Rebirth: 100 Days Before Doomsday - Chapter 352

Chapter 352: Celestial Monarch
The return to Starfall was supposed to be a moment of peace, a breath, a pause after the chaos of the battle they just won.

But Grace barely stepped into the command center of the warrior academy through the portal, before her knees buckled. She didn’t fall as Kevin was there to steady her just as Davian and Rune turned sharply toward her.

“Grace!” Davian shouted as he rushed forward.

But she couldn’t respond. A sudden pulse of energy was surging through her veins – wild, burning, and searing.

Her vision blurred.

Her breath caught.

Something inside her was shifting.

A second later, her head got filled with 2025’s familiar voice. “Master, your vitals are spiking. Your blood pressure is unstable, heart rate is erratic, and even temperature is rising rapidly. You are entering a dangerous physiological flux. I’ll recommend you to immediately retreat into the spatial realm for stabilization and scans.”

Grace didn’t argue, and with the last of her focus, she activated the Infinite Realm inside the jade bracelet sitting on her wrist.

The world around her melted in an instant. The familiar voices of her men dissolved into nothingness as she slipped into her personal realm. She wanted to take a moment to let them know that she was alright, but she didn’t have even a second to spare as her situation was getting worse.

She collapsed onto the grassy floor of the front garden of the Villa. Her body was feeling to weak to hold her weight any longer.

2025 immediately appeared next to her, and so did the dragon. Both creatures were looking worried as they took in her condition.

“Beginning full body diagnosis.”

“Scanning…”

Pain blossomed in her spine, sharp and crackling like lightning. Her breath hitched. Sweat slicked her brow. Her bones started vibrating beneath her skin, as if ready to shatter.

“Complete.” 2025 paused, and despite barely hanging from a thread of consciousness, Grace didn’t miss the strange undertone its voice held.

“Master… you are entering a breakthrough phase.”

Grace froze. Or tried to. Her body had refused to respond the way she wanted it to.

“You have already reached and surpassed the 100% potential threshold for the Supreme Warrior Rank. Your battle with the Class 12, combined with prolonged exposure to high-level elemental stress, internal cultivation tension, and spiritual expansion, has triggered an automatic ascension attempt. You are on the brink of a breakthrough to the Celestial Monarch Rank.”

Grace stared at 2025 with her heart pounding.

Celestial Monarch?

She had been at 90% full power in her current rank for over a couple of months – progressing steadily, yes, but carefully. Her advancement to the Supreme Warrior Rank had nearly killed her as her internal structures were forced to break and reform, piece by piece. Her soul core almost fractured from the strain back then.

And this…

This was going to be far much worse.

“2025,” she breathed, “what’s the risk?”

The little creature hesitated. Then, it answered, “Ten times higher than your last breakthrough. You have a 63% chance of surviving the process, 25% chance of partial core collapse and long-term cultivation loss… and 12% chance of complete self-destruction.”

She closed her eyes.

The numbers weren’t kind.

She tried to move, but another spike of energy pinned her to the ground. Her body was arching involuntarily, as if pulled upward by invisible chains. Her elemental powers were flaring out from her spine, out of control, their tendrils snapping wildly through the realm’s atmosphere.

“Contain it,” she hissed, trying to rein it in.

“Initiating containment field.” 2025 immediately began the work and a sphere of glowing energy started to form around Grace. It sealed her inside a vortex of light and pressure, keeping her power flares from destroying the spatial realm’s balance.

“You must begin the breakthrough immediately,” the dragon advised. “Any delay will increase instability.”

Grace grit her teeth and nodded once. “Guide me.”

“Let your energy flow,” the dragon began guiding her. “But do not fight the pain. You must surrender to the shift.”

She breathed in, and then… screamed as the pain hit her all at once.

Her bones cracked and she felt every joint, every marrow-deep crevice snapping open under the pressure of the new energy flooding her channels. Her skin was glowing with golden veins and colorful lines representing her elemental powers, all of them clashing within her. Her blood was boiling and her spine felt as if it was lit up with fire.

She thrashed inside the containment field as the grass beneath her got burnt to ash.

The celestial energy pressing down on her was not gentle. It did not ask for permission. It commanded obedience. And her body, strong as it was, was still mortal.

She felt her soul tremble, her core twisting and expanding.

And for a terrifying moment, she heard the cracking. Her inner realm fractured, causing her shadow beasts to howl in fear as they felt the disturbance within her. Even the dragon felt the discomfort though it didn’t voice it.

And through it all, Grace kept screaming ad the agony was beyond anything she had imagined. Her heart was feeling like it had stopped and restarted a hundred times. Her lungs were burning with every breath, and her vision was flashing gold, then black, then nothing.

“Keep going,” the dragon continued to guide her. “Don’t give in.”

She clenched her fists so tightly that blood started running down her palms.

Countless minutes passed as she pushed through the pain… and finally, something broke inside her chest.

It was a soundless, earth-splitting rupture before everything went still and the pain vanished.

For a second, she felt like she was floating, suspended in a sea of absolute silence. Her soul was no longer aching, and her body was feeling weightless. Whole.

Her fractured and struggling core was now pulsing with quiet, deep power. It had not just repaired, but expanded and had evolved. What once held the capacity of a Supreme Warrior was now shimmering with the resonance of a Celestial Monarch.

She opened her eyes that were shining bright golden.

And then, 2025’s voice filled the silent air. “Breakthrough complete. Vital signs stabilizing. You are now… Celestial Monarch Rank, Initiate Phase. Congratulations, Master.”