Ancestral Lineage - Chapter 315

Chapter 315: Earth Against Mind
The moment cracked like thunder.

Jeroth’s eyes ignited with blinding blue light as all four pupils dilated into spirals. The air screamed as a concentrated lance of pure thought — invisible to the eye but crushing to the senses — shot from his gaze like a spear aimed at Galeno’s chest.

Galeno didn’t dodge.

Instead, he stepped forward — and the earth obeyed.

A jagged obsidian plate erupted from the ground, absorbing the mental lance mid-flight. It trembled under the pressure, then shattered into fine black sand that floated upward like smoke.

Jeroth blinked once.

Then smirked. “You always were too literal.”

“And you were always too loud.”

With a twist of his palm, Galeno clenched his fist — the very plateau beneath Jeroth tilted. Stone groaned and snapped, throwing Jeroth off-balance. But before the E’Sheril could hit the ground, he vanished — flickering like a disturbed memory.

He reappeared behind Galeno, fingers splayed, and a thought-bomb detonated inside the giant’s skull.

The impact was silent.

But Galeno’s eyes flared golden, and a ripple of stone burst outward from his feet — a defensive quake. He staggered slightly, grunted.

“Still trying to crawl inside people’s heads,” he muttered, turning with frightening calm.

“You’re the one head I never cracked,” Jeroth hissed, circling him again. “A mind like a tomb. Sealed. Heavy. Ugly.”

“Thanks.”

Jeroth struck again — no gestures this time. The space around Galeno twisted, refracted. The E’Sheril’s psychic mastery compressed reality itself, trying to erase Galeno’s physical location from existence.

But the ground howled in response.

Massive spires of earthen armor burst up around Galeno, encasing him in a mobile fortress. Glowing runes etched into the plates lit up one by one with molten light. Then—

BOOM!

Galeno charged, encased in living stone.

Jeroth weaved through the air, psychically flying backward, hurling wave after wave of compressed telekinetic force. Entire ridges were uprooted by the collision of mind and mountain. The sky shimmered with afterimages of Jeroth as he flashed across space like a flickering mirage.

Galeno stayed grounded.

He needed no wings.

He was the battlefield.

Jeroth zipped behind him, four arms whirling like bladed wheels. Psychic claws extended from his fingers as he went for Galeno’s neck—

THUD.

A stone tendril — unexpected, primal, fast — whipped up from the ground and caught Jeroth mid-slash, slamming him into a granite slab with seismic force.

Blood, faintly blue, splattered the air.

“Got you,” Galeno muttered.

But Jeroth grinned from within the crater.

“No… I got you.”

Galeno’s head rang.

A delay trap.

Dozens of psychic threads—planted earlier during their exchange—suddenly detonated inside Galeno’s nervous system. The earth around him screamed in protest as his body froze for 0.7 seconds.

Enough for Jeroth.

He phased through space, appearing in front of Galeno’s chest, his claws pulsing with sharpened thought—

SLASH.

A direct hit.

Or so it seemed.

The impact landed. The claw dragged down Galeno’s side, drawing blood—but it struck something far deeper than muscle. Something ancient.

And Galeno smiled.

“This body was carved in war, Jeroth. You can wound it… but you can’t bend it.”

Suddenly, Jeroth’s hand froze. Cracks crawled up his arm — stone was crawling across his flesh. Galeno had reversed the feedback. The moment Jeroth touched him, his magic turned Jeroth’s body into part of the terrain.

Jeroth screamed and ripped himself free, his arm petrifying at the elbow.

He stumbled back.

Panting.

Bleeding.

Snarling.

“You—filthy mud creature! You turned my own will against me—!”

Galeno raised one brow. “Didn’t I say I don’t need spikes?”

The ground quaked. All around them, the terrain rose.

This wasn’t just a duel now.

This was the shaping of a battlefield.

“You started this, Jeroth,” Galeno said, stepping forward again as the sky darkened. “Now dig your own grave.”

