At this moment, ten sigils had burned, meaning Ten Flame Acolytes had risen, and now only two challengers remained.
Jacob stood tall beneath a blazing sky, cloak fluttering with residual embers. On the opposite side of the coliseum, Vortigash loomed like a conquering war-god, his golden-ram horns wreathed in silent solar pressure. Between them, the wall of flame cracked, shimmering like a veil of finale.
Their trials had been brutal, and now, only one Flame Inheritor would remain.
The final three Flame Acolytes Jacob faced weren’t easy to deal with. Each was a window into forgotten flame paths—ancient, obscure, terrifying. Their defeat didn’t just bring him victory; it was comprehension of Fire Law, and Jacob, like the predator of knowledge, devoured it all.
---
Jacob’s third last opponent was Scorchveil Thesa, who controlled the Flame of Forgotten Grudges.
She descended carrying deep sorrow. Draped in veils of cinder and ash, Scorchveil Thesa’s flame was born from long-dead hate, simmering memories turned to embers of vengeance.
Her battlefield warped into a phantom cemetery—echoes of Jacob’s past whispered in his very soul.
But Jacob was no stranger to guilt, and even surpassed it—he had dissected his conscience long ago. His Eyes of Judge revealed the illusion’s anchor, and with a wave of his Life Bane Wheel, he incinerated and devoured her lamenting form.
The second last opponent was called Cindervault Jurox, who controlled another Quasi-Divine Flame known as the Gravity Flame of Burnt Time
A walking paradox—Jurox was a sealed titan whose every movement distorted reality. His flame wasn’t fast, but dense. Each step pressed time down like lead. His body radiated the fatigue of centuries, and Jacob felt its weight instantly.
In this battle, Jacob was forced to tap into his Void Law to counteract the oppressive drag. Even activating Life Bane Wheel was slower, delayed by the fold in temporal space.
But Jacob adapted. He conjured Void Nodes, disrupting Jurox’s temporal drag, then used a burst of Spatial Rend to slip past his gravitational dome.
With a blade of devouring flame forged from Solari’s remnants, he pierced Jurox’s core and was able to devour it with the Life Devour.
Jacob’s final opening was most troublesome of them all. He was known as the Blazekind Solari, controller of the Reflective Incineration, also referred to as the Mirror Sunfire.
Solari shimmered like a prism. Every law Jacob unleashed came back threefold—his lightning, his fire, even his killing intent were mirrored back with intensified polarity.
Jacob’s soul force nearly annihilated for the first time, he became a Quasi-Myth. Solari’s flame was the most dangerous so far, not because it was strong, but because it used his power against him.
Only when Jacob was able to fuse a shard of Fire Law with Space Law was he able to strike from a non-reflective angle, using reversed intention to bypass Solari’s reflective field and land a fatal strike that shattered the mirrored skin.
On the other hand, where Jacob was surgical, Vortigash was overwhelming. His opponents fell under pressure, crushed under the weight they couldn’t resist. Yet, even he was forcefully tested—and revealed the terror of his Divine Flame!
Vortigash’s third last opponent was Blightbrand Rukkah – the Withering Burn Flame, Flame Acolyte.
A whispering specter clad in rotting robes, Rukkah’s flame-corrupted essence. Her touch decayed energy, and her breath turned fire into ash. She tried to rot Vortigash’s body from within. But he simply stood still, letting her touch him, and his own inner law reversed her decay.
A brief flash of true Divine Flame, and she withered into dust.
Next came Flarehowl Kirr of Wailfire Sonic Flame
Kirr didn’t burn with heat, but with sound. A beast of vibration, his flame was a symphony of violence, each scream detonating the battlefield.
Vortigash was caught off-guard—his Divine Flame couldn’t manifest amid Kirr’s vibration null-field. His casting was almost locked.
But then Vortigash used horn strikes, flame-infused hooves, and a burst of gravity law mastery before Kirr’s final scream was silenced by a fist to the throat.
Finally, Vortigash’s last opponent was Eclipsar Vunae, who controlled the Flame of Silent Annihilation.
She descended like a moon eclipse—silver skin, eyes blind, surrounded by anti-light flame. Her very presence silenced the battlefield. Her attacks didn’t explode—they erased.
Vortigash was forced to use his Divine Flame for an entire minute to fight against the annihilation and retaliation. She almost ended up clipping one of his horns and forced him to show a glimpse of a mysterious Gravity-Flame Dominion, a realm of spiraling starfire gravity, before she fell.
---
During their final confrontations, Jacob and Vortigash were paying ample attention to each other, and both of them avoided using their trump cards and hiding as much as they could because they knew they would meet in the final match.
At this moment, the translucent flame wall separating Jacob and Vortigash cracked with a thunderclap. White-gold fissures spiderwebbed through it, runes melting away into light.
The sky above dimmed. A giant sigil appeared—ten sigils joined in a flaming ring: The Mark of the Final Trial.
The ancient voice spoke one last time:
"Ten Flames Burned, yet Two Will Remain...
"The Inheritor of the True Flame Will shall be decided...
"Let the Final Match Initiate!"
As the voice faded away, the barrier exploded inwards, disintegrating into thousands of golden cinders that rained down on the coliseum like falling stars.
Jacob stepped forward, fire twisted around his fingers, laced with fragments of every flame he had devoured.
Vortigash tilted his head, a small smirk on his lips. His aura was deeper, darker. A hint of Divine Flame flashed around him like a burning constellation. His hooves pressed molten symbols into the floor with every step.
"Not bad, you were able to reach this point..." Vortigash snickered, "But this is the end for you!"
Jacob’s eyes flickered with killing intent as he impassively said, "You are not from the Middle Plains, are you?"
A hint of surprise flashed past Vortigash’s eyes before he grinned darkly as he replied, "Are you finally afraid?" His words were sharp, but he neither denied nor acknowledged Jacob’s conjecture.
Jacob remained composed as he looked at the towering Vortigash, who was ten meters tall, while Jacob was only two meters tall, dwarfed in front of the giant.
But at this moment, Jacob’s body suddenly began to expand; his two-meter frame increased before he stood as tall as Vortigash, and this sudden ability amused Vortigash.
"So, you’re a giant?" Vortigash seemed to be very knowledgeable about giants and their unique innate traits, "Well, it doesn’t matter, giant or gnat, you are not qualified to face me!"
Jacob’s skeletal face was eerie before he said, "I’ve decided to make you my new specimen..."
His eyes flickered with a mystical energy as he activated something he had been holding back all this time just for Vortigash, "Slumber Hex!"