The Thorne of Destiny-Chapter 148: Good 3

Adrian staggered back, blood blooming from a shallow gash along his shoulder. The corrupted qi within the strike tried to leech into him, to burrow into his meridians like worms—but the Bound Star pulsed once, and the corruption was burned away in an instant.

Chains didn’t pause. Its movements were inhuman, relentless. One chain whipped across the battlefield, snatching a Mistshroud disciple mid-retreat and slamming him against a stone outcrop.

Adrian gritted his teeth and lunged forward.

This wasn’t just an opponent. It was a test.

Every clash of his blade against Chains’ bracers sparked lightning. Every breath he drew was a war of willpower against the rising pressure of the Soulforged’s presence. It wasn’t strength in the traditional sense—it was weight, inevitability, a thing that had forgotten death and now sought to remind others of it.

The chains came again—five this time, wrapping in a spiral formation designed to seal movement, qi flow, and spiritual sense. A triple-binding sequence, perfected to kill sect heirs like him.

But Adrian didn’t move back.

He stepped into the spiral.

"Fool," Chains hissed. "You seek to die quicker?"

Adrian’s hands blazed with sigils—not Mistshroud ones, but something older, sharper. Runes shaped in the language of the Bound Star. He slammed his palm into the ground.

A dome of white flame erupted outward.

The Soulforged’s chains recoiled instantly, black metal hissing as if burned by celestial fire.

Chains skidded back, its mask now cracked down one side. The fragment fell away, revealing half a face—gray, gaunt, and stretched unnaturally over bone.

Adrian’s voice echoed with a calm that carried weight. "You’re not the only one who learned from the dead."

Below, the battle turned with the shift of momentum.

Laen drew in a deep breath, then exhaled a sharp whistle. Wind blades spiraled out, pushing Silence back long enough for Olivia to complete her spell. The talisman she slammed onto the ground wasn’t a ward—it was a memory seal.

A brilliant lotus of light burst upward, forming a mirror that reflected the battlefield. Dozens of silhouettes shimmered inside it.

"Mirror path activated!" she shouted.

The formation circle beneath the ravine flared to life.

Bella, still locked with Hunger, saw her chance. She kicked off her opponent, flipped backward in mid-air, and hurled a poison-laced dagger at Hunger’s eye socket. It missed by an inch—but the feint gave Laen time to drive a sigil-spear into the Soulforged’s exposed side.

The construct staggered.

"Disciples! Fall back to the mirror path!" Bella barked, blood dripping from her jaw.

Reya had already begun dragging the wounded toward the growing portal. Mistshroud forces moved with desperate coordination, each step a prayer, each strike a delay.

Storm growled and leapt onto Silence, knocking the Soulforged down and buying a few precious seconds. He didn’t need to kill—just disrupt.

Adrian and Chains clashed again—this time midair, this time with finality.

"You don’t belong in this world," Adrian said as his blade locked against Chains’ corrupted sabers.

Neither of them could move.

Chains tilted its head again, that same inhuman motion. "Nor do you. You are a memory walking in flesh. A star long fallen."

Adrian’s grip tightened. The blade in his hand flared with the full brilliance of the Bound Star. "Then let this fallen star burn you to ash."

He let go of the blade—just for a second.

Not in surrender.

In trust.

The sword hovered on its own, spinning in place. Runes ignited along its edge, forming a spiral of gravitational force. It sucked inward—and then detonated outward in a pulse of stellar collapse.

Chains didn’t scream. It couldn’t. But the implosion caught it mid-step, folding its corrupted qi inward, crushing the puppet strings, breaking the seal sigils that gave it movement.

When the light cleared, Chains was gone.

Ash blew across the scorched ground.

Adrian dropped to one knee, breathing heavily.

The mirror portal behind him flickered, stabilizing just long enough.

He turned.

"Go!" he shouted toward the others.

One by one, the Mistshroud survivors passed through the mirror—Bella carrying a half-conscious Olivia, Laen dragging a limping disciple, Reya covering the rear with a soulbow crackling in her hands.

Adrian stepped through last.

Behind him, the wind howled.

The Emberfell Divide closed. 𝗳𝚛𝚎𝚎𝘄𝕖𝕓𝕟𝕠𝚟𝚎𝕝.𝗰𝕠𝐦

Elsewhere – Obsidian Gate

The woman in imperial robes sat on a throne made of black lotus roots, their petals feeding on the soul of a chained cultivator below.