Jeroth stood tall again, blood trickling from his mouth. The rage in his eyes sharpened into clarity.

“Fine,” he whispered. “Let’s see which is stronger. The will to crush… or the will that cannot be crushed.”

Their auras flared.

And the war of Earth and Mind began again.

…

The Obsidian Groves—ancient, blackened trees said to have grown from the crystallized blood of a fallen star—stood as silent witnesses.

That silence shattered.

A golden explosion ripped across the air as Ethan and Queen Ashtora clashed.

He moved like light compressed into thought. She moved like a scream turned physical.

Ethan’s Psyche-Eye opened, glowing deep blue and serpentine. His entire form surged with radiant energy. Alchemic tattoos flowed like rivers of ink across his chest and arms, shifting with each micro-adjustment of will.

Queen Ashtora stood amidst the chaos, unmoved. Her ten-spiked tail lashed behind her, each spike vibrating with pure mental frequency. Her four glowing eyes bled psychic pressure into the air like fire in an oxygen-rich forest.

KRNNNGGGG!

They clashed again.

A single strike from Ethan’s palm flattened a hundred meters of the Grove, sending obsidian trees flying like paper. Roots snapped like bones. Dust clouded the air.

But Ashtora countered, her hand glowing with fractal geometry, and shattered his spell mid-air. She opened her mouth—

“KNEEL.”

A word filled with divine will.

Reality folded.

Even the wind stopped blowing.

Everything obeyed that command—except Ethan.

His knees buckled for half a heartbeat again. Her will was truly commendable.

Then the Psyche-Eye blazed.

“You command thought,” Ethan said, his voice layered with distortion, “but I have transcended obedience. I will never kneel to one beneath me.”

His hair lengthened into golden streaks of energy. The alchemic tattoos surged in brightness as his aura turned visible, a chaotic corona of gold and dark blue flames.

He vanished—and reappeared above her.

Fist raised.

BAAAAAAAAAAM!!!

His blow cracked the entire Grove.

A crater formed beneath Ashtora as the ground caved into itself. The trees within a kilometer radius exploded from the pressure.

But Ashtora floated upward, unharmed—though her regal horns now bled.

Her smile had vanished.

“So the mortal plays god…”

She raised her arms.

The sky rippled.

Suddenly, shadows from every tree, stone, and fallen leaf lifted, coalescing into a crown of black psychic fire above her head. She brought it down—

And time itself slowed.

Ethan moved through the distortion with effort, every cell screaming as he overpowered the effect. He conjured a golden sigil mid-air, twisting his entire body—

SHRAAAAKK!!

The black crown collided with his defense, exploding in a sphere of absolute silence. Trees imploded. Hills collapsed. Psychic tremors danced for miles.

Both were flung backward—crashing through terrain, warping land with every step.

Ethan hit a monolith—a sacred obsidian pillar older than the Queen herself—and shattered it in his wake.

Ashtora skidded across the battlefield, her spiked tail carving into the land like a scythe.

Blood trickled from Ethan’s mouth.

A tooth fell.

He grinned.

It grew back in less than a second.

“That all you’ve got, your majesty?”

Ashtora’s response was unspoken—she flickered forward, trailing afterimages of psychic chaos. All four of her arms struck in unison—like a symphony of blades—each blow bypassing physical defense, targeting his mental structure directly.

Ethan countered with mirrored thoughts—every movement from her was predicted, played back, and reversed.

They became a blur.

Two deities in humanoid form, fighting across multiple layers of thought and time.

A mountain in the far north exploded from the aftershock of their clash.

The sky cracked.

A bolt of unnatural light split the firmament in two as the battle reached fever pitch.

“ENOUGH!” Ashtora roared, unleashing her true form—her entire body split open into fractal geometry, a kaleidoscope of thought incarnate.

Ethan, bleeding and panting, his body burning, raised his hands. Alchemic circles of divine complexity spun into existence behind him. His spirit beasts flickered into silhouette behind his shoulders, roaring, a projection of their bond. His injuries healed in no time.

