Chapter : 573

They did not try to block the blade. They ignored it. They attacked the wielder.

They shot from every direction—from the floor, from the walls he had created, from the very air around him. They were a swarm of silent, striking vipers, their target not his weapon, but his body.

Before Lloyd could even register the shift in tactics, before he could think to pull back, the chains were on him. They wrapped around his ankles, his wrists, his waist, his chest, his throat. It was not a clumsy binding; it was a surgical, systematic immobilization. He was caught, ensnared, a fly in a web of absolute, inescapable control.

The Chimera Blade, its wielder suddenly, comprehensively, neutralized, sputtered. The warring energies, deprived of the focused will that had been forcing them together, flew apart. The demonic flames winked out. The azure lightning dissipated into harmless sparks. The sword in his hand became, once more, just a simple, inert, steel practice blade.

Lloyd hung there, suspended in the air, a prisoner in a cocoon of his father’s will, his merged form still crackling with a faint, frustrated lightning, his golden eyes wide with a stunned, profound disbelief. He had been so close. He had wielded a power that could have shattered mountains. And he had been defeated. Not by a superior force. But by a superior mind. A superior will. His father hadn’t blocked his ultimate attack; he had simply… disarmed him. With a casual, almost contemptuous, elegance that was more humbling, more devastating, than any physical blow could ever have been.

He thought of the King’s words: he teaches them how to be the best, within the existing paradigm. He had tried to break the paradigm with a new, chaotic power. And his father, the ultimate master of that paradigm, had simply… adapted. Had shown him that true mastery was not about wielding the biggest weapon, but about possessing the sharpest mind.

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He hung in the silent training ground, a defeated demigod suspended in a web of his father’s will. The glowing, ethereal form of the Storm-Forged Prince, which had felt so powerful, so invincible, moments before, now felt like a hollow, fragile shell. The last vestiges of the crackling lightning faded from his silver-streaked hair, the molten gold of his eyes dimming, replaced by a deep, weary exhaustion. The Chimera Blade, his desperate, ultimate weapon, lay inert on the floor below him, a simple, forgotten practice sword.

He had thrown a supernova at a grandmaster. And the grandmaster had not even blinked. He had simply sidestepped, and used Lloyd’s own momentum to guide him gently, but firmly, into a checkmate so absolute, so elegant, that it was a work of art in itself.

Arch Duke Roy Ferrum stood before his ensnared, defeated son. The immense, fortress-like defense of his chains had receded, leaving only the intricate, unbreakable steel cocoon that held Lloyd helpless. The Arch Duke’s face was a mask of calm, dispassionate assessment, the warrior-king surveying the outcome of a successful, and deeply instructive, training exercise.

“You are powerful, Lloyd,” Roy stated, his voice a quiet, level rumble that held no hint of triumph, no trace of gloating. It was a simple, factual observation. “The speed of the storm, the fury of the flame… you have forged yourself into a weapon of immense, chaotic potential. Your progress is… staggering. Beyond anything I could have anticipated.”

He took a step closer, his dark eyes, so like Lloyd’s own in their base form, holding a new, complex light. It was not just the assessing gaze of a Duke, or the challenging glare of a master. It was the proud, and slightly worried, look of a father who has just realized his son has been playing with a power so great it could burn down the entire world.

“But raw power,” Roy continued, his voice a low, didactic murmur, the teacher delivering the final, crucial part of the lesson, “is a wild river. It is a force of nature. It can carve canyons, yes. It can reshape the landscape. But it is indiscriminate. It is inefficient. It floods, it destroys, it rages without purpose.”

He raised his own hand, and a single, thick, dark chain of steel flowed from his palm, coiling around his forearm like a familiar, obedient serpent. It did not crackle. It did not burn. It simply… was. A perfect, absolute expression of contained, controlled force.

