Thalric stood at the top of Fort Kaelgrim’s walls, staring at the sky as the clouds gathered like a thick, angry blanket over the world. No matter where he looked, the sky was the same—dark, swollen with rain, and maybe lightning. It was supposed to be the end of winter, yet the air felt colder than usual, as if even nature had sensed what was about to happen today.

  Below the rolling clouds, the kraels circled the fort in restless loops. The massive winged beasts usually glided lazily across the sky, but now their movements were sharp, jittery, as if every nerve in their bodies buzzed with unease. Beasts sensed war long before any soldier did.

  Even the alpha was uneasy—shrieking, beating its wings hard enough that the wind rippled across the walls. The creature was twice the size of the regular kraels, its scales rough like stone and its eyes glowing faintly with mana. No rider sat upon its back. Only Duke Raktor could ride it, and his days of flying had passed, but that didn’t matter. Thalric knew what the alpha was capable of. If the mana cannons somehow failed to kill Arzan, that beast would finish the job.

  Thinking of the cannons, Thalric swept his gaze across the wall.

  Row after row, the mana cannons stood ready—long, metal constructs mounted on fortified stone bases, each spaced evenly across the ramparts. Two men stood beside each one, gripping their mana guns tightly. The men looked stiff, but they didn’t dare let their fear show on their face while their king was watching.

  His Mages and blacksmiths had spent days inspecting the cannons and guns they had raided. Although they weren't able to dismantle them, every single one of them as worked as well as expected.

  If Arzan—or any of his men—tried to get close, they would be torn apart before reaching the gates.

  It was the advantage of a great fort: plenty of space to fill with cannons of death.

  He only wished they had more cannons. Arzan clearly knew someone had betrayed him, and the supply raids had stopped immediately. Palman hadn’t been able to give more information after that, but Thalric wasn’t angry at the man. Palman had already delivered more than Thalric ever expected, and now all that was left was to kill Arzan… then kill his elder brother.

  Thalric leaned forward and placed his palms on the cold stone. His eyes narrowed as faint silhouettes appeared on the horizon. He could see Arzan’s army climbing the long slope toward Kaelgrim.

  There was one thing he wondered. Why was Arzan so confident of winning against him? Palman’s information hadn’t been wrong even when it came to Arzan. And his scouts had already reported what they had seen sitting on the kraels—Arzan looking sickly pale.

  It was clear that Arzan wouldn’t be on his best self, and despite that, why would he move here for a siege knowing that his mana cannons were stolen and the fort was covered in them?

  What was his plan?

  Was he putting all hope on the barbarians? If so, then Arzan was delusional. Barbarians weren’t taking this fort. Not with the preparations made here.

  But Thalric also knew Arzan wasn’t foolish. He wouldn’t walk into death without a reason. Something didn’t add up, and the uncertainty dug at Thalric’s stomach like a claw.

  A presence approached beside him, distracting him from his thoughts. Thalric turned his head just as Duke Raktor walked up the wall, a massive sword strapped to his back as if it weighed nothing.

  Raktor glanced at Thalric’s tense expression, then at the horizon, and finally said quietly, “I don’t think you should think too much, your majesty.”

  “Why is that so?” Thalric muttered, jaw tight. “I’m pretty sure our enemy has something up their sleeves that we have no idea about.”

  Raktor huffed, almost amused. “Yes, they must. But whatever it is, it would surely not be able to do anything against us or the fort. I must say, with the cannons, the fort is almost impenetrable. You always focus on victory. Why aren’t you doing the same today, when it’s right in front of your eyes?”

  Thalric’s frown deepened. “I wonder why that is,” he said, but the truth tugged at him even before the words left his mouth.

  He knew why.

  The memory rose uninvited, sharp as the chill wind cutting across the battlements: that day in the arena, Arzan standing in the center as if the world itself bent around him… he looked like a god descended upon the world. Even now, whenever he thinks of Arzan, that picture comes to his mind as clear as daylight.

  Some part of him simply refused to believe that such a man could die.

  But could Thalric afford to lose? No.

  There was no space for doubt in the path he had chosen. If he fell today, everything—every sacrifice, every gamble, every drop of blood spilled—would amount to nothing. He couldn’t let that happen.

  He forced a slow, steady breath into his lungs as the silhouettes on the horizon crept closer. He licked his lips. The air tasted of storm and iron.

  Finally, he turned to Duke Raktor and murmured, voice low, “You have prepared what I asked of you, right?”

  Raktor’s thick brows lowered, but he nodded. “Yes. The alpha krael will do what you asked if things start to look bleak for us. But I really don’t think it will. We have everything under control. Your plan is something we will never need to use.”