“Let’s finish this.”

As they flew toward each other—sound vanished.

Only light remained.

And destruction.

…

BOOM.

Another tremor rolled through the broken lands of the eastern fringe — the edges of the Obsidian Groves. Sharp ravines cut the land like torn paper. Stone cracked. Trees bent backward. Birds vanished from the sky.

The sky itself pulsed with lightless thunder.

The battle between Ethan and Queen Ashtora was shaking the world apart.

And Stygian?

He laughed.

“Heh. That’s master for you…”

He stood amidst a dozen corpses — torn, broken E’Sherils. Their spiked tails twitched lifelessly on the ground. Blood — dark red and streaked with psychic motes — soaked the dirt around his feet.

His dark purple flames flared upward, turning the battlefield into a storm of heat and ghostlight. His eyes gleamed like twin hellstars. His claws were coated in fresh blood, still dripping.

But more were coming.

Four E’Sherils advanced, coordinated and fast. All bore three to four spikes — lesser than their Queen, but still deadly.

They snarled in perfect unison — a psychic pack link. Their four glowing eyes narrowed, and their tails shimmered with vibrating mental blades.

“You are not of the mind,” one hissed telepathically, their voice like blades scraping inside Stygian’s skull.

“Then die like a beast.”

Stygian just grinned wider.

“I am a beast…”

He dashed forward, faster than a blink.

CRACK!

His fist shattered the face of the first E’Sheril. Bone, horn, and mind imploded together.

The others struck — psychic blades lancing out from their tails, cutting through rock and space itself.

But Stygian twisted through them, fire cloaking his skin, his muscles bulging with monstrous strength.

He grabbed one mid-air by the throat.

“You think numbers make you special?”

His fangs extended — and he bit into the E’Sheril’s neck, draining its life force in one savage motion. The psychic backlash hit him like a bell, but he roared through it, laughter turning feral.

KRAKOOM!

Another quake struck — this one stronger. A visible ripple ran across the ground.

Even the E’Sherils stumbled.

Stygian stopped.

He looked west.

There, in the distance — the sky had turned into a maelstrom of gold and obsidian. Glimpses of titanic forces colliding like stars. Psychic shockwaves rode the wind like thunder.

He felt it in his bones — Ethan was battling a god.

“Master…”

He clenched his fists tighter, blood sizzling from his claws.

The memory of Ethan’s smile — calm and proud — flickered in his mind.

“You owe me a duel, master…” he muttered, voice low.

Then he screamed.

“AND I’M NOT LOSING TO ANY DAMN FOUR-SPIKED LIZARD WHILE YOU’RE OUT THERE MAKING LEGENDS!”

His entire form ignited — black-purple fire exploded outward in all directions. The surviving E’Sherils screamed, clawing at their heads as the infernal presence of Stygian’s wrath overwhelmed their minds.

Stygian lunged into them like a reaper born from fury.

BOOM! CRUNCH! SNAP!

Each strike broke more than just bones — it shattered their link. Their unity crumbled under the sheer savagery of his will.

Stygian’s movements were raw, chaotic — but deliberate. He wasn’t just a brute. He was a predator—one born to hunt elites, not just survive them.

One final foe remained.

A four-spiked female, breathing hard, psychic armor flickering.

She tried to flee.

Stygian appeared behind her in a flash.

“You’re not running.”

SLAK!

He impaled her through the chest, claws tearing through with brutal precision.

She gasped, eyes wide, trying to send a final thought.

Stygian twisted.

Silence.

As her body fell, he exhaled — a deep, satisfied growl escaping his throat.

Then he looked west again, as another colossal pulse of energy swept through the air.

His voice was quiet now, reverent.

“Keep going, master. I’ll carve a path for you with fire and death.”

His flames surged higher, and he vanished into the battlefield once more—heading deeper into enemy lines, blood and vengeance dripping from every step.