Chapter : 574

“True mastery,” he said, his gaze intense, compelling, “is not in unleashing the river. It is in building the dam. It is in digging the irrigation channels. It is in controlling the flow, directing the power with absolute precision, making it do exactly what you will it to do, no more, no less. It is the difference between a wildfire and a forge. Both are fire. But one consumes, and the other creates.”

He looked at Lloyd, at the chaotic, beautiful, and ultimately defeated, storm-forged form. “You wield a wildfire, my son. It is magnificent. It is terrifying. And you will burn yourself, and everything around you, to ash with it, if you do not learn to control it.”

He made a subtle, almost imperceptible gesture, and a new, massive construct began to form from the chains that still coiled in the air around him. The steel flowed, merged, solidified, not into a simple wall, but into a shape of breathtaking, terrifying artistry.

It was a dragon. A colossal, magnificent dragon, forged from pure, dark Ferrum steel. Its scales were interlocking links of chain, its wings vast, articulated shields of metal, its claws honed, razor-sharp points. Its head was a masterpiece of brutal, intimidating beauty, its jaw hinged, its teeth a row of sharpened steel daggers. And its eyes… its eyes were two glowing, crimson embers, fueled by the contained, internal fire of Roy’s own Void power.

The Steel Dragon coiled in the air above them, a silent, awesome testament to Roy’s absolute, creative mastery. He had not just created a defense; he had created a work of art. A living, breathing (or so it seemed) engine of war, forged from his own will.

“This,” Roy stated, his voice a quiet murmur against the immense, silent presence of his creation, “is control. This is mastery. This is what you must aspire to, Lloyd. Not just to wield the storm. But to become its master.”

The Steel Dragon let out a silent, spiritual roar, and then, with a slow, deliberate, and almost gentle, motion, it descended, its massive, steel-coiled body wrapping around Lloyd’s already ensnared form, adding a new, even more absolute, layer to his prison. The pressure was immense, a final, crushing statement of his father’s overwhelming, absolute dominance.

The duel was over. The lesson had been taught. And Lloyd, trapped in the belly of his father’s steel beast, finally, truly, understood the vast, humbling, and deeply, profoundly, inspiring distance between the apprentice and the master.

He was trapped. A prisoner in a magnificent, suffocating cage of his father’s will. The coils of the Steel Dragon were a cold, unyielding reality, a final, crushing punctuation mark on his defeat. The immense, chaotic power of his merged form, which had felt so limitless moments before, sputtered, faltered, and then, with a soft, sighing whisper, it receded.

The brilliant silver streaks in his hair faded back to a simple, unassuming black. The molten gold of his eyes cooled, solidified, returning to their familiar dark, human hue. The ethereal, wolf-like ears dissolved into nothingness. The swirling cloak of moonlight and thunder vanished. The Storm-Forged Prince was gone. All that remained was Lloyd Ferrum, bruised, exhausted, and comprehensively, humiliatingly, defeated, hanging limply in the coils of a dragon made of steel.

Roy Ferrum watched the transformation, his expression unreadable. He saw the demigod retreat, the boy return. He saw the defiance in his son’s eyes fade, replaced by a weary, but strangely calm, acceptance. He had made his point. The lesson had been received.

With a final, silent command, the magnificent Steel Dragon uncoiled. The massive chains that had formed its body went slack, flowed, and dissolved back into the latent Void energy from which they had been born, vanishing without a sound.

Lloyd dropped the last few feet to the ground, his legs, which had forgotten what it was to hold his own weight, buckling beneath him. He landed in a clumsy, undignified heap on the cracked stone floor, his body a single, throbbing symphony of abused muscles and a profoundly bruised ego. He lay there for a moment, panting, the cool stone a welcome, grounding presence against his cheek.

He had lost. Utterly. But as he pushed himself up, slowly, painfully, to a sitting position, he felt not the bitter sting of shame, not the hot flush of humiliation. He felt… a strange, quiet sense of clarity. A profound, almost peaceful, understanding.