided with black divinity, lighting the underground chapel like the sun. The force hurled bodies back. Whitney slammed into the emissary, fangs burying into the shadow-wrought flesh.

Luxclade, blazing with Severra's will, pierced the void.

The emissary screamed—not in pain, but in revelation.

"Too late," he rasped. "The gate opens…"

His body disintegrated into smoke. The temple began to collapse.

Jean fled, Whitney beside her, the echoes of ancient truth chasing them like ghosts.

As they emerged into the cold night of the Iron Empire, Jean looked toward the distant mountains where the Obsidian Spire stood.

The Empress had a shard of Severra's soul.

And the final war had already begun.

CHAPTER 57. THE WAR OF SOULS.