CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Trial of the Celestial Arena

Three days later, Nyra was summoned to the Celestial Arena.

Not a school challenge.

A god-sponsored war trial.

They claimed she had awakened a forbidden artifact — the Star Core — and would be judged in combat.

Lucifer was furious.

"They want to test you like an animal."

"Then I'll show them how beasts fight," Nyra said.

The arena was shaped like a shattered moon.

Floating debris. Cracked gravity. No stable footing.

The opponents?

Five star-tier war gods.

Each one older than memory.

Each with at least one planetary kill.

Each with the permission to erase her from existence.

Nyra arrived in silence.

Wearing a white battle cloak stitched by Caelia.

No armor. No weapon.

Just the starburn mark glowing on her neck.

The first god attacked — an axe wielder from the Crimson Nebula.

He swung.

She didn't move.

The axe bent in mid-air and shattered before touching her.

"Gravity belongs to me now," she said.

The second god used photon manipulation.

Blades of light, compressed lasers, sunfire.

Nyra stepped through the blasts untouched.

Then touched the god's chest.

And said:

"Dim."

The god's light flickered.

And he turned to ash.

The third and fourth gods came together.

One controlled time dilation.

The other, mass and density.

Nyra let them hit her.

Let them crack her ribs.

Then she said:

"I can break stars. You are just fragments."

She split them both in half using Whisper, her soul-forged blade.

The last god trembled.

She tried to run.

Nyra didn't stop her.

She just looked up.

The stars obeyed.

And rained light down — not as beams, but as judgment.

The arena cracked.

Silence.

She had killed four gods.

Let the last one live.

Because fear spreads better through the survivors.

Later that night, Caelia was waiting in her chamber.

They didn't speak.

Nyra just fell into her arms.

Tired.

Not from battle.

But from trying to hold on to her humanity.

The next morning, the council didn't arrest her.

They bowed.

And declared her the Celestial Sovereign of Star Order — a title never given to anyone under a million years old.

Lucifer grinned.

"They think giving you a title will contain you."

"They're wrong," Nyra said. "They gave me a stage."