The Grand Martial Arena was now a tomb of broken reputations. As Arga stepped out into the humid Jakarta night, the air felt different. It was no longer just the heavy, polluted oxygen of a sprawling metropolis. It was thin, vibrating with an unnatural frequency that made the hair on Yasmine's arms stand up.
"Master," Yasmine whispered, following a pace behind him. "The Surya family satellites just picked up a thermal anomaly directly above the warehouse. It is stationary at thirty thousand feet, but it has no radar signature. It is not a plane."
Arga stopped. He did not look up. Instead, he closed his eyes and expanded his Divine Sense.
His consciousness shot upward, piercing through the smog and the clouds. At the edge of the atmosphere, he felt it. It was a cold, sterile presence, like a lens made of diamond. It wasn't a machine. It was a Spirit Eye, a high-level surveillance technique used by the Great Sects of the Higher Realms to monitor "Lower Planes" for signs of unauthorized ascension.
So soon? Arga thought, a flicker of cold amusement touching his soul. I have only reached the Third Cycle, and already the Watchers are nervous.
"Yasmine, get the General and the prisoners to the Peak of the Clouds immediately," Arga commanded. His voice was a low vibration that seemed to settle into the asphalt. "Do not stop for anything. If you see a silver light in the sky, do not look at it."
"What about you, Master?"
"I have a guest to greet," Arga replied.
He didn't wait for her answer. With a single explosive movement, Arga leaped. He didn't just jump; he rode a pillar of golden Qi that propelled him toward the roof of a nearby sixty-story skyscraper. He landed silently on the helipad, the wind whipping his black hair across his glowing golden eyes.
He stood at the very edge of the building, looking up into the starless void.
"You have been staring for ten minutes," Arga said, his voice projected through the air by pure spiritual energy. "In my world, peering into a Sovereign's business without an invitation is punishable by the extraction of one's soul."
The air in front of Arga began to warp. A ripple appeared in the space above the helipad, and a figure stepped out of the vacuum.
The man was dressed in robes of shimmering white silk that flowed even though there was no wind. His skin was unnaturally pale, and his eyes had no pupils only a swirling vortex of silver mist. He carried a jade staff topped with a blue flame that burned without heat.
"I am Envoy Lu of the Heavenly Balance Pavilion," the figure said. His voice sounded like glass grinding against glass. "We detected a disturbance in the karmic flow of this sector. A mortal has broken the laws of the Lower Plane. A 'Sovereign Rebirth' was spoken of in the shadows."
Envoy Lu looked at Arga, his silver eyes scanning Arga's meridians. A flash of genuine shock crossed the Envoy's frozen face.
"Your foundation... it is not of this world. Who are you? Which Forbidden Zone did you crawl out of?"
Arga took a step forward. With every inch he moved, the concrete of the helipad cracked under the weight of his returning divinity.
"You are a mere messenger, Lu. A dog kept on a leash by the Seven Heavenly Kings," Arga said, his voice dropping to a terrifying, guttural register. "Go back to your masters. Tell them the sun they tried to extinguish has begun to rise again. Tell them Arga is coming for his throne."
Envoy Lu's face twisted in a mask of divine fury. "Sacrilege! A worm of the mud dares to speak the names of the Kings? You shall be erased!"
The Envoy raised his jade staff. The blue flame flared, expanding into a massive, ghostly phoenix made of soul-chilling fire. The creature let out a silent scream that shattered every window on the top ten floors of the skyscraper.
"Die, heretic!"
The phoenix dived.
Arga didn't flinch. He raised his right hand, his palm glowing with the concentrated essence of the Heavenly Lotus.
"Nine Sun Current: Eclipse Palm," Arga whispered.
As the blue fire touched his skin, Arga didn't burn. He absorbed. The golden light of his hand turned a deep, bruised violet, swallowing the phoenix whole. The shockwave of the collision sent a ring of force outward, visible for miles across the Jakarta skyline.
Envoy Lu stumbled back, his jade staff cracking down the center. "Impossible! You... you consumed the Blue Soul Fire? No mortal can..."
"I told you," Arga said, appearing inches from the Envoy's face. He grabbed the Envoy by the throat, lifting the celestial being off the ground. "I am no mortal."
Arga's eyes burned with the full, unbridled fury of a War Sovereign. He reached into the Envoy's chest, his hand passing through the silk robes like they were water. He pulled out a glowing, silver crystal the Envoy's Source Memory.
"I'll take this," Arga said. "I need to see who sent you."
He tossed the gasping, weakened Envoy toward the edge of the building. But before the Envoy could speak again, a bolt of crimson lightning struck from the highest reaches of the atmosphere.
It didn't hit Arga. It hit Envoy Lu.
The Envoy didn't even have time to scream before he was vaporized into red mist. The lightning bolt lingered for a second, a jagged scar against the night sky, before a voice echoed from the clouds a voice so powerful it caused Arga's own blood to vibrate.
"We see you, Traitor. The hunt has begun."
Arga stood alone on the rooftop, the silver crystal pulsing in his hand. He looked up at the spot where the lightning had struck, a cold, hungry smile spreading across his face.
He looked down at the crystal. As he crushed it, a vision flashed in his mind, not of the Seven Kings, but of a face he recognized. A face from his time as the discarded son-in-law.
"So," Arga whispered, his voice disappearing into the wind. "The enemy isn't just in the Heavens. One of them is already here... in this city."
The silver crystal didn't just contain memories. It contained a live GPS coordinate.
Arga looked at the location flickering in his mind. It was the address of the Wijaya Corporate Headquarters.