First, it was Luna, an advanced human, who stated that Achilles was not like them.
Then ca King Darrun Flawake of the Primordial Age. He, too, declared the sa: Achilles was not like them either.
The Primordial Age rejected him. The Evolutius Age cast him aside as well.
So where exactly did he belong?
As they watched the image of an entity bathed in radiant purple-gold brilliance, with wings of celestial light and a halo wielded like a weapon against a Phoenix- they affird a single, undeniable truth.
He could not be human.
—
KAA!
A phoenix's scream tore through the sky as green-gold blood erupted into the air.
Blood that shimred like gold.
Whenever such blood was seen, it called to mind the races of old- ancient beings, long extinct. For only they bled gold.
At this mont, the figure of the Millennium Acheron Phoenix warped- disappearing from one place, reappearing miles away. Her left wing, bloody and cut, dripped molten starlight.
High above, Achilles floated. In his hand spun the green-gold halo of light. His eyes- brimming with regal coldness- glowed with tendrils of purple-gold radiance as he stared down the Phoenix.
Below, the True Magitech Throne conjured an array of flaming crystal lotus petals, her expression shaken. She layered the blossoms into a wall of floral disks, each surging toward the Phoenix in a wave of relentless assault- denying her room to breathe.
Yet the Phoenix was enraged beyond asure.
She- a glorious, sovereign creature- had been made to bleed.
"O, Starfire!" she cried.
"Burn… Burn! BURN!"
Her voice rang with wrath and ruin, summoning starfire itself to ignite.
The trails of gold blood she left behind ignited- turning the sky into a terrifying canvas of spinning typhoons of green fla, dancing with chaos and destruction. The cries of lesser phoenixes echoed through them, perilously close to madness.
The True Magitech Throne darted through the sky, dodging the scorching flas. But in their center, one figure stood- unmoving.
Achilles.
His first-ever Dharmic Ethereal Self still glowing behind him.
The typhoons of green-gold fla surged toward him- and veered away.
As if an unseen force repelled them.
He remained motionless, still gripping his radiant halo, eyes scanning the chaos with a detached, imperial calm. They weren't human eyes. They were the eyes of sothing else entirely.
And then, his voice rang out- heavy with authority. With majesty.
"Descend, O Phoenix of the Sun and Moon."
…!
It was a command.
Given not to a beast, but to an aspect of his own assimilation.
This ti, his body did not morph into a Phoenix. He retained the form of the winged, purple-gold sovereign.
Instead, power began to converge ahead of him.
A singularity ford. Then erupted into white flas- pure, absolute- shaping into a being of majesty.
A white flaming phoenix.
"KAAA!"
Its cry echoed, and the flaming typhoons stilled.
Its power was undeniable.
Yet Achilles needed more.
He felt the Holy Hyacinthus Mountain Flower draw deeper into him, its Aeonic Treasure fueling his evolution. His Organic Crystal Echelon spiked, and with focus, he unleashed the devouring of the Organic and Inorganic Terrestrial Planetary Body assimilation. He devoured it wildly, unconcerned with Existence Corruption as he now had an Aeonic Treasure being devoured.
He had just arrived at Land Dharma King. Now, he forged his Existence as a continent. It expanded and grew wider as before him, the white phoenix burned bright.
And not far off, Rose hovered in the sky.
The manifestation of a Millennium Acheron Phoenix surrounded her- tangible and majestic. Not her own flas, but the flas of over 100 Dharma Manifestation Phoenixes, and more than 1,000 Ethereal Physiology Phoenixes… all halted.
Because of her.
Rose's eyes shimred, bright with the ancestral lineage of the Acheron Phoenix. She called out.
"I can sense your lineage and power."
WAA!
Her voice rang with sharp, crystalline clarity. At that mont, she was attuned- deeply.
She could feel the lineage of every phoenix facing her, syncing with her physiology.
And in that clarity…
"The purity of your lineage is poor."
…!
Shock rippled outward.
The three Sky Dharma Kings roared in defiance, pride wounded. Who was she. so much weaker than them, to claim their lineage lacked purity?
"Do you not believe ?"
Her question lingered.
Then her body shimred, radiating with brilliance- a show of pure lineage.
It was incandescent. Green and blinding.
"Ah…"
The phoenixes stared, stunned. Her purity...it was greater even than Ayan, the one who commanded them!
How?
How could soone weaker possess a lineage so much stronger?
That question rippled through them, loud and unsettling. Rose spoke again.
"I don't have to be the only one."
"Even in your impure states, you too can attain such purity. Quickly."
…!
"Just stand down. Let the battle be decided. And that purity… will be yours."
Her voice blended enticent with command.
The phoenixes- so prideful, so focused on bloodlines- looked to each other. Then back to her. Silence fell across that corner of the sky.
Back on the battlefield.
Where flas had been frozen.
Millennium Acheron Phoenix Ayan glared at the white flaming phoenix.
She clashed with obsidian lotuses conjured by the unrelenting True Magitech Throne, her voice cracking with disbelief.
"That is no phoenix!"
She couldn't accept it.
Wouldn't.
The purity it exuded- it would dismantle everything. Shatter her place atop the Acheron lineage.
Because in that phoenix… she saw sothing ancient. Sothing otherworldly.
It did not feel like it belonged here.
"You… Who are you? What are you?!"
Her cry surged as stellar fire erupted from her, the halted typhoons of fla beginning to rage anew.
Her wings stretched wide- blood still dripping, yet unbowed.
"Millennium Acheron Catastrophe!"
She invoked it like a curse, calling down a green inferno from the skies.
Pillars of fla descended.
A catastrophe.
And yet, Achilles did not flinch.
"Flimsy flas."
Toward the storm above, he raised his arm.
The spinning purple-gold halo flew from his grasp and began ascending.
And before him, the white flaming phoenix spread its wings wide.
Its eyes almost flashed with sentience as if it were alive, its eyes seeming like acrually white gold suns as they carried temperatures that began to exceed even the Astral Core Ascension Phoenix!
From it.
Beams of scorching white light erupted.
And everything turned to light.
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