The moment Chains fell, she opened her eyes.

"A pity," she murmured. "He was the most stable one."

She turned to her aide. "Deploy the second wave."

"But, General—"

"No excuses. The Bound Star has awakened. The Mistshroud heir must not reach the Shroudspire Basin."

She stood.

"Seal the skies. Burn the roads. Let him know: we are done sending shadows."

She reached out and touched the gate behind her. A pulse answered.

"And now," she whispered, "let’s remind the heavens what silence sounds like."

The world on the other side of the mirror was wrong.

Adrian landed hard, boots crunching against crystal shards embedded in a field of broken stone. Above him, the sky was not blue, but a swirling canvas of grey and violet clouds, shifting like oil over water. Mist coiled in the distance, curling through twisted trees and shrouded peaks.

He rose slowly, still feeling the echo of the battle in his bones. His blade, now silent, returned to its sheath with a hum of satisfaction. For now, it slept.

The mirror behind him cracked, webbing like frost under the strain of its final function.

A heartbeat later, it shattered completely.

Adrian stared for a moment, lips tight. There was no going back.

They had escaped—but they were not safe.

"Everyone here?" he called out.

Reya responded first, checking the unconscious and wounded. "We lost two in the crossing. One was too wounded. The other... never made it to the portal."

Her voice was tight with guilt.

Olivia, still pale from channeling the mirror spell, leaned against Bella. "We’re in the Rift between Realms. This is... this was one of our sect’s old sanctuary paths, I think. But it’s decayed."

Bella’s eyes swept the terrain. "This isn’t a sanctuary anymore. It’s a ruin."

Adrian nodded grimly. "Then we rebuild. One step at a time."

He reached out with his spiritual sense—and winced.

The qi here was fractured. Not corrupted like Chains’ aura, but broken, unsteady. It warped and twisted unnaturally, rising in spirals before vanishing. Some cultivators could go mad cultivating here without guidance.

"We’ll have to ration our energy," Elder Laen murmured, having just finished applying a healing talisman to a disciple’s leg. "No breakthroughs here. Not without anchors."

Adrian’s gaze lifted to the distance. Faint glimmers shimmered along the edges of the horizon—ruins. Towers, half-sunken into mist, and statues long forgotten. Somewhere out there was their goal: Shroudspire Basin, the last untouched Mistshroud sanctuary, hidden behind the folds of reality.

"We head there," he said, pointing toward the tallest ruin. "We rest first. But that’s where we’re going."

Storm padded up beside him, tail flicking. The silver-winged tiger cub rubbed against Adrian’s leg, sensing the tension and staying close.

Later that Night

They had made camp within the hollowed shell of what might once have been a sect hall. The foundation stones still bore the Mistshroud sigil—three interlocking stars above a veil of mist—but they were cracked, some eaten away by time or strange energies.

Faint blue fire danced atop Adrian’s palm, providing heat without drawing attention.

The group was smaller now, bloodied but alive. They ate quietly, dried rations shared between them. The weight of loss hung thick in the air, but so did something else: resolve.

Bella sat across from Adrian, her arm bandaged, her face lit by firelight.

"I saw you in the city," she said quietly.

Adrian didn’t pretend not to understand.

"I wasn’t sure it was you," she continued. "But I knew something was wrong when the City Lord’s spies turned frantic."

"You let me go."

She nodded. "Because the boy I knew would never let the Mistshroud legacy die in silence. And now..." She looked at the others, at Olivia curled up beside Storm, at Jayson sharpening his blade in silence. "Now I see you’ve lit the flame again."

Adrian didn’t reply immediately.

"I’m not the same person I was," he finally said. "Not after the Sect fell. Not after what we’ve seen. I can’t afford to be."

"No," Bella agreed. "But you’re stronger now. And they need you."

Adrian met her gaze. "You came back for us. Even after joining the House of Vyre."

"I never truly left the Mistshroud," she said. "I just survived."

They sat in silence for a while, the fire crackling between them.

Then, Olivia stirred.

"Brother..." she murmured, half-asleep. "Someone’s... watching."

Adrian turned instantly, senses flaring.

From the shadows at the edge of the ruined hall, a shimmer of light coalesced—then solidified into a ghostly figure robed in silver and black.

The apparition bowed.

Meanwhile – Far Beyond the Rift

Within the imperial court, beneath the banners of the Celestial Throne, an old man stirred from his meditative seat.

He opened his eyes slowly.