betrayal

betrayal

Several days later, a massive army, led by hundreds of knights, arrived at the city. Astonishment dominated every gaze. They had entered the metropolis that had always prided itself on being the safest in the empire—even safer than the imperial palace. The frontier fortress, where the greatest resources and the strongest protection were allocated.

But now... only silence and ice remained.

The leader of the army dismounted with a somber expression, advancing cautiously through the streets. Among his men, some held their breath, unable to comprehend what force could have caused such devastation.

"Lord Cirse... we're too late," murmured a soldier in a tense voice. He wore a green uniform, and a sword of the same color hung at his waist. His black hair framed green eyes filled with uncertainty.

"Yes... there's nothing we can do," Cirse sighed as he contemplated the frozen city.

He was another of the four generals of the empire. Another protector of humanity. Paul de Cirse, the master of the emerald aura.

Alongside his men, he advanced to the palace. He inspected each silent corridor, every corner coated in ice, until he reached the main hall.

There, Claude emerged from the chamber, his demeanor even colder than the ice surrounding him.

"C-Cl... Claude..." Cirse stammered, surprised and, for a moment, afraid. "Y-you're alive," he whispered, his hand moving slowly toward the hilt of his sword.

"You're late," Claude said, his voice so calm it hardly seemed human.

"Yes... we're at war. I had to protect my territory," Cirse replied quickly, as if needing to justify his presence.

Claude fell silent for a moment, his gaze resting on Cirse's sword.

"What was the order?" he asked suddenly, his voice carrying a chill beyond his power.

"Excuse me?" Cirse stammered, a shiver running down his spine.

"The order... what was it? From the emperor."

Cirse's eyes widened in disbelief. For an instant, he seemed to search for the right words, but at last he lowered his gaze in resignation.

He brought a hand to his forehead, letting out a sigh that vanished into the hall.

"Well... Claude, you did it. You inflicted so much damage on the enemy army that you even killed one of their generals. Because of that, the demons want to negotiate peace. They will marry the princess to the emperor... as a symbol of truce. And... they'll put aside the battle."

He forced an awkward smile.

"You did it."

"What is the price of this change?" Claude asked, his voice so serene it froze the air more than any winter.

Cirse held his gaze for a long moment before answering.

"You."

"You really hurt them... but they hurt us too," he continued, his tone sounding like both an apology and a justification. "We are the only two generals left. The only surviving aura master is the emperor. But thanks to the blades of Le Ciel, we have more power than an ordinary aura master. They only have two remaining... but they have far more mages than we do. If we throw everything we have left... we will only annihilate each other. You are the imbalance in the scales."

"I see," Claude replied, as unshakable as an iceberg.

As he spoke, Cirse began to draw his sword. His fingers trembled. Though he was as young as Claude, not even in his most arrogant fantasies had he believed himself capable of standing as his equal.

His late grandfather had earned the right to be a general after decades of battles. Cirse, on the other hand, barely understood the nuances of his own aura.

An aura master was the pinnacle of energetic control. Yet even that summit divided into two levels: those who could wield pure aura, and those who could imbue it with an element. Elemental aura was infinitely more powerful than mere essence. In the entire empire, only two men commanded it: Claude... and the emperor.

That was one of the reasons they wanted him eliminated. Since the empire's founding, no one but the monarch had ever borne an element. The emperor's sickening envy had begun the day Claude awakened an element never seen before: ice. A perfect fusion of water and wind, stronger than the simple water the emperor could barely wield.

"Don't make this harder, Claude," Cirse whispered tensely. "We brought all the empire's semi-masters. And ten mages. If we have to... we will end you. It's just another order. Like always. Just accept it."

As he spoke, his aura began to flow through his muscles, tinting his sword with an emerald glow that flickered like a weak flame.

Claude watched him with absolute calm.

"No."

For a second, the silence was so deep that every heart beating in the hall could be heard in a frantic chorus.

Cirse clenched his teeth, his features taut with frustration and fear. He shook his head, unable to reply, while the soldiers behind him drew their weapons in unison.

The ground shook as the ceiling began to collapse under a spell. Ten mages descended in concentric circles, raising their staffs while chanting incantations that made the vault tremble. Magic flooded the air with an oppressive pressure that bordered on panic.

"Then... I'm sorry, Claude," Cirse murmured, the weight of betrayal pressing every word. "It's a shame to lose a prodigy like you. But we need peace. Too many are dying."

His figure vanished in an instant, transformed into a green blur that crossed the distance and appeared before Claude's chest.

At that same moment, the soldiers disappeared and reappeared around him, every sword aimed at his throat.

The blades pierced Claude's body with ease. The mages froze, stunned by how effortless it had been.

But when his head and torso fell to the floor, his flesh crumbled into transparent crystals. Pure ice.

"Watch out!" Cirse screamed in a ragged cry, spinning toward the mages.

It was too late.

Claude was already behind one of them, standing on a platform of ice that had materialized under his boots. The mage's head flew in a perfect arc before hitting the ground.

The rest raised their staffs with a chorus of terror, reciting spells at inhuman speed. But Claude vanished again. A sudden snowfall began to fall around them, followed by a gale that tore down banners and lifted a whirlwind of debris.

He reappeared in front of another mage, who could barely utter the final syllable of his incantation. His blue sword pierced the man's chest, breaking three magical barriers in a single motion, driving straight through his heart.

The remaining mages finished their spell and unleashed lightning and fire from every direction.

For an instant that felt eternal, everyone watched as Claude turned into a block of ice, which was shattered by the attacks. The body of the mage he had just killed was reduced to charred remains, a victim of his own comrades' desperation.

A frigid roar swept through the hall as the gale intensified.

"Claude! Killing us will only weaken the empire! Are you truly willing to destroy everything you built? Everything your family protected for generations?" Cirse shouted, his voice breaking as he watched another mage collapse, eyes glassy.

"They chose to come," Claude replied, appearing within the storm. His blue sword dripped with blood and frost. "And so did you."

He lunged toward Cirse in a single bound, leaving a trail of ice in the air.

The mages raised their staffs to cast another barrier, but Claude moved so fast that their bursts of fire and lightning struck only empty space.

Cirse lifted his sword, muscles tensed, while his men formed a defensive circle around him.

When Claude was just a step away, he vanished again.

Cirse barely glimpsed a white flash… aimed not at his heart, but at the aura semi-masters stationed in the rear.

"Idiots, fall back!" Cirse yelled, a thread of panic in his voice.

But if he could hardly perceive Claude, the others couldn't react at all. In a blink, two heads rolled across the floor, tumbling over ice stained red.

"Signal the alarm!" Cirse bellowed, pointing at a mage.

The spellcaster raised his staff and fired a red beam into the sky, which exploded with a thunderclap and bathed the territory in bloody light.

Cirse charged at Claude with determination, knowing he could only buy time.

Claude fixed him with an unwavering stare as he lifted his sword.

"You're making this more complicated than it needs to be," Cirse murmured, breathing ragged. "You're betraying the human race."

"And you betrayed me," Claude replied in a glacial tone that could break a soul. "But even that wouldn't matter to me… if you had protected my people. Protected her."

His leg swung up and landed a brutal kick to Cirse's chest. Cirse was hurled back several meters, spinning through the air until he managed to brace a hand on the ground and steady himself with a groan of pain.

Claude leapt back in the same instant, evading a rain of lightning that crashed down like the wrath of the gods. One of the mages was trying to trap him in a cage of bolts while the others erected barriers to seal off every escape route or prevent another attack.

But all of it was futile.

Claude looked up, and with a gesture almost lazy in its ease, a spear of ice emerged above one of the mages, impaling him through the back.

That was why elemental aura masters were so feared. They didn't need direct contact: they could create their element anywhere, shape it however they wished, and make it an extension of their will. In that blizzard of snow and wind, Claude was a god among mortals.

One of the mages, seeing death descend upon them, began reciting a spell with frantic desperation. Several spheres of fire appeared, encircling everyone—even the semi-masters and Cirse—in a last attempt to melt the ice and recover some mobility in that white hell.

But Claude took a single step. In an instant, a field of frost burst from his body, spreading like a frozen ocean. The flames turned to stone at its touch, transformed into orange sculptures that crackled and died. And as it spread, dozens of ice stakes erupted from the floor, shooting in every direction.

The soldiers and mages tried to dodge, but most managed nothing more than a final scream before falling. Soon, everyone lay wounded, bleeding onto the snow that would not stop falling.

That was the reason for the blizzard: the moment they allowed it to form, they had lost nearly every chance of victory.

Then, a trumpet sounded amid the echoes of death. Claude turned his gaze for only an instant, always vigilant. In the distance, the rest of the army that had come with Cirse was marching toward him. Hundreds of men with weapons raised. Some looked at him with determination. Others with a hope almost childish. Many more… with a hatred that seemed to justify any atrocity.

"They know that defeating you will bring peace to the realm…" Cirse shouted, trying to break through the stone in Claude's heart. "Will you kill them too?"

"Yes," he answered with absolute calm.

A new pulse of frost expanded from his body.

Even Cirse's eyes widened in disbelief. This was the man who had risked his life countless times to save civilians… but he was no longer the same. Perhaps he had never truly been.

Cirse clenched his teeth, his aura forming an emerald shell around his body as the ice closed in. But the protection shattered with a crack. The semi-masters' barriers broke just as easily.

The army, unable to hold the line, was caught in a mantle of ice that covered their bodies, their weapons, even their screams. For a single second, silence was total… until everything broke in an explosion of crystal. Shards of ice and blood rose into the air like a macabre display of fireworks.

"You're insane… you're truly insane," Cirse shouted, voice breaking as he stumbled back. "Now I understand why we have to stop you… why the emperor ordered it."

"No," Claude replied, his voice so cold the air itself seemed to freeze. "He ordered it because he's a fool."

He disappeared before Cirse's eyes.

An instant later, the head of a semi-master rolled across the snow, his expression still marked by the horror of the slaughter.

The remaining soldiers advanced, though with a tremor that betrayed their fear. They had no choice. They had to try to stop the ice demon who killed as easily as others breathed.

Cirse took a step back, feeling his resolve slip away. He let his men stand between him and the fate that awaited them.