The deeper I went down the tunnel, the hotter it beca. Eventually, I felt as though I were being burned alive. Still, I narrowed my eyes, squinting through the waves of heat.
This is the heat of the Primordial Ember, huh, I thought.
It was as expected of sothing called “primordial.” The air itself seed to tighten around my lungs, the suffocating heat almost unbearable. It was extrely hot—there was no denying that.
Grace glanced at through the haze, eyes half-narrowed. “You. What are you, exactly?”
“What do you an, what am I?” I asked.
Her brows furrowed, clearly unable to make sense of what she was seeing. “No, it’s just... I may not feel pain in this spirit form, but this heat alone should be enough to incinerate any normal person in seconds. How are you just... standing there like it’s nothing?”
Bewildered, Grace just blinked at , as if trying to decide whether I was human at all.
I shrugged lightly and nonchalantly answered, “Well, I’m used to it.”
Perhaps because this was rely an ember, not the true fire, the surrounding heat felt much gentler than what I was accustod to. I had spent countless days burning myself alive, training to provoke the fla of the Primordial Fla itself. If anything, this felt a little cool. Of course, that was only my perspective. As Grace said, an ordinary person would have been reduced to ash the mont they stepped in here.
“You’re used to this? This?” Grace looked around in disbelief at the tunnel, its walls lting and warping from the heat. “Well. Maybe that ‘power to extinguish fire’ you carry also makes you resistant to fire.”
Whatever the so-called “power to extinguish fire” within was, it had nothing to do with this. I could endure the heat for a simpler reason. It was because I had already burned like this countless tis before.
After we descended the fiery tunnel for several minutes, a massive cavern appeared before us, blazing red like the inside of a molten furnace.
“We’re here,” said Grace.
At the center of the chamber, a gigantic fla burned violently.
“You sure that’s an ember?” I asked.
Calling it an ember felt wrong. It was the size of a house, roaring like a living beast.
Grace clicked her tongue. “Hmm. Guess the new generation doesn’t learn much mythology these days.”
She gave a “back in my day” kind of look and explained, “The Primordial Fla is the power that once burned down the Tree of Creation, the very thing that made this continent and the gods themselves. Even as a re ember, that size is perfectly natural.”
“Yeah, I know that, but still...”
Grace spread her arms wide, exaggerating to show the supposed scale. “If it were the true Primordial Fla, it’d be far, faaar bigger than this!”
I couldn’t help but chuckle at her theatrics, finding it funny. The real Primordial Fla had barely been the size of a clenched fist. It had been small, but infinitely more potent. The raw power sealed within it couldn’t even be compared to the wild blaze before .
This thing felt untad, like molten tal, not a refined blade. If the true Primordial Fla were a finely forged sword, this ember were molten steel—hot, shapeless, and destructive.
I stepped toward it.
“Wait, be careful!” Grace said.
“It’s fine.”
The instant I drew near it, the fla surged wildly, like a beast finding its prey. The inferno lunged at , waves of fire crashing from every direction.
Grace’s desperate voice rang out. “No! Stop!”
The flas swallowed whole. She tried to rush forward, her spirit flaring with white light, but even in her incorporeal state, the heat struck her, sending her flying backward. “Ugh!”
Sizzle! Ssshhhhh!
The fire wrapped around , devouring flesh, burning it to smoke. Yet, I smiled.
I stomped hard, flas swirling violently around . “You’re getting cocky, you brat.”
Drawing in a slow, deep breath, I stirred the sleeping fla within my heart. Agony tore through . It was as though molten tal coursed through my veins instead of blood, searing from the inside out. It was unbearable, so much so that I could barely think.
“Phew!”
Yes, it was this feeling, this pain. It hurt like hell, but it also made things clear. Compared to the true Primordial Fla, the heat of the ember before was laughably weak.
The flas consuming suddenly shuddered in surprise, trying to scatter and flee. A vicious grin tugged at my lips as I reached out. “Where do you think you’re going?”
Ash-gray smoke poured from my body, coiling around the panicked ember. I closed my eyes and focused. It felt as though I were floating, drifting out of myself. My consciousness slowly sank deeper and deeper into a world of imagery that unfolded within my mind. Before , I saw the Primordial Fla and the Ember, entangled in a chaotic struggle.
