"This is your path as a king?"

If anyone was shaken by the spectacle before them, it was undoubtedly Artoria.

It wasn't the power of Iskandar's Noble Phantasm that intimidated her.

Rather, the very essence of this Noble Phantasm shook the foundation of her honor as the King of Knights.

Unwavering, wholehearted devotion.

The profound bond with his followers, elevated to the level of a Noble Phantasm.

As an ideal king, this was the treasure Artoria had never attained in her lifetime.

"If only... if only I could have..."

Artoria thought of her own Knights of the Round Table.

She was not without followers.

But compared to Iskandar, she couldn't even unite her subordinates as one.

"To be a king!"

As if responding to Artoria, Iskandar bellowed, "It means living more vibrantly than anyone, inspiring awe in all who behold you!"

The ranks of mounted Heroic Spirits echoed his words, clashing their shields in unison, roaring in celebration.

"To unite the aspirations of all warriors, to stand tall as their exemplar... that is a king."

"Thus!"

With overwhelming confidence and pride, Iskandar, standing below, seemed to tower above all Heroic Spirits, gazing down upon them.

"A king is not detached from the mortal world."

"A king embodies the will of all their subjects!"

"Exactly! Exactly! Exactly!"

The Heroic Spirits' unified shouts shook the earth, piercing the heavens.

No army, no matter how fierce, nor any fortress, no matter how sturdy, could withstand Iskandar's comrades, whose fervent battle spirit could split the skies.

"Come!!!"

"Show me your path as a king before me and my heroes!"

"Demon King from another world!!"

"..."

"That's right!"

Perhaps it was the sheer awe of Iskandar's Ionioi Hetairoi that struck Artoria.

She suddenly realized something.

Damien, too, possessed the power to summon strange Servants.

Before, she hadn't understood how he did it.

But now, with Iskandar's example before her, the existence of Shion and Snow Empress made sense.

"A truly captivating speech, King of Conqueror."

Damien stood alone at the other end of the desert.

Yet his voice reached everyone's ears without delay.

Especially Iskandar, his chosen opponent.

"I must thank you."

Damien slowly raised his right hand, then clenched it. "Thank you for providing me with such a magnificent stage."

Crack!

As Damien's words fell, the sound of shattering glass echoed from above.

"What?"

The sky split open.

This phenomenon startled Iskandar.

He tried to repair his Reality Marble, only to find it needed no repair.

"What's happening?"

Crack, crack, crack!

Despite the Reality Marble being intact, spatial rifts grew larger and more numerous.

Bang!

Finally, with a crisp shattering sound, countless crystalline snowflakes fell from the sky, blanketing the vast, scorching desert.

"Snow?"

"It's snowing?"

Before anyone could marvel, more changes unfolded before their eyes.

The desert churned as massive tree roots burst from the ground, soaring upward.

Green sprouts emerged from the roots, spreading the color of life across the desert in an instant.

Boom!

But it wasn't over!

Flames roared, sand dunes began to melt, and a volcano spewing thick smoke rose in the distance.

Winds howled, rain poured, thunder rumbled, shadows loomed...

A myriad of conflicting magical attributes... fire, ice, wind, and more... abruptly appeared within Iskandar's Reality Marble.

Like blooming flowers, they flourished in someone else's domain.

Crack! Bang!

Behind Damien, a slender, pale hand swept through, violently shattering the endless desert landscape.

Crack, crack, crack!

The rift didn't stop but extended outward on both sides.

It was as if someone had torn the distant heavens and earth apart with immense force, splitting them in two!

"Amazing, so amazing."

"Is this the kind of opponent Lord Damien faces in other worlds?"

Meanwhile, in the kijin village of the Cardinal World, all residents looked up, gazing at the reflection of another world's scene in the sky.

When Iskandar unleashed his Reality Marble, it wasn't just Artoria and the others who were awestruck.

Even the Majins in the Cardinal World felt the heroic spirit of ancient warriors.

It was inspiring, admirable.

Though from different worlds, their hearts resonated with this loyalty.

Step, step, step!

Within the Reality Marble, from the shattered spatial rift behind Damien, figures poured out like a tide from a dark world, assembling into thousand-strong formations around him.

"The enemy numbers over 30,000!"

"Each one has strength comparable to a C-rank Heroic Spirit, with elites rivaling B-rank and even peerless heroes matching A-rank!"

Five thousand goblins against 30,000 C-rank Heroic Spirits... Damien's side was clearly at a disadvantage.

But!

He had an advantage Iskandar lacked!

Rumble!

The earth began to quake, the first change coming from the distant volcano.

A colossal figure stepped forth from it.

Standing fifty meters tall, covered in sharp crimson fur, with magma flowing across its body like pulsing veins or a beating heart... this was Honooga, one of the eighteen Wolf Guards personally named by Damien!

Behind it, dozens of equally massive werewolves exerted unprecedented pressure on Iskandar's army!

Howl!

A wolf's cry echoed, and a chunk of the sun hanging in the sky vanished.

Darkness began to descend.

A chilling wind blew, and the Frost Wolf of Winter emerged from the ice, its scarlet beastly eyes greedily fixed on the ancient heroes, like Fenrir from Norse mythology.

"Another one!"

While Artoria showed little reaction to the wolf beast, Gilgamesh's expression grew darker.

As a Heroic Spirit from the Age of Gods, Gilgamesh understood the terror of divine beast and phantasmal beasts far better than Artoria.

Damien wasn't Solomon, unable to summon the seventy-two demon god pillars.

But the wolf beasts he summoned now, in Gilgamesh's eyes, were no less formidable than any daemon.

***

Bonus Chapter:

100 Power Stones = 1 BC

300 Power Stones = 2 BC

500 Power Stones = 3 BC

700 Power Stones = 4 BC

1000 Power Stones = 5 BC

***

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