  Thalric shook his head sharply. “You know what happened to Aldrin.”

  Raktor’s expression tightened. “Yes, but Aldrin is a fool who thinks himself too smart. None of us are going to rot away in a dungeon like him.”

  Thalric allowed himself the smallest smile. That much was true—his destiny wasn’t to rot in chains. Better to die than to be caged like his brother. But his mother’s voice whispered through his memory.

  If you even have one percent doubt in your victory, make sure your enemy cannot enjoy his victory if you lose.

  And Thalric did have that one percent doubt today.

  So he had prepared accordingly. He could only pray it wouldn't come to that. He couldn’t let that be.

  Thalric forced the thought down as he and Duke Raktor watched the horizon darken with movement. The enemy finally emerged from beyond the hills—an army stretching wide, marching with steady purpose. And at its front was the man he had come to see as his greatest rival.

  Arzan.

  Even from this distance, Thalric could see the pallor on his face. The man looked like he had been bedridden for a month, surviving on nothing but weak soup and stubbornness. Yet his eyes… his eyes carried the same maddening light Thalric remembered from the arena. A blaze that wanted to devour everything in its path.

  That memory tightened something in Thalric’s chest—not fear, never fear—but a flicker of doubt he refused to name.

  Behind Arzan, the nobles Thalric recognized gathered, and with them marched the barbarians. Towering figures with painted faces, axes and other heavy weapons strapped to their backs, the same warriors he had fought and killed before. Now they had come for revenge.

  They would not get it.

  As the fortress wall stirred with whispers and shifting boots, Thalric straightened. Every soldier’s eyes were on him now, waiting and expecting. He could not afford hesitation—not here, not today.

  He drew his sword in one smooth motion, metal glinting beneath the storm clouds pressing low over the fort, and pointed it straight at Arzan and his gathering army.

  “Strengthen the wards!” Thalric bellowed, his voice rolling across the battlements like thunder. “The enemy is upon us, and we are going to win this war like we have before!”

  A roar rose behind him. Soldiers slammed their palms against their armor, shouting victory cries. Mages immediately turned on the wards, layers of shimmering mana knitting into the invisible barrier in front of the walls. A sheet of protection sealing into place with a low hum.

  Thalric didn't look away from Arzan. Not even when the clouds above flickered with lightning. Not even when the kraels screeched overhead, circling like restless predators.

  Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Arzan moved.

  The man suddenly rose into the air, drifting forward toward the ward as if the fort, the cannons, the beasts, the armies meant nothing.

  Thalric tightened his grip on his sword, jaw clenched.

  Whatever happens today… I win. I must.

  ***

  Kai hovered just above the ward of Fort Kaelgrim, and a quiet wave of relief rolled through him. Up until this very moment, there had always been a chance—small but dangerous—that Thalric would realise the truth, see the trap for what it was, and flee before the jaws snapped shut. But there he stood on the battlements, blade drawn, shoulders squared like a man who believed the walls beneath him were unbreakable.

  By choosing to stand there, exposed and proud, Thalric had signed his own death warrant.

  For a heartbeat, Kai wondered whether he even needed to pretend anymore. The pale face, the slowed movements, the shallow breaths—it had all been an act, crafted only to feed Thalric’s overconfidence. Now that the prince was locked in place and surrounded, the act felt unnecessary. So Kai straightened, letting the illusion drop just enough that his posture turned firm again. A few Mages on the wall stiffened as if noticing the shift, but Thalric didn't.

  Above him, the kraels circled like restless storms. Their shrieks tore through the air. A few dove low, wings beating hard enough to send wind slamming against Kai’s cloak, but their riders yanked the reins in time, holding them back from tearing into him.

  And below, dozens of mana cannons rotated in unison—metal plates grinding, seals flaring—until every barrel pointed directly at him.

  It was almost amusing.

  Kai smiled down at Thalric and called out in a steady voice. “You call yourself a king, but all you did was steal my cannons. You are just a thief sitting on a borrowed throne.”

  Thalric snorted and raised his chin, his hand tightening on the hilt of his sword. “If you can’t protect your neck, that’s not my fault my blade finds it.”

  A few soldiers around him smirked, chuckling. Thalric continued, “I’m guessing that you’re here to ask for surrender, aren’t you? To beg me to avoid bloodshed. You already know my answer.”

  Kai inhaled slowly. “I do. But it’s still the right thing to ask. I don’t wish to see so many die to defeat you.”

  Thalric’s lips curled. “Only your side will fall today. I’m eager to watch it happen.”

  The last word had barely left his mouth when two kraels swooped down at once, wings cutting through the cold air. Their riders hurled spells in twin streaks of burning light—each one aimed straight at Kai’s heart.

  Kai raised his hand, letting the two attacks slam harmlessly into his wind-armour. The force rippled across the air around him, but he didn’t slow. Instead, he pointed his palm at the two kraels diving toward him and released a sharp beam of ice.

  The cold shot through the sky like a spear, striking the wings of both beasts. Frost spread over their feathers in seconds. The kraels shrieked, their wings stiffening as they tried to flap, but their weight dragged them down. Their riders leaned low, trying to break the ice with spells and blades, but they were far too late.

  Both kraels slammed into the glowing ward, scraping along it before tumbling down toward the ground below.

  The other kraels cried out in panic and anger. Their voices echoed off the walls of the fort as they beat their wings harder, ready to dive at him in a coordinated attack.

  Two mana cannons fired at the same time.

  Blue beams ripped through the air, burning the sky itself as they chased him. Kai twisted aside, spinning through the air with ease. He caught a quick glimpse of Thalric on the wall, his jaw tight, his face twisting with frustration at seeing Kai dodge so easily.

  More beams followed—four, then six, then nearly all of the cannons turned toward him.

  Kai danced through them, gliding and weaving like he was moving through falling leaves instead of lethal blasts of mana. With every dodge, Thalric’s expression shifted further—from anger, to doubt, to something close to disbelief.

  He had been waiting for Kai to collapse. Waiting for his supposed wounded Mana heart to slow him down, force him into one of the beams. But Kai wasn’t slowing. Not even a little.

  Kai even steered closer toward the kraels once or twice, hoping the soldiers would accidentally hit their own beasts. But Thalric’s men weren’t foolish enough to fall for that, and the kraels kept their distance.

  Then—finally—Kai saw the moment he’d been waiting for.

  A rumble rose from the ground as a wall of stone erupted upward, towering in front of where most of his forces stood. Dust scattered into the air as the wall locked into place like a giant shield.

  In their obsession with hitting him out of the sky, Thalric’s forces hadn’t fired a single cannon at Kai’s men. That small delay was all the Mages needed to raise a solid defensive wall, thick enough, Kai hoped, to block the worst of what was coming next.

  Kai darted between the beams of mana, the air burning behind him as he twisted out of their paths. The moment he found an opening, he dropped straight onto the top of the stone wall. His boots hit the rock with a thud. He glanced back just long enough to meet Leopold’s eyes. Leopold gave a stiff nod, and Kai returned it before turning his gaze forward.

  Every mana cannon on the fort had already turned toward him, their barrels glowing faintly as they gathered power. Even the kraels circled above, their wings beating hard against the heavy wind, eyes fixed on him as if waiting for Thalric’s order to tear him apart.

  Thalric’s voice boomed across the ward.

  “The wall won’t be able to save your forces from the mana cannons!”

  Kai didn’t flinch. “The wall isn’t for that,” he said calmly. “I just don’t want pieces of the fort hitting my men.”

  The moment the words left his mouth, Kai closed his eyes.

  For five seconds, the world slowed.

  He barely heard Thalric shouting something. The voices in the fort blurred together, fading into a dull echo. Kai pushed everything out of his mind except one thing—the cannons.

  Back when he learned he couldn’t fully control where the mana cannons ended up, he and Balen had secretly built a mechanism into every single one they sold. A hidden switch that would only respond to his mana signature. No Mage in the kingdom could detect it; no blacksmith could undo it.

  Now, Kai let thin strands of his mana flow out, tiny wisps that stretched toward every cannon positioned around the fort. At first the connection was faint, distant… and then, one by one, each cannon stirred under his awareness. Like dozens of eyes blinking open.

  He felt them.

  He controlled them.

  Kai opened his eyes again. The cannons were glowing hot, ready to fire. They were seconds away from destroying the wall beneath his feet, and turning him to ash.

  He didn’t hesitate. Kai snapped his fingers.

  The connection surged. His will rushed through every cannon like lightning through metal.

  And in the next instant, he issued a single silent command: “Explode.”

  ***

  A/N - You can read 30 chapters (15 Magus Reborn and 15 Dao of money) on my patreon. Annual subscription is now on too.

  PS:

  Book 3 is officially launched!If you’re on Kindle Unlimited, you can read it for free—and even if you’re not buying, a quick rating helps more than you think. Also, it's free to rate and please download the book if you have Kindle unlimited. It helps with algorithm.