No, calling it a fight wasn’t quite right. The Primordial Fla wasn’t battling; rather, it was hunting. It seized the Ember, which desperately tried to flee, and overwheld it in a one-sided assault. Perhaps the difference in their power was simply too vast. The Ember couldn’t last long, and it was quickly devoured, disappearing into the flas.
That ended faster than I thought. It was a little anticlimactic, but inevitable. With such a huge gap in strength, there was never any doubt who would win.
Once I confird that the Primordial Ember had been fully absorbed, I prepared to leave the mindscape, opening my eyes. However, the Primordial Fla suddenly flared up, thrashing wildly like a chained beast breaking free. Pain exploded through my body as the raging flas lashed at . I turned toward the source. The fire burned violently, as though it sought to consu the entire world.
What? What is happening?Did it grow stronger after absorbing the Primordial Ember?
The once-quiet Primordial Fla roared to life, surging toward with overwhelming force. Flas that had consud the Ember now ca to devour whole. The ground of my mindscape split apart, and from the rift, sothing massive erupted, stomping down the raging flas as though extinguishing them beneath its heel.
“Urgh!”
Panting heavily, I looked up at the enormous figure now dominating the fire. Shrouded in ash-gray smoke, its full form was impossible to make out, but its sheer scale was beyond comprehension. I wondered if that was the power Grace ntioned, the “power to extinguish fire.”
The being that had effortlessly suppressed the flas slowly sank back into the cracked earth, as if its job were done. Relief escaped as I looked upon the now-subdued Primordial Fla. “Hah!”
From this experience, I learned sothing new. Absorbing Embers recklessly could be dangerous. The heat itself wasn’t the problem; it was what the absorbed energy did to the fla inside . The Primordial Fla, which until now had been kept docile by the power that suppressed it, went berserk the mont it devoured the Primordial Ember, like a hunting dog finally slipping its leash.
Luckily, that suppressive force, the “power to extinguish fire,” was still strong enough to keep it under control for now. But there was no guarantee it always would be.
While this move had been risky, it was not without its reward. I extended my hand toward the dancing flas. They obeyed gently, almost ta, as they crawled up my arm like loyal pets. The volu of fire I could command now had clearly increased compared to what I could before the absorption.
I thought, At this rate...
Flas wrapped around , igniting. I activated Ignition, then Blazing Fire. The fire spiraled higher, swirling violently around . Normally, I could only push it this far, short of invoking the Incarnation of Fire, which would be when the Primordial Fla itself took over.
But this ti, I decided to take it a step further. I exhaled slowly, focusing my will. The fire enveloping spread outward, engulfing the entire ground beneath my feet. With a flick of my fingers, enormous flas blood in midair. They flickered and faded in rhythm with my gestures, like extensions of my own thoughts.
My control over the Primordial Fla increased within this field of fire. Until now, I always had to channel fire through my body, kindling it on my skin before transferring it to my sword or surroundings. But within this fiery domain, that restriction no longer applied. I could ignite the Primordial Fla anywhere, anyti, without needing a vessel.
So, this is what it feels like to unfold a domain, I thought.
At that mont, I recalled I had heard of sothing similar before. Certain Blessings altered the surrounding environnt, creating an area favorable to the user, like what Laneige’s Blessing had done back then. She couldn’t fully master her Blessing yet, but even so, her power stirred up snowstorms around her. In her past life, whenever she used it, she transford the entire battlefield into a frozen wasteland, her personal domain.
It ant that after Ignition and Blazing Fire, I had now reached a new realm, one where the very land itself burned beneath my feet. Of course, the real question was how much of it I could reproduce outside my mindscape. Still, with enough training, it should be possible to increase its effectiveness.
I had nad my first skill Ignition, the second Blazing Fire. For this new power, just like how it had happened when a Blessing was awakened, the na surfaced in my mind as naturally as breathing, like sothing I had always known, yet forgotten—Cataclysmic Fla.
With this technique, I had achieved a new peak in my mastery of the Primordial Fla. Cataclysmic Fla was a power one step higher than Ignition and Blazing Fire.
I grinned, watching the blazing domain spread around . I had never thought I’d stumble upon a treasure like this. I hadn’t planned for any of this, yet I had discovered sothing far more valuable than the top prize, the Blessing of God, that everyone else was after. Though, I probably wasn’t going to get any bonus points for it.
Wait. My bonus